and detects a surplus of passengers, he notes the number of the conductor, who is fined 3 marks (72 cents), which are paid to a charity fund and divided once a year to employees of the company requir ing support.

All cars not only the trolley cars, but also the smokers-are supplied with hand and electro-magnetic brakes; the latter are applied in case of danger, and afford a sudden halting of the car. There are no fenders in use on the cars, but accidents are few. Experiments are being daily made with all sorts of safety appliances to test their reliability; but up to the present the company has not decided to introduce any particular system on all cars. There is certainly an opportunity here for a good American device, as the different appliances now in use are not fully satisfactory to the company or to the authorities.

The Hamburg Electric Street-Car Company must be considered a model institution, and its system worthy of careful study.

HAMBURG, July 18, 1899.

HUGH PITCAIRN,

Consul.

EXPOSITION AT GHENT.

An exposition of the industries and arts of this province was opened in this city on the 1st day of June and is to continue until the 1st of September.

Ghent, with its suburban towns, contains a population of 214,000. The exposition grounds, comprising 41 acres, are situated in a portion of the city park, ten minutes' ride by electric tram from the heart of the city. The floor space for exhibitors (some 2,300 in number) covers a total area of 57,812 square feet.

All foreign displays are made through local agents. They consist almost entirely of machinery, such as weaving, spinning, artificial ice, steam laundry, feed cutters, boilers, engines, steam pumps, coffee grinders, etc., and of carpenters' and machinists' tools. The foreign countries represented are the United States, England, Germany, and France. The following American manufacturers are

represented:

The Henderson Manufacturing Company, Geneva, N. Y.
Enterprise Manufacturing Company, Philadelphia, Pa.
William P. Kellogg, Troy, N. Y.

The Dean Steam Pump Company, Holyoke, Mass.
The Aermotor Company, Chicago, Ill.

Carter Densmore & Co., Boston, Mass.

Hibbard & Ajax Cycle Works, Chicago, Ill.

The last-mentioned firm makes a very creditable display of bicycles and shows the only American wheel here. At this booth our flag is majestically displayed, but nowhere else is it to be seen on the exposition grounds.

An English company makes a good exhibit of some fifty different pieces of hand and steam laundry machinery and utensils, from the ordinary clothes wringer to the heaviest and largest steam washers and ironers. A German manufacturer of steam-laundry machinery. also makes a fair display. Reference is made more especially to this class of machinery as it applies to an industry yet in its infancy in this section of Belgium, which, I am informed, is gaining rapidly in popularity. I am told that the agents of the English company. have within the past two years furnished two complete steam laundries in this city and some ten in this vicinity, and that they have just closed a contract with one of the largest local hospitals to furnish the machinery for a complete steam laundry. The agent of the German firm has just closed a contract to furnish the machinery for a laundry at Antwerp.

It is admitted by dealers here that American laundry machinery is far superior to either the English or German makes, and it would not be difficult to find an energetic, reliable house to accept an agency; in fact, I am quite sure such an agency would be sought for. One apparently serious complaint made by dealers is that they can not succeed in doing business directly with the manufacturers, and that to deal through middlemen brings the cost so high that they can not introduce the machinery in competition with English and German makes. Our manufacturers should give this their attention.

A very novel exhibition is made by one of the industrial schools. It comprises a set of maps representing the different cantons of this. province. River, canal, and railroad routes and principal cities are carefully noted, and miniature manufactured articles are attached to indicate the production and industry of the various cities or localities. On the spot where Ghent is indicated there is attached a piece of loaf sugar, a bottle of beer, a bunch of flowers, a spindle of cotton, a spindle of flax, samples of linen and cotton goods. To the city of Lokeren there is attached a piece of rope, a package of cordage, and a bottle of wheat; to the prairies of East Flanders, cattle and sheep. Maps containing manufacturing centers have miniature locomotives, cars, wagons, chairs, tables, etc., attached.

