in this country; or that any machines, the use of which should be prohibited here, would infallibly find their way into foreign nations.

Your committee therefore cannot but include among the laws of which they recommend the repeal, the 5th and 6th of Edw. VI. for putting down gig mills; and also all the other statutes recited in the Appendix, which, as some of the petitioners conceive, prohibit, though less directly the use of particular articles of machinery.

The committee also recommend the repeal of all the acts comprised in the third class, controlling the making and selling of cloth, excepting only those which prohibit its exportation in an unwrought state.

The 2nd and 3rd of Ph. and Mary is another of the acts comprised within the 3rd class: This statute commonly called the Weavers' Act, among other regulations limits the number of looms which persons residing in villages may keep in one house. It is highly valued, and its repeal strongly opposed, by another very respectable class of petitioners. But in order that the House may enter more distinctly into the principles and reasonings which belong to this part of the subject, it may be expedient for your committee to state that there are three different modes of carrying on the woollen manufacture; that of the master clothier of the West of England, the Factory, and, the domestic system.

In all the western counties as well as the north, there are factories, but the master clothier of the west of England, buys his wool from the importer, if it be foreign, or in the fleece, or of the wool stapler, if it be of domestic growth; atter which, in all the different processes through which it passes, he is under the necessity of employing as many distinct classes of persons; sometimes working in their own houses, sometimes in those of the master clothier, but none of them going out of their proper line. Each class of workmen, however, acquires great skill in performing its particular operation, and hence may have arisen the acknowledged excellence, and, till of late, superiority, of the cloths of the West of England. It is however a remarkable fact, of which your committe has been assured by one of its own members, that previously to the introduction of machinery, it was very common, and it is said sometimes to happen at this day, for the north countryman to come into the West of England, and, in the clothing districts of that part of the kingdom, to purchase his wool; which he carries home; where, having worked it up into cloth, he brings it back again, and sells it in its native district. This is supposed to arise from the northern clothier being at liberty to work himself, and employ his own family and others, in any way which his interest or convenience may suggest.

In the factory system the master manuf cturers who sometimes possess a very great capital, employ in one or more buildings or factories, under their own or their superintendant's inspection, a number of workmen, more or fewer according to the extent of their trade. This system, it is obvious, admits in practice of local variations. both in the system of the West of England clothier, and in the factory system, the work, generally speaking is done by persons who have no property in the goods they manufacture, for in

But

this consists the essential distinction between the two former systems, and the domestic.

In the last mentioned, or domestic system, which is that of Yorkshire, the manufacture is conducted by a multitude of master manufacturers, generally possessing a very small, and scarcely ever any great extent of capital. They buy the wool of the dealer; and, in their own houses, assisted by their wives and children, and from two or three to six or seven journeymen, they dye it (when dyeing is necessary) and through all the different stages work it into undressed cloth.. Various processes, however, the chief of which were formerly done by hand, under the manufacturer's own roof, are now performed by machinery, in public mills, as they are called, which work for hire. There are several such mills near every manufacturing village, so that the manufacturer, with little inconvenience or loss of time, carries thither his goods, and fetches them back again when the process is completed. When it has attained to the state of undressed cloth, he carries it on the market day to a public hall or market, where the merchants repair to purchase.

Several thousands of these small master manufacturers attend the market of Leeds, where there are three halls for the exposure and sale of their cloths and there are other similar halls, where the same system of selling in public market prevails, at Bradford, Halifax, and Huddersfield. The balls consist of long walks or galleries, throughout the whole length of which the master manufacturers stand in a double row, each behind his own little division or stand, as it is termed, on which his goods are exposed to sale. In the interval between these rows the merchants pass along, and make their purchases. At the end of an hour, on the ringing of a bell, the market closes, and such cloths as have been purchased are carried home to the merchants' houses; such goods as remain unsold continuing in the halls till they find a purchaser at some ensuing market. It should however be remarked, that a practice has also obtained of late years, of merchants giving out samples to some manufacturer whom they approve, which goods are brought to the merchant directly, without ever coming into the halls. These however, no less than the others, are manufactured by him in his own family. The greater merchants have their working-room, or, as it is termed, their shop, in which their workmen, or, as they are termed, croppers, all work together. The goods which, as it has been already stated, are bought in the undressed state, here undergo various processes, till, being completely fi nished, they are sent awa: for the use of the consumer, either in the home or the foreign market; the merchants sending them abroad directly without the intervention of any other factor. Sometimes again the goods are dressed at a stated rate by dressers, who take them in for that purpose. The greater part of the domestic clothiers live in villages and detached houses, covering the whole face of a district of from 20 to 30 miles in length, and from 12 to 15 in breadth. Coal aboun's throughout the whole of it; and a great proportion of the manufacturers occupy a little land, from 3 to 12 or 15 acres each. They often likewise keep a horse, to carry their cloth to the fulling mill and the market.

