44
The high counts of yarn mentioned here were, at that time,as yet scarcely spun on the Continent of Europe , because it didnot possess tho needful skilled workers for them. They werespun, outside of England , only by Indian hand-spinners, whosedexterity up to then had been the wonder of Europe . Theselinest Indian muslins were termed “ woven -wind ”; they wereextraordinarily expensive, because counts of yarn up to 240'swere not seldom in them. But although the Indian femalespinner of those fine yarns, up to then unattained on the newerContinent, received 9d. per week, the English spinner, there-fore, earning 40 to 50 times as much, tho latter neverthelessdestroyed the ancient industrial art still existing at this time,which (paradoxical enough) succumbed to dear labour, to labourwhich, as the table on page 43 shows, was about four times asdear as in England (24).
But a similar process developed also within England, in thatthe place where the industry progressed most strongly was wherepiecework wages were certainly lower, but, on the other hand,the weekly earnings and standard of living of the spinner wasthe highest. Thus at that time Manchester raised itself aboveGlasgow , which, notwithstanding considerably lower weeklywages, paid higher piecework wages (25).
It is everywhere a fact capable of proof that with CentralisedIndustrial development a continuous decline of piecework wagesis accompanied with a continuous increase in the income of theworker. Upon what does this result depend 1 In order to under-stand it, we must grasp it as a continuation of that old-timedevelopment which once raised labour from slavery to freedom.The fettered or slave worker, who acomplishes labour by externalpressure, is chained to the minimum of life; the master doesnot, as a matter of course, spend more than is absolutely necessaryfor maintaining and perpetuating labour. It has to be viewedas a permanent factor, that it was economical progress whichemancipated the worker. Only the most primitive tools canbe put into the hands of slaves (26). Economical progress de-
24. Compare Ure: “Cotton Manufacture,” I., p. 45. Compare also thework quoted by Boscher, I., par. 40 : “La main d’ceuvre est chore en Eussie. ”
25. Committee on Manufactures (5,339), and Baines, p. 440.
20. Thus slaves in America could not be trusted with horses, but only withmules. Compare Boscher: “System,” I, par. 71. Agricultural exhaustionof land can only he permanently connected with slavery. Compare Baines“ Slave Power ” (London, 1863); and Mackenzie Wallace: “ Bussia,” where asimilar state is reported in America and Bussia.