"When ordinary agricultural labor is worth $2 50 per week, pipes half one and a half inch, and half two-inch, maybe taken at an average cost of $4 38 per 1,000. When labor is $3 00 per week, the pipes will average $5 00 per 1,000, and when labor is $3 50, they will rise to $5 62."
He adds: "In giving the above average cost of materials, those districts are excluded from consideration, where clay suitable for pipes, exists in the immediate vicinity of coal-pits, which must necessarily reduce the cost of producing them very considerably."
Taking the averages of several careful estimates of the cost of tiles and bricks, from the "Cyclopædia of Agriculture," we have the price of tiles in England about $5 per 1,000, and the price of bricks $7.87, from which the duty of 5s. 6d. should be deducted, leaving the average price of bricks $6.50. Upon tiles there is no such duty. Bricks in the United States are made of different sizes, varying from 8 × 4 in. to the English standard 10 × 5 in. Perhaps a fair average price for bricks of the latter size, would be not far from $5 per 1,000; certainly below $6.50 per 1,000. There is no reason why tiles may not be manufactured in the United States, as cheaply, compared with the prices of bricks, as in England; and it is quite clear that tiles of the sizes named, are far cheaper there than common bricks.
What is wanted in this country is, first, a demand sufficient to authorize the establishment of works extensive enough to make tiles at the best advantage; next, competent skill to direct and perform the labor; and, finally, the best machinery and fixtures for the purpose. It is confidently predicted, that, whenever the business of tile-making becomes properly established, the ingenuity of American machinists will render it easy to manufacture tiles at English prices, notwithstanding the lower price of labor there; and that we shall be supplied with small tiles in all parts of the country at about the current prices of bricks, or at about one half the present Albany prices of tiles, as given at the head of this chapter. It should be mentioned here, perhaps, that, in England, it is common to burn tiles and bricks together in the same kiln, placing the tiles away from the hottest parts of the furnace; as, being but about half an inch in thickness, they require less heat to burn them than bricks.
In the estimates of labor in making tiles in England, a small item is usually included for "rolling." Round pipes are chiefly used in England. When partly dried, they are taken up on a round stick, and rolled upon a small table, to preserve their exact form. Tiles usually flatten somewhat in drying, which is not of importance in any but round pipes, but those ought to be uniform. By this process of rolling, great exactness of shape, and a great degree of smoothness inside, are preserved.
TILE MACHINES.
Drainage with tiles is a new branch of husbandry in America. The cost of tiles is now a great obstacle in prosecuting much work of this kind which land-owners desire to accomplish. The cost of tiles, and so the cost of drainage, depends very much—it may be said, chiefly—upon the perfection of the machinery for tile-making; and here, as almost everywhere else, agriculture and the mechanic arts go hand in hand. Labor is much dearer in America than in Europe, and there is, therefore, more occasion here than there, for applying mechanical power to agriculture. We can have no cheap drainage until we have cheap tiles; and we can have cheap tiles only by having them made with the most perfect machinery, and at the lowest prices at which competing manufacturers, who understand their business, can afford them.
In the preceding remarks on the cost of tiles, may be found estimates, which will satisfy any thinking man that tiles have not yet been sold in America at reasonably low prices.
To give those who may desire to establish tileries, either for public or private supply, information, which cannot readily be obtained without great expense of English books, as to the prices of tile machines, it is now proposed to give some account of the best English machines, and of such American inventions as have been brought to notice.
It is of importance that American machinists and inventors should be apprised of the progress that has been made abroad in perfecting tile machines; because, as the subject attracts attention, the ingenuity of the universal Yankee nation will soon be directed toward the discovery of improvements in all the processes of tile-making. Tiles were made by hand long before tile machines were invented.