42 EXTRAORDINARY DIFFERENCES OF 



What is here meant by a uniform amount of 

 wages, is not the value of labour in so much 

 gold or silver, whether paid in the shape of 

 day's wages, or the stipulated price per piece ; 

 but what will produce an uniform or regular 

 quantity of food, clothing, and household accom- 

 modation of a uniform quality. The price of 

 provisions and other necessaries of life fluctuates 

 very much ; but a labouring man can only 

 perform a certain uniform quantity of work, 

 and hence, on the counterpart, requires a certain 

 uniform supply of those necessaries to enable 

 him to do so. This equitable principle will be 

 found in general to regulate the wages of the 

 workmen of both England and the Lowlands of 

 Scotland at present. For instance, we paid 

 our servants an advance on their wages in cash 

 of eightpence per day, being at the rate of 

 10/. 8s. per annum in 1847 over 1846. This, 

 however, was no advance of their incomes ; nor 

 were their domestic circumstances in 1847 even 

 equal, after all, to what they had been in 1846. 

 In the latter year they suffered considerably, 

 along with the community at large. 



The wages which we paid in 1846 were 10s. 

 and 12s. weekly, and in 1847 14s. and 16s. to 



