Mr. FESSENDEN. The same principle upon which the committee acted with regard to many other duties governed them in fixing this duty. We oboked to see whether the duties raised upon some particular materials would affect the manufacturers of those mate rials. We came to the conclusion that it was necessary to raise the duties on iron, though not as much as the House.proposed, and on wool, which we left pretty much the same; and of course upon all those things manufactured from iron and from wool it became necessary to raise the duties somewhat. But with regard to this particular thing, we could not see where the logic was as applied to marble. In 1864 the duties were fixed exactly to suit the prede cessor of the honorable Senator, Mr. Foot. 2 years ago, or a little more, the Vermont marble men demanded a duty of 50 cents upon “all other marble' and 20%. advalorem, and they got it. It cannot be contended, I think, that wages are any higher now than they were then, especially in Vermont, where they work in marble. It cannot be pretended that it costs any more to work the marble in Vermont today than it did when the tariff of 1864 was passed, or that the necessa ries of life have increased in price since. If that rate of duty was satisfactory then to the predecessor of the honorable Senator and the chairman of the ComWays&Means of the House, who looks sharply after Vermont's interests, the ComFinance could not see why it should not be satisfactory now. We raised the duties at that time to protect what is mere labor; and having given lo.all they wanted and all they said was necessary to compete with foreigners then, the committee were unable to see why this duty should be raised at the Present time. I am unable to perceive it no W. The same argument is made by the senator that is made by the rePresentatives of every other interest. Calculations are presented which nobody can answer because no body has the data but those who make them up; and we must take them on their say so. We had before us some of the workers in marble who say there is a very considerable interest, a large interest in the city of Philadelphia and in the city of NewYork, and probably in other cities. They demonstrated to our satisfaction that this increase of duty would operate very onerously upon them, and they stated the fact also that the Vermont marble works were so filled with orders that they could not supply the demand and had not been able to supply their own demand, that is the demand for marble of these men themselves, or to an swer their orders. I do not understand the honorable Senator as saying that the interest is suffering any up in Vermont. I have never heard that the marble quarries of Vermont were anything but a source of wealth. I have never heard any complaint that they suffered for want of adequate protection. Anybody may look and see how much a dollar a cubic foot would be upon a large slab of marble. It was illustrated in the room of the ComFinance by referrin to the table before us around which we sat, an it was evident that a dollar a cubic foot on anything like a considerable block of marble would be so large that it would be almost impossible for parties of moderate means to use imported marble. Again, there is one thing of which the Ver mont marble now has a perfect monopoly, and that is for statuary purposes. No one thinks of importing marble to compete with the Ver. mont marble for that. It is pure white, the best that can be had. These other marbles which the Senator has referred to are expen sive. They are used, as he says, rather as articles of luxury. It is not so much so with the common marbles, which are used for various purposes in. connection with the building of and for furniture and divers things which I cannot begin to enumerate. Many import these foreign marbles for that use. They are not very high priced, and their use does not interfere, as we are told, with the sales of the Vermont marble works, because they have as much as they can do to supply the demand, and, indeed, that is more than they can do. I believe our marble trade is the principal trade we have with Italy. There are but 2 or 3 articles in which we have any trade with Italy. We trade there for fruits, and we trade for sulphur, most of which comes from Sicily, and we trade for marble. I do not suppose it costs a great deal for our fruit vessels to bring home marble, or that they charge a very large sum. The Senator should remem ber in his calculations of what the freight costs and what profit the importer makes, that the importer charges according to what he has to pay, and if he has to pay a dollar duty he charges that dollar to the consumer. ow, sir, I hope the amendment will not be adopted, unless the Senator can give some good and sufficient reason which shows that this burden should be laid upon the many uses that are made of marble for ordinary purposes of ornament in furniture and in the building of houses, so as to give an entire mo nopoly of the whole matter to the Vermont marble works and destroy the little trade we have with Italy in this matter. Unless he can show some different reason that prevails now from that which prevailed in 1864, 2 years and a half ago, when the duty was fixed exactly to suit these gentlemen, and was made perfectly satisfactory to them on their own motion, I really think this amendment ought not to prevail.