Though the system which has been just described be that which has been generally established in the West Riding of Yorkshire, yet there have long been a few factories in the neighbourhood of Halifax and Huddersfield; and four or Eve more, one however of which has been since discontinued, have been set on foot not many years ago in the neighbourhood of Leeds. These have for some time been objects of great jealousy to the domestic clothiers. The most serious apprehensions have been stated, by witnesses who bave given their evidence before your committee in behalf of the domestic manufacturers, lest the factory system should gradually root out the domestic; and lest the independent little master manufacturer, who works on his own account, should sink into a journeyman working for hire. kis for the purpose of counteracting this supposed tendency of the factory system to increase, that a Bumerous class of petitioners wish, instead of repca ing, to amend and enforce the act of Philip and Mary, for restricting the number of looms to be worked in any one tenement; and with a similar view they wish to retain in force the 5th of Elizabeth, which enacts the system of apprenticeship. On this latter head your committee will have occasion to say more hereafter; but it seemed right just to notice the circumstance in this place.

Your committee cannot wonder that the domestic clothiers of Yorkshire are warmly attached to their accustomed mode of carrying on the manufacture: It is not merely that they are accustomed to it-it obviously possesses many eminent hantages seldom found in a great manufac

ture.

It is one peculiar recommendation of the domestic system of manufacture, that, as it has been expressly stated to your committee, a young man of good character can always obtain credit for as much wool as will enable him to set up as a little master manufacturer, and the pub'ic mills, which are now established in all parts of the clothing district, and which work for hire at an easy rate, enable him to command the use of very expensive and complicated machines, the construction and necessary repairs of which would require a considerable capital. Thus, in tances not unfrequently occur, wherein men rise from low beginnings, if Lot to excessive wealth, yet to a situation of comfort and independence.

It is another advantage of the domestic system of manufacture, and an advantage which is obvious y not confined to the individuals who are engaged in it, but which, as well as other parts of this system, extends its benefits to the landholder, that any sudden stoppage of a foreign market, any failure of a great house, or any other of those adverse shocks to which our foreign trade especially is liable, in its present extended state, has not the effect of throwing a great number of workmen out of employ, as it often does, when the stroke falls on the capital of a single individual. In the domestic system, the loss is spread over a large superficies; it affects the whole body of the manufacturers; and, though each little master be a sufferer, yet few if any feel the blow so severely as to be altogether ruined. Moreover, it appears in evidence, that, in such cases as these, they seldom turn off any of their standing set of journey

men, but keep them at work in hopes of better times.

On the whole, your committee feel no little satisfaction in bearing their testimony to the merits of the domestic system of manufacture; to the facilities it affords to men of steadiness and industry to establish themselves as little master manufacturers, and maintain their families in comfort by their own industry and frugality; and to the encouragement which it thus holds out to domestic habits and virtues. Neither can they omit to notice its favourable tendencies on the health and morals of a large and important class of the community.

But while your committee thus freely recognize the merits and value of the domestic system, they at the same time feel it their duty to declare it as their decided opinion, that the apprehensions entertained of its being rooted out by the factory system, are, at present at least, wholly without foundation.

