The Sun.
London, England, 1860-05-09 00:00:00

STATE OF TRADE.

LEEDS, May B.—The woollen cloth-markets to-
day have been of an ordinary character. There
was not a very large attendance of buyers, and they
purchased but small and select parcels of goods. It
is evident that merchants do not find a very ready
sale for their recently purchased spring stocks, and
hence they are buying. Prices are generally firm,
the cost of wool and the recent advance of £4 per
tun duty imposed upon olive oil by the Neapolitan
Government, coupled with the probability that the
disturbances occurring in India will tend to raise
the price of indigo at home, causing manufacturers
to ask more rather than less for their goods.
MANCHESTER, May B.—Cotton Goods.—There is
not much business in yarns. Buyers for the Medi-
terranean market and for Germans have operated
to a limited extent. Some little business has also
been done for the home trade, but the India people
have not done much, partly owing to spinners, who
are full of orders, asking rather high rates. In
cloths there is no change to notice ; the market is
without animation, but prices are firm. A fair busi-
ness is springing up from day to day in im-,st de-
partments of the trade, which has a tendency to
keep prices firm, and the engagements of manufac-
turers are extensive. The uneasy feeling manifest-
ingitself from time to time among the operatives is
exciting continual apprehension, threats of strikes
being a matter of almost daily occurrence. A firm in
the neighbourhood of Manchester received a docu-
ment from the strippers and grinders (a class of un-
skilled labourers) in their mill, which said, " We de-
mand i
an increase in our wages to 18s. per week."
The firm in question, being bound by contracts for
some time forward, had no option but to give the
advance, which of course was done. The same class
of operatives in the same mill, only seven years ago,
were paid lls. per day.
ROCHDALE, May 7.—The wool market has not
been very active to-day. Prices, however, are
steady, and in the aggregate there has been a little
more done than last week. The farmers are ask-
ing, it is said, a higher price for the new clip, and
there appears little probability of the range of
prices being lower than those now current. The
flannel manufacturers are mostly well employed ;
but, as usual at this period of the year, the market
for products has been rather quiet, and not many
buyers were present. Orders are not freely ac-
cepted at late prices, as the price of wool and of
labour necessitate, manufacturers say, sonic ad-
vance.

THE PRICE OF GOLD.—The quotation of gold at
Paris is about at par, and the short exchange on London is
25.121 per £1 sterling. On comparing these rates with
the English Mint par, £3 17s. 101 d. per ounce for standard
gold, it appears that gold is about 2-10ths per cent. dearer
in Paris than in London. By advice, from Hamburg
the price of gold is 4211- per mark, and the short
exchange on London is 13 3a per £1 sterling. Standard
gold at the English :Mint price is therefore nearly
1-10th per cent, dearer in London than in Hamburg.
The course of exchange at New York on London for
bills at 60 days' sight is about 1091 per cent., which, when
compared with the Mint par between the two countries,
shows that the exchange is against England. But, after
making allowance for charges of transport and difference
of interest, the present rate leaves no profit on the trans-
mission of gold between the two countries.
THE REPAVING OF FLEET-STREET.—The re-
paving of the carriage way of Fleet-street with new .Aber-
deen granite blocks, three inches wide, was completed on
Saturday. The immense traffic had worn the old stone,
which when laid down in 1816 was 9 inches in depth, to
41 inches. About 6,000 yards of granite have been taken
away and new substituted, and the weight of material
removed and replaced amounts to about 7,000 tons. Al-
though upon the previous occasion it necessitated the
closing of this important thoroughfare for eight weeks, the
present work has been accomplished in the short space of
a fortnight. The contract has been carried out by Messrs.
Mowlem, Burt, and Freeman, of Millbank, Westminster,
under the superintendence of Mr. Mortimer, on behalf of
he City Commissioners of Sewers.