frame they had taken out two of the guides and one rod, and since making this change had fifty per cent. less breakage than with all the guides and rods in. There is a larger amount of yarn between the power which carries it through and the rolls where the yarn is sized. The guides and rods have much to do with breaking the yarn.

Mr. SCOTT, of Waltham, said that, with the old-fashioned dresser, the sizing has been outside, and the size used is thicker; consequently the threads adhere one to the other more readily, and, in separating by the coppers and guides, the yarn is broken. In the Slasher there is nothing to guide the yarn, until it is dried thoroughly.

The PRESIDENT inquired if the Slasher ran without any division of the yarn?

Mr. LOCKWOOD replied: It passes both the drying cylinders, and then there are three or four or more rods that separate all the threads, one from the other; these rods are about seven feet from the loom beam. After passing the rods, the yarn goes from the outer cone or guide, and is carried on to the beam by a guide.

Mr. SCOTT said that he had several Slashers at work, and had increased the quantity of work nearly one-half. The labor of the dresser tender is $1.32 per piece of 45 yards. We change readily on the same Slasher from one kind of work to another. We started the machines with beams from our old warping, and run them off better than we could on our old dressers. As soon as we found the machine was working so successfully, I commenced stopping our old frames, and took the beams designed for those, and put them to the Slasher, and we run them through without any trouble, and much better than we could on the old dressing machine. The girls cannot draw in as many machines; but they are doing nearly as well as upon the old dressing. The more you can get upon the section beam the better. In the Lewiston warper, the beams are dressed in the same number of yarn, very nearly. We get on about 270 lbs. of yarn, and a set of beams taken from the same warper will vary but a few yards in running

out.

In answer to a question as to the cost of the warper, the speaker replied: I think the new warper would cost less than the old. I cannot say it costs less to begin with, because we had the first machines that were built by the Lewiston Company, and had to make some alterations,-but they were very slight. The difference between the Slasher which we have and the Tape Machine is, that in the Slasher, when the yarn passes on to the large cylinder, it becomes nearly dried before it passes to the second cylinder. It is so nearly dry that the fibres of the yarn are not affected by the cylinder. In the old Tape Machine there were several cylinders, the yarn passing from one to the other. For No. 25 to 30 yarn, the 7 ft. cylinder is none too large for the yarn to go on at first. For yarn coarser than that,-Nos. 14 to 25,-I would have large cylinders say 9 or 10 feet.

I think

The only limit in running the machine is the amount of ground surface. We are running 45 yard cuts in 15 seconds. that the yarn takes up more sizing, but do not think it will cost any more for starch than with the old dresser. There is no waste whatever, and with the old machine, there is always more or less

waste.

In reply to a question from the PRESIDENT, as to whether the goods increased in weight with the same number of yarn, the speaker replied:

Our goods have been made a very little heavier, but I think we may be able to dress with the same amount of starch. We are running goods that weighed 4.50, and I had two or three beams dressed with about as much sizing, and, when the cloth came off, it weighed 4.28, and it run equally as well.

I will further say, that if you run four beams on the Slasher instead of eight, we claim that one hand on one machine will warp as many pounds as two hands. It might not be quite equal to that, because it would require more time and attention, running more threads. In having more threads we want larger beams, or else we get on less length.

Mr. SCOTT.-It is better to have eight beams, and to have longer length of yarn, because there is waste every time that the section beams are changed. It would be necessary in some cases to change

the size of the spools, so as to have the length of yarn on the spools agree with the length on the beams.

Mr. LOCKWOOD.-There is no question at all about the importance of having as much length on the beams as possible. When you have very large spools, they will hold enough to fill a beam. If you adopt the system that Mr. SCOTT is inclined to, it may cost a little more than if you used less beams. He has an idea that he can warp about as cheaply, if he spends a little more money on the warper to begin with, and I am not certain that he is not right. We want to get as much length of yarn on the section beams as we can. We can tie on the section beam, but like to save the knots in the cloth, on the weaving. We begin with a full set, and then we avoid all the section-knots in the cloth; but there is no objection to the knots, so far as the dressing machine is concerned.

Mr. PERRY, of Manchester.-I would like to ask Mr. LOCKWOOD whether ladies or gentlemen tend the Slashers?

