126 THE FARMER AT HOME. 



branches, each of which forms a distinct occupation for the different 

 workmen. Observe the accommodation of the most common artificer 

 or day-laborer in a civilized and thriving country, and you will per- 

 ceive that the number of people, of M'hose industry a part, though but 

 a small part, has been employed in procuring him this accommodation, 

 exceeds all computation. The woolen coat, for example, which 

 covers the laborer, though it may appear coarse and rough, is the 

 produce of the joint labor of a great number of workmen. The 

 shepherds, the sorter of the wool, the carder, the dyer, the spinner, 

 the weaver, the fuller, the dresser, with many others, must all 

 join their different arts to complete even this ordinary production. 

 How many merchants and carriers, besides, must have been employed 

 in transporting the materials from some of those workmen to others 

 who often live in a distant part of the country ! How much com- 

 merce and navigation in particular, how many ship-builders, sailors, 

 sail-makers, rope-makers, must hare been employed, in order to bring 

 together the different drugs made use of by the dyer, which often 

 come from the remotest corners of the world ! What a variety of 

 labor, too, is necessary in order to produce the tools of those workmen ! 

 To say nothing of such complicated machines as the ship of the 

 sailor, the mill of the fuller, or even the loom of the weaver, let us 

 consider only what a variety of labor is requisite to form that very 

 simple machine, the shears with which the shepherd clips the wool. 

 The miner, the builder of the furnace for heating the ore, the burner 

 of the charcoal to be made use of in the smelting-house, the brick- 

 maker, the brick-layer, the workmen who attend the furnace, the 

 mill- wright, the forger, the smith, must all of them join their different 

 arts in order to produce them. 



Were we to examine, in the same manner, all the different parts 

 of his dress and household furniture, the different hands employed in 

 preparing his food, the glass window which lets in the heat and the 

 light, and keeps out the wind and the rain, with all the knowledge 

 and art requisite for preparing that beautiful and happy invention, 

 together with the tools of all the different workmen employed in pro- 

 ducing those different conveniences ; if we examine all these things, 

 and consider what a variety of labor is employed about each of them, 

 we shall be sensible that without the assistance and co-operation of 

 many thousands, the very humblest person in a civilized country could 

 not be provided for, even according to what we falsely imagine the 

 easy and simple manner in which he is commonly accommodated. 

 Compared, indeed, with the more extravagant luxury of the great, 

 his accommodation must no doubt appear extremely simple and easy : 

 and yet it may be true, perhaps, that the accommodation of an Euro- 

 pean prince does not always so much exceed that of an industrious 

 and frugal peasant, as the accommodation of the latter exceeds that 



