that it could not be sampled, and that the cotton around the core was hard to a degree which made it difficult for the spinner to work. It now seems that the matter of sampling is practically not so difficult as was at first thought. I have seen a Lowry bale go through a cotton mill. The superintendent was enthusiastic, not only as to the clean condition of the cotton, but as to the facility with which it went through the mill.. The hardness of the cotton at the center of each disk disappeared in the second "breaking," and the superintendent said that one great advantage this cylindrically baled cotton had over the old-style square-baled cotton was that the fiber ran in one direction in the former, thus greatly facilitating the spinning. The superintendent also claimed that the spinner got more net cotton by the new cylindrical bale than by the old square bale, there being no loss represented by the absorption of dampness as in the old bale, nor loss by dirt in the cotton, nor did he have to pay for bagging patched on by those from whom he bought the cotton. So far there have been only a few thousand bales shipped here, but those that have come have found ready sale. A number of dealers here have expressed their intention of handling the Lowry bale next season, it being understood that arrangements have been made for fully meeting the expected demand. Whether the Lowry bale is a solution of the problem, and whether it is destined to supplant the present system, are questions which the opinion of the trade here, with characteristic conservatism, is not yet prepared to answer; but it is altogether likely that there will be, with the incoming of the new crop, an improvement in the baling of American cotton.

LIVERPOOL, June 20, 1899.

JAMES BOYLE,

Consul.

THE EDUCATION OF GERMAN CONSULS.

No attentive reader of current newspaper discussion in Germany can have failed to notice the earnestness and intelligence with which the leading journals have seconded the plans which are now understood to be under consideration by the Imperial Government for the reorganization of its consular service.

The scope and purpose of the proposed reform have been dictated by the new and enlarged functions which are imposed upon the foreign service of Germany, by the expansion of her foreign trade and by the valiant fight which this country is preparing to make for a leading and permanent place in all important foreign markets.

As long as Germany was an agricultural State, without colonies.

or any large export trade, except in manufactured products which went mainly to the United States and neighboring countries in Europe, her consular service organized on the old lines served satisfactorily for the protection of German subjects residing abroad and such other incidental duties as might be required of it. Under that system, consuls were educated as lawyers and diplomats, passed the prescribed assessor's examination, underwent a period of training in the Foreign Office, and became typical Prussian officials, with a good command of languages, a fair knowledge of diplomacy, international law, and the history of treaties, but no practical acquaintance with industrial processes, commercial values, or mercantile usages. As trained officials belonging to the privileged class, many of the imperial consuls and their subordinates—as is now asserted by the German press-have evinced a certain contempt for trade and those engaged in it, and have rejected requests for commercial aid and information as forming no part of their official duties.

The exigencies of the wholly new situation that has been developed during the past ten years-stimulated, as is broadly hinted, by the recognized efficiency of American and other consuls in obtaining valuable information and promoting export trade-have created a demand for a radical reform of the entire consular system and its reorganization upon wholly different lines.

In so far as the leading newspapers are informed, the propositions now under consideration are two:

First. To retain practically the present consular organization, and to strengthen the commercial efficiency of the consulates by assigning to them commercial attachés—a plan that has been found to work well in the German consulates in the United States.

Second. To abolish permanent consuls (Berufsconsuln) and appoint in their stead experienced and capable merchants, who will give to the consular office a definite commercial character, while its legal and purely official duties are performed by young attachés trained in the usual manner.

Whichever of the plans may be adopted, there is a general demand that the consular service shall remain, as now, a life career; that the basis of its personnel shall be a corps of consular pupils, selected by competitive examination for their intelligence, energy, and efficiency as students of modern languages, commercial law, and technology, trained by special studies for their career, and then sent out to foreign parts to begin their life work as apprentices. For the purposes

of this service, the world will be divided into four or five districts, for each of which the consular pupil will be specially educated in all that relates to languages, history, and special commercial conditions. In such a division, Great Britain and its English-speaking colonies

would constitute one district, the United States a second, South America a third, China and Japan a fourth, the East Indies a fifth; and the consular pupil, prepared and assigned to one of these, would remain there during his career, thus saving the reckless waste of valuable knowledge and experience that occurs where a competent consular officer, familiar with the language and commercial uses of one foreign country, is suddenly transferred to another.

To emphasize the need of a radical reform on this point-—in respect to which the proposed new German system would be a step beyond what has been hitherto embodied in the consular service of any other government-the Cologne Gazette says:

The essential condition to the practical success of this reform will be a radical change in the plan by which our consuls are assigned to duty. Hitherto, the whole world has constituted for our foreign service but one district. A consular officer now begins his career at Pekin and during his two or three years' service there learns the language and begins to feel at home. Just as he becomes of real value to the consulate, his experience and attainments are wasted by a transfer to Buenos Ayres. What he learned in China is now lost and worthless. But he begins zealously the study of Argentine conditions and the Spanish language. At the end of three years, he is so far advanced that he has practical command of his district, when he is transferred to the consulate at Odessa. There he has to forget his Spanish, just as he forgot his knowledge of Chinese at Buenos Ayres. He now works three years more to learn the language and commercial conditions of Russia, when he is promoted to consul-general and transferred to, say, Palermo. Chinese, Spanish, Russian, and all the peculiarities of those countries which he had laboriously acquired, and which would have been so valuable at either of his former posts of duty, are now lost and worthless capital, and he is naturally too discouraged and indifferent to begin the study of Italian and the peculiar conditions in that country, because he knows that sooner or later he will be transferred-perhaps to Chicago-where his Italian would again become useless.

