Rensselaer Union, Volume 2, Number 38, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 16 June 1870 — How Broadcloth is Made. [ARTICLE]

How Broadcloth is Made.

MonqAN’#4fiEi<ii*A Trade the following comprehensive summhjryof the various processes by which SvboNfc made into broadcloth: J . “The better to manifest whatJpAplag hr not, let us see what doth is.. stage, from sheep’s bach to gesKHtanturs back, we will trace its history, being shorn, goes to the stapler's; afed ny him is sorted. It is neither long nor short, and, for the cloth munulacture, if Wool be not moderately short, it must be shortened artificially. It is next well oiled and spun into thread or yarn, then woven into a tissue that will ‘be cloth by-and-by, though a long way distant from cloth when it leaves.thc weaver. The tissue, if examified at thiA st|gp bf manufacture, would display Its threads just like madam’s stuff gown does. A coat of this material would be thread-bare all over, despite its newness, Before this material can become commercial cloth, five chief things will have to be done to it. Its texture must be closed; it must be shrunk—that is to say, it must be cleansed ; a nap must be put upon it; superfluous nap must be shorn off; finally, it must be hotpressed. First, as to closing or shrinking. If we bear in mind what has already been • stated about the quality of felting possessed by wool, due to the presence of certain saw-like teeth, the reason of shrink Age will be understood. To accomplish this is the fuller’s task, and he goes to work as follows:. He takes the material to be shrunk, wets it, soaps it, and submits it to the full-mill for a considerable time—seven or eight hours—under which operation the shrinkage is effected. The fulling machine is an engine so contrived that certain heavy piles or hammers are brought to bear upon the texture, already soaped, Wotted, and laid in a trough. The hammers are so fixed in the machine that not only do they fall upon the texture with heavy thuds, but at the same time turn it about, each stroke being delivered on a fresh portion. Now, bearing in mind the saw-like teeth, and the quality of fitting, what happens will easily be understood. The Wool libers are well soaped, as we already know, and but for their serrations all looking one way, they would slide upon each other iu various aDd Irregular directions. Practically, however, they can only slide one way—namely, with the roots foremost. The result is that the saw like teeth catch among each other, at every catch making the woohnbers shorter, whereby the entire texture is shrunk, and, of course, proportionately closed up and thickened. This result being accomplished, the workman clears away the soap by means Of fuller’s earth and water, the fabric remaining still in the trough,? and _%till jwrongbt upon by the falling 'habraiera hr pile! Being taken from the fuller’s mill, the shrunken material has next to be dried. This is done by hanging it pa tenter hooks stuck into the margins of the texture at convenient distances. Obviously, this is an operation that would admit of considerable deceit in dishonest hands. The wet fabric might be injuriously stretched made broader and longer—ta the prejudice of material. Formerly tin exaictamount ol stretching to be deed was regulated by act of parliament, so. important did the matter seem. Well, our mifteHal,’ woven, fulled, and dried, is hot cloth yet, though a considerable way advanced on its road to cloth. It has no nap, so the next process will be in imparting a nap to It. Let us suppose, now, by way of introducing tho nap-imparting process, that a piece of our material having been laid flat on a board, a cat gets ou it and scratches It. Pass would geta sort of -nap on our material, though she wou’d deal with it , somewhat roughly. If the ■ scratching effect of cats’ claws were such as the cloth-worker required,he might imitate the operation by some sort of wire-tooth machinery. Altogether too violent it would be; for, although nap is really scratched up put of the threads, this is effected by little hooks incomparably finer than the claws of any cat—finer than any hooks man’s ingenuity has enabled him to devise, the agent used by clothiers of to-day, as by the Romans, being the hook-like growths of the Dipsaeus fidlonum, or fuller’s teasel. This plant, in grbwth/ something like -« thistle, though, botaoi- < cally, it differs from a thistle. It bfears round heads, each about the size of a small apple, .and studded all over with fine booked protuberances. Many of these teasel-heads, being packed together and bound up tight on a flat Surface', make a sort of comb, or currycomb, and this was the invariable way of picking teasels for use in cloth maosfactured base, They may be also packed on a "cylinder, but however arranged tksir use in getting up nap out of threads will be obvious. Caused to rub against the Incipient; cloth, they scratch out tittle odfls and, epdiiof wool, and produce a hkiry surface. One stage furthef, then, our woven material has advanced on the road to perfect cloth, but it is not cloth yet The nap just scratched up by the teazel-hooks is of all lengths, within certain limits. The manufacturer wants an even length, which he accomplishes by shearing. Next follows hot-pressing, which being done, we regard the doth as made.

Thk Commissioner of Indian Affairs, Ell 8. Parker, has communicated to Congress an enumeration of the Indians within the United States. The enumeration, he states, is the resist Of an actual census in some cases, and of estimates in others. He makes the whole number' 878,677. A makiukd lady in St. Paul has been in a trance for several weeks, and her husband refuses to send for. t» doctor. The wretch lays he intends to have a quiet time as long as possible. »