Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 36.djvu/306

292 by the "Financial Chronicle," 14,175,000, one spindle to 4·52 of the probable population, now computed at sixty-four millions.

Our exports have varied, but not enough to affect the average materially. They are a little more in value now than they were in 1860, but not so much in ratio to product. These facts appear to sustain the theory that the increased purchasing power of the population will sustain a small relative increase in spindles per capita.

Now, any one can form his own judgment as to whether or not the spindles are in excess of our present population. In view of the greater variety of uses to which cotton fabrics are now put, in view of the greater purchasing power, in view of the very low prices of cotton fabrics, and in view of the extravagant habits of the people, my own judgment is that the spindles are not in excess of the population; on an even balance we may of course be subject to an overstock of special goods, such as affects some classes, especially export goods at the present time. In the long run I think that we are more likely to require a ratio of one spindle to four than to go back to the ratio of one to five persons. We now gain in population nearly or quite two millions in a year. The average of the next ten years may be two million two hundred thousand each year. On the basis of two millions which is substantially the present rate, if we require one spindle to each five of the population, we must add four hundred thousand new spindles every year to our present number; at one to four and a half, four hundred and forty-four thousand; at one to four, five hundred thousand, besides providing for the increasing wants of the existing population. It would then appear that we may require five million new spindles in addition to our present number during the next ten years, to meet the increased home consumption of cotton fabrics, no consideration being given to any increase in exports. Please do not exaggerate the importance of this forecast, and don't be in a hurry to double your investments.

Five hundred thousand spindles a year will only cost sixty to eighty million dollars, varying according to the number of yarn. Now, all life and progress consist in a conversion of force. We convert the food, the fuel, and the clothing which we consume—

1. To sustaining life. 2. To an increase of capital.

We may, therefore, take any single element of our food as a standard by which to measure the relative increase of our capital into which it may be in part converted. My favorite standard is the egg standard! Agassiz went to the egg to find the unit of life, I go to the egg to find the relative standard of production and of savings. Don't crow very much over your own little egg; it may be only a Bantam. If each adult of the present population