perfect that there seems to be no need of an attendant, save to furnish a constant supply of sheets.  The folding completed, cutting machines are again brought into requisition, to cut and trim the sheets to the size of folded note or letter-paper, which is the final operation before they are sent out into the world on their mission of usefulness.  The finished paper may or may not have passed through the ruling and folding process, but in either case it goes from the cutters to the wrappers and packers, and then to the shipping-clerks, all of whom perform the duties indicated by their names.  The wonderful transformation wrought by the magic wand of science and human invention is complete, and what came into the factory as great bales of offensive rags, disgusting to sight and smell, goes forth as delicate, beautiful, perfected paper, redeemed from filth, and glorified into a high and noble use.  Purity and beauty have come from what was foul and unwholesome; the highly useful has been summoned forth from the seemingly useless; a product that is one of the essential factors in the world’s progress, and that promises to serve an ever-increasing purpose, has been developed from a material that apparently held not the slightest promise.  Well might the Boston News Letter of 1769 exclaim in quaint old rhyme: 

    Rags are as beauties which concealèd lie,
    But when in paper, charming to the eye! 
    Pray save your rags, new beauties to discover,
    For of paper truly every one’s a lover;
    By the pen and press such knowledge is displayed
    As would not exist if paper was not made.

And well may man pride himself on this achievement, this marvelous transformation, which represents the fruitage of centuries of striving and endeavor!

Up to this point the reference has been almost entirely to paper made from rags, but radical improvements have been made, caused by the introduction of wood pulp, and these are of such importance that the account would not be complete without some mention of them.  These changes are mainly in the methods of manipulating the wood to obtain the pulp, for when that is ready, the process from and including the “washers” and “beaters,” is very similar to that already described.  All papers, whether made from rags or wood, depend upon vegetable fiber for their substance and fundamental base, and it is found that the different fibers used in paper-making, when finally subdued, do not differ, in fact, whether obtained from rags or from the tree growing in the forest.  In the latter case the raw wood is subjected to chemical treatment which destroys all resinous and foreign matters, leaving merely the cellular tissue, which, it is found, does not differ in substance from the cell tissue obtained after treating rags.  In either case this cellular tissue, through the treatment to which the raw material is subjected, becomes perfectly plastic or moldable, and while the paper made from one differs slightly in certain characteristics from the paper made from the other, they are nevertheless very similar, and it might be safe to predict that further perfecting of processes will eventually make them practically alike.