Page images
PDF
EPUB

tripled; and, as no more hands were employed, the increase was entirely due to improved methods of manufacturing. The multiplication by three, however, would give but a feeble idea of the power of machinery.

In France, the fabrication of woollens was probably practised at as early a period as in England. The demand for English wool was so great, that, early in the fourteenth century, application was made to open a staple for its importation; but the exportation of manufactured woollens did not figure in the commercial balance till three centuries later; neither were the coarser stuffs the most abundant. At the beginning of the seventeenth century, workmen were procured from Flanders for a manufactory of tapestry, but we find no mention of any notable improvement made in the art of weaving for the people. The administration of Cardinal Richelieu encouraged every species of manufacture then known and demanded; but cloths of luxury were more in request than cloths of necessity. It was in 1646, that Nicolas Cadeau, with some other Frenchmen, obtained a patent for twenty years, together with various other privileges and immunities for establishing at Sedan a manufactory of black and coloured cloths, made, like those of Holland, of the finest Spanish wool: About fifteen years after this, a treaty between France and Spain put the former country in possession of the finest wool of Europe, which was wrought into stuffs fit for the Levant. The opening which France possessed to the south by means of the Mediterranean, and, still more, her own wants, naturalized the fabrication of thin and light woollens; and her connection with Spain furnished her with the materials. It is rather a subject of astonishment that her vicinity to that country did not put her earlier in possession of a manufacture from which so much benefit was to be derived. In 1664, Colbert, to whose efforts France is so much indebted, invited manufacturers from every country to introduce their industry; and persuaded his monarch to appropriate a million of livres to the encouragement of this manufacture. Now the proportion between the English and the French trade may be esti mated by the modicity of this sum, near twenty years after the exportation of raw wool had been absolutely and definitively prohibited by the Lords and Commons in parliament assembled; and two years before the law for burying in woollens.

In 1669, Van Robais, a Dutchman, was induced to settle with 500 workmen at Abbeville, where a new manufactory of superfine broad-cloth was established, and where in less than forty years the number of looms increased from thirty to one hundred. The better to honour this branch of industry the French king permitted the nobility to take a part in it without derogating from their rank.

But

But the cruel and impolitic revocation of the edict of Nantes soon gave England a share in the advantages which every protestant state reaped from the influx of many industrious families, and proved how much bigotry was preferred to industry in the kingdom of Lewis XIV.

The principal manufactories of fine woollen in France, were, the Gobelins in Paris, Sedan, Abbeville, Louviers, Elboeuf and Rouen. The first has long been celebrated for the luxury of its productions, and most of all for its magnificent tapestry. It was established by two brothers, Giles and John Gobelins, in the time. of Francis I.; but it did not become a royal manufactory till the year 1667, when Lewis XIV. changed its former name of Folie Gobelins,' into the grandiloquous epithet of Hôtel Royal des Gobelins.' The cause of this metamorphosis is characteristic, for it was not any popular or national want, but the desire of the monarch to possess furniture worthy of his splendid palaces, which induced his minister, Colbert, to collect all the ablest workmen and even artists, into this establishment; and to make it the most luxurious of its kind in the known world. But the embroidered battles of Alexander, the four seasons, the four elements, all the exploits of Lewis XIV. however they may ornament regal apartments, and gratify national vanity-however they may speak the splendour of the monarch-are less approved by reason than the homeliest drugget that ever hung upon the backs of our bold peasantry, their country's pride.'

[ocr errors]

From this very rapid sketch two things are evident: 1st, that the woollen manufactures of France were not, in their general progress, so much directed by the wants of the people as ours; and, for this reason, 2dly, that they were not so extensive. No sovereign, no court, can give such support to a manufacture as to make it rank among the mines of national wealth; while the true customers which make it flourish are the people; the people at home, and the people abroad. The French, we know, are not of that opinion, and we doubt whether M. Dupin does not prefer the Hôtel Royal (even with this title) des Gobelins,' to the sixteen millions of yards of broad and narrow cloths which were milled in the single West Riding of York, in the year 1817. We do not by any means wish to depreciate the merits of beautiful tapestry, or to say that the Gobelins is not a very fine establishment; but, taking all things into consideration, we prefer seeing a peasantry well and warmly clothed, to the finest painting. that ever was represented in the most exquisite colours which woollen threads are capable of receiving. In the same manner, we prefer that the richest and greatest man of England should tread upon a carpet worth but three hundred pounds, and that

this wholesome piece of furniture should be found-of inferior quality, it is true-general in our cottages, to the cold and dirty tiles which pave the floors of almost every apartment in France, except those of absolute luxury; even though the monarch and his ministers should trample under their feet the softest and most brilliant worsted picture, worth perhaps five thousand pounds.

