The textile industry, in its various branches, is the greatest British manufacturing industry, and its rise is frequently, although erroneously, attributed by many to

Free Trade. Measured by the quantity of raw material imported-the best test available-the British textile industries, according to Porter, developed as follows:

Between 1801 and 1845 the importation of raw silk increased about sevenfold, that of raw wool more than tenfold, and that of raw cotton more than thirteen-fold.

1 Ten years average.

The British iron production increased, according to Porter, as follows:

Between 1806 and 1845 the British iron production increased nearly sevenfold.

The expansion of all the British manufacturing industries was so rapid after 1815 that they speedily acquired practically a world monopoly. In 1845 Great Britain was indeed, to use Cobden's words, the workshop of the world.

Modern manufacturing is based on coal. The commanding position which the British industries had obtained during and after the Great War can best be gauged by Great Britain's production of coal. According to R. C. Taylor's valuable Statistics of Coal,' a bulky handbook published in 1848, the world's production of coal in 1845 was as follows:

In 1845 Great Britain not only produced two-thirds of the world's coal and two-thirds of the world's iron, but also worked up two-thirds of the world's raw cotton.

During the war, and during the three decades of peace which followed the Congress of Vienna, Great Britain became the workshop of the world. The predictions of Napoleon and of many statesmen, financiers, and economists, that

the enormous National Debt and the huge burden of taxation would utterly impoverish Great Britain, were triumphantly refuted. In no other period of the nation's history did its wealth progress at a more rapid rate. The principal cause which led to this marvellous economic development was, in my opinion, illogical as it may sound, the great burden which forty years of almost incessant warfare had laid upon the British people. Men do not love exertion, do not love work. They are born idlers who endeavour to enjoy life without exertion. They will not work hard-there are, of course, exceptions-unless compelled. Men, being born idle and improvident, live without labour in all climes where a kindly Nature has provided for their wants. Necessity is not only the mother of invention, but also the mother of labour, of productivity, of thrift, of wealth, of power, and of progress, and the greatest civilising influence of all is the tax-collector. The tax-collector converted the backward and happy-go-lucky British nation into a nation of strenuous and intelligent industrial workers.

Men like their comforts and their amusements, and they are apt to spend very nearly all they earn. If their taxes are suddenly very greatly increased, their first impulse is to stint themselves, but as this is a painful process, they soon endeavour to provide the money required by the taxcollector by harder work, or by more intelligent exertion. During the forty years period of almost incessant war, and during the three decades which followed the Peace of Vienna, taxes were increased enormously, and as the increased taxes could scarcely be provided for by the unpleasant virtue of thrift, the people began to exert their ingenuity and strove to increase their income by increasing production. At the end of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth century, two periods of greatly increased taxation, British genius was applied to money-making, to industry, and to invention in an unparalleled manner. Not chance, but the constantly and colossally growing demands of the tax-collector led to the introduction of the steam-engine, of labour

saving machinery of every kind, of modern manufacturing, of modern commerce and banking, of railways, and of steamships.

The time when taxation was trebled and quadrupled saw the rise of inventive geniuses such as Watt, Boulton, Brindley, Trevethick, Telford, Brunel, Maudesley, Bramah, Nasmyth, George Stephenson, Hargreaves, Arkwright, Crompton, Cartwright, Horrocks, Smeaton, Priestly, Dalton, Faraday, Davy, Wedgwood, and many others. The resources of the country were carefully studied and energetically developed. Excellent roads were built to facilitate traffic. The activity of the Duke of Bridgewater, and of other men, gave to England the then best system of inland waterways. The Duke of Bedford, Kay, and Coke of Norfolk gave a tremendous impetus to scientific agriculture. Rowland Hill introduced the penny postage. By the perfection of the organisation of joint-stock undertakings, the building of costly railways, of factories on the largest scale, and the evolution of modern banking, were made possible.

During the end of the eighteenth and the first half of the nineteenth century, Englishmen were the most enterprising men in the world. They not only made the principal inventions of modern industry, but they were invariably the first to exploit the industrial inventions made by other nations. Since then, English enterprise and English inventiveness have sadly declined. Most industrial inventions and improvements are made nowadays in Germany and in the United States, and the most valuable industrial inventions and discoveries made by Englishmen are exploited not in England, but in Germany and America. The British discovery of making dyes from coal-tar led to the establishment of an enormous coal-tar dye industry in Germany. Although an Englishman invented the valuable automatic loom, only a few automatic looms are to be found in this country, while hundreds of thousands are employed in the United States. Many similar instances might be given.

During the last fifty years, England has undoubtedly grown slack. Many British industries have remained stagnant or have declined, while those in the United States and in Germany have mightily expanded. Great Britain was the workshop of the world in 1845, but she occupies no longer that proud position. What is the cause, or what are the causes, of this extraordinary change? There are many causes, but the principal cause is undoubtedly this, that when England had become industrially supreme and very wealthy, the people were no longer compelled to work hard. Having established their position in the world of industry and commerce, Englishmen began to take their ease. Selfindulgence took the place of industry. Both the employers and their workers began to neglect their business at a time when necessity compelled the German and American peoples to concentrate their entire energy upon the development of their commerce and their industries.

I have endeavoured to show in these pages that the wonderful development of the British industries during the end of the eighteenth and during the first half of the nineteenth century was due not to chance, but to high taxation-that not chance, but the pressure of high taxation produced the invention of the steam-engine and of laboursaving machinery of every kind. It is to be hoped that the vastly increased demands of the tax-collector will once more stimulate inventiveness and industry in this country to the utmost, that necessity will cause Englishmen to discover new avenues which lead to prosperity, that the gigantic cost of the present War will be as easily borne as that of the Great War a century ago. However, we need not reckon upon the discovery of new processes and the invention of new machines. Great Britain can easily provide for her financial requirements, however long the War may last, by the simple process of Americanising her industries. Great Britain is blessed with an excellent climate and a most favourable geographical position. She is the only country in the world which, owing to the situation of its coalfields, can