us to compete with certain foreigners in our
red dyes. The same materials, used in
precisely the same manner, which produce a
glorious depth of red in Turkey and at
Nismes, and a dazzling carmine at Tunis, here
come out flat and dull in comparison. It
cannot be helped. We cannot "have our
cake and eat it." If we rejoice in our insular
position, which keeps us out of many
mischiefs, we must accept its fogs. We must
be thankful for a stout national character
and a lasting political freedom; though we
must do without carmine and Turkey-red
dyes.

The dyeing process is not done in this
shed, but in another, which needs no
particular description, as it consists simply in
boiling the yarns in various decoctions. We
may mention here, however, the method by
which "tapestry carpets" are woven in
a pattern, as it belongs to the dyeing
department, rather than the weaving. We all
know the streaked, and clouded, and shaded
work that comes out in purses, comforters,
and the like, from under the hands of knitting
young ladies, or crochet-workers. We see
that the silk or the worsted is party-coloured,
and that it forms clouds or shades in the
working. Just so is it with the tapestry
carpets which have been in use for seven
years past. The yarn is party-coloured; and
it is dyed carefully, so that the red of the
weft may return upon the red, to make a rose;
and a green upon a former patch of green, to
make a leaf—and so on. This is done by
encrusting the portions of the yarn with their
respective dyes, and cooking them in this
crust. As might be anticipated, these dyes
cannot be made so permanent as in the case
of a batch of yarn boiled in one dye; conse-
quently the tapestry carpets do not wear well.

Now let us mount, and see the wool at the
top of the mill. What an immense room it
is!— airy, though low. Here are women
employed, and boys, and a tall young man in
a pinafore. He is wise to wear a pinafore;
for the wool is, of course, oily and dusty.
Two or three fleeces are brought; and we ask
again whether they can be fleeces of ordinary
sheep—they are so very large. Yes; they
are from Westmoreland sheep. The greater
part of the wool used here is of home growth.
If it be true that an ingenious man has discovered
a method of waterproofing the fleeces
of sheep without injuring the animal's skin,
and without interfering with its transpiration,
it is a great discovery. We heard of it some
time since, and we hope it is true. The great
object was to obviate the rot in sheep, by
preserving them from damp; but it is an important
object, though secondary, to keep the
wool from the plaster of tar which the
shepherds smear all over it, to save the lungs of
their bleating charge. The native wool is
certainly horribly dirty; and, after fingering
the long staple and the short staple, and the
more silky and the more woolly wool (so to
speak), we are glad to wash our hands. This
black handful is from the Punjaub; and so is
that shiny, curly, white specimen. They
have come down the Indus to Bombay, and
thence to this nook among the hills. The
dwellers in this nook are ready to take a
great deal more of this Punjaub wool, whenever
we can agree with the inhabitants that
they shall change their spears into shepherds'
crooks. The long staple, that is required for
the warp of certain fabrics, comes from
Russia. It used to come over in a very
rough state; but it is growing cleaner, with
time and experience. The wool from Buenos
Ayres is highly valued, and, if there could be
an assured supply, the demand would be an
important one; but that assurance of supply
is exactly what is wanting. Sometimes the
trade has been locked up for eighteen mouths
together; and an inferior article is a less evil
than such uncertainty.

Women and boys are sorting the wool
here, pulling out the long staple and the
short; throwing the finer fibre here, and the
coarser there, ready for the operations below.
The women earn about five shillings a week
here, and the boys about three shillings.

The next destiny of the wool is to be
"teased" by "the devil." This "devil" is a
tremendous affair to be teased by. It has
cylinders set with crooked teeth, among
which the wool is pulled this way and that,
and torn with the most persevering malignity,
until there is nothing left but shreds and
patches. The wool is next "fanned" in a
revolving machine, which sends the dust
down through a grating, to a receptacle
below. The carding, and combing, and the
"scribbling," which brings the wool out in
a gauzy state, ready for spinning, and the
spinning process, are so like the preparation
of flax and cotton, as it may be seen in every
mill, that there is no need to describe them
here. There is, however, a "piecing" process,
ingeniously managed by machinery, which
was new to us, and very interesting, from its
dispensing with the labour of children. As
the proprietor observed to us, the little things
can be at school while this machine is doing
their work. By the revolution of a cylinder,
lengths of wool are turned out horizontally,
each falling into a tin channel; and being
carried on, till there are about a dozen, when
the dozen channels turn completely over, and
spill the lengths upon a cloth beneath, so as
that one end joins upon the other end of a
length below. The join is then pressed, so as
to unite by a cylinder beneath; and an
interminable length is made. It seems to us that
we have seldom seen anything more ingenious
-- more original in its ingenuity—than this
process. It has been in use about three
years.

After the spinning and reeling (women's
work chiefly), comes the washing and drying.
Here again we find machinery doing what
was, until lately, slow and toilsome human: