ing of the year. Prices during 1896 fell to 7.06 in July; then rose to 8.87, September 10, on the strength of short crop estimates; and gradually declined during the last quarter, though the price rose with a speculative flurry the day before election closing at 8 cents. Stocks in this country were practically as large as in 1894; but the stock of American cotton abroad was about 625,000 bales smaller. During the quarter, Northern spinners have taken 37,000 bales less than last year, and 431,000, or over 30 per cent, less than in 1894; while Southern spinners have taken about 12,000 bales more than last year, but 145,000 less than in 1894. The demand for cotton goods hardly kept pace with the mills at work, with the result that heavy stocks of print cloths accumulated during December, and prices declined accordingly, closing at 2 cents. year opened with a stock of 450,000 pieces; and, at its close, saw the largest stock ever carried at the end of a year, 2,300,000 pieces.

The

Wool. At the opening of the quarter there was a slight advance in wool, which continued until the end of the year; but the advance was almost purely speculative. The average of 104 quotations October 1, was 12.33 cents; November 1, 12.92 cents; and December 1, 13.66 cents. Without any visible increase in demand for goods, about a dozen mills resumed work early in November, and the opening of December found sales considerably more than double the quantity consumed by the mills. There was but little better demand for manufactured goods during December; manufacturers were not inclined to buy raw material except to complete orders on hand, and there was a decline amounting to one cent on some leading goods.

Hides and Leather.-The symptoms of a speculative advance in hides noticed early in October developed during November until, in the third week, prices were 51.4 per cent above the lowest point last summer; but the advance in leather and boots and shoes did not keep pace with hides. Leather averaged but 16 per cent, and some kinds 25 per cent, above lowest point. Boots and shoes rose 10 per cent, which checked further buying; and during December the trade remained light, though fair shipments were made and manufacturers seemed more hopeful regarding the future.

Tin Plate.-Commissioner Ayer's official report upon the production of American tin plate, which appeared during the quarter, is most gratifying to those who struggled to prove that tin plate could be manufactured in the Uni

ted States. The act of 1890, imposing a duty on imported plates, provided for the removal of that duty October 1, 1896, unless the aggregate quantity of plates lighter than 63 pounds per 100 square feet produced in the United States during any of the five fiscal years preceding June 30, 1896, should equal one-third the amount of such plates imported during the year. Two years ago our manufacturers met this requirement, and during the last fiscal year the product of American mills exceeded the imports by 17,509,299 pounds. During the year 984 per cent of the finished tin plates made in the United States were from sheets rolled in American mills; and fifty out of fifty-three firms used wholly American rolled sheets.

Iron and Steel.-In spite of all combinations formed early in 1896, prices declined 14 per cent during the year, and never rose over 3 per cent above the opening. The unsold stock of pig iron increased during the year from 400,000 tons to 800,000 tons. The changes in prices of finished products at the beginning of the quarter were downward, while an extraordinary stagnation in demand early in November caused a still further decline; but there was a slight advance in prices after the election. Steel rails sold at Philadelphia the third week in December for $25.00, which had been held at $28.00 by the combination since September 10, 1895. One cause assigned for the small demand for finished products throughout the year, was the impression that the failure of one or another combination to maintain prices would result in a smash; and we have to note the collapse of the wire and cut nail trust, which was announced November 22. The Nail Association was formed June 1, 1895. The trust maintained a regular force of inspectors to keep all the members of the pool "toting fair," and bought up opposition mills as fast as they sprang up. A newspaper account of the collapse

reads thus:

*

"For this and kindred purposes the trust imposed a pool tax of $1.50 a keg on all the nails sold by its members, and rebated to them the difference after the objects sought were accomplished. * * The advance of 15 cents a keg ordered by the trust at its March meeting was the last act which marked the trust's doom. This put the base price of wire nails at Pittsburg at $2.55, which, under the peculiar terms of its nail card, meant that the lowest figure at which any nails could be bought there was $3.05 a keg. * * * This resulted in an immense curtailment of the demand, and in turn forced the trust to close up 90 per cent of its mills and throw its workmen out of employment in order to reduce the output to comply with custom ers' needs. The entire sales of nails by the trust mills during July were but 30,000 kegs, and in August but 25,000 kegs, though the

Vol. 6.-56.

output agreed upon for these months was 60,000 and 50,000 respectively."

Failures. The total number of business failures in the United States during 1896 has been exceeded but once in our history, namely, in the panic year of 1893, when the number reached 15,560 with liabilities of $402,427,518 (Vol. 3, p. 698). The number in 1896 was close on to

15,000, liabilities about $225,000,000, with the rate of assets to liabilities about 60 per cent, which is the largest proportion recorded for any calendar year except 1893. The percentage of failures to number in 1896 was 1.39, against 1.23 in 1895, and 1.50 in 1893. There were 195 bank failures during the year, with liabilities of nearly $50,000,000, as against 132 in 1895 with $20,710,210 liabilities. The most important bank failures during the quarter were as follows: October 15, the Bank of Commerce, Buffalo, N. Y., capital and surplus $500,000, deposits $1,304,700,

suspension caused by heavy losses on loans; November 30, the Missouri National bank, Kansas City, Mo., capital $250,000, deposits $1,131,000, caused by slow collections and disagreement among directors; December 21, the National Bank of Illinois, Chicago, capital $1,000,000, deposits $11,000,000, caused by heavy loans aggregating $2,400,000 on the bonds of the Calumet Electric Railway and other undesirable paper; December 23, the Bank of Minnesota, St. Paul, capital and surplus $800,000, deposits $2,647,000, caused by inability to make collections on which it had depended to meet obligations due. On December 28 the Atlas National bank of Chicago, capital and surplus $850,000, went into voluntary liquidation

after standing a run which reduced deposits from $1,860,412 on December 17 to about $900,000.

In going under, these banks dragged numerous smaller institutions and mercantile houses with them, so that it may be said that an epidemic of failures marked the last days of a year which will long be remembered as a time of extraordinary business anxiety, depression, and disappointment, commercially and industrially.

PUBLIC ACCOUNTS.

The Public Debt.-At the close of the year 1896 the total public debt of the United States, less a cash balance in the treasury of $228,320,379.95, was $992,929,581.45, as compared with $947,298,262 at the close of 1895. The following table shows details of the debt, besides assets and liabilities of the treasury, at the end of December:

Receipts and Expenditures.-Government expenditures for the six months ended December 31-the first

half of the current fiscal year-exceeded receipts by $37,Details are given as follows:

902, 396.

Monetary Circulation.-The total circulation of the country on December 31, including all money coined or issued and not in the treasury, was $1,650,223,400—a per capita of $22.87. The various kinds of money, with the amount of each in circulation, are shown in the following table:

MONEY IN CIRCULATION, DECEMBER 31, 1896.

As a result of the labors of the Dawes Commission (Vol. 5, p. 887), it was announced in November that at a convention of representatives of the Five Civilized Tribes it was at last decided that on certain conditions the tribes would consent to give up their communal life, accept allotments, open their lands to settlement, and live like other people.

The conditions proposed by the Indians, presumably as a working basis for further negotiations, were that the Indian Territory should be admitted as a state to the Union, and that $500 should be paid to each Indian to reimburse him for relinquishing his share in the portion of the territory not allotted. The latter proposition would involve a payment by the federal government of about $30,000,000.

On December 18 a formal agreement was signed with the Choctaw tribe, providing for allotment of lands, town sites, reserve of coal fields, Choctaw schools, and relin