known expert operator can possibly guide the work under it.

It is very improbable that such speeds will ever be exceeded. The limit has
no doubt been reached. Very high speed is generally a delusion, and either
results in indifferent work, or actually retards its progress. Some idea of
the speed of the single thread machines now shown may be gathered from the
fact that, running at 4,500, and making eight stitches to the inch, they
accomplish over fourteen yards of sewing every minute.

Of special machines of interest, and which are too unwieldy to be shown
here, I am enabled to exhibit a few photographs.

One of the most novel of these is the "Twin" machine, designed by the
Singer company for the connecting together of the Jacquard cards used in
lace machines. The operation was formerly performed by hand. It is now done
by machine at less cost. The cards are placed upon a feeding drum, and fed
beneath a pair of needles. The laces forming the connection between the
cards are fed above and beneath, in line with the needles, and the whole is
easily stitched together. An extension of the same device is the multiple
machine, in which four needles and shuttles are used, sewing all the four
seams at one operation. This method of linking the cards is considered
better than similar work done by hand.

Of Wheeler & Wilson's new factory, at Bridgeport, and of the Singer
company's great new factory near Glasgow, I am enabled to exhibit
photographic views.

Before drawing my remarks to a close, I would briefly indicate the nature
of the various machines shown upon the power benching. Of the Singer
system, there are four. A drop-feed oscillating shuttle machine for