APPENDIX. 4 



silk which were manufactured in the Lyons region were 

 manufactured by hand.* Twenty years before that 

 is, about 1865 there were only from 6,000 to 8,000 

 power-looms, and when we take into account both the 

 prosperous period of the Lyons silk industry about 

 1876, and the crisis which it underwent in 1880-1886, 

 we cannot but wonder about the slowness of the trans- 

 formation of the industry. Such is also the opinion of 

 the President of the Lyons Chamber of Commerce, 

 who wrote me that the domain of the power-loom is 

 increased every year, " by including new kinds of 

 stuffs, which formerly were reputed as unfeasible in 

 the power-looms ; but," he added, " the transformation 

 of small workshops into factories still goes on so slowly 

 that the total number of power-looms reaches only from 

 20,000 to 25,000 out of an aggregate of from 100,000 

 to 110,000." (Since that time it certainly must have 

 considerably increased.) 



The leading features of the Lyons silk industry are 

 the following : 



The preparatory work winding off, warping and so 

 on is mostly made in small workshops, chiefly at 

 Lyons, with only a few workshops of the kind in the 

 villages. Dyeing and finishing are also made of 

 course, in great factories and it is especially in dyeing, 

 which occupies 4,000 to 5,000 hands, that the Lyons 

 manufacturers have attained their highest repute. 

 Not only silks are dyed there, but also cottons and 

 wools, and not only for France, but also to some 

 extent for London, Manchester, Vienna, and even 



* I take these figures, from a detailed letter which the Presi- 

 dent of the Lyons Chamber of Commerce kindly directed to me 

 in April, 1885, to Clairvaux, in answer to my inquiries about the 

 subject. I avail myself of this opportunity for addressing to him 

 my best thanks for his most interesting communication. 



