The rags do not come to the mammoth factories of to-day in bell carts, but by the carload in huge bales gathered from all sections of this great Republic, as well as from lands beyond the eastern and western oceans.  The square, compact, steam-compressed bundles are carried by elevators well up toward the top of the building, where they await the knife of the “opener.”  When they have been opened, the “feeder” throws the contents by armfuls into the “thrasher.”  The novice or layman, ignorant of the state in which rags come to the mill, will find their condition a most unpleasant surprise, especially disagreeable to his olfactory nerves.  Yet the unsavory revelation comes with more force a little farther on, in the “assorting-room.”  The “thrasher” is a great cylindrical receptacle, revolving rapidly, which is supplied with long wooden beaters or arms passing through a wooden cylinder and driven by power.  When the rags have been tossed in, there ensues a great pounding and thrashing, and the dust is carried off in suction air-tubes, while the whipped rags are discharged and carried to the “sorting” and “shredding” room.  Here the rags are assorted as to size, condition, and the presence of buttons, hooks and eyes, or other material that must be removed.  Then those that need further attention are passed on to the “shredders,” these as well as the “sorters” being women.  The “shredders” stand along a narrow counter; in front of each one there is fastened a long scythe-blade with its back toward the operator and its point extending upward, the shank being firmly fixed to the table or operating board.  Here buttons, hard seams, and all similar intruders are disposed of, and the larger pieces of rags are cut into numerous small ones on the scythe-blades.  The rags thus prepared are tossed by the women into receptacles in the tables.  The work in this room is the most disagreeable and unwholesome in the entire process of manufacture, and this despite the fact that these rags, too, have been thrashed, and freed from an amount of dust and dirt beyond belief.

While one is watching the operations carried on here, it is impossible to repress the wish that rags might be bought otherwise than by the pound, for, unfortunately, filth, dust, and dirt weigh, and to wash rags only reduces the weight.  While this is a true reflection of the condition in the average mill, it is pleasant to know, however, there are others of the higher class that are decided exceptions as far as dust and dirt are concerned.  Such are the mills making high-grade ledger and bond papers, as well as the mill manufacturing the paper that is used for the printing of our “greenbacks,” to which further reference will be made later.  In these exceptional mills everything is neat and perfectly clean, all the stock used being new and fresh from the cotton or linen mills, or from factories producing cloth goods, like shirt and corset factories, and others of the same sort.  The sorting and shredding room is always large and light, with windows on all sides, and well ventilated, offering a decided contrast in many respects to the less cleanly mills first referred to where the women must wear bonnets or hoods for the protection of the hair.  In either case the process is certainly an improvement over the old plan of leaving the rags to decay in a cellar to expedite the removal of the glutinous matter from them.