INDUSTRIAL VILLAGES. 315 



big city the industry of fancy-knitting has taken 

 within the last thirty years a sudden develop- 

 ment. Only 2,000 women were employed in it 

 in 1864, but their numbers were estimated by 

 M. Dumazet at 20,000 ; and, without abandon- 

 ing their rural work, they find time to knit, 

 with the aid of small knitting-machines, all 

 sorts of fancy articles in wool, the annual 

 value of whicii attains 360,000.* 



It must not be thought, however, that tex- 

 tiles and connected trades are the only small 

 industries in this locality. Scores of various 

 rural industries continue to exist besides, and 

 in nearly all of them the methods of produc- 

 tion are continually improved. Thus, when the 

 rural making of plain chairs became unprofitable, 

 articles of luxury and stylish chairs began to be 

 fabricated in the villages, and similar trans- 

 formations are found everywhere. 



More details about this extremely interesting 

 region will be found in the Appendix, but one 

 remark must be made in this place. Notwith- 

 standing its big industries and coal mines, this 

 part of France has entirely maintained its rural 

 aspect, and is now one of the best cultivated 

 parts of the country. What most deserves 

 admiration is not so much the development 

 of the great industries, which, after all, here as 



* Ardouin Dumazet, vol. viii., p. 266. 



