449 
PLATE GLASS MANUFACTURE. 
The progress of the plate glass manufacture is very instructive. Owing 
to the obstruction of excise regulations, notwithstanding the reduction 
of the duty in 1819 to 60s. per cwt., the production in 1836 was but 
about 7,000 feet per week. In the latter year, however, the manufac- 
ture ceased to be confined to two houses ; new establishments were 
formed, and in 1845 the production had more than trebled, at a great 
reduction of price. In 1845 the excise duties on glass were abolished, 
and Sir R. Peel, in proposing their abolition, said, " If you leave the 
manufacture altogether disburdened, as in France and Belgium, then, 
with your peculiar advantages of material, the command of alkali and 
coal, my belief is you will supply almost the whole world." And, 
thanks to the wisdom of that measure, freedom from fiscal regulation 
has opened the door to extraordinary advantages, by means of which 
the cost of production has been reduced to a point below that of any 
other country. In coal the savings effected by unrestricted action are 
no less than 80 per cent, in quantity alone, involving a corresponding 
decrease in the cost of furnaces, fire-clay, pots, tools, labour, and also 
in the erection of buildings that now suffice. The cost of coal, there- 
fore, which in London, in 1826, exceeded Is. lOd. on each superficial 
foot of glass, is now about 2d. per foot. Sand, also, which is its base, 
forming as it does nearly three-fifths of its composition, is now obtained 
near London in boundless supplies at 3s. 6d. and upwards per ton, of a 
quality superior to Lynn sand formerly used at 18s. per ton. The 
direct charge of labour, which in 1826 exceeded Is. 6d. per foot, is now 
about 5d. per foot, and, notwithstanding this enormous reduction of 
more than 70 per cent., the average rate of wages for skilled labour is 
higher by 20 per cent, than forty years ago. In 1819 two furnaces, each 
having a huge chimney-shaft, were required to produce 1,000 feet per 
week, while at the present time two furnaces, with only one chimney- 
shaft, suffice for the production of 12,000 feet, with the same, if not a 
less, consumption of fuel. Similarly, though in a less degree, grinding 
and polishing benches which, then finished 200 feet each per week, now 
accomplish 500 feet to 700 feet, which, by judicious means, may be still 
further increased to 1,000 feet and upwards. By these means the whole 
cost has been reduced to nearly the price of common duty-paid window 
glass thirty years ago ; and whereas in 1819 the British make was 3,000 
feet per week, sold at 20s. to 25s. per foot, it is now 140,000 feet, selling 
at 2s. and upwards, according to quality. The former superior make of 
this country has, indeed, been greatly neglected, and this has led to a 
very large increase in the imports of the finest fabrics of France and 
Belgium, so that these imports amounted in 1862 and 1863 to about 
16,000 feet per week, and those countries have had a corresponding sale 
in foreign markets in the absence of such supplies from England ; but 