For, happily, the merchant no less than the domestic manufacturer finds his interest and convenience promoted by the domestic system-while it continues, he is able to carry on his trade with far less capital than if he were to be the manufacturer of his own cloth. Large sums must then be irrecoverably invested in extensive buildings and costly machinery; and, which perhaps is a consideration of even still more force, he must submit to the constant trouble and solicitude of watching oyer a numerous body of workmen. He might then often incur the expence of manufacturing articles, which, from some disappointment in the market, must either be kept on hand, or be sold to a loss. As it is, he can agree with his customer, at home or abroad, for any quantity of goods; and whether on a long expected ora sudden demand, he can repair at once to the market, and most probably purchase to the precise extent of his known wants; or, if the market happen not to furnish what he wishes to purchase, he can give out his sample, and have his order executed immediate y.

While these and various other considerations, which might be stated, interest the merchant, as well as the manufacturer, in the continuance of the domestic system; and when it is remembered that this mode of conducting the trade greatly multiplies the merchants, by enabling men to carry on business with a comparatively small capital, your committee cannot participate in the apprehensions which are entertained by the domestic clothiers. In fact, there are many merchants, of very large capitals and of the highest credit, who for several generations have gone on purchasing in the halls, and some of this very description of persons state to your committee that they not only had no thoughts of setting up factories themselves, but that they believed many of those who had established them, were not greatly atta hed to that system, but only persisted in it because their buildings and machinery must otherwise lie a dead weight upon their hands. Under these circumstances, the lively fears, of the decline of the domestic, and the general estab ishment of the factory system, may reasonably excite surprize It may have been in part occasioned by the decrease of the master manufacturers in the immediate neighbourhood of the large towns, cs

pecially in two or three populous hamlets adjoining to Leeds, whence they have migrated to a greater distance in the country, where they might enjoy a little land, and other conveniencies and comforts. It may have strengthened the impres sion, that, as your committe: have already stated, three or four factories have, within no very long period of time, been established in Leeds, or its vicinity.

But your committee are happy in being able to adduce one irrefragable fact, in corroboration of the sentiments they have already expressed on this question: This is, that the quantity of cloth manufactured by the domestic system has increased mmensely of late years, not only in itself, but as compared with the quantity made in factories.

Several factories, it has been observed, had long been established near Halifax and Huddersfield, but the principal progress of the factory system, and that which chiefly created the alarm, is stated to have been, within about the last fourteen years, in the town and neighbourhood of Leeds.-Your committee succeeded in their endeavours to discover the quantity of cloth annually manufactured in all these factories, and it was found not to exceed 8,000 pieces. According to the provisions of the acts commonly called the Stamping Acts, 11 Geo. II. end 5 and 6 G o. III. Returns are made every Easter to the justices at Pontefra t session, of the quantity of cloth which has been made in the preceding year; the account being kept at the fulling mills by officers appointed for that purpose. These returns your committee carefully examined for the last 14 years, and find that in the year 1792, being by far the greatest year of export then known, there were manufactured 190,332 pieces of broad, and 150,666 pieces of narrow cloth: Yet the quantity of cloth manufactured in 1805 was 300,237 pieces broad, and 165,847 pieces of narrow cloth, giving an increase, in favour of 1805, of 109,905 pieces broad, and 15,181 pieces narrow; from which increase deducting the cloth manufactured in factories, there remains an increase of about 100,000 broad, and 15,181 narrow pieces, to be placed to the account of the domestic system. The comparatively small quantity of cloth manufactured by the factories will excite less surprise, when it is considered that they are better adapted to the manufacturing of fancy goods, of which immense quantities and great varieties have been invented aud sold, chiefly for a foreign market, of late years.

