Nearly every silk crop as raised by the individual growers contains
three or four grades of cocoons, and to produce good and uniform silk,
these must be separated and each sort reeled by itself, producing
several grades of silk.
Without going into detail, it is enough to say that this is not
practical for those who attempt to reel their own cocoons, and that for
this reason, and many others, hand reels and single basins have been
nearly abandoned even in Italy; the women finding so much difficulty
that they prefer to sell their cocoons and work in large establishments
where the work is done to more advantage.
It is evident, therefore, that, from the estimates made, there should be
a considerable deduction for poor workmanship, and another for use of
capital, organization, selling expenses, superintendence, insurance,
repairs, deterioration, etc. In fact, I do not see in what way the
reeling of silk in the United States, by the ordinary method, could be
made to bear a much higher charge for labor than that borne by European
filatures, which barely pay with labor at one franc per diem of thirteen
hours.
To be able, then, to reel silk by the ordinary reels, it would first be
necessary to find a sufficiency of highly skilled operatives willing
to labor in a factory thirteen hours per day for twenty cents each.
Pages:
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159
160
161
162
163
164
165
166
167
168
169
170
171
172
173
174
175
176