his mainly into simple forms. It produces iron
and steel in considerable quantities but has few machine shops where really
delicate work can be done. It does not manufacture motor cars, electric or
even textile machinery or machine tools, nor does it make watches or
firearms in appreciable quantities. In short, the South carries some of the
most important raw materials only a step or two toward their ultimate form
and depends upon other parts of the country for the finished article.

Years ago the story was told of a Georgia funeral at which that State
furnished only the corpse and the grave. Georgia, and other States too,
can do much more today, if the funeral be not too elaborate. It can
furnish a cotton shroud, each year of finer quality. The knitting mills
of the South are able to supply an increasing proportion of the
population with hose and underclothing, and a number of the mills are
gaining a national trade through advertising. If demanded, Southern-made
shoes may be found, and a Southern-made coffin may be drawn on a
Southern-made wagon by Southern-bred horses and perhaps, though
improbably, in harness of local manufacture also.

The South was once the richest section of the Union. The vicissitudes of
the Civil War rendered it poor, but now it is rapidly growing richer and
since the beginning of the Great War has shown a phenomenal accumulation
of new capital. During this great struggle some of the cotton mills made
in a single month profits as large as they were formerly accustomed to
make in a year. Even though the farmer received for his cotton much more
than usual, the price of cloth would still have yielded a profit to the
manufacturer if cotton had been twice as high. Other enterprises have
likewise been profitable, and when normal conditions are restored this
capital will seek new investment. While prophecy is dangerous it seems
probable that manufacturing in the South will grow as never before; and
new forms of investment must be found, as the rural districts cannot
furnish any greatly increased supply of labor for cotton manufacturing
though the towns can supply some adult labor for other forms of industry.

The labor question is beginning to grow serious in some localities,
though it is difficult to discover whether the problem is chiefly one of
getting labor at all or of getting it at something like the wages
formerly paid. Apparently, however, the industrial growth of the South
has been more rapid