Statistics bring out the interesting fact that over one-quarter of the paper output is roll and sheet news paper. If an average value of 2¼ cents per pound at the mills be allowed for this, it is evident that the users of news paper pay out some thirty-two million dollars every year for this important product. Notwithstanding the fact that this paper is sold for one-sixth of the current price of twenty-five years ago, it is yet greatly improved in quality. As a staple in this country, paper has come to rank third in importance in the list of man’s wants. The products of mother earth hold first place, including foodstuffs, raiment, etc.; and the second place must be given to iron and steel, the bulwark of our commercial life. Paper follows next, as the keystone of our intellectual life, and promises in the years to come to play even a more important part in the upbuilding of our modern advancement and business. The conditions of civilization are such that intelligent reading is one of the essentials in individual progress. Affording as it does food for the mind, and opening up the way to profitable employment through which the bodily wants are supplied, reading might almost be classed as next in importance to the food that nourishes and gives strength to the body. On account of its large production of the higher grades of writing, book, and ledger papers, Massachusetts leads in the value of the output; if our estimates are correct, the value of the paper of all varieties manufactured in the state was about $25,000,000 for the year 1900, or one-sixth of the entire estimated product. New York follows with an almost equal amount in the value of the product, while Maine, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania will show about $10,000,000 each, the five states thus making, in value, over one-half of the paper manufactured in the country. In considering these figures it must be taken into account that by increasing the width of the webs and the rate of speed at which the paper passes over the machine, the possible output has in many plants been more than quadrupled during the past ten years, which in part explains the doubling of the value of the output since 1890, during which year, according to the government census, the output amounted in value to $74,308,388. ♦Number of mills and their value♦ The number of paper-making establishments is placed at 762, operating 1,070 mills, and the value of the plants is $107,759,974; 52,391 persons find employment in the industry, and are paid wages aggregating $23,575,950, while the value of the material used reaches $78,067,882. ♦Average output per plant♦