jyfjE 10 
THE RURAL MEW-YORKER. 
example, about half of the farms in a certain 
township in Summit County, Ohio, were sold 
under mortgage a few years ago, and society 
and the church were convulsed and almost dis¬ 
rupted, as follows: A fine, ministerial-looking 
gentleman came to town and lectured on tem¬ 
perance. He was a good talker, and won the 
hearts of the good, religious, temperance peo¬ 
ple in that rich and moral farming township. 
He stayed in the region some time, no one 
seemed to know, or at least sa.y, why. In a 
strictly confidential way he approached one 
after another of the solid farmers, making 
each think be was the only one to have a 
chance at the bonanza. Itwa9 this: He was 
indirectly interested in a patent for the man¬ 
ufacture of an im pro zed spring bed or mat- 
trass, far superior to any other. County and 
tate rights were sold for its manufacture. 
A very J'eiv Western States were still unsold. 
If Mr. A. wanted a certain county in Iowa for 
§50, with the refusal of the State at the same 
rate per county, he could have it, and the 
chance to go out and prospect on the ground. 
Counties would sell readily at $200 to $250 
each. The thiug must be kept strictly quiet 
and confidential, or so many would rush in as 
to swamp the thing. 
So farmer A. buys a county or two at $50, 
payment on his return provided he sells. No 
possible chance for a swindle. All perfectly 
plain and clear. He had best not let it be 
known why he goes West, or even that he 
goes at all, if possible. “ The still sow eats 
the corn,” you know. So he goes, readily 
finds a purchaser for his county at $250, comes 
home with $200 profit, mortgages his farm 
and buys the whole State at $50 per county; 
one hundred counties, at $50, cost $5,000. One 
hundred counties to be sold at $250 will bring 
$25,000 ; profit of the transaction $20,000, 
So, after a few weeks, his arrangements are 
all made and he sets forth to sell the rest of 
his counties and finds no buyers! The man 
that bought bis •* trial county” at $250, was a 
“ pal” of the ministerial temperance lecturer 
who sold it to him for $5 >, and didn’t ask his 
pay till ba bad sold ! And it developed slowly 
that nearly half the farmers in this goodly 
town (Tallmodge is its name) had bought 
counties, States, or parts of States, or had 
discounted notes given by others in payment 
of county or State rights. “ The man” had 
taken teams, notes, money, mortgages, any¬ 
thing in payment, and before the final col¬ 
lapse and expose, had turned all into what 
ready cash they would bring, and left the 
region. 
Here the appeal was made to the avarice of 
these farmers. They left their regular busi¬ 
ness of farming, which they understood, 
and went into a doubtful outside speculation 
which they did not understand, in hopes of 
sudden wealth or competence. They found 
the scripture true: “ They that make haste to 
be rich fail iuto a snare.” As a rule, it is best to 
avoid outside speculation, even agencies of an 
agricultural character; to have nothing to 
do with the wonderful, the astonishing, high- 
priced seeds, plants, agricultural or horticul¬ 
tural discoveries, blight-proof pear trees, cur- 
culio-proof plum trees, Russian apple trees 
that bear all years or in all climates (and sell 
at $1 a piecej ; Bohemian oats that will make 
us all rich—aud the seed sells at $10 per bushel 
under an association which you are urged to 
join. 
Then there are agencies offered to you as 
“ the most influential farmer in town,” and on 
which you are sui'e to make enormous profits. 
You are to sign an order for so many wagon 
jacks or patent cultivators—or “Revised New 
Testaments,”, (for this is one of the latest and 
most pious dodges) or “ farm diaries” or what 
not “ to be paid for when sold.” That “ or¬ 
der” turns up in three months or so as a judg¬ 
ment note for $300, which you have to pay. 
" To be paid for when sold” means when you 
are “ sold.” 
|i Swindles of this sort are many and various. 
I have mentioned only a few of the many 
I have actually seen and known of in Ohio. 
They are going on constantly. In a recent 
Cincinnati Enquirer the following caught my 
eye, because I used to teach in the town named 
and knew the farmer mentioned, as one of the 
wealthiest and shrewdest. 
Cuyahoga Palls, Ohio. 
POOR FELLOW! 
M. Gilbert, a prominent farmer, signed a 
contract to become a book agent. The con¬ 
tract proves to be a promissory note for $350, 
which Gilbert has paid the sharpers rather 
than stand suit. Ail he got for his money 
was a $1.50 sample Bible. 
