JOURNAL OF MINING AND MANUFACTURES.

THE WEST POINT FOUNDRY AT COLD SPRING.

"THE WEST POINT FOUNDRY" was originally established by the association of that name, in 1817. Since the expiration of their charter, it has been leased by GOUVERNEUR KEMBLE, Esq., by whom it is now conducted on his own account. The capital originally invested, was $100,000. The establishment consists of 2 moulding-houses, comprehending together an area of 300 feet in length, by 45 feet in breadth, with 3 air furnaces and 3 cupola furnaces, with 12 cranes of various power, from 4 to 15 tons. The boringmill contains 10 beds for boring guns and mortars, and 1 for cylinders, with 15 lathes, 4 planing machines, 1 slitting, and various drilling machines. The blacksmith shop contains 3 trip-hammers, 1 for large shafts of 8 tons weight; 2 heating furnaces, and about 20 smiths' fires, with 1 crane of 20 tons power, and others of less strength. The principal fitting shop is about 100 by 50 feet, and contains 3 cranes; the second shop, 30 by 50 feet, with 1 crane. The boiler shop is 100 by 40 feet. There is besides, a brass foundry, pattern shop, and various works connected with the business, and a blast furnace 42 feet high. The wages and materials vary according to the demand-the wages, from $140,000 to $180,000 per annum; the materials, from $250,000 to $350,000 per annum; the finished work, from $450,000 to $650,000 per annum; the number of hands employed, from 300 to 500, the present number being about 400, with an average wages of about $1 50 per diem.

THE UNION WHITE LEAD COMPANY.

The works of this company are located in the city of Brooklyn, on Long Island, and cover about eighteen lots of ground, embracing both corners of Bridge and Front, and Bridge and Water-streets. This manufactory consumes about 3,000,000 pounds of pig lead, and 45,000 gallons of linseed oil per annum. The cost of these materials fluctuates with the market, which varies considerably; but taking as an average 34 cents per pound for lead, and 70 cents per gallon for oil, the annual cost would be $136,500. The company employ about 70 men as laborers, coopers, and engineers, their wages amounting to about $25,000 per annum. The men employed in the factory work ten hours per day. The lead manufactured by this company is of an excellent quality. The office and place of business of the corporation, is at 175 Front-street, New York.

CORNWALL AND SWANSEA MINES.

The "West Britain and Cornwall Advertiser," for January 15, 1847, furnishes a list of the mines whose produce has been sold at the Copper Ore Ticketings in Cornwall and Swansea, in ore, for the year ending December 30th, 1846. From this table it appears that there were sold, at Cornwall, 150,413 tons, amounting to £796,182. This return shows a falling off in the staple product of the country, in the past year, of not less than 12,126 tons of copper ore, and a decrease in the amount of sales of £123,751 19s. 6d. The produce of mines, sold at the Ticketings at Swansea, for the year ending December 31, 1846, was 58,456 tons ore, for £668,267 1s. This account exhibits a decrease in the quantity of ore sold at Swansea, in 1846, as compared with 1845, of 8,748 tons of ore, and, in the amount of money, of £109,594 18s. 6d., which, added to the deficiency in Cornwall, makes a total of 20,924 tons of ore, and, in money, £233,346 16s.

STATISTICS OF LOWELL MANUFACTURES, COMPILED FROM THE MOST AUTHENTIC SOURCES.-JANUARY, 1847.

1,200,000...600,000....600,000....750,000....600,000....600,000..1,500,000....140,000..1,200,000..1,200,000....600,000....500,000..11,490,000.

...41,600.....25,956.....11,776..7,142 cot'n....13,000.....13,936.....12,960.....44,032..

244 cotton. 45 brdcloth

...7,566..

.479......1,260..

..548.

Females employed..

..1,157.

Steam..Steam, H.A

Steam.. Hot air fur. Fur.&st'm,!,.

Steam..., Steam,. ..Steam,.

