70 



By the Eev. E. H. Clutteebuck. 



[Read before the Society at Andorer, Aagnst, 1883.1 



CAN believe it quite possible that tbe title I have chosen 

 for this paper may be supposed to have some reference to 

 that unfortunate result of unfavourable weather which we all un- 

 feignedly lament as a misfortune, not only to the agricultural interest, 

 but— since agriculture is as the heart of the country— through that 

 to every rank and every interest in the land. 



Or, perhaps, it may be taken as a desire to indicate that for more 

 than the usual " few days only," " alarming sacrifices," and " tre- 

 mendous reductions," and " awful losses " have been attractive 

 advertisements in a certain line of business. 



But it is not my object to touch on either of these subjects, 

 although what I have to say is entirely about drapery, and the 

 depression I have to speak of as real, and even perhaps as severe, as 

 that which has been the unhappy experience of the last few years. 



What I have set before myself is, to endeavour to give you an 

 illustration, in the lightest way I can, of some of the facts mentioned 

 in a paper in the ninth volume of your transactions, on the Merchants 

 of the Staple, by the Rev. Canon Jones ; a paper of transcendent 

 excellence, of which your society, famed as you are for more than 

 usually good papers, cannot fail to be proud. 



In that most admirable paper Canon Jones does in fact give as 

 exhaustive a history of the wool and clothing trades as can be 

 possible in the space assigned to him. I can only venture to 

 slightly illustrate just one point he mentions. It is this. 



To quote the Canon^s words, " The loss of Calais in 1558 deprived 

 England of her foreign staple. None was afterwards established. 

 Indeed, by the middle of the sixteenth century the home manu- 

 factures had so increased that a proportionate diminution took place 

 in the quantity of ^ool carried out of the kingdom." 



