the odds and ends into flocks."

"Well, if this stuff is flocks, how is shoddy made, and what does it
look like?"

"It is something like wool. The rags are fed into a 'picker' up in the
'pick room,' and come out all torn apart."

"What is it used for then?"

"It is mixed with a little coarse wool, and carded into rope yarn, the
same as wool, ready to be spun."

"The idea of weaving shoddy into cloth is new to me. It can't make very
good cloth."

"Well, they only use it for the back of the cloth. Here, look at this
piece! See; it is white on one side and brown on the other. The white
side is the face, and is made from good wool. You see we are beating
these flocks in on the back side."

"Yes, I see you are; and now as you've told me about shoddy, I'd like to
know about flocks, for that's what I have got to handle, I suppose."

"I guess you'll know all you want to about them before you've been here
long. I'm 'bout dead from being in this dust so much. It fills a feller
all up. See how thick it is now, and you're drawing it in with every
breath."

By this time the other machine was ready for action, and Carl, finding
that they were short of flocks, gave Fred a basket, took another
himself, and both boys started for a fresh supply. They went up stairs,
passed through the "gig room," and across a long hall which opened into
a little room by itself, where the rag grinders were humming away. This
was their destination. Carl filled one of the baskets with flocks and
the other with ground rags; then turning to Fred, said:

"You wanted to know about flocks and how they are made. This is the
first machine they go through. You see that pile of rags and odds and
ends. When they have been run through here, they will come out cut up
fine, like those I just put in your basket. Now we will go back, and I
will show you the next process they go through."

Each of the boys now shouldered his basket and returned down the stairs.
There Carl turned his flocks upon the cloth that was rapidly being
filled, and then emptied the contents of the other basket into a tub or
tank, which was about five feet wide by fifteen long. It was full of
thick, muddy looking water, which was rapidly going round the tank.

It struck Fred as a curious proceeding when he saw the fine cut rags
thrown into that place; it looked to him very much like throwing them
away, and he was about to ask an explanation when Carl satisfied his
curiosity by saying