imaginary competition was as silly as it was unjust. The demand of the wool-growers that the prohibitive duties on all kinds of wool substitutes be restored, was imperative. By raising the cry of “shoddy” they could wrest a duty from Congress on any material, no matter how valuable to the manufacturer. Perhaps no word has been more unjustly degraded in the history of industry in this country. The world has never produced enough raw wool to meet the demand for woollens. It has always been necessary and probably always will be necessary, to use wool waste and wool rags. Ingenious machines have been devised for preparing all this material for the manufacturer. It is a legitimate part of the business, and one that helps to provide warm, cheap clothing for the poor. “It would be as unreasonable,” says one authority, “to despise paper makers because they use up linen rags, or to despise dyers who use colors made from coal tar, as to despise manufacturers who use up waste woollen rags as shoddy. It is said that 125,000,000 pounds of shoddy, mungo, etc., are manufactured into wool every year in England alone. If this immense quantity were wasted, it is difficult to estimate the increase which would take place in the price of wool and the consequent dearness of cloth; but the result would be that countless persons would be unable to afford proper clothing.” The wool-growers cut off all importations of shoddy in the new schedule. It would displace American wool. As we shall see, it drove the manufacturers, not to use more wool, but to find a substitute for wool.