i 9 4 LIFE AND EXPERIENCES CHAP. 



of 83,000 inhabitants greatly exceeded the entire 

 export of silk from the United Kingdom. Our 

 informant insisted that the chief motive power in all 

 this development had been the Weaving School, and 

 that its influence had been chiefly felt in two important 

 branches in which the factory is most liable to fall 

 behind, viz., designing and dyeing. It was shrewdly 

 remarked by one of the manufacturers, " The day has 

 gone when I can make money without effort ; to exist 

 I must move on ; my neighbour compels me." We 

 were further told that employers are constantly on the 

 look-out for students who have attended the school. 



We were much struck by the fact that the members 

 of the Council of the Chamber of Commerce, with one 

 or two exceptions, all spoke English fluently ; they 

 had all visited England frequently, as their trade was 

 mainly with this country. At a luncheon which was 

 given us, toasts were proposed and speeches made in 

 English, and we often asked each other, " Where in 

 any town in Britain could a deputation of Germans or 

 Frenchmen find a Chamber cf Commerce, or indeed 

 representatives of any public body, all able and willing 

 to address the foreigners in their tongue ? " 



All this is now, one is thankful to think, to a great 

 extent a matter of ancient history. The textile 

 schools in Manchester, Leeds, Bradford, and other 

 places, in equipment and staff, are now, to say the 

 least of it, equal to any of the continental textile 

 schools, whilst the results thus effected upon the trade 

 of those districts by the introduction of new methods 

 and the perfection of old ones is a matter of notoriety. 



We not only devoted our attention to the great 

 manufacturing centres, and assured ourselves of the 

 enormous influence which technical schools have 

 exerted on every branch of what may be called the 



