| NUMBER OF SPINDLES. | |||
| 1858 | 1861 | 1868 | |
| England and Wales | 25,818,576 | 28,352,152 | 30,478,228 |
| Scotland | 2,041,129 | 1,915,398 | 1,397,546 |
| Ireland | 150,512 | 119,944 | 124,240 |
| United Kingdom | 28,010,217 | 30,387,494 | 32,000,014 |
| NUMBER OF PERSONS EMPLOYED. | |||
| 1858 | 1861 | 1868 | |
| England and Wales | 341,170 | 407,598 | 357,052 |
| Scotland | 34,698 | 41,237 | 39,809 |
| Ireland | 3,345 | 2,734 | 4,203 |
| United Kingdom | 379,213 | 451,569 | 401,064 |
Hence, between 1861 and 1868, 338 cotton factories disappeared, in other words more productive machinery on a larger scale was concentrated in the hands of a smaller number of capitalists. The number of power-looms decreased by 20,663; but since their product increased in the same period, an improved loom must have yielded more than an old one. Lastly the number of spindles increased by 1,612,541, while the number of operatives decreased by 50,505. The "temporary" misery, inflicted on the workpeople by the cotton-crisis, was heightened, and from being temporary made permanent, by the rapid and persistent progress of machinery.
But machinery not only acts as a competitor who gets the better of the workman, and is constantly on the point of making him superfluous. It is also a power inimical to him, and as such capital proclaims it from the roof tops and as such makes use of it. It is the most powerful weapon for repressing strikes, those periodical revolts of the working class against the autocracy of capital.[1] According to Gaskell, the steam
- ↑ "The relation of master and man in the blown-flint bottle trades amounts to a chronic strike." Hence the impetus given to the manufacture of pressed glass, in which the chief operations are done by machinery. One firm in Newcastle, who formerly produced 350,000 lbs. of blown-flint glass, now produces in its place 3,000,600 lbs. of pressed glass. ("Ch. Empl. Comm. Fourth Rep.," 1865, pp. 262, 268.)
viz, reducing wages 5 per cent. The workpeople resisted, and said that the only remedy was to work short time, 4 days a-week; and their theory was the correct one. After holding out for some time, the self-elected captains of industry had to make up their minds to short time, with reduced wages in some places, and in others without.
