Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1898-01-17
THE COTTON SITUATION.

The slump in the price Of print
cloths which is reported from Fall
River but verifies the predictions that
were made long before the cut in wa
ges was made, that it's effect would be
to depress the market rather than to
accomplish the results hoped for by
the manufacturers. It required no
highly developed prophetic instinct
to foresee this result, as fall in the
value of these goods has in every in
stance followed the announcement OF
a cut in wages. Two and a quarter
cents for 81 squares was low figure
for them, and it's quotation preclp1-
tated the panic which our cotton man
ufacturers have allowed to develop as
it has, leading to the cutdown which
is, unfortunately, becoming general
in all lines of cotton manufacture
hereabouts. Two and three sixteenths
is still lower, and, worse than all, the
goods are not moving even at this hg-
ure.
Tt must be evident now that some
other means must be tried to bring
New England cotton manufacture up
out of this slough of despond, or at
least that portion of it which relates
to the coarser materials. The latest
advices from Bradford show that our
largest imports from that centre just
now are cotton Innings and that i'm
mense quantities of these goods are
being received here for the fall trade.
What have our mills been doing not
to have been ready to supply such a
demans as that? It doesn't seem like
the old spirit of enterprise which
struggled over, piece by piece, the
constituent parts Of our first cotton
machinery in opposition to the inter-
dict of Parliament, that we might OBJ
tain our own produce Independently
of the mother country-for this later
generation to go into Mysteries and
cry aloud that the industry is un-
done because hitherto agricultural
part of our country sets up in business
for itself, to produce goods which ap-
proximate somewhat the grade which
we have been turning out, but which,
as matter of fact, ought to have
given place more generally to finer
grades years ago.
Take this matter of Innings staple
goods constantly in demand, but re-
curing a high class of labor; in fact,
just the kind that are desirable in
community and capable of earning
fair wages for fair days work-the
ideal of Massachusetts workers, in
word. England pays labor we'll; her
humane labor laws are stricter and
more rigidly enforced than ours; her
hours of labor are as short. On the
whole, as matter of fact, aside from
some advantages of previous training
and natural aptitude which have had
to be developed there, just as we
hope to develop them here; Old Eng
land has no advantage over a score of
New England mills that might be
named. It is too late now to talk of
changing Massachusetts laws which,
while they may be a little in advance
of the country in general in enlight-
ment, were not considered at the time
of their passage as beyond the Massa-
chusetts standard. Better to bring
the mills product up to the standard
Of the laws and let other sections en-
JOY the brief advantage that they en-
JOY in immunity from the humane
legislation of which this State is justly
proud and which counts for more
than the extra dividends which the
community would receive in the event
of their northumberland
Old People.
Old people who require medicine to regu-