The iron trade of the country, and the business of
the raisers of iron-stone, are in a bad way. The Iron and Steel Institute held its annual meeting on Wednesday; and the address of the President, Mr. Windsor Richards, was one long moan. He informed his hearers that the exports of steel rails in 1892 were not much more than half those of 1890, which, again, was only a poor year. The total falling-away in the export of metal and machinery in 1892, as compared with 1891, amounted to 27,000,000. There was, in fact, a great over-production in steel; and the founders looked round in vain for new markets, especially to India, where there were only 17,000 miles of railway. 'The use of British iron-stone had fallen off still more, for in Scotland the make from native ore had been reduced till 24 per cent. was now from foreign ores ; South Wales had practically ceased raising iron-stone ; and last year we imported 3,250,000 tons of hematite iron- ore from Spain. The depression was more prolonged than it had ever been ; and his only hope, as the cost of pro- duction has been ,reduced to its lowest level, was that Spain could not continue raising such enormous supplies. It looks very much as if the cheaper iron-stone of foreign mines was superseding our own ; while production of the manufac- tured article had been carried past the world's wants. Demand may develop again in time ; hut meanwhile, what is to become of the thousands of hands engaged in the iron industry, for whom it is a question not of lower wages, but of doing without any wages at all P
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