The Sun.
London, England, 1865-11-22 00:00:00

STATE OF TRADE.

MANCHESTER, Nov. 21.—We have had another
very quiet market, and to make sales in shipping
yarns lower prices would have to be taken. The
offers making were generally at prices too low for
acceptance. No doubt the heavy receipts of cotton
at Liverpool have had a depressing effect. Home-
trade yarns have been exceedingly quiet, and the
little advance obtained last Friday has been decidedly
lost. Spinners are more anxious to sell than they
were last week, and very little business can be done
at the rates of last Tuesday. In the cloth market
there has been no new feature since Friday. Great
caution has continued to moderate the action of
buyers, who have been anticipating a reduction of
prices as the result of their limited operations. By
making low offers they have attempted to produce
a lower *scale of prices. Stocks of cloth, however,
aro really small, so that only in few instances have
sellers been willing to submit to lower terms. The
result has been a great limitation of business. We
find a pretty general inquiry for cloth, and quite a
general wish to resume operations at a scale of prices
not very seriously lower than the present range, but
such a resumption appears unlikely to be brought
about without some reduction in the price of the raw
material. Manufacturers complain that so unremu-
nerative is the trade in its present condition that any
further reduction would be ruinous, and they lean
more to a consideration of decreasing their production
or discontinuing it altogether than to lowering pre-
sent rates with cotton at present prices. To-day
we have had no quotable change in prices, and
the feeling has been one of general dulness, which,
however, might have been greater but for the
arrival of slightly better cotton accounts from Ame-
rica by the City of Boston steamer. Cotton had ad-
vanced a cent. per lb. when the steamer left, and this
seems to have prevented the amount of depression
people here had prepared themselves for in the
morning. The business has been small, with no
disposition to give way in prices. Messrs. John
Slagg and Co. report of this day's cloth-market:—
" The dulness noticed last Tuesday has continued
to characterise our market during the week. Buyers
have held aloof or only operated on a very moderate
scale, in expectation, doubtless, of easier prices.
The absence of stocks and absorption of re-sale lots,
however, prevent any pressure to sell, and though
the transactions of the day are few we close with
prices but little changed."
LEEDS, 21st.—There has been a rather limited
attendance of buyers in the cloth-halls this morning,
and they made purchasei , rather slowly, chiefly of
t.wprqt: a.nd meltous—:.and some fancy goods for
ladies' wear. There was not much done in the white
cloth-hall, there being but a small demand for hair
lists and other goods chiefly offered in the mart.
Prices are generally firm, having been strengthened
by the high cost of wool. The manufacturers and
country clothiers keep in full work.

ROCHDALE, 20th.—Though the weather keeps
rather open, and winter goods consequently do not
meet with a very active demand, a fair amount of
business has been done in the flannel-market to-
day. There was about an average attendance of
buyers, and they made purchases a little more
freely than of late. Fancy goods are in the most
request,and the manufacturers of such are well em-
ployed. The local wool trade is steady, and prices
have a hardening tendency. Stocks are within a
moderate compass in the hands of both dealers and
manufacturers. The active demand for wool at the
current sales in London and the advance in the
quotations have tended to strengthen their prices
here. There is a moderate sale for the best qualities
of Yorkshire goods usually offered in this market,
but inferior fabrics are in little demand.