Steam. A. Steam. .. Steam.. Steam

The kinds of goods made were as follows:-By the Merrimack Manufacturing Company, prints and sheetings, No. 22 to 40; Hamilton Manufacturing Company, prints, flannels, and sheetings, 14 to 40; Appleton Company, sheetings and shirtings, No. 14; Lowell Manufacturing Company, carpets, rugs, and cotton cloth; Middlesex Manufacturing Company, broadcloth and cassimere; Sussex Manufacturing Company, drillings, 14; Tremont Mills, sheetings and shirtings, No. 14; Lawrence Manufacturing Company, printing cloths, sheetings, and shirtings, 14 to 30; Lowell Bleachery, 1,700,000 lbs. bleached per annum ; Boott Cotton Mills, drillings, No. 14, shirtings, No. 40, printing cloth, No. 40; Massachusetts Cotton Mills, sheetings, 13, shirtings, 14, drillings, 14; Prescott Manufacturing Company, sheetings and shirtings, 12 and 14; Lowell Machine Shop, 3,000 tons wrought and cast iron per annum.

Average wages of females, clear of board, per week, $2; average wages of males, clear of board, per day, 80 cents. Medium produce of a loom, No. 14 yarn, 45 yards per day;

No. 30, 33 yards per day; average per spindle, 1 yards per day.

The Middlesex Company make use annually of 6,000,000 teasels; 1,600,000 lbs. fine wool; 80,000 lbs. glue; $60,000 worth of dye-stuffs, and $17,000 worth of soap.

The Lowell Machine Shop, included among the above mills, can furnish machinery complete for a mill of 6,000 spindles, in three months, and a mill can be built in the same time. The several manufacturing companies have established a hospital for the convenience and comfort of persons employed by them respectively, when sick, which is under the superintendence of one of the best of surgeons and physicians.

The institution for savings for the year ending April 29, 1846, had received from 4,679 depositors, $750,645 77, being an increase from the former years of 491 depositors, and the amount of $76,020 95. The whole number of new accounts opened was 1,692, depositing with others, $330,471 56; and 1,181 accounts were closed, withdrawing, with other partial payments, $254,450 61. The operatives in the mills are the principal depositors.

There is one public high-school in the city, where all branches of education are taught, preparatory to a collegiate course. Also, eight grammar-schools and thirty-six primary schools, all of which will compare to advantage with any schools in the country. Average daily attendance, about 3,500.

There are two banks, the Lowell, capital $200,000, and the Railroad, capital $600,000. There is a Mutual Insurance Company in the city, which has been highly successful in its operations.

There is a valuable library of 5,000 volumes belonging to the city, to which any one can have access by paying fifty cents per annum.

The Mechanic Association have an extensive reading room, and a valuable library of 3,300 volumes. Nearly all the religious societies have valuable libraries of religious and miscellaneous books.

An important undertaking, eventually to redound to the interest and wealth of Lowell, is the building of the new canal. It is destined to give to most of the mills on the lower level a more constant supply of water, and consequently benefit those on the upper level. It is to be of an average width of 100 feet, and a depth of 15 feet. It will require in its construction, a rock excavation of 150,000 yards, an earth excavation of 110,000 yards, and a mass of masonry of 50,000 yards; the whole estimated at an expense of $500,000 In the course of a few months, two new cotton mills will be in operation; the one built by the Merrimack Company to contain 23,424 spindles, and 640 looms; the other, built by the Hamilton Company, will commence with 10,368 spindles, and 260 looms, but is of sufficient capacity to contain nearly 20,000 spindles and 400 looms. The driving power of the latter will be a steam-engine of 160 horse-power, which is being put in.

Other manufactures are produced in the city than those specified above, of a value of $800,000, employing a capital of $310,750, and about 1,000 hands.

MINERAL WEALTH OF SOUTH AUSTRALIA.

The richness of the South Australian Mines is described, by the Colonial Gazette, as altogether surprising. The geological description, furnished by a gentleman who traversed the country, and in whose account the utmost confidence may be placed, is most wonderful. The extent of the mineral lands, the richness of the ores, and the regularity of the lodes are, we believe, unexampled. In Mr. Dutton's highly interesting publication, entitled "South Australia and its Mines," various analyses of the copper ore from the Kapunda Mine (of which Mr. Dutton is a joint proprietor) are given. These were made by Mr. Penrose, the Government assayer at Swansea, and are as follows:

"The average produce gave a result of 29 per cent of copper for 39 specimens, good, bad, and indifferent, taken from every part of the property, the following being the different descriptions found:-Grey sulphuret with green carbonate; produce, 53 per cent. Black sulphuret with green carbonate; 23, 24, 33, 44, 50, 59 per cent. Pale green carbonate; 267, 33, 34, 40, 41, 48 per cent. Blue carbonate (hydrocarbonate;) 21 per cent. Grey carbonate with red oxide, 28 per cent. Dark green carbonate, 28 per cent."