It is a good rule never to sign a paper for a 
stranger. They turn up where, when and as 
you don't expect. It is a good rule not to 
leave a business you do understand for one 
you don't understand. It is a good rule not 
to bs tempted or fooled by the marvelous. As 
a rule, a dollar costs a dollar in this wicked 
world, aud when some smoothed-longued 
gentleman tries to show you a “ short and 
easy way” to get rich, or offers you two 
dollars for one dollar, it is usually best to let 
him enrich some one else. If you .look jat it 
From Nature.—Pig. 180.—(See Page 388.) 
ployed in British factories. Since new 
factories in course of construction in New 
England and the Southern States this year 
will add 8,000,000 spindles at work by New 
Year’s, and authenticated statistics demon¬ 
strate that investments in cotton mills lo¬ 
cated in the South have paid and are paying 
a round 23 per cent, dividend on the aver¬ 
age with good, bad aud indifferent man¬ 
agement, we can see clearly that, with in¬ 
creased area and improved cultivation and 
handling and such exceedingly large profits 
tages over England is shown by the figures 
representing the product of the mills of the 
two countries for the past year, Nearly one- 
third of the cotton crop of 1880-81—the 
largest ever grown—was manufactured at 
home. The production of our mills for 1881 
in exact figures is $223,280,000 while the mills 
of Great Britain yielded $437,265,000. That is, 
our 12,000,000 spindles produced upwards of 
half the sum produced by the 39,000,000 spin 
dies in that country. The number of operatives 
in the American mills last year was 181,000 
CAUSES OK ADULTERATION AND ITS RESULTS. 
Anyone who witnesses the careless manner 
of packing cotton which prevails from the 
Rio Grande in Texas to Virginia, realizes the 
shameless disregard of cleanliness with which 
it is done. The name of the packer is never 
placed on the bale. It should be put on a card 
in the center of every bale, and then when 
adulterations are found they could be traced. 
The whole of the A merican staple is at present 
under such a ban in England that manufac¬ 
turers in that country do not purchase a pound 
of our growing until all the cotton of India 
and all other Eastern cotton-growing coun¬ 
tries is first purchased. The same gentleman 
says that when in good order the American 
cotton is the finest and most easily spun. On 
account of these fraudulent practices English 
spinners will not order direct from the States. 
By purchasing from Liverpool or London 
‘‘middlemen” they have some redress; hence 
if a large card wore placed in each bale, having 
names of grower and packer and the number of 
pounds, a record kept of this would answer as 
a check. Such a practice would soon result 
iu orders coming directly to the original 
owners who would receive better prices than 
they do at present; for all the onerous commis¬ 
sions that go to middlemen would pass into 
the hands of the growers of cottou. It has 
long perplexed Southern cotton brokers and 
commission merchants why English spinners 
it is “ too thin.” If there were really $20,000i 
to be made on spring bed county rights in 
Iowa, the smooth temperance lecturer would 
p o himself and make it, and not give the 
chance away to you. It is an open shame 
upon the intelligence of farmers that “confi¬ 
dence men” can truthfully boast that we 
furnish them their richest pasture ground, 
that we are their readiest dupes. We should 
in manufacturing, our spindles will increase 
in numbers, especially in the South, so rapidly 
that we shall, in the next half decade of time, 
count 40,000,000, 
So unprecedentedly large are the dividends of 
mills and factories of the South that not 
American capital only but English, French 
and German funds are being invested, and 
new fields for investment searched after. 
Giant Knot weed. —(After Robinson’s 
make it a duty for ourselves aud our sons to 
“cut our eye-teeth,” to inform ourselves, to 
read the papers, to meet in farmers’ clubs and 
granges and discuss mattersof mutual interest 
and concern, and give each other the benefit of 
our successes and even of our failures and our 
follies, and keep forever clear of all confidence 
games that appeal either to our dishonesty or 
to our avarice, through our vanity. When¬ 
ever we go into any of these modes of makiug 
money (?) we shall come out like the Dutchman 
from his partnership. Said he “Yhen I vent 
into der pardnersehip init dot Yankee, 1 had 
ter monies and he had der pushness egsperi- 
ance; und vhen I came oud of dot pardner- 
schip he had ter money und I had ter egsper- 
ience. 
-♦ -— 
COTTON. 
PROFITS OF FACTORIES IN THE SOUTH. 
Although cotton is no longer king of the 
produ cts of the soil of our country, it is 
our great certain staple which by export 
insures us the balance against England in 
exchanges. That country works 89,000,000 
spindles to our 12,01)0,000, or we run less 
than SS>8 P&r cent, of the numb r em 
Wild Garden. See Page 393 )—Fio. 179. 