Mr. LOCKWOOD.-My impression is that we can use girls, in part, but we have not tried them.

Mr. PERRY.-I think Mr. LOCKWOOD will remember that, twenty years ago, there was a Dresser imported from England or Scotland, and put into the Lonsdale Mills, Lonsdale, R. I. The agent was so highly elated with the machine, after it was started up, that he took out all his old dressers; but he finally stopped his mill and put his dressers back, because the man who tended the machines got drunk, and he had nobody to run them.

Mr. LOCKWOOD.-I understand that case perfectly. It cost the Lonsdale Company fifty thousand dollars. They went back to the old dressing machines, and have run them until the present time. About three months ago they gave us an order for five Slashers, and they are now going to throw out the dressers and use the Slashers.

There was a Slasher put into a mill in Rhode Island some time ago, and it worked perfectly well; but they soon after got a new agent who dispensed with the Slasher, and put in a dresser; there

is now so much complaint with the running of the weaving that he is forced to go back to the Slasher again.

Mr. SCOTT.-Any man who has had experience in tending the common dresser can learn to run the new machine in three or four days. We had a young man who worked with the man who came and started up one of our new machines, and the next morning he went to work to run the machine, and has run it satisfactorily ever since.

Mr. WETHRELL said: There is no difference between the Slasher and the Tape Machine; they are the same machines precisely. They are called different names in different sections of the country in England. Whatever may have been the causes of the previous failures of the machine in this country, the facts presented here by these gentlemen, who are eminently capable of coming to correct conclusions in the matter, merit careful attention. I should like Mr. HAINES' statement as to the working of the Pepperell Machine.

Mr. HAINES, of Boston.-The Superintendent of the Pepperell Mills, who is a very competent weaver, was strongly opposed to the Slasher; but I desired him to watch the working of it, for I was disposed to make a change in my dressing department. At length I desired him to send some of our warps-No. 22 in the yarn and 92 in the warp-to Lewiston and have them dressed. He did so, and they run better than any that we dressed upon our ordinary frames. Upon that experience, I observed he changed his opinion gradually, and he ordered a machine which has been running some six weeks or two months upon No. 22 yarn, in various widths; and I believe the testimony of all, overseers and weavers, is uniform and explicit, and very decided, that the weaving is better from the beams dressed upon the Slasher, than from beams dressed upon the ordinary dressing frames.

By some mistake or carelessness of the overseer, a considerable amount of warps was made of No. 22 yarn, from a considerable portion of waste, by which the yarn was so weakened that we could not dress it upon the old frame, from the fact that only fifteen pounds per day could be woven. We laid the beams aside, and after we received the Slasher we put these same section-beams

of weak yarn to the Slasher, and run them through; and the tes timony of the same weavers is, that the yarn put through the Slasher run better than the best yarn woven in the mills, side by side.

Mr. DRAPER, of Hopedale, said that he had seen in the mills managed by Mr. OLIVER HUSSEY, a very simple and cheap process for drying yarn on the present dressing frames. They have increased the amount on their present frames about thirty per cent., and the process has other considerable advantages connected with it. He was not prepared to give an explanation of the process, but thought it worthy of investigation by the members of the Association.

No further remarks being offered upon the topic, Mr. PALFREY, of Lowell, presented a paper upon The Use of Steam for Heating. It was cordially received, and appears in full in the subsequent pages. At its conclusion Mr. BURKE remarked:

I believe the paper presented by Gen. PALFREY is of great value to us, and I think we have been too much accustomed to put up steam-heating apparatus by guess. We have acted more from our own judgment than from any calculations that might be made, supposing it was a matter that could not be well calculated. The paper will undoubtedly be considered, after it has been published and placed in the hands of the members of the Association, and I would like to offer a resolution, that the thanks of the Association be tendered to Messrs. LOCKWOOD and PALFREY, for the valuable papers presented and read before the meeting.

The resolution was passed unanimously.

Mr. HAINES said that some time since he had occasion to make a change in the boilers, at the Pepperell Mills, taking out the old boilers and replacing them with a new set with larger tubes. The foreman in the shop, following his own ideas, made some change in the connecting pipe, and put in new valves. After the change was made we had a complaint of wet warps, although for twelve years previously we never had any difficulty in this respect, and had dressed under a head of fifteen pounds of steam at the boiler.