SMALL INDUSTRIES AND INDUSTRIAL VILLAGES. 131 



until now, especially in the woollen and silk trades, by 

 the side of big factories in which 50, IOO, or 5000 wage- 

 workers, as the case may be, are working with the 

 employers' machinery and are paid in time-wages so 

 much the day or the week. 



The small industries are thus quite a world, which, 

 remarkable enough, continues to exist even in the most 

 industrial countries, side by side with the big factories. 

 Into this world we must now penetrate to cast a glimpse 

 upon it : a glimpse only, because it would take volumes 

 to describe its infinite variety of pursuits and organisa- 

 tion, and its infinitely varied connection, with agriculture 

 as well as with other industries. 



Most of the petty trades, except some of those which 

 are connected with agriculture, are, we must admit, in a 

 very precarious position. The earnings are very low, 

 and the employment is often uncertain. The day of 

 labour is by two, three, or four hours longer than it is in 

 well-organised factories, and at certain seasons it reaches 

 an almost incredible length. The crises are frequent and 

 last for years. Altogether, the worker is much more at 

 the mercy of the dealer, or the employer, and the em- 

 ployer is at the mercy of the wholesale dealer. Both 

 are liable to become enslaved to the latter, running into 

 debt to him. In some of the petty trades, especially 

 in the fabrication of the plain textiles, the workers are 

 in dreadful misery. But those who pretend that such 

 misery is the rule are totally wrong. Any one who has 

 lived among, let us say, the watchmakers in Switzerland 

 and knows their inner family life, will recognise that the 

 condition of these workers is out of all comparison 

 superior, in every respect, material and moral, to the 

 conditions of millions of factory hands. Even during 

 such a crisis in the watch trade as was lived through 

 in 1876-80, their condition was preferable to the con- 

 dition of factory hands during a crisis in the woollen 



