ods
for putting the links together.

For more than twenty years after Mr. Roullier's visit, nothing was done
with leather link belting in this country.

In 1882, however, Mr. N.W. Hall, of Newark, N.J., patented a link belt,
composed of leather and steel links. His method was to place a steel
link after every third or fourth leather one, in order to strengthen the
belt. In practical use this belt was found to be very defective, because
the leather links soon stretched, and thus all the work had to be done
by the steel links. The whole strain coming thus upon the steel links,
they in course of time cut through the bolts and thus broke the belt to
pieces. So this invention proved worthless.

In 1884 a Chicago belt company obtained a patent on another style of
link belt. In this belt all the little holes in the links were lined
with metal, similar to the holes in laced shoes. This produced an effect
similar to that produced by Hall's patent. The metal lining of the holes
cut the bolts into pieces by friction and thus ruined the belt.
Therefore this patent proved a failure also.

After all these failures it fell to our lot to improve these belts so
that they may now be worked successfully on our American fast running
machinery. During the past two years we have made and sold over five
hundred leather link belts, which are all in actual use and doing
excellent service, as is proved by many testimonials which we have
received.

Our success with these belts has been so surprising that we think we
have found, at last, the long looked for "missing link," not in
"Darwinism," however, but in the belting line. We prophesy a great
future for these belts in this country.

How have we attained such success? First: We found that Roullier made a
mistake in using leather offal, as, in the links of an _iron chain_, if
one link is weak or defective, the whole chain is worthless, so in link
belts, if one or two links are weak or made of poor material, the whole
belt is affected by them. It is therefore of vital importance that only
the best and most solid leather be used in making the links; second, the
leather must be made very pliable, but at the same time its toughness
and tenacity must not be injured, or it will stretch and break.

[Illustration: FIG 1.]

These things are of great importance, and are the principal reasons for
the failures of all former efforts. The leather which Roullier used was
stiff, hard, and husky. He bel