Greene County herald. (Leakesville, Miss.) 1898-current, 1900-11-23
NEW STYLES OF FEATHERS.
barnyard Fowls Now Furnish Bird Plum.
ages For the MiIliner.

1 ages For the Mfl1iner.
The demand for feathers for millin-
cry purposes has caused an inventor to
experiment in this field, and he has
succeeded so well that many of our
most fashionable bird plumages and
/ feathers are artificlally manufactured.
The trade in feathers amounts to mill.
Ions of dollars annually, and The sup,
ply Of the birds furnishing them il
decreasing so rapidly that it is quite
essential that substitutes should DO
found. How many women who wear
the beautiful ostrich tips and plumes
know whether they are the genuine
article or artificial feathers? The
work of raising ostriches in California
has certainly brought the cost of these
feathers down to a reasonable figure,
| but hardly to the rldiculously low
prices that are sometimes asked for
them in the stores. The artificial os-
trich feathers have their quilts made
of celluloid, and the barbs of silk
waste. Then when dyed and skillfully
curled 1t would take an expert to de-
tect them from the genuine article.
Various other expensive feathers and
plumes are manufactured out of silk
and cotton waste, and inventors are
constantly devlslng new methods by
which they can supply the demands
Of fashion at little cost to the public
and at a great profit to the manufac-
turers. The utilization of poultry
feathers for millinery purposes is a
subject Of Importance. There has
been an unexpected demand for the
feathers of chickens, ducks and geese
this year. Farmers have really found
that their poultry was profitable. Some
of the special breeds of farmyard
ducks and geese have remarkably
beautiful feathers, shimmering with
gold, green and blue, and tinged with
a metallic lustre of unusual beauty.
All of these have a value aside from
the meat and eggs they furnish. But
even the common barnyard poultry is
made to furnish material for the mar
ket. By dyeing the feathers they can
be made to initiate the brightest
plumes that ever graced the back or
topknot of tropical bird. The plumes
are artfully made up by hand, each
individual feather being colored be-
forehand, and then worked into an ex-
quisite design. Some of these plumes
are so gorgeous that they are more in
demand than the genuine plumes of
wild birds.
A remarkable machine Is In use for
plucking the feathers from dead poul-
try, and by it's use the feather industry
has been greatly slmplified and ex-
banded. The dead bird is placed on a
table, and the picker strips 1t Of all
feathers In just half a minute. Then
the plucked feathers are passed rap
idly along to another small room
where current of air sorts the very
fine from the heavy ones. The very
lightest and softest feathers are used
for pillows, but all the others find
some use In the millinery trade. 1t Is
becoming the fashion now to have
cloaks and mantles mazda n"t nf-1ea
wearing apparel have been made in
this way. Such feather cloak is |
more expensive than sable or seal. In |
the National Museum at Washington |
there is such cloak that is said to be |
valued by the authorities at $1,0O0,O0O. |
1t was made of the feathers of an ex- |
tinct bird for one of the old Kings of |
the Hawaiian Islands, and contains
probably several million feathers
New York Times.