The Kongo Free State display is made in a separate building. It is rather small, consisting of goods manufactured for the Kongo, as well as native products, weapons, implements, and photographs. The principal exhibits are cotton, linen, and woolen fabrics, to show the quality of goods in use and the manner of putting up packages

of convenient size and weight for shipment. as follows:

There are four sizes,

These packages are covered with heavy burlaps and bound with four hoop-iron bands 14 inches in width.

This city is the center of a very large textile industry, and has

a heavy export trade of such goods to the Kongo.

The exhibition as a whole is a credit, not only to the province, but to the Kingdom. The displays are effective and the decorations in

I give below a table of the exports of cotton yarn, cotton velvets, cords, and fustians from this district to the United States for the first half of the years 1898 and 1899, shipments recorded monthly, which I think will be of interest to a large class of our manufacturers and merchants.

EGG INDUSTRY IN GERMANY AND RUSSIA.

The egg trade in Germany and Russia has grown astonishingly within the past few years. The following tables will show the extent of this growth:

German import from adjoining countries.

Nine-tenths of this import came from Russia and Austria, smaller quantities coming from Italy, the Netherlands, and Roumania. Russia's increased export in eggs, however, is something enor

The raising of poultry for the production of eggs has become an important factor in Russian husbandry. Not only is this the case in districts which border on the frontier, but in the interior of the country as well. In 1894, freight on the Russian railroads was reduced. This gave the infant industry a new impulse. The completion of the Kaiser Wilhelm Canal enables the dealers to ship eggs direct to Hamburg without change of bottom. From this port, transshipments. are immediately made for England, Belgium, and the Netherlands. JNO. F. WINTER,

ANNABERG, June 19, 1899.

Consul.

ADVICE TO IMPORTERS OF SICILIAN ESSENTIAL

OILS.

I would suggest to all dealers in essential oils who purchase under chemists' certificates to take a sample in the presence of witnesses, immediately upon arrival of the goods, seal it, and send, in the little bottles made for that purpose, to the chemists Messrs. G. H. Ogston & Moore, of Messina (who put goods under their seal after

My reason copper has

analyzing them), at the same time asking for an analysis. for this is that I have discovered that even after the been sealed, it can be most successfully tampered with. A minute's contact of a hot iron with the line of solder which encircles the copper where it begins to taper will remove sufficient to allow two little holes to be made. If the copper is then placed on its side, the contents will easily run off. The adulterant turpentine is then readily injected by a syringe. A few passes of the soldering iron soon destroy all traces of the work.

I do not wish to be understood as saying that any particular exporter has adopted this method to defraud, but I do say that it can be done. Every honest shipper will be glad to learn that the second analysis agrees with the first. When the importer finds that it does not, the remedy rests in his own hands.

I would suggest that samples be sent, not only of goods now on the way, but also (if any of the coppers are still intact) of shipments received as far back as April. If a fraud has been committed, an empty copper would probably show on the inside the marks where the fresh solder entered the holes.

A safeguard against such frauds would be to make it a condition of the contract that the chemists send one-half of the original sample, after analysis, to the purchaser under their private seal.

MESSINA, June 10, 1899.

CHAS. M. CAUGHY,

Consul.

PETROLEUM INDUSTRY IN RUSSIA.

The St. Petersburg Messenger of Finance, in an article on the petroleum industry in Russia, states that English capitalists have recently invested $9,000,000 in the petroleum-producing territory between the Caspian and Black seas.

Since 1892, when new regulations concerning the petroleum industry were published, more than thirty firms have received permits from the Minister of Agriculture and Crown Domains to engage in the petroleum industry in Russia, and applications are being made for permission to develop the petroleum-bearing territory on the Apsheron Peninsula, some 300 miles north of Baku on the Caspian Sea.

The increased demand for fuel caused foreign capitalists to look carefully after the residues, which has resulted in a decrease in the amount of kerosene exported and a greater demand for petroleum fuel at good prices; this increased 900 per cent during the past six years and is still growing, notwithstanding the competition of pit coal and wood.

The demand for petroleum fuel from the factories