56 MANUFACTURING INDUSTRY 



is obvious. In the shape of wages alone, it 

 would place in our over-loaded warehouses 

 20,000,000/. worth of goods annually. This 

 is the very reverse of that reformation which 

 we formerly acknowledged as alike beneficial 

 in its results to all classes of the community. 

 The fact that England and the Lowlands of 

 Scotland are already prepared to supply an- 

 nually this amount of manufactured goods, 

 without the erection of a single pennyworth 

 of machinery, renders the scheme fruitless, 

 were it even possible to be reduced to practice. 

 There can be no doubt that, were it possible 

 to reduce the scheme to practice, it would have 

 for its ultimate result the reduction of our 

 manufacturing interests in the three kingdoms 

 to a uniform level, as to the wages of the 

 artist. But the practical question is, what 

 would that level be ? Undoubtedly, not even the 

 present distressed level of our operatives, but 

 something worse, if worse can possibly be. For 

 the same reason, the introduction of the manu- 

 facturing industry of Ulster into the south and 

 west of Ireland would ultimately reduce the 

 industry of her four provinces to a uniform and 

 common level ; but it is very obvious, that 



