The Shoe and Leather Trade of Boston takes its date, as a prominent branch of commerce, about the year 1830, caused principally by the change made in conducting the business. It was formerly the custom for Manufacturers and Dealers in Boots and Shoes to _seek_ a market for their goods, by consignment on their own account, to New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Charleston, Savannah, New Orleans, Havana, and other West India Islands. It was found to be remunerative for a while, but on the increase and competition of trade, it became a losing business. The leading houses failed. Since 1828 and 1829, an entire change in the method of conducting the shoe business has taken place. Manufacturers and Dealers now sell their goods on their own account instead of consigning them to other States. The consequence is that Boston is made not only the head-quarters for nearly all the manufactories of New England; and although the city of Lynn and the towns of Haverhill, Danvers, &c., sell a large portion of their goods at home, a large number of the manufactories have offices in Boston for the sale of their goods. If the domestic trade of Boston had been conducted on the home principle, the expansion of the city would have greatly exceeded its present limits. The great industrial and trading interest is a correct type of New England thrift and industry. No branch of our mechanical pursuits is conducted with so much safety, energy and intelligent perseverance, as is the great Boot and Shoe interest. When convulsions come which rend in pieces other commercial or internal trading interests, the boot, shoe and leather trade, is the last to succumb, and the first to reinstate itself. The great financial crisis of 1857, thoroughly tried the strength of this branch of trade, and nobly did it sustain itself, even extending the helping hand to such as required assistance. Especially applicable is the latter remark to the merchants of Boston. All this demonstrates the soundness of their basis—the back-bone which enables the Shoe and Leather interest to hold itself up under a pressure which easily crushes all departments of trade and commerce built up on a paper foundation. The peculiar characteristics of the boot and shoe trade, its democratic elements, its freedom from all monopoly, gives it a strength and power which corporations can never wield. Every man is his own director, and as all interested are subject to, and dependent upon, their individual shrewdness and enterprise, it is very seldom that success fails to crown their efforts. The day is not far distant when all our industrial interests will be conducted upon a like basis, and corporations cease to exist. CHAPTER III. GUTTA-PERCHA—ITS PROPERTIES, MANUFACTURE, &c.