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pressure of traffic is apparently as great as ever, while
the sidewalks in front of the wholesale stores are cum-
bered with barrels, bales, and boxes awaiting shipment.
Nevertheless, the merchants with one accord say that
trade is very dull. I am inclined to think, however,
that the city is suffering less from the crisis
than any other great commercial metropolis in
the country. There is no complete prostration
of business, except in two or three branches. The
state of affairs may be described rather as an unu-
sual dullness resulting from great caution on the part
of both buyers and sellers-a dullness, however, that
does not threaten disaster, but that is sensibly abating
from day to day. All classes are shortening sail, not be-
cause they believe a storm is coming, but because the
weather is lowering and squally around them and it is
well to be prepared for emergencies. Manufacturers
have limited production, jobbing houses are carrying
light stocks and are exceedingly wary about giving
credit, and customers buy for immediate wants only.
The conservatism of the business men of Baltimore has
been spoken of in a previous letter to THE TRIBUNE.
This characteristic enables the city to weather, without
serious damage, financial storms that produce ru-
inous effects in localities where speculation runs
riot. There have been but three failures of banking-
houses since the crisis began-those of Brown, Lancaster
& Co., Wm. Fisher & Sons, and Richard W. Cox & Co.,
and the two former firms will probably soon resume.
Only one mercantile house of any importance has suc-
cumbed; this was the grocery firm of Thomas Kemp &
Co., whose liabilities were less than $100,000. When the
panie began there was a run on the savings banks, last-
ing a part of two days, but these institutions were much
too strong to be shaken. A steady drain upon them
still continues; that is, the amount deposited does not
equal that withdrawn, a circumstance always to
be expected in hard times, when people who are out of
employment are obliged to fall back on their savings to
meet their pressing necessities. Money is scarce. On
first-class collaterals, such as Governments and State
and city bonds, it can be had at the rate of from 10 to 12 per
cont per annum. Commercial paper is hard to negotiate,
as high as from 15 to 18 per cent being asked for best
names, while anything at all doubtful has to pay a ruin-
ous rate.
# WHISKY, COFFEE, AND PROVISION TRADES DEPRESSED.
Among the trading and manufacturing interests, those
engaged in the production or sale of articles of luxury
naturally suffer most. The prostration of the oyster
packing business has already been described in these
columns. The whisky trade is greatly depressed. It is
an important business in Baltimore. Fully 200 houses,
large and small, are engaged in it, the annual sales
amounting to about $6,000,000. The distilleries are nearly
all running, but are doing very little. The Globe Distil-
lery, the largest in the city, with a capacity of 2,400
bushels of grain a day, is now distilling only 200 bushels
daily. Others have reduced their production in almost
as great a ratio. The trade is largely with the South,
and the tenacity with which the planters are holding
their cotton for better prices makes money even scarcer
in that section than in the North, and greatly
reduces the demand for all luxuries. The tobacco manu-
facturers say that there is almost nothing doing in their
line. It is always the dull season with them at this time
of the year, however, the French contracts, which make
a large item in their trade, having been already filled.
The very important coffee trade feels the effects of the
crisis as seriously as almost any other branch of busi-
ness. Baltimore is the second coffee importing city in
the United States. In 1871 the importations reached the
enorinous figure of 92.892,904 pounds more than double
the amount brought to the three cities of Boston, Phila-
delphia, and New-Orleans together. The importers are
carrying pretty large stocks, and say that their sales
are very light. A period of dullness is more serious
for them than for men in many other lines
of trade, because it is not followed by an exceptionally
brisk demand. People who stint themselves in coffee
when times are hard, do not make up for their self-de-
nial when times are better by drinking more than usual.
But why return to their ordinary habits? The pro-
vision trade, another large item in the business of the
city, is also seriously depressed. The customers for the
70,000 hogsheads of bacon, the 20,000 casks of hams, and
the 30,000 barrels of pork, which Baltimore annually
handles, are mainly in the South, and the dealers are
puzzled to know what the people in that section are
living upon, since they appear to have dispensed with
these staple articles of Southern diet. One branch of
the trade, the manufacture and shipment of refined
lard, is still fairly active, the market for the article be-
ing chiefly in Germany and England. The trade in
grain and flour is almost at a standstill, but is showing
signs of improvement. The coal trade is tolerably ac-
tive. The coastwise shipments have fallen off, but the
foreign demand is good.
# FACTORIES LIMITING THEIR PRODUCTION.
The jobbing trade is, I suppose, in about the same
condition here as in New-York as far as the business
doing is concerned. The merchants are, however, better
abie to stand a dull season than those of most other
cities. Their capital is usually their own, and their
business is generally a cantious and safe one. They
take few risks. A request for credit to the amount of
$10,000 would astonish the largest house in Baltimore.
Their customers are nearly all in Maryland, Virginia,
and North Carolina, and having dealt with them for
years they are thoroughly acquainted with their cir-
cumstances.
Manufactories of all kinds are, with few exceptions, in
operation, but are limiting their production to the sup-
piy of orders. The shrinkage of prices and the uncer-
tainties of the future make every one timid and un-
willing to accumulate stocks in anticipation of
future sales. The piano-makers have closed their
factories. The largest of these establishments, that of
Wm. Knabe & Co., manufactures from 1,500 to 2,000 instru-
ments annually. Its stoppage has thrown a large number
of men out of work. The shoe factories, of which there are
26, have greatly reduced their force of workmen and work-
women, and, unless there should soon be a revival of the
Southern trade, will soon make further reductions. The
railway companies have discharged hundreds of men em-
p.oyed in their car and machine shops the Baltimore
and Ohio road as many as 500, I am told. The railway
officers report a good business, nevertheless, and say
that they are doing about the ordinary freight and pas-
senger traffic of this season of the year. At the Baiti-
more and Ohio offices, I was informed this morning that
the coal traffic last weck was considerably greater than
for the corresponding week last year, and that the
general freight traffic was fairly good and improving.
The rolling-mills of the Company are working "double-
turn," making iron for Western extensions.
# AN UNUSUAL DEMAND FOR SAFES.
I found to-day a curious exception to the general rule
-a business that instead of being depresssed is actually
more prosperous than ever, and that owes its increased
prosperity to the very cause that makes others so dull.
Walking down Baltimore-st. I dropped in to see an old
friend who is engaged in selling fire-proof safes, and of
course after the first greetings began to talk about the
absorbing topic in mercantile circles, the dullness of
trade, when he surprised me by saying that his business
was unusually good-in fact, his sales since the crisis com-
menced had been larger than at any time before. The
reason was not difficult to find. People have lost confi-
dence in banks, and are buying safes with the intention
of being their own bankers and keeping their cash and
valuables where they will not be squandered in bubble
railroads or made away with by absconding cashiers.
# ANOTHER PHASE OF THE MCGARRAHAN CASE.
McGarrahan, who claims the vast quicksil-
ver mining property now held by the New-Idria Mining
Company, has suffered a new defeat. A dispatch from
San José, Cal., Nov. 5, says:
Upon the assembling of the Court this morning, Judge
Belden, in the suit of McGarrahan agt. The New-Idria