It is stated in a report of the Commissioners appointed in 1832 to
inquire concerning the employment of women and children in factories,
that 'in the cotton-mill of Messrs Houldsworth, in Glasgow, a spinner
employed on a mule of 336 spindles, and spinning cotton 120 hanks to
the pound, produced in 1823, working 74-1/2 hours a week, 46 pounds of
yarn, his net weekly wages for which amounted to 27s. 7d. Ten years
later, the rate of wages having in the meantime been reduced 13 per
cent., and the time of working having been lessened to 69 hours, the
spinner was enabled by the greater perfection of the machinery to
produce on a mule of the same number of spindles, 52-1/2 pounds of
yarn of the same fineness, and his net weekly earnings were advanced
from 27s. 7d. to 29s. 10d.' Similar results from similar circumstances
were experienced in the Manchester factories. The cheapening of the
article produced by help of machinery increases the demand for the
article; and there being consequently a need for an increased number
of workmen, the elevation of wages follows as a matter of course. Nor
is this the only benefit which the working-man derives in the case,
for he shares with the community in acquiring a greater command over
the necessaries which machinery is concerned in producing.--_Condensed
from a Lecture by G. R. Porter to the Wandsworth Literary and
Scientific Association._
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