SOME PROBLEMS OF AGRICULTURAL LABOR 86l 



must be considered as entering upon a new phase. A few of the 

 important facts are as follows: 



Till the end of the nineteenth century the question of trade unions 

 had never arisen among French agricultural labourers, and it seemed 

 improbable that it would ever arise, because these labourers were 

 isolated from one another, leading the same life as their employer, 

 working with him, and eating at his table. It was among the wood- 

 cutters of the central parts of France that the question first attracted 

 attention. The position of these woodcutters seems to be somewhat 

 peculiar. According to M. Souchon they are only employed in the 

 woods for a part of the year. During the months of November and 

 December they are occupied in felling trees, and for a fortnight hi 

 spring in barking them. This trade not being exercised continu- 

 ously, a woodcutter must have other means of support. He is gen- 

 erally also an agricultural labourer. 



Toward 1891 there was a considerable depreciation of wages which 

 led to strikes, the first of which were not planned by any pre-existing 

 organization, but during the cessation of work syndicates were con- 

 stituted. In June, 1892, fifty syndicates in the department of Cher 

 alone met in a congress, and claimed to represent more than 6,000 

 workmen. In the course of two seasons, 1891-92 and 1892-93, the 

 workmen succeeded in having their wages nearly doubled. 



The syndicates rapidly disappeared, but in 1902 under the auspices 

 of the General Labour Confederation, the Labour Exchange of Bourges 

 organized a congress of woodcutters at which the foundation was laid 

 of a National Federation of Labourers on the Land. 



The woodcutters' syndicates acted not only through strikes but 

 also tried to work by appealing to the force of the law and by the 

 extension of co-operation, but M. Souchon believes that these efforts 

 were merely secondary. They sought legal intervention to secure 

 the extension of laws respecting the labour of women and children to 

 agriculture, to claim for labourers in the state forests the application 

 of the decrees of the nth of October, 1899, respecting state contrac- 

 tors, and to obtain the appointment of agricultural experts. The 

 syndicates have often demanded that the state should manage its 

 own forests directly through its own agents, the exclusion of dealers 

 facilitating the formation of co-operative societies of woodcutters. 

 The woodcutters' syndicates have in fact taken up the question of 

 co-operation, and in 1905 at their annual congress, they drew up a 

 vast programme of co-operation for consumption and for production 



