The Locomotive - Lighthouse Survival Blog

168 THE LOCOMOTIVE. [November,
cause — over-production — he devotes greater space. Iu this relation he says: "The
truth about the matter I believe to be that the condition of things, which we agree to
call over-production, or depression of trade, is not primarily due to machinery, but in a
great measure, to the reckless borrowing by impecunious States, communities, and asso-
ciations, encouraged by the imprudence of financiers, and the credulity of the public as
to the powers of governments and other debtors to fullril their obligations. The
abnormal and unwarranted demand for goods from those put in easy possession of borrowed
funds is rapidly met by the setting in motion of modern machinery — itself
partly brought into existence by the necessity temporarily created. High prices become
the rule, until the inevitable glut takes place, when there follows the revulsion to prices
that are unremunerative. The fall in values is, perhaps, increased in rapidity by
machinery, but the unwholesome stimulus is not immediately traceable to mechanical
appliances." This explanation is more satisfactory to the capitalist than to the laborer,
for the latter seldom reaps such a harvest during the good times as will carry him com-
fortably over the periods of depression. It is undoubtedly true that machinery does dis-
place manual labor very often, and that it does not always produce such a lowering in
price that the increased demand reinstates the men who have been superseded. Mr.
Inglis finds from the census returns, by Messrs. Booth, Hobson, and Marshall, that while
the output of textile goods has enormously increased, the proportion of labor employed
in their production has continuously diminished. Again, while the rural population
has declined but little, the number of persons engaged in agricultural labor has largely
decreased, and this falling off began long before the comparatively recent fall in rents,
and what is known as the decay of agriculture in this country. What has become of the
persons that would, had the strict ratio been maintained, have followed these pursuits ?
Evidently they have turned to others, either old or new. Commercial pursuits, shop-
keeping, transport, and other industries show an increase beyond their due proportions;
shipbuilding afforded employment to 40 per cent, more persons in 1891 than 1881 ; the
making of machinery and tools required an increase of 28 per cent, during the decade:
those engaged in road traffic and in the industries connected with it show an increase;
coal miners have grown in numbers 35 per cent, in ten years, while the output has only
augmented 20 per cent. Of those released from manual labor, many have betaken themselves
to professions. Clergymen, lawyers, doctors, teachers, painters, actors, and
musicians are far more numerous, proportionately, than they were; and their pleasant
lives are all due to machinery.
Indeed, were it not for machinery many of the inhabitants of this kingdom would
not exist. The population of England at the Norman Conquest was about 2,000,000;
in 500 years it had scarcely doubled. The conditions of life when muscle was the sole
motive power, were too hard for all but the exceptionally strong. Professor J. W.
Draper has given us a picture of existence in the middle ages. "The houses were of
wood, daubed with clay, and thatched with straw and reeds. They had no windows, and,
until the invention of the saw-mill, very few had wooden floors. The luxury of a carpet
was unknown; some straw scattered in the room supplied its place. There were no
chimneys; the smoke of the ill-fed, cheerless fire escaped through a hole in the roof.
. . . . The bed was usually a bag of straw, a wooden log served as the pillow."
iEneas Sylvius, who afterwards became Pope Pius II, has left an account of a journey he
made to the British Isles in 1430. He describes the houses of the peasantry as con-
structed of stones put together without mortar; the roofs were of turf, a stiffened bull's
hide served for the door. The food consisted of coarse vegetable products. In some