Your committee have the satisfaction of seeing, that the apprehensions entertained of factories are not only vicious in principle, but that they are practically erroneous; to such a degree, that even the very opposite dispositions might be reasonably entertained; nor would it be difficult to prove, that the factories, to a certain extent at least, and in the present day, seem absolutely necessary to the well-being of the domestic system; supplying those very particulars wherein the domestic sys. rem must be acknowledged to be inherently defective: for, it is obvious, that the little master manufacturers cannot afford, like the man who possesses considerable capital, to try the experiments which are requisite, and incur the risks, and even losses, which almost always occur, in inventing and perfecting new articles of manufac

ture, or in carrying to a state of greater perfection articles already established. He cannot learn, by personal inspection, the wants and habits, the arts, manufactures, and improvements of foreign countries; diligence, economy, and prudence are the requisites of his character, not invention, taste, and enterprize; nor would he be warranted in hazarding the loss of any part of his small capital. He walks in a sure road as long as he treads in the beaten track; but he must not deviate into the paths of speculation. The owner of a factory, on the contrary, being commonly possessed of a large capital and having all his workmen employed under his own immediate superintendance, may make experiments, hazard speculations, invent shorter or better modes of performing old processes, may introduce new articles, and improve and perfect old ones, thus giving the range to his taste and fancy, and, thereby alone, enabling our manufacturers to stand the competition with their commercial rivals in other countrics Meanwhile as is well worthy of remark and experience abundantly warrants the assertion), many of these new fabrics and inventions, when their success is once established, become general among the whole body of manufacturers: the domestic m✩nufacturers themselves thus benefiting, in the end, from those very factories which had been at first the objects of their jealousy. The history of almost all our other manufactures, in which great improvements have been made of late years, in some cases at an immense expence, and after numbers of unsuccessful experiments, strikingly illustrates and enforces the above remarks. It is besides an acknowledged fact, that the owners of factories are often among the most extensive purchasers at the halls, where they buy from the domestic clothier the established articles of manufacture, or are able at once to answer a great and sudden order; while at home, and under their own superintendance, they make their fancy goods, and any articles of a newer, more costly, or more delicate quality, to which they are enabled by the domestic system to apply a much larger proportion of their capital. Thus, the two systems, instead of rivalling, are mutual aids to each other; each supplying the other's defects, and promoting the other's prosperity.

The committee, therefore, feel it to be their duty to recommend the repeal of thed and 3d of Phil. and Mary, or the Weavers' Act.

The 5th of Eliz. c. 4, may be said to controul the manufacturer in the making of his cloth, inasmuch as it prescribes the peculiar description of persons who shall alone be suffered to employ either themselves or others in the woollen manufacture; by prohibiting the engaging or working in it to all who have not served a regular apprenticeship under indentures, or as apprentices (for the acts make this distinction) for the term of seven years.

The system of apprenticeship is obviously more congenial with the domestic than the factory system; and therefore your committee were not surprised to find that it has maintained its ground more generally in the North than in the West of England, where, however, a practice of a similar kind and under a peculiar name (that of colting) has pretty generally prevailed; but rather, as your committee understand, from custom, than from a

sense of the obligations of the law. The domestic clothiers of Yorkshire are strenuous opponents of the repeal of this statute; agreeing in this respect with the cloth workers or shearmen, from whom they entirely differ as to the policy which ought to be pursued as to certain articles of machinery. They allege, that were the apprentice law no longer binding, the working manufacturers would gradually become less skilful and intelligent, and that, therefore, its maintenance and enkurcement are indispensably necessary to the good quality, consequently to the credit and sale, of the manufacture

They also frankly allow, that they wish to retain this law, on account of its tending to embarrass the carrying on the factory system, and thereby to counteract its growth.

It does not seem to your committee to be neCessary to enter very largely, at this day, into the discussion of this part of the subject; the less so, because even the manufacturers themselves have not appeared very consistent in their conduct in relation to it. The two principal cloth halls at Leeds are under the management of a certain number of trustees, who serve for three years, being clected from the clothiers at large, as the most discreet and intelligent of their body, to watch over the general interests of the manufacture, and in particular to consider and superintend the execution of all the regulations and b e-laws made from time to time for the government of the halls. Formerly, no clothier was allowed to expose his goods to sale in those halls, unless he had served an apprenticeship, or as an apprentice for seven years. But it appears in evidence before your committee, that, in or about the year 1797, a new regulation was adopted, and that it originated with the trustees of the respective halls; by which, persons having served an apprenticeship, or exercised the trade of a clothier for five years, were entitled to all the privileges of the hall. A still further extension of this principle appears to have taken place subsequently, in one of the halls, by admitting all persons, without any condition or qualification. It has not been stated to your committee indeed the very contrary has been admitted without contradiction) that there has appeared any deterioration in the quality of the manufacture since the above relaxation took place. And it is notorious, that our woollen manufactures have been for some time gradually improving in quality and increasing in amount on the one hand, while on the other, the system of apprenticeship had been in many parts of the country greatly disused, until the general attention was called to the subject, by the discussions which commenced less than four years ago.

