obbin and Fly Frames." There are usually three of
these machines for the cotton to pass through, to which are given the
names of "Slubbing," "Intermediate," and "Roving" Frames.

Their duties are to carry on the operation of making the sliver of
cotton finer or thinner until it is ready for the final process of
spinning, and incidentally to add to the uniformity and cleanliness of
the thread of cotton.

The final process of spinning is chiefly performed on one of two
machines, the "Mule" and the "Ring Frame," either of which makes a
thread largely used without further treatment in a spinning mill.

Sometimes, however, the thread is further treated by such operations as
doubling, reeling, gassing, etc. It should be added that in the
production of the finest and best yarns an important process is gone
through, named "combing."

This may be defined as a continuation of the carding process already
named before to a much more perfect degree. The chief object is to
extract all fibres below a certain required length, and reject them as
waste. There is as much of this latter made at this stage of manufacture
as that made by all the other machines put together, that is, about 17
per cent. Of course it will be readily seen that this is a costly
operation and is limited entirely to the production of the very best and
finest yarns.

This process necessitates the employment of a machine called a "Sliver
Lap" and sometimes a "Ribbon Lap Machine" in order to put the slivers
from the carding engine into a small lap suitable for the "creel" of the
"Combing Machine."

=Cotton Mixing and the Bale Breaker.=--As before stated, the first
operation in the mill is the opening out of bales of raw material and
making a "mixing." Of course the weight of the bale is ascertained
before it is opened.

All varieties of cotton vary in their commercial properties, this
variation being due to a number of causes. From a commercial value point
of view, there is an enormous difference between the very best and the
very worst cottons; so much so, indeed, that they are never blended
together. Between these two extremes there is a well-graded number of
varieties and classifications of cotton, and some approximate so closely
to others in quality, that they are often blended together in the
"mixing."

Further than this, the same class of cotton often varies in spinning
qualities from a number of circumstances that need not here be named.
This is, h