OUR MANUFACTURES GOING ABROAD. 77 



It is certainly a fact, and by no means a cheering one, that the orders from 

 America for Sheffield goods are much lighter this season than they have ever 

 been. American makers of files, saws, and tools are beginning to make their 

 competition keenly felt. " Harry Disston," of Philadelphia, is again to the fore. 

 He is said to be bent on teaching Sheffield saw makers rather a rough lesson. 

 Not content with taking a good deal of American trade, he is now carrying the 

 fire into the enemy's camp. We are told that his brother-in-law is on his way 

 to England with a magnificent set of saw and tool samples, " resolved to wrest 

 the home trade" from our townsmen. " Harry" employs 1,000 men, all non- 

 unionists, and uses most novel and excellent machinery, by which it is claimed 

 he can make saws AS GOOD as Messrs. Spear & Jackson's, and VERY MUCH 

 CHEAPER. Sheffield saw makers will wait to see these famous samples with 

 some curiosity. There is no doubt, however, that saws have long ceased to be a 

 specialty of the Sheffield trade which defies competition. The Sheffield manu- 

 facturer is being roughly jostled in nearly every market of the world. At the 

 same time, the end of the Sheffield saw trade is not yet at hand, despite that 

 terrible Harry Disston, of Philadelphia. 



This bold invasion of the British home market by American 

 competition is only the image of what has been going on, step by 

 step, in other foreign countries for some years. In the early part 

 of 1871 the London Times editorially expressed the following 

 admissions, which are exceedingly candid, pointed, significant, 

 and impressive : 



At this moment Birmingham is losing its old markets. A few years ago it used 

 to supply the United States largely with edge tools, farm implements, and various 

 smaller wares. It does so no longer, nor is the cause to be sought merely in the- 

 American tariff. It is found that the manufacturers of America actually super, 

 seded us, not only in their own but in foreign markets and in our own colonies, 

 and the Birmingham Chamber has the sagacity to discover, and the courage to 

 declare, that this is owing to the superiority of American goods. 



High as are the wages of an English artisan, those of an American artisan are 

 higher still, and yet the manufacturers of the United States can import iron and 

 steel from this country at a heavy duty, work up the metal by highly-paid labor, 

 and beat us out of the market, after all, with the manufactured articles. How is 

 that to be explained ? 



The Americans succeed in supplanting us by novelty of construction and ex- 

 cellency of make. They do not attempt to undersell us in the mere matter of price, 

 Our goods may still be the cheapest, but they are no longer the best, and in the 

 country where an axe, for instance, is an indispensable instrument, the best article 

 is the cheapest, whate-ver it may cost. Settlers and emigrants soon find this out, 

 and they have found it out to the prejudice of Birmingham trade. 



It thus appears that the greater intelligence ancj skill of Ameri- 

 can workmen, coupled with the greater inventive genius of our 