This state of things, and the circumstances above related, supersede the necessity there might otherwise be, of considering how far the right of those who had actually served an apprenticeship in the woollen manufacture, might be rendered less valuabic, by taking away their exclusive pri vilege.

But, in truth, it scarcely needs be remarked, that when the statute of apprenticeships was matter of positive and universal obligation, the state of habits and manners was extremely different from what it is at the present day. Hence we fin, in the same statute, several other provisions

VOL. I. [Lit. Pan. Oct. 1806.]

wholly inapplicable, at least to these times, such, for instance, as that which requires that the parents of every clothier's apprentice should have 31. per annum in land, with others of a like description.

The moral arguments also in favour of apprenticeships can no longer have the same force, when few masters receive their apprentices under their own roof, or consider them as members of their family; and in our times, when it must be confessed that the influence of the opinions and feelings of subordination, formerly prevalent, has so greatly declined, it is likewise too often found, that the apprentice, when he approaches the terni of manhood, and, having become a competent workman, should compensate to his ma ter the expence and trouble of his instruction and maintenance, becomes discontented and unruly. Often he quits his master's service, or, if he reluctantly continues in it, habits of idleness and dissipation are incurably contracted by a youth, who, had he himself tasted the immediate fruits of his own industry, might have been formed to the opposite habits of sobriety and diligence. But still more, when the 5th of Elizabeth was passed our manufactures were confined almost entirely to the supply of the home market, a branch of commerce which is in a great degree exempt from the operation of those sudden shocks and vicissi-udes to which a foreion trade is liable, from the operation not merely of commercial, but also of political causes; shocks whereby great numbers of workmen, being at once thrown out of their old employment, are driven to seek some new, perhaps some kindred occupation, for the maintenance of their families. A rigid enforcement of the apprentice laws would obviously preclude any occasional transfer of this sort, while, of the benefits to be derived from it, your committee, in the course of their enquiries, have received an express confirmation, by finding, that in the westerni parts of Yorkshire the makers of certain articles composed of wool, had, on their trade declining, turned with no great difficulty to the cotton manufacture, to which the restraints of the apprentice law do not apply; and, though their old employment had failed them, had thereby obtained a comfortab e livelihood.

As to the necessity of apprenticeship, in order to insure a competent degree of skill in the workmen employed in the woollen manufacture, though much evidence in support of it has been adduced before your committee, by the petitioners; yet at this day, when the true principles of commerce are so generally understood and acknowledged, it cannot be necessary for your committee to do more than refer to them, in order to evince the fallacy of such an opinion. On advering therefore to the various considerations above stated, while your committee would by no means wish absolutely to prohibit apprenticeships, or by rendering them illegal to prevent their being entered into where any persons, whether in a commercial or a moral view, find them suited to their circumstances, or agreeable to their inclinations, they yet feel it their duty, so far as regards the woollen manufacture, to recommend the repeal of those clauses of the 5th Eliz. c. 4, which ren ders apprenticeships compulsory.

The committee recommend the repeal of the

F

STAMPING LAWS, for the West of England; but leave the question undecided in reference to the North.

The committee, in the course of their examihation, received occasional notices of the existence in the clothing district of Yorkshire of an institution or society, chiefly consisting of cloth Workers, or shearmen; and, though it was alledged that the object of the institution, and of the payments made to it, was to effect and conduct the application to parliament for preventing the repeal of laws which the parties eonceived to be necessary to the well being of the manufacture, yet various circumstances concurred to render this explanation far from satisfactory, and strongly to suggest the idea of a connection with some other transactions which had taken place not long before in the manufacturing district, and in which, from their nature, the interests of all commercial men were deeply involved. Your Committee,there'ore, thought it right to scrutinize the affair more accurately.

