Omaha daily bee., 1895-11-26

that the product is superior to any that hs,
been produced with other material.
The speaker is an enthusiastic believer ir
the future OF ramie as factor in the textile
Industry. He declared that in two hours
| after the stalk was cut the product could be
ready for shipment to the manufacturer. The
great difficulty that has been met with In its
use is In "decottication." or separating the
fiber from the wood This difficulty is caused
| by the acidty Of the gummy matter which
makes 1t almost impossible to prepare the
fiber without injurng it. Several government:
have offered large sums for the Invention
| Of some machine that viii do away with this
| trouble and several inventions have been
| tried with Indifferent success. But the
! speaker asserted that a new machine was
| tried In st. Louis last Saturday which prom
sed to do the work perfectly, and he de-
! clared that II this promise should hold good
| the time would soon come when the intro
| ductlon Of ramie would work revolution in
| the textile industry Even now two factories
| are about to locate in St. Louis to prepare
| the product for the manufacturer. II their
! methods are successful II will mean a new
| industry, the proportions of which can
| scarcely be estimated. Ramie is now raised
! in Florida. Georgia. California, Texas and
other southern states, about 200 acres In all
| being under cultivation In the United States
| a company is about to plant 10000 acres in
Mexico and grant of half a million acres in
| Honduras, Costa Rica and other Central
| American states has been obtained for the
same purpose. There are now three factories
In the United States in which the fbSr is
used in place of cotton, and there are six
more in which IL is used in conjunction with
wool and fax. The mills are ready to use
ramle as soon as they can be assured that
there will be an adequate supply. and the
speaker holds that the time is coming when
IL will be almost universally used. He cited
figures to show that its culture would prove
a profitable venture for the farmers OF the
south, who were growing poor on account
OF the low prices that were paid for cotton.
and closed by introducing a resolution in
which the congress was to go on record as
urging farmers TO undertake the cultivation
of the new textile. The resolution was re-
ferred.
In illustration of his remarks Prof Water
mouse exhibited samples of the fiber of the
ramie in various stages Of manufacture, as
also tablecoth woven out Of the completed
product. The cloth was very similar to good
linen and exceptionally strong
WANTS MORE AMERICAN SHIPS.
Iha second address of the session was on
American Shipping" the speaker being
Hugh Craig OF San Francisco. Mr.. Craig re-
ferred to the vast amount of seacoast by
which this country is surrounded and on the
relative insignificance of the American ship
ping interests. In 1878 congress passed a
law by which ships with foreign bottoms
were compelled to pay six times much ton
mage as ships of American bottoms, and the
effect of this was to largely develop the
shipping interests Of this country Although
In the beginning foreigners had done n per
cent OF the shipping of this country, after
this law had been in operation for decade
American ships were doing 92 per cent of the
same business. In 1928 tbs tonnage law was
partially abrogated and the per cent done by
Americans fell TO 66. Things kept going
from bad to worse until the foreigner was now
doing 81 per cent Of the shipping of this
country
He carries s5 per cent of our wheat to
Liverpool Why should this be when we
have all the materials out Of which to de-
velop shipping business of our own?"
One essential was that America should have
American sailors, and the speaker related
some of his personal experiences to show to
what extent the foreign element predominated
among the sailors who must be relied on to
man American ships. To rectify this diff
Guilty 1t was necessary that the American
boys should have some inducement TO go to
sea. On the coast all were interested in the
subject, and the speaker asked his hearers
who lived in the interior of the continent to
join with them in presenting the resolutions
which he advocated to congress II the
government had given half the amount to
Its shipping interests that 1t had given TO
the transcontnental railroads the American
nag would now be flying In all parts of the
world - '-
The remainder of the afternoon was de-
voted to the introduction of resolutions |
Which were read and then referred to the
committee on resolutions There were reso-
'utiohs OF all sorts, and many Of them re-