Our merchants do not continue poor, and at length become insolvent, because they do not make money. For a time they make more money than their ancestors did; but they have not the prudence nor the perseverance which characterized the latter. They estimate their gains before they are made, and wish their losses out of sight as much as possible. They have an abhorrence of the debtor side of their profit and loss account, and instead of carrying the bad debts from year to year to that page of the ledger, they suffer those debts to make up an aggregate which they call net profits. This is the reason why so many insolvent estates pay so poor a per centage compared with what the creditors anticipated upon the first exhibit of an insolvent inventory. It is bad enough to deceive the public and creditors in this manner, but it is mere fatuity to deceive one's self by such a shallow parade of figures. It is said that figures will not lie, and that is correct; but false premises may be apparently sustained by figures, which in themselves are correct, although the application of them is false. We have but a word of advice to the young merchant or trader, and with this we will close. Undertake no business on your own account with which you have not a previous acquaintance. Keep your stock small. Trust nobody who is unsound or dilatory. Increase the quantity of your stock only as the demand for goods increases. Collect your bills promptly as they become due. Do not trade on temporarily borrowed capital. If you need more capital than you possess, borrow it of friends who will allow you a long time to repay it in; but it is better not to borrow at all. Above all, never rely upon a bank or broker to supply you with any portion of your permanent capital; for such loans will be called in when it is most inconvenient for you to pay them. Moreover, keep out of the hands of note-shavers, for there is sure destruction. Heed these suggestions and attend to your business and we will guarantee success. DEPARTMENT OF MANUFACTURES AND MINING. 1.-WOOL. THE quantity of wool grown in Great Britain is a mere matter of estimates, and these vary from 120,000,000 lbs. to 275,000,000 lbs. The former estimate is on 40,000,000 sheep at an average of 3 lbs. per fleece at the present produce. The import and export of foreign wool has been, during the present century, as follows: Year. IMPORT AND EXPORT OF WOOL INTO AND FROM GREAT BRITAIN. 45,883,983 3,637,789 42,196,194 49,243,093 2,961,282 46,282,811 1844. 1845. 1846. 1847. 1848. 1849. 1850. 65,663,686 1,972,674 63,691,015 57,782,873 63,946,373 64,405,686 59,938,104 STATISTICS OF GROWTH AND IMPORTATION OF WOOL. 359 The export of British wool has increased largely in the last ten years, although it did not much during the first twenty years after export was allowed. Nearly one-half of the long combing wools of England are sent to France, and have there served greatly to promote the quality of the cloths. There is also a large quantity of the Australian wools re-exported to France. If we take this column of net import and compare it with the estimate of British wool the results are as follows: GROWTH, IMPORT, AND CONSUMPTION OF WOOL IN GREAT BRITAIN. 64,305,686 178,222,041 59,938,104 167,935,331 69,346,893 180,829,393 82,753,614 188,834,547 107,698,672 220,926,662 1800.. 78,064,560 1828.. 92,280,550 1,669,389 1848.. 120,000,000 1849.. 120,000,000 11,013,641 108,916,355 1850.. 120,000,000 12,002,773 107,997,227 1851.. 120,000,000 8,517,500 111,482,500 1852.. 120,000,000 13,919,077 106,080,933 1853.. 120,000,000 6,671,410 113,323,590 1854.. 120,000,000 12,901,294 107,098,706 1855.. 120,000,000 16,172,409 103,727,591 1856.. 120,000,000 14,378,774 105,621,228 1857.. 120,000,000 15,142,881 104,857,119 93,262,679 198,117,798 81,654,711 188,758,417 69,888,384 173,615,975 89,531,599 196,152,825 Hence it appears if the British product was the same last year as in 1853, there have been used twenty-four million pounds less foreign wool, and nine million pounds less British wool, or, together, fifteen per cent. less. In France and on the Continent, there is already great activity, which must necessarily be enhanced by the removal of the French duty on wool. Wool imported into the United States under twenty cents, at the place of shipment, was made free in 1857, after July 1. The imports of the three nations are as follows: The imports for 1858, since the removal of the duty, have been large into Boston, and if the South American wools can be successfully cleansed, the supply may be large. The sources whence the United States have derived their wool have been as follows: IMPORT OF WOOL INTO THE UNITED STATES, WITH the aggregATE VALUE. The quantities and values imported annually were as follows: With the removal of duty from wool came the panic, which has checked the demand for wool and lowered the prices. The high prices abroad during the past few years have drawn most of the disposable wools from the American markets, but for the coming year the demand will be more equalized. The above aggregate result presents a continued rise in the price of imported wools up to 1855. This fact indicates, with the high prices sustained here for the domestic wool, notwithstanding the considerable quantities that were kept out of the market on speculation, how vigorous had been the demand from the manufacturers for consumption. The duties on cloths had been complained of as too low to ensure prosperity to the manufacturer, who, nevertheless, had been so active in the wool market as to raise prices steadily. The fears entertained in 1853 that the Australian supplies would be cut off by the gold excitement, were not realized; on the contrary, more wool than ever was received into England from that quarter. It is to be remarked that while the pries of wool has doubled, the duty has doubled also: Making a rise of over eight cents per pound. This evidently operated powerfully against our manufacturers, who have had to contend against foreign goods, of which the material was free. The quantities of wool which Europe can spare above the wants of its own manufacture, are yearly diminishing; consequently the cost of it is rising on their hands; hence any movement which should create a greater demand for that wool would diminish the ability of the foreign manufacturers to compete with those of the United States. Prices in New York have been as follows: CLEASING COTTON SEED-SALT RESOURCES OF VIRGINIA [361 AN intelligent correspondent, residing at Antwerp, writes under date of May 19th, 1858, that a machine for cleansing cotton seed has lately been invented, and is now in operation in that city. From two to three tons of seed can be cleansed per day by a machine of four-horse power, with the assistance of three persons. The cotton surrounding the seed is taken clean off, and can be sold to carpet-manufacturers and paper-makers at from thirty to fifty franes the one hundred kilogrammes. After the oil is pressed out, the cakes remaining can be sold for the same price as other cakes of oleaginous seeds. The cost of the machinery is said not to be expensive. This is an important invention and promises to be of incalculable advantage to cotton-growers. 