There are 13,500,000 horse power on the rivers 
and other streams of the Southern States, not. 
utilized and available for factories. Still, 
were there no such cheap reserve power, the 
fact is proven ia the records of the Mississippi 
Mills, at Wesson, Southern Mississippi, which 
are run by steam power, under Capt. William 
Oliver’s management, that these have paid the 
enormons profit of 29 per cent, on the invest¬ 
ment. It follows that capital will not hesitate 
to place all the needed millions necessary to 
make up all the cotton grown in our country. 
The governments of England and the United 
States offer three per cent, interest, and the 
banks four to six ou money. A hundred 
thousand dollars at three per cent, will not 
sustain a family in any style in any city ou 
our continent. But, invested in cotton- 
cloth-producing mills in regions where the 
staple is grown, it will yield from $20,000 to 
$29,000, and thus afford an aristocratic 
maintenance and a surplus for other in vest 
ments. This is w hy the half-a-hundred mills 
and factories in process of construction in the 
South and the 200 and odd others planned, 
will be completed this calendar year. 
advantage of home manufacture. 
That this country has superlative advan- 
The number which operated the mills of Great 
Britain was 479,155. This gives as a result 
a production of $1,268 of manufactured ma¬ 
terial for each American operative to $912 
worth for each operative in tb* mills of our 
Mother Country. English sales of cotton 
goods to old Mexico and Central America de¬ 
clined $1,221 000 last year, and the sum of 
$1,312,471 iu Canada. The fact is that 
English manufacturers have not cleared any 
money on operating cotton mills during the 
last two years. While Englishmen are 
shutting down their mills two weeks in this 
month iu order to lessen production, the 
greater numher of the mills of the Southern 
States are running day and night. The whole 
number of spindles in our country average a 
consumption inch of 05 pounds per annum, 
while the spi dies of Great Britain average 
82 pounds only, or less than 50 per cent, of 
the American. These are stubborn realities, 
and as such it is plainly to bo seen that our 
march to superiority iu monopolizi nu the in¬ 
dustries associated with cotton is inevitable. 
COMPLAINTS OF ADULTERATIONS IN COTTON. 
Under the pressure Engli-h manufacturers 
are obliged to endure of paving for a product 
of soils three and-A half thousand miles dis¬ 
tunt from their spindles and looms, they are 
obliged to cry out against both real and 
imaginary abuses. One of these is the al¬ 
leged adulteration of eotton grown and 
baled in the United States. These complaints 
have been made public by Mr, A. D. Shaw, 
the United States Consul General located in 
Manchester, Eugland, who has very recently 
edited a pamplet of 40 pages on the subject. 
It is addressed particularly to all citizens of 
the United States who grow, buy orin any 
manner handle cotton. This little work com¬ 
plains of the practices of adulterating cotton 
with sand, water and other foreign sub¬ 
stances, and regarding defects in the methods 
of preparing and packing American cottons 
for the English market. Ho obtained docu¬ 
mentary reports from the associated cotton 
spinners of Manchester, Ashton under-Lyne, 
Blackburn, Burnley, Oldham, Bolton, Pres¬ 
ton, Stockport, Warriugton and other places 
having master spinners’ headquarters. 
NATURE OF ADULTERATIONS. 
English manufacturers loudly complain that 
different classes of cotton are mixed in the same 
bale; often they say, this is certainly intention¬ 
al, because the same bale will contain different 
colors of cotton. The most prevailing feature 
is that different grades are packed in the same 
bale because of the inability of the packer to 
distinguish the difference. Spinners through¬ 
out Great Britain assert that shovelfuls of 
white sand are found in packages,and that the 
amount in one bale alone was 101 pounds. 
Aga>n they complain of uunatural moisture 
not hesitating to say that either steam or 
water is poured into the press in the process of 
compressing. Four bale3 were selected from 
a New Orleans shipment before Consul Shaw 
who saw them distributed and dried under a 
heat of 120 deg. The result was that these bales 
showed a loss of 10.94; 15.74; 10 and 11 per 
cent, respectively. These were purchased as 
“Good Middling New Orleans.” A Preston 
cotton spinner says that he has worked every 
kind of cotton named in the Liverpool cotton 
circular, from Georgia Sea Island to Bengal, 
and makes it a practice to personally examine 
fully 75 per cent, of all his purchases, and 
that dust aud sand have become a pest almost 
exclusively confined to American cotton. 
This witness says that there is no other remedy 
than to make fraudulent packing a penal 
crime, and for government to have skilled in¬ 
spectors the same as for liquors and other 
articles of commerce. 
