Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1916-02-17

| to use for piano keys. The greatest diff
| hculty at present In the plano manufac-
| turing business is In getting materials.
/ We cant get players We are taking
/ orders for delivery from five months to a
/ year ahead.
Another matter which handicaps us is
| the difficulty In gettius machinery. We
I ordered 2 few DAYS ago for our factory
/ double-surface pl ier ana were told
/ II will be year before we would get
| delivery.
| "Up tin a year ago the percentage of
/ PLAYER pianos sold was % to 20 per cent.
This year they are going By leaps and
! bounds and the percentage Is now from
10 to 80 per cent of all instruments sold.
"A singular thing about this business
is that during the hard times the number
| OF player pianos sold was not affected by
conditions People bought them notwth-
standing the higher cost
WHY DRUGS ARE DEAR
ut is a tickllsh matter to talk about
4 prices these days in our business" said
/ G. A. Steele, purchasing manager OF IL.
/ Is. Mulford Company. manufacturing
I chemists. 42S South 18th street, 1--WE don't
know what prices are going to be from
one day to another
There Is no standard to hx prices,
| everything Is up in the air Take as
an instance antipyrene; II is quoted today
| at S65 a pound, before the war It was
about S23S. Acetanalid before the war
sold at 20 cents n pound, today it is
| SI.4S. Potash bromide was % cents.
now 1t is $3.50 pound,
People generally could hardly think
of reason why Norwegian cod liver oil
should go from $40 barrel before the
war to 500 n barrel today But Ger
| many Is hard pushed for lubricating oil
| and is buying the cod liver oil from Nor
way for that purpose.
Castor oil is practically out of the
market. The castor oil bean grows in
| India. England has placed an embargo
on II. l understand II Is the best lubri-
cant for aeroplanes and England does
not want any castor oil to get into the
possession of her enemies
I'm mercurial preparations prices have
gone away up. Calomel has gone from So
cents TO S3,43 Mercury itself formerly
pounds; now 1t brings from 5000 to sS25
a flask. | don't quite understand the rea-
| son for this as 1t is produced in large
quantities in this country, but Japan is
buying enormous quantities and none can
be had in the West.
Corrosive sublimate, another mercurial
product. has jumped from 60 cents to SO
| pound. Opium products have advanced
from 81 to Sl1 a pound. There should be
large stocks of opium in this country. At
the outbreak of the war Turkey sent large
quantities to Greece and for time that
country flooded the United States with IT,,
but lately very little Is coming in, and that
may account for the increase in prices.
"Glycerine was % cents but yesterday
was quoted at 81 cents. The demands Of
the munition plants take large quantities
of this product AS to the outlook my
impression is times will be worse before
they are better and naturally am an op-
timist. When the present stocks, which
were bought at favorable prices, are de-
peted prices are bound to go much
higher"
AUTOMATIC TYPEWRITER.
An automatic typewriter is TO be placed
on the market that will type letter
without the intervention of human hands
A stencil Is cut similar in appearance to
n pianola roll and this is inserted In the
typewriter, a switch is turned and the
machine electrically writes the letter.