250 Mineral Trades 



ently or associate with him working tinners and all work together; 

 the output and the charges are then divided into as many "Doales" 

 or shares as there are laborers. This becomes what is known in min- 

 ing organization as the "cost agreement" system whenever any of the 

 partners, instead of working personally, hire substitutes to do their 

 share. This system's chief \irtue is that it offers a way for "sleeping 

 partners" who contribute capital but are exempt from management 

 of the venture; by this means the working capital of the community is 

 conserved and little lies idle. It was an opening for capitalistic pro- 

 duction. The second method of mining organization is called the 

 "tribute" system. The mine association set out the tributers with 

 mine and tools and supplies; the tributers di\aded the ore with the 

 associates in some predetermined proportion. This method leant 

 itself to the independence of the tributer and to the exploitation of 

 the mines, but was always transitionary and ended in a wage system 

 because the tributers were weak as bargainers with the tributee and 

 as sellers of their ore to the merchants. The third system was 

 the lease. If any mine associates lacked the means of operating 

 their mines or any mine it was farmed out to a lessee for a fixed 

 money rental; the lessee was a man of some capital; he took all the 

 risks and the profits; and operated it mostly by hired labor. Roughly 

 stated, the above order of treatment indicates the historical order 

 in which the cost agreement, tribute, and lease systems acquired 

 prominence over each other. It is noticeable that they each opened 

 the way for capitalism. 



During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries capitalistic organi- 

 zation was increasingly evident. The original "doals" system of 

 partnership evolved into the "cost-book" system.^ The doals were 

 transferable rights and the tinner-partners sold them sometimes to 

 Cornish merchants; laws were repeatedly enacted against the disposi- 

 tion of tin doals to the more wealthy and powerful.'^ Many persons 

 of various occupations, as goldsmiths, pewterers, clerks, nobles, 

 churchmen, widows, merchants, etc., were contributors to the town 

 coinage; they evidently did not work themselves in the mines and 

 were "sleeping partners" under the "cost agreement" plan. Such 

 was the condition during the later medie\'al period. By 1765 the 

 tribute system, somewhat more capitalistic, seems to ha\'e prevailed. 



' James, Pseudo-Cost-Book Companies, 22, 45; Bartlctl, Treatise on British 

 Mining, 24; "Cornish IMining," 11; Report on Stannary Amendment Bill, 1887; 

 Watson, Compendium of Brit. IMining, 11; Pike, Britain's ISIetal Mines, 52. 



- Lewis, 189. 



