The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1878-09-21
LETTER FROM PARIS.
Correspondence Of Tie Democratic Adgoea

The Canadian trophy, towering up a
hundred feet under the northwestern
dome, IS an immense structure, composed
of the timber of the country, and is sur
rounded by specimens of work done in it.
and by grand collection of ornamental
woods; and | may state, once for all, that
nearly all of the English Colonies have
sent specimens of their timber and orua-
mental woods, which have been prepared
and set up with much care. And the same
remark win apply to many of the geologi
cal and natural history collections, espe-
cially of Caneda, which has separate list
of the former class. All the colonies ex-
hibit stuffed birds and animals; and. gen
orally, they are well set up in the usual
manner. But in the Canadian Depart
ment n novel and remarkable plan has been
adopted,-the earcasses of deer and other
animals and birds are suspended by the
feet as in a market or shop, and present
admirable tableaux of "dead game, while
the tsh lie on something resembling herb
age, and look as natural as if they had come
out OF the sea, or river, an hour or two
since only. The trophy contains examples
OF nearly every class in the collection, and
visitors wind up and down its staircase
continually, neither deferred by the black
bear that stands sentinel at one door, nor
BY the white one which performs the same
duty at the other.
People who take in hand an inspection
of the Paris Exhibition in the expectation
that it will furnish them with a faithful
reflex of the present aspect of the manu-
facture of iron aud steel are not only likely
to be largely disappointed, but are certain,
if influenced in their judgment only by
what they see in the Champ de Mars, TO
be led to altogether incorrect conclusions
England, the leading country in all that
relates to the metalurgy of iron, is very
inadequately represented; America, the
next in Importance, comes so far short of
putting forth its real strength that it had
much better have left itself altogether out
of the reckoning; Germany, the third
greatest representative of iron and steel,
is in the same position as America; and
Belgium has been content to leave itself
very largely in the hands of one firm
which, however, has worthily discharged
the trust. On the other hand, it will be
found that such countries as Russia, Aus
tria, and Sweden, with natural resources
and degrees of development that only en-
title them to place in the third rank of
the European family, have done more in
the way of asserting their claims to recog-
milton as industrial powers than might have
been expected from them, even if they had
been much more literally endowed by
nature, and geographically within easier
reach of the Champ de Mars. But after
these considerations have been duly dis
counted, the collective exhibits of iron aud
steel present educational facilities and
scientific memorabilia quite as notable,
and probably, on the whole, much more
complete, than any antecedent Exhibition.
England and America have had numerous
opportunities, of which they have taken
full advantage, of showing to the world
their capabilities and resources in this
sphere of industrial effort, and heretofore
the race has been so far to the swift, that
the right of England to pre-eminence has
hardly been challenged LISA fact much
too notorious to be gainsaid that the pride
of place enjoyed by Great Britain has
made her disregard the threats of foreign
competition, and it is perhaps, due more
to their insular prejudice and contempt
of danger, than to aught else, that Eng
lish firms have come so far short of their
best efforts in the present Exhibition
But the extent and character of foreign
competition have been brought very near
and made uncomfortably apparent to the
English industrials, who have never until
now ceased to believe in their manifest
destiny as "the workshop of the world,
and must, unless they are as far frnm wis
dom as an ostrich, persuade them that their
energies must more than ever be taxed to
breast the rising tide of foreign competition.
\ more complete or n more elaborate
series of iron and steel was probably never
brought together than that contributed by
France to her own Exposition of 1878.
This may, indeed, be regarded as the very
finest opportunity France has enjoyed of
showing TO the rest of the world her reia-
tive position in the race of industrial pre-
ferment. Neither in her own exhibitions
of 1855 and 1867 nor in the English Ex-
hibitions of 1851 and 1862 did she come
largely to the front in matters metallurgi-
cal, and the enormous drain made upon
her resources by the war left her in the
background at the Exhibitions of Vienna
and Philadelphia. But to-day she proves
to the rest of the world that, in spite of
the general Generalization and disturbance
of industry, caused by the misfortunes that
eliminated in Sedan, aud notwithstanding
the consequent loss of eleven of her prin-
cipal ironworks in Alsace and Lorraine,
representing the transference to the Zoll-
verein of three-fourths of the iron pro-
duction Of the old French department of
the Moselle, she has in this, as in all other
indications of material progress, developed
amazing recuperative energy, and become
formidable rival of nations with longer
industrial pedigrees and more obvious ma
tural endowments.
In the printing department. tie new
composing machine works wonders. The
apparatus is not unlike piano aud is com
posed of a series of vertical tubes, placed
side by side; each tube is filled with one
kind of letter. These tubes all converge
at the lower end, into one pipe, which
abuts upon horizontal trench. The CON-
positor has before him a keyboard, upon
the notes of which the letters of the alpha
bet are marked When he strikes one of
these notes the corresponding tube opens,
and drops the letter indicated into the
trench, where a special mechanism advan-
ces it to the place it is intended to occupy.
The types then pass into the justiier,
kind of movable metallic frame, of size
suitable to the line which is to be printed.
Each line, when composed, is lowered, to
give place to the succeeding one. The
superior rapidity of this method is evident
BY the usual mode skilful compositor
can turn off 1900 letters in an hour; BY
this machine it is possible to make 23O,-
400 notes in the same time, but, allowing,
for the fatigue to the fingers it is no ex-
to put the average at $4,000
notes an hour. There is. of course, the
of reading the manuscript, which