"There's a big waste in making tar, then," said Charley.
"Not half so much as you think," said Jack. "They don't waste the smoke up in the North Carolina tar country."
"How do they burn it?"
"They don't burn it, but they catch it and sell it."
"How do you mean?"
"Why, they have wire screens stretched over the tar-kilns, and as the smoke strikes them the fine particles of carbon stick to them. I have seen masses of them hanging down many inches from the screens, and very pretty they are too."
"But what do they do with the stuff?" asked Charley.
"Sell it. It is called lamp-black, and it brings a pretty good price."
"That is close economy, isn't it?"
"Yes, but it is frequently by just such 'margins' as that that manufacturing becomes profitable. It is a very poor and desolate-looking country up there in the tar-making districts, and I remember hearing a man say once, as we passed through it: 'This is the country where they waste nothing; they bark the trees to get resin: they distil the resin and make turpentine; what's left is rosin; when the trees die they burn them to make tar, catch the smoke for lamp-black, and there aren't any ashes.'"