CHAPTER XIV 



UNEMPLOYMENT — CONGESTION IN TRADES, PROFESSIONS, I 



AND INDUSTRIES — CAUSE AND EFFECT WHO AND ; 



WHAT ARE TO BLAME ? 



Employment and all that it involves is one of the most im- 

 portant factors in the domestic economy of tlie human race, and 

 yet it remains one of the least understood problems of daily 

 life. With the exception of that comparatively small section 

 of what is called the — favoured few ; that is to say, that gilded 

 band of monied idlers of whom it may be said — "work is 

 not their earthly portion," every human entity is personally 

 and particularly interested in this vast question of Employment. 

 This ubiquitous quality has the mercurial properties of quick- 

 silver, and it will be found in every grade of society running 

 hither and thither, touching every human being and trickling 

 over into every highway and byway of human life. The Bank 

 Manager and the Chief Secretary of a great public company are 

 as much interested in this all-embracing question as the poor 

 typewriter or the shabby clerk ; while the Board of Directors, 

 sitting in their sumptuously appointed Board room, shaping the 

 destinies of vast industrial enterprises, are not a whit less 

 affected by it than the sweating, toiling thousands in mill or 

 factory whom they control. 



Work — Man's Poetion 



Labour is man's portion, and it is a good and a fitting 

 portion ; for a man without work is like a ship without a rudder. 

 " In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread, till thou return 

 unto the ground," said the old Commandment ; and whether 

 or not we believe in the old story of man's first disobedience 

 and the " curse " which followed it, the fact that our lot is 

 — Toil, is patent enough to all. The millionaire and the 

 beggar, the pauper and the prince, noble and simple, the poor 

 matchbox makers and the grande dame, the miller and the 



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