This is, of course, an extreme picture, but it shows what has been a serious weakness in the bureaucratic system of consular administration and shows how fully the German press at least realizes what governments have been so slow to learn, viz, that the higher, more valuable work of a consul requires special attainments and capabilities, not only in different countries, but often in different districts of the same country; that given intelligence, industry, and patriotic devotion to duty, the practical value of a consul to his country and people increases with each year that he remains at a given post for which he has been prepared by proper antecedent education; that the system of transfers with each advancement in grade or fixed period of service is only less wasteful and ill considered than the plan of filling important consulates with wholly inexperienced men who are in danger of removal before they have become competent through experience and practically acquired knowledge of their duties.

Whatever else may happen, this much may be recognized and

taken into future account: Germany has set herself to the task of remaining what she has become--one of the foremost manufacturing and exporting nations of the world. What she lacks.in native materials and resources she will make up for by superior education, organization, energy, and mastery of details; and in the furtherance. of this policy every energy of the Government and the people, from Emperor to operative, will be enlisted and exerted with a persisent, unswerving, patriotic purpose.

The consular service is to be made, like the great subsidized steamship lines, the effective agent of the Government for pushing. the trade of German merchants into every corner of the civilized world; and it will be reorganized, trained, and equipped for its work with the same scientific thoroughness that characterizes the military, industrial, and educational systems of this country.

If present indications are fulfilled, the officialism which has heretofore restricted the usefulness of the German consular service will be sacrificed to practical utility. Young men, carefully selected and specially educated for service in a designated field, will go out and pass from clerk through the successive grades to consul-general in that one district, and as the final reward of competent, faithful service, will be recalled for duty in the Foreign Office, which will in time become a bureau of experts, whose aggregate knowledge will cover the whole realm of German export trade.

As has already happened in law, medicine, engineering-in nearly every field of applied science-the day of the all-round man, with a smattering of many things but a thorough knowledge of nothing, is definitely past, and the successes of the future will be won by the nations as well as by the individuals who can bring the highest attainments, the largest experience, and the most consummate proficiency to bear where competition is keenest and the richest prizes.

are to be won.

BERLIN, May 13, 1899.

FRANK H. MASON,

Consul-General.

GERMAN TOOL-MACHINE TRUST.

This association, which was formed in the spring of last year and comprises the majority of the works manufacturing tool machines in Germany, held its first annual meeting a short while ago in Düsseldorf, and reports for the year 1897 as follows:

Our supervisory committee has given the matter of tariff policy careful consideration, in order to be able to supply concise information to the German imperial authorities as to the productive capacity of this branch of manufacture. The declarations of the firms belonging to this trust, as well as of others outside of it, concerning the question of tariff policy have demonstrated the necessity of affording

stronger protection to this industrial branch. Stringent measures are especially required in the importation of American tool machines. It is also necessary to take steps to have transportation rates to, and the tariffs of, countries in eastern and northern Europe reduced, so as to stimulate the export of German machines. Investigations concerning this branch show that in 1897 there were employed in 208 tool-machine works (out of a total of 220 firms operating in Germany) over 26,000 hands, who received a little over 24,000,000 marks (about $5,700,000) in wages. The product of these 208 works was valued at 70,000,000 marks (almost $18,000,000), and about three-fourths of the machines produced were exported. This branch of industry is therefore important, and returns for 1898 will show further progress. Almost all the works engaged in making tool machines have undergone large extensions in the last year, and their output is consequently increased.

It will be noted that the trust asks for the putting down of customs barriers by other foreign countries and strenuously urges the putting up of such barriers against American imports, which latter are in reality the models of the German tool machines.

SIMON W. HANAUER,

FRANKFORT, June 21, 1899.

Vice-Consul-General.

TRADE AND INDUSTRIES OF MANNHEIM.

Vice and Deputy Consul Osterhaus writes from Mannheim, June 12, 1899, in regard to harbor improvements and trade conditions at that port. He says:

An old channel of the Rhine, until now reserved to the timber trade, will hereafter be largely devoted to the wants of shipping.

The harbor is at the head of the regular navigation and connected with the great seaports of Rotterdam, Amsterdam, and Antwerp. Boats drawing 3 meters (9.8 feet) and carrying from 800 to upwards of 2,000 tons ply, almost the whole year, regularly and directly between Mannheim-Ludwigshafen and the above seaports. The bulk of all goods arriving or leaving by water or rail has to be transshipped here. The field of traffic comprises all southern Germany, Switzerland, northern Italy, and a part of Austria, as well as the highly cultivated regions bordering the Rhine to the north.

The arrivals and departures by water and rail, which in 1860 amounted to 460,000 tons, augmented in the year 1897 to 7,744,000

tons.

Imports in the year 1896 were: Breadstuffs, 758,000 tons; petroleum, 118,000 tons; wood (pitch pine), 59,000 tons. Of these articles, breadstuffs and petroleum are exclusively American productions, while a large portion of the wood was shipped by the Southern States.

The Mannheim importers of wheat paid, in the year 1897, customs amounting to $3,500,000.