IBANSACTIONS OF SECTION F. 855 



^irosperity upon caprice, is directly opposed to thrift. Nor does it seem likely that 

 the future of the Nottingham lace trade will be more stable than it has been in the 

 past. Fashion is beginning to change more rapidly than it did, but, on the other 

 hand, more things become fashionable in a single season, and the choice for the 

 public is greater. There may be a greater volume of trade done as lace becomes 

 increasingly popular with the million, but there are more rivals springing up to 

 share that trade. Prices will never reach the fabulous height that the Nottingham 

 monopolists used to obtain ; and thus, while there is no diminution in the expensive- 

 mesa of the manufacture, the profits will be seriously lessened. 



2. On Agricidtural Depression. By W. J. Allsebrook. 



3. On Home Work — The Share of the Woman in Family Maintenance. 

 By Miss Ada Heather-Bigg. 



A little while ago it was generally believed that excessive toil, starvation 

 wages, and insanitary surroundings were due to the action of sub-contract. The 

 painstaking inquiries of Mr. 0. Booth, Mr. David Schloss, and Mrs. S. Webb soon 

 showed that sub-contract was not responsible for these evils. It is now asserted 

 that home work is. The outcry against sub-contract had been swelled by the 

 antagonism of labour to capital — by the dislike of the man who works for wages 

 to the man who works for profit. 



The outcry against home work is being swelled by the hostility of the working 

 anan to the woman wage-earner. 



Common sense and a fear of alienating public sympathy prevent the working- 

 «lass leaders from too openly condemning the employment of women altogether, 

 but special classes of women-workers are being constantly singled out for attack. 



The wage-earning of married women (albeit in their own homes) is particularly 

 •denounced. It is alleged that this makes women joint earners with their husbands, 

 and tends to substitute the wife for the husband as bread-winner. 



As a matter of fact, however, women of the working classes always have been 

 joint bread-winners with their husbands. At no time in the world's history has 

 the man's labour alone sufficed for the maintenance of his wife and children. So 

 far from keeping his wife, the true account of the matter is that he and she have 

 iept themselves and the children. 



This truth has long been admitted and acted upon in France. It was affirmed 

 ■of England before the Ind. Remun. Conference. ' Not more than half the whole 

 number of working-class families,' said Miss Simcox, are maintained by the labour 

 of the father assisted only by the elder children.' 



It has been shown to apply even to the United States, where, though the total 

 family income is higher than in Europe, and the husband's contribution to it is 

 also larger, there are only a few industries in which, unaided, he can support his 

 family. Even in the bar-iron industry one-tenth has to be made up. 



In Belgium it is calculated that the husband earns three-fifths and the wife 

 two-fifths. 



Talk about the gradual substitution of the woman for the man as bread-earner 

 is absurd. The woman's share in household maintenance is no more than it ever 

 was. The facts have not altered, but the conditions of modern industry enable us 

 to see what the facts are. 



In short, a revelation is going on, not a substitution. 



Formerly, a woman working for a family in her home had to pick up faggots, 

 fetch water, bake bread, spin flax and wool, cure, pickle, preserve, churn, wash, 

 knit, &c. 



To-day, at any rate in big cities, the wife's household work means only mend- 

 ing, washing, cleaning, cooking, care of children being the same in both cases. 



Even amongst working men there are some enlightened enough to see that 

 the ideal to be aimed at is not that the man should be the sole bread-winner, but 