3. SALT RESOURCES OF VIRGINIA. THE Richmond Enquirer has been for sometime publishing a series of papers upon the "Resources, Improvements, and Commerce of Virginia." Though we are unacquainted with the writer or his antecedents, we have consulted his papers with some interest, as without doubt, the emanations of a very practical mind. Upon the subject of salt, he says: "Common salt for domestic or culinary purposes, is not only an important item in our natural resources, but also one of the great necessities of life, and one for which there is no substitute-we must either buy it or make it. "The consumption of salt throughout the world is prodigious. It is computed that a half bushel per annum to each inhabitant is used wherever it can be conveniently obtained, and proportionately less in all countries where it is less accessible; but Nature has so universally distributed her provisions for the human family that there is scarcely a country on the globe where this article cannot, or could not be obtained through the intelligence of its people; and, we may remark, in the connection, that this rule is alike universally; for all people and all countries, profit, prosper and enjoy the provisions of Nature, according to their standard of intelligence or industry. It is true that some portions of the world are peculiarly favored in the distribution of natural resources and gifts, but it does not follow that the people are naturally rich, or proportionately prosperous; that depends on their exertions, their industry and their knowledge. "The saliferous formations, or salt deposits of Virginia, are on the same grand characteristic scale, which distinguishes her coal, her iron, and her copper formations. In the West, on the great Kanawha, that noble 'river of the woods,' the 'salt wells,' are, perhaps, the most extensive in the world, and the probability is, that Kanawha alone could supply the world with salt for ages, since it is known to exist for over twenty miles through the valley of that river; and this would be no small number of bushels, even if we only allow twenty pounds to each of the one thousand millions who use it more or less. "In this region peculiar facilities exist for manufacturing the article, since it lies in the midst of the great coal region of the State; and so convenient is this fuel deposited and obtained, that it can be mined, in many cases, immediately in the vicinity of the salt works, and, frequently, it can be delivered by the means of schutes, inclined planes, &c., directly from the mines to the furnaces, without the aid of machinery. The gasses which arise from coal, carboniferous, or bituminous formations, as in China and many other places, here escape from numerous salt wells in abundance, and effect a great economy in the salt making operation, though it is evidently not used as judiciously and effectively as a scientific application would warrant us to expect. The depth at which the salt water is reached is various, and generally extends from a few feet to about one thousand, though it is found much deeper and probably exists many thousands of feet below the surface. With the great extent of the Kanawha salt formations, and the facilities for manufacturing it, there can be no limits placed to the production of the article but the demand, as soon as this magnificent region can be fully opened out and developed by means of railroad communication with the East and West, but particularly by the river itself, when improved as designed. The quantity of salt which the West will demand from the Kanawha salt wells, will be prodigious in the course of a few years, when the supply will be regular, with the means of constant transportation and the permanence of a market not liable to the sudden fluctuations which now seriously effect the Kanawha salt manufacturers. "The quantity of salt required to supply the wants of the United States is not less than fifteen million bushels per annum, or about half a bushel to each inhabitant. It has been stated that we require a bushel to cach inhabitant, but that is evidently too much, though it is probable that we use a larger proportion than the average consumption per head in most other countries. In England the consumption of salt per head, is calculated at twenty-five pounds, and in France at twenty pounds. But even supposing that we consume annually a half bushel each, or fifteen million bushels per annum, the business of supplying that demand becomes one of great importance, and, if imported, it must necessarily cause a great drain of the precious metals, or their equivalent. But great as the business may be, there are three States in the Union which can supply the whole of that demand with ease, at moderate prices.___Virginia herself could profitably supply herself and furnish the South and West with five million bushels per annum; the great bulk of which would be produced in the Kanawha region; but there are salt deposits on the east of the mountains and in the southwest, which, though less in extent, are probably equally as valuable, on account of the strength and purity of the salt water and the location of the wells. The most eastern deposit of salt that has been found appears to be located in Pittsylvania county, but the most important is that magnificent deposit of almost pure brine in Smyth county, in southwestern Virginia, where the celebrated Preston salt has been manufactured for the last century. The Preston salines at Saltville produce about three hundred thousand bushels of salt yearly; the character of which, when carefully manufactured, is not excelled by any salt now made in any part of the world; and we have no doubt that an article equal to the refined salt of the Dutch, from which the celebrated "Dutch herrings" receive their peculiar flavor, might be prepared from those wells, with a small amount of additional care and labor. The brine is the strongest known, one-fourth of the bulk being pure salt, twenty bushels of brine produce five bushels of salt. Those salines are as capable of producing one million bushels per annum as the amount now furnished, and, we should judge, with a corresponding degree of profit; and yet the drain on the natural supply would be too limited to be seriously felt for ages to come.— A branch road from the Virginia and Tennessee Railroad is extended from the Glade Spring depot to Saltville, which was built expressly for the produce of the Preston salines and plaster banks, and which are here worked in close prox imity to each other. "Coal has been found within sight of the furnaces, and it is supposed to exist in quantity and quality sufficient for every purpose. With such desirable facilities and natural richness, we cannot imagine another locality where Nature has been more liberal; for, in addition to the immense quantities of the purest gypsum and salt, both iron ores and coal are abundant; and black lead, pure silica, limestone, marble, mill stone, or burr, and other minerals, are plentiful, |