No. 149.] 325' 



which were equally deserving of a place. It compelled us to 

 present only a selection. 



Here are the premium and other pieces of broadcloth, which 

 the manufacturers have sent for exhibition, all of a high quality ; 

 allow me to say that I have bespoken a suit of it. Here are also 

 some very fine Muslin de Laines, which will be more prized 

 when it is known that they are the production of our own 

 material and manufacture. Our country, which has been bur- 

 thened with the importation of foreign Shawls, is now teeming 

 with abundance from our own manufactures. The shawls im- 

 ported from France and England, but particularly from France, 

 have been the great wonder on account of the perfection to which 

 they have been brought. They have carried out of our country 

 twelve millions of dollars. I hold in my hands one of the shawls 

 made in the Bay State Mills, in Massachusetts, which employ 

 2,500 men, and which manufacture 2,800 square, or 1 ,400 long 

 shawls per day. Each of these is now sold at half the price 

 formerly paid. The product of these mills this year is one and a 

 half millions, and this domestic production saves that amount in 

 debt for the importation of foreign shawls. Here are other speci- 

 mens from the Watervliet Mills, Skaneateles, and other factories; 

 I can only allude to the single circumstance that we are manu- 

 facturing these articles extensively, and by this means we have 

 stopped the importation.* 



Here is linen thread, made in your own country, which until 

 a recent date we were compelled to import. The American In- 

 stitute, three or four years ago, offered the gold medal for a 

 specimen of linen manufactured in this country ; but no answer 

 was made until last year, when the premium was taken for the 

 first time. 



There is also here, I may mention, a fine specimen of woollen 

 yarn, which has been made by American machinery. I feel in 

 every stage of this experience a heartfelt joy that we now have 

 ceased to look abroad for our supplies. We have the ability at 



» It requires 3500 sheep to be kept a whole year to support the Lawrence, Mass., 

 MiUs with wool for one single day. They produce 1500 shawls per day, and con- 

 sume Cochineal to the value of $60,000 per annum. Three years since there were 

 not 500 inhabitants in Lawrence, and now there ai-e 10,00t). 



