INDUSTRIAL VILLAGES. ' 261 



The distribution of the textile factories in 

 the other counties of the United Kingdom is 

 even more instructive. We learn that there 

 are nearly 2,000 textile factories in forty-nine 

 counties, and everyone of these factories has 

 much less than 100 workpeople ; while a 

 very considerable number of them employ 

 only from forty to fifty, from ten to twenty, 

 and even less than ten persons.* 



This could have been foreseen by everyone 

 who has some practical knowledge of industry, 

 but it is overlooked by the theorists, who 

 know industry mostly from books. In every 

 country of the world there are by the side of 

 the large factories a great number of small 

 ones, the success of which is due to the variety 

 of their produce and the facilities they offer 

 to follow the vagaries of fashion. This is 

 especially true with regard to the woollens and 

 the mixed stuffs made of wool and cotton. 



Besides, it is well known to British manu- 

 facturers that at the time when the big cotton 

 mills were established, the manufacturers of 



* From the curve that I computed it appears that all the 

 textile factories are distributed as to their size as follows : 

 Not less than. 500 operatives, 200 factories, 203,100 operatives ; 

 from 499 to 200, 660 factories, 231,000 operatives ; from 199 

 to 100, 2,955 factories, 443,120 operatives; from 99 to 50, 

 1,380 factories, 103,500 operatives; less than 50, 1,410 

 factories, 42,300 operatives; total, 6,605 factories, 1,022,020 

 operatives. Nineteenth Century, August, 1900, p. 262. 



