A third suggestion relates to the preparation of animal size for the carpet-manufacture and for that of many kinds of woollen and worsted goods. This size is made from the clippings and scrapings of skins and hides, from rejected scraps of parchment and vellum, and from the worn-out buffalo skin pickers and skips largely used in textile manufactures; also from the pith of cattle-horns, which contain a large amount of valuable gelatine. The suggestion is, to utilise the refuse left after making this size. One large carpet factory in Yorkshire rejects as utterly useless a ton or more of this refuse every week. The horn-pith contains as one of its components phosphate of lime, and is on that account recommended to the notice of the manufacturers of chemical manures on a large scale.
One more suggestion comes from our ingenious correspondent. Old corks are applicable to a greater number of purposes than we are generally in the habit of supposing. That many of them are ground up to make cork-stuffing for cushions, padding, &c. is well known; but there are other uses for them as corks or half corks, besides making floating buoys and life-preservers. A taverner in a Lancashire town covered the floor of his lobby and bar with very open rope-matting, and filled up the openings with old corks cut down to the level of the surface of the mats. This combination is found to be almost indestructible under the feet; while it gives a good grip or foothold. As the making of rope-mats is one of the trades carried on in reformatories and some other large establishments, it is suggested that the managers should take into consideration the feasibility of adding old corks to their store of manufacturing materials.
As this _Journal_ finds its way into every corner of the busy hives of industry, it may possibly be that some of our readers are already acquainted with such applications of waste refuse to useful purposes as those which our esteemed correspondent suggests. But this is a point of minor importance. The primary question is, not whether an idea is absolutely new, but whether it is practicably susceptible of useful application. The history of manufactures teaches us that apparently humble trifles like these have proved to be worth millions sterling to the country.