The comparative value of the ore from the Kapunda Mine is also given, ascertained by actual sales at Swansea; and this is the result:—

AVERAGE PRODUCE OF THE PRINCIPAL MINES IN THE WORLD.

The average produce of the Kapunda Mine is, therefore, at present the highest of any copper mine in the world.

6883

MANUFACTURES IN MISSOURI.

Extract from the annual message of Governor John C. Edwards, to the Legislature of Missouri, under date November 16, 1846:

"The establishment of manufactories is attended with its difficulties. To carry them on very successfully, large investments and a superior population are required. We are not without capital, but the high rate of interest, and the many supposed profitable investments for money, which have heretofore existed, have prevented the appropriation of funds to the erection of manufacturing establishments. If the rate of interest were lower, capital would be probably invested in manufactories to a considerable extent. The tariff also retards the establishment of manufactories in our State, whether it be a tariff for protection, or a tariff for revenue, for all tariffs are protections to a greater or less extent; but a high tariff tends more to prevent the establishment of manufactories in our State, than a low one, being a protection to the eastern manufacturer. The eastern manufacturer contends that he cannot succeed without protection against his foreign competitor. Our interior position, and our remoteness from the principal ports of entry, gives the manufacturer in this country a protection which no tariff can immediately affect. If, then, the eastern manufacturer was but lightly protected, or not protected at all, he would find it profitable to remove his capital, and to invest it in manufactures in the West, where nature would always protect him against the foreign competitor. No country can manufacture cheaper than our State. We have all the necessary ingredients at the lowest prices. We have the real estate, the waterpower, the ore to make the iron to make the machinery, the manual labor, the provisions to support the hands, the raw material, the flax, hemp, and wool of our own production, and the cotton in exchange for our wheat, corn, and tobacco, hogs, horses, cattle, and mules and these ingredients we have, taken together, cheaper than any other country on earth. Even our manual labor is at the lowest price. But, as before observed, to manufacture very successfully, a superior population is required. This we can soon have by fostering the common school, and developing the genius and mechanical ingenuity of the youth of our country."

COMMERCIAL STATISTICS.

COMMERCE OF THE PORT OF PHILADELPHIA.

WE publish below, a statement of the foreign commerce of Philadelphia, prepared by order of the collector of that port, which shows an increase in 1846, over 1845. Col. Childs, the editor of the "Commercial List," says the commerce of Philadelphia “is destined to increase, in spite of the policy of the general government, which leaves our noble river without a single safe harbor, from the breakwater to the city of Philadelphia."

COMMERCE OF PHILADELPHIA FOR THE YEAR 1845 AND 1846, COMPARED.

Imports.

*Value of Imports in American vessels, for 1846,...... $7,751,948 00 Value of Imports in foreign vessels,

556,667 00

Value of Imports in American vessels, for 1845,....... $6,939,769 00
Value of Imports in foreign vessels,

$8,308,615 00

554,728 00

7,494,497 00

$814,118 00

Excess in favor of 1846,..........

VALUE OF EXPORTS TO FOREIGN PORTS FOR 1843, '44, '45, and '46, compared.

$3,059,171 $3,664,696 $3,916,833 $5,118,054

Excess in favor of 1846,....... 2,058,883 1,453,358 1,201,221

TONNAGE ENTERED from FOREIGN COUNTRIES.-In American vessels, 1846, 87,146 tons; in foreign vessels, 1846, 12,483; total, 99,629 tons. In American vessels, 1845, 73,705 tons; in foreign vessels, 1845, 10,794 tons; total, 84,499 tons. Excess in favor of 1846, 15,130 tons.

NUMBER OF ARRIVALS AND CLEARANCES DURING THE YEARS 1845 AND '46.-Arrivals from foreign ports, 1846, 459; coastwise,† 1846, 6,018; total, 6,477 vessels. eign ports, 1845, 387; coastwise, 1845, 8,029; total, 8,416 vessels. 1845, 1,939. Clearances for foreign ports, 1846, 458; in 1845, 400. 1846, 58 vessels.

Arrivals from forExcess in favor of Excess in favor of

EXPORT OF TEAS FROM CHINA TO THE UNITED STATES.

We give below a statement, derived from the Friend of China, of the export of teas to the United States, in the years ending June 30th, 1845 and 1846, in 50 vessels:

* Part of the fourth quarter estimated.

+ Some of the smaller craft, heretofore entered, omitted this year.