134 ■^' O- ^7^7- 



and ingenuity ading upon capital and machinery, to from ten to fifty 

 times the vakie of it, when purchafed by the manufadurer *. Such 

 are the powers cf machinery -, and fuch are the benefits conferred upon 

 this nation by the inventive genius of Sir Richard Arkwright. 



It happened unfortunately, in the firfl inflance, for the Britifti man- 

 ufadurers, that the Eaft-India company had at this time a very great 

 ftock of piece goods in their warehoufes, and the competition between 

 them and the Britifli fabrics very much deprefl^ed the prices of both. 

 The manufadurers took the alarm, and prefented to the committee of 

 the privy council for trade a memorial, charging the company with 

 having purpofely augmented the quantity of the goods, and lowered the 

 prices, in order to ruin them, and deftroy Britifli induftry, in favour of 

 their own fubjeds in Hindooilan and their own commerce. Tiie fub- 

 flance of the accufation being tranfmitted by the committee of the privy 

 council to the company, it was fo completely anfwered, that the com- 

 mittee were fully convinced that any refliridions upon the company's 

 fales would be prejudicial to the manufitfarers themfelves, throw the 

 trade into the hands of foreigners, and open a door to very extenfive 

 fmuggling for home confumption f . And, indeed, when we confider, 

 that all Eaft-India goods are fold by public fale, it is evident that the 

 demand muft entirely regulate the price, which is fixed by the buyers 

 themfelves : for no one can fuppofe that the company refufed to take 

 as good a price as they could get. Neither was the glut of goods, which 

 now came into the market, and prefixed fo hard upon the manufadurers 

 at the time, permanently hurtful to them, but rather highly beneficial : 

 for it called into employment a vaft number of hawkers of muflins, &c. 

 who, by dint of low prices, diffufed a tafte for thofe goods in the remot- 

 eft villages of the kingdom, where they had fcarcely ever been feen be- 

 fore, and thereby paved the way to a greatly-extended demand for the 

 produdions of the Britifh as well as the India looms, by which the re- 

 gular fales of both are augmented at leaft a hundred-fold. 



Meffieurs Kendrew and Porthoufe of Darlington in York-ftiire, in- 

 vented mills and machinery for fpinning flax, which had been believed 

 incapable of being drawn out and duely twined by any mechanic 

 powers, and took out a parent for their invention. 



The following is believed to be a pretty accurate eftimate of the an- 

 nual amount of the French Levant trade about this time. 



* If we take into confideiation the value in all : a degree of duflility far furpafTing that of 



added tomuflin by tambouring, we may fay, that the fined wool, and perhaps only inferior to that 



a pound of cotton is thereby brought up to the of gold and Clver. 



■value of about £lS> ^^ above a hundred times the ^ A committee of the principal buyers of piece 

 original value. A pound of Dcmararay cotton goods drew up a memorial, expreCing their con- 

 has been fpun by the machinery to the extent of vidion that fuch would be the cafe. 

 356 hanks, meafurir.g S40 yards each, or 169 miles 



