214 Memoir of the Life of Eli Whitney. 
In July 1794, Mr. Whitney was confined by a severe illness, from 
which he recovered slowly; but his business received a still farther 
interruption from a very fatal sickness, (the scarlet fever) which pre- 
vailed in New Haven during this year, and which attacked a number 
of his workmen. 
Under all these discouragements, Mr. Miller was constantly wri- 
ting the most urgent letters from Georgia, to press forward the man- 
ufacture of machines. ‘Do not let a deficiency of money, do not 
let any thing (says Mr. Miller) hinder the speedy construction of the 
Gins. The people of the country are almost running mad for them, 
and much can be said to justify their importunity. When the pres- 
ent crop is harvested, there will be a real property of at least 
fifty thousand, yes of a hundred thousand dollars, lying useless, un- 
less we can enable the holders to bring it to market. Pray remem- 
ber that we must have from fifty to one hundred gins between this 
and another fall,* if there are any workmen in New England, or in 
~ the Middle States, to make them. In two years we will beginto take 
long steps up hill, in the business of patent ginning, fortune favoring.” 
The general resort of the planters to the cultivation of cotton, 
and its consequent production in vast quantities, the value of which 
depended entirely upon the chance of getting it cleaned by the gin, 
created great uneasiness, which first displayed itself in this pressure 
upon Miller & Whitney, and afterwards afforded great encouras® 
ment to the marauders upon the patent right, who were now be- 
coming numerous and audacious. é 
The roller gin, was at first the most formidable competitor; with 
Whitney’s Machine. It extricated the seeds by means of rollers 
crushing them between revolving cylinders, instead of disengag"s 
them by means of teeth. ‘The fragments of seeds which remal” 
in the cotton, rendered its execution much inferior in this respect © 
Whitney’s Gin, and it was also much slower in its operation. Great 
efforts were made, however, to create an impression in favor ° 
superiority in other respects, to which we shall advert by and by: 
But a still more formidable rival appeared early in the yeat 17 
under the name of the Saw Gin. It was Whitney’s gin, 
the teeth were cut in circular rims of iron, instead of bein 
of wires, as was the case in the earlier forms of the patent gin. 
95, 
* This letter is dated Oct. 26, 1794. 