It appears that there has existed for some time, an institution, or society, among the woollen manufacturers, consisting chiefly of cloth workers. In each of the principal manufacturing towns there appears to be a society, composed of deputies chosen from the several shops of workmen, from each of which town-societies one or more deputies are chosen, to form what is called the central committee, which meets as occasion requires, at some place suitable to the local convenience of all parties. The powers of the central committee appear to pervade the whole institution; and any determination or measure which it may adopt, may be communicated with ease throughout the whole body of manufacturers. Every workman, on his becoming a member of the society, receives a certain card, or ticket, on which is an emblematical engraving, the same, the committee are assured, both in the north and the west of England, that by producing his ticket he may at once shew he belongs to the society. The same rules and regulations appear to be in force throughout the whole district; and there is the utmost reason to believe, that no clothworker would be suffered to carry on his trade, otherwise than in sclitude, who should refuse to submit to the obligations and rules of the society. A stated weekly contribution, greater or less according to existing circumstances, is required from every member; and of course the sum raised in this way may be, and in fact has been, very considerable. From this fund was defrayed a very considerab'e part of the expences of several different applications to parliament, as well as of that which is now depending. This was no doubt strictly legal. But, what is no less clearly contrary to law, it also appears, that from the same fund, liberal weekly allowances have been made to whole shops of workmen, who have turned out, as it is called; that is, who have illegally combined to quit the service of some particular master who had become obnoxious to them, and thereby to force him into a compliance with their terms. It likewise appears that the society, which, by embracing only the workmen in the woollen manufacture throughout so large a district, must, both from its numbers, and its pecuniary resources, have become a very powerful body, had formed a

sort of confederacy, cemented as it appears, by mutual contributions and payments, with various other classes of artificers, nowise connected with the woollen trade; and that these connections, and the effects of them, were not confined to the clothing district, but that they extended to various parts of England, and your committee have reason to believe, into Scotland also. Your com. mittee purposely abstain from being more particular; it appears sufficient for them, in this place, to exhibit a general and summary view; but they think it may be useful to specify one extraordinary fact. The following anonymous letter, dated September 28th, 1805, came by the post to two of the principal fire insurance companies in London:

"Gent. Directors,

"At a general but private meeting of the chairman of all the committees of clothworkers in this county (viz. York) it was ordered to desire you (for your own profitt) not to insure any factory where any machinery was in belonging to the clothworkers. For it was ordred again, to petition parliament for our rights; and, if they will not grant us them, by stopping the machinery belong us, we are determined to grant them ourselves, but does not wish you to be any loser thereby. By order of the cloth workers.

"Sept. 28, 1805.

"N. B. Only remember Bradley Mill in this county, which did not do 1-6th of what was wishd for; and expect more about Decr. W. R. Superscription "Royal Exchange

"Insuring Office, London.

"W. R."

The above letter requires no explanation.➡ The committee need only add, that the letter appears from the post-mark really to have been sent from Huddersfield, and that a meeting of the institution, at which much business was done, appears to have been held at Leeds on the day of its date. Your committee, however, by no means intend to charge so foul a proceeding either directly, or by insinuation, on the meeting in question, much less, on the general body of the society. But the transaction (and the remark deserves the most serious consideration of every member of the society) strikingly tends to shew the dangerous purposes which such institutions may be made to answer; the imputations which the members who engage in them may bring upon their character; and, above all, the conduct for which they may in the end become responsible. On the nature and tendencies of an association of this sort, it cannot be necessary for your committee, in addressing the House of Commons of the United Kingdom, to enlarge; especially when, as in the present instance, it has been carried to such an extent as to comprehend within its range almost all the working part of the community. How liable such institutions are to be abused, even when originally formed for an innocent, and even a meritorious purpose, is remarkably evinced by the history of this very institution; the funds of which appear, for a time to have been applied to the relief of the sick, though they were afterwards diverted to very different purposes. It must be obvious to any

* Bradley Mill was in part consumed by fire no long time before.