The manufacture of silk presents a very different history from the above. This substance is an indigenous product of the warmest climates. The art of manufacturing it was said to be invented by Pamphila, daughter of Platis, in the isle of Cos. It was much valued by the Roman ladies and much satirized by the Latin poets, for it had the double advantage of covering the body and yet showing the form. It was at one period sold for its weight in gold: and Vopiscus says that the Emperor Aurelian refused to give a suit of it to his wife, on account of its excessive dearness; and Heliogabalus, who preceded Aurelian by about half a century, is said to have worn a holosericum, or a garment made entirely of this material. In the middle of the sixth century, two monks who returned from India brought back with them large quantities of the worm, with full instructions upon all the processes relating to the thread. Manufactories were established in the provinces and cities of the Greek empire, particularly at Athens, Thebes and Corinth; and Venice became the carrier between them and the west of Europe. In the twelfth century, when these cities were damaged by the Crusaders, the silk-workers were carried into Sicily by Roger II. and by degrees the Italians and the Spaniards learned the art. The vicinity of these countries diffused it gradually into France; and before the reign of Francis I. it was fully established in Dauphiné, Provence and Languedoc. Nothing can be more conformable to our theory then, than the progress of this light and luxurious material, so admirably suited to every warm climate in all periods; and to climates a little less warm in proportion as men have learned artificial means of making them more temperate.

While the French were in possession of the duchy of Milan, at the beginning of the sixteenth century, they studied the secrets of this art; they carried these, together with an ample provision of workmen, into France; and immediately the manufactory at Lyons, which ever since has continued to spread its merchandize through Europe, was established. But the raw material was still imported from abroad, and the stuffs continued scarce and dear. Henry II. is said to be the first who wore silk stockings; and that upon the great occasion of his sister's marriage with the Duke of Savoy. Mezerai says that until the troubles under Charles IX. and Henry III. the courtiers did not use much

silk; but after that time the very citizens began to wear it, so much do pride and luxury predominate during public calamities.

At the end of this century, Henry IV. gave new encouragement to the silk manufactures of his realm. Wisely indulging the propensity of his people to vanity, lest, by repressing it, he should altogether disgust them with industry, and with a view to keep at home the money which purchased silk in other countries, this monarch used all his efforts to propagate the worm, notwithstanding the representations of Sully. Hitherto the mulberry tree, so essential to the nourishment of this animal, had flourished only in the southern provinces; but Henry had it planted at Orleans, at Fontainebleau, at the Castle of Madrid within two miles of Paris, and even in the gardens of the Tuileries. These attempts were not very successful; yet the manufacture of silk became much more general than it had ever been before. During his reign it prospered very much, and De Thou says, that silk clothing had become so common, especially among the fair sex, that they despised the use of woollens, which their ancestors had so generally worn.

That while France was thus encouraging her silk manufactures, England was supplying her with woollen goods, may be learned from a treaty of commerce concluded between James I. and Henry IV. in the year 1606, by which it was stipulated that, in the ports of the respective countries, all controversies concerning trade should be referred to two merchants of each nation, who should be called conservators of commerce; that each should see to the justness of weights and measures; and those in France to the goodness of English woollens; and that the cloths which should appear bad should be re-exported to England, but without confiscation or paying any duty. This was the year in which Henry particularly encouraged many branches of industry, but which were generally more luxurious than necessary; and, ever since, the manufacture of silk has been among the most prosperous, the most cherished, and staple sources of wealth and luxury to his kingdom. Silken apparel has gradually descended from the highest to the lowest ranks of society, and is now to be found, in almost every shape, even in the wardrobe of the peasant.

The introduction and success of this manufacture, so early as the beginning of the sixteenth century, and while many of the necessary arts were neglected, evince a premature and an irresistible tendency in the nation to luxurious industry. The climate of France is not such as entirely to preclude the use of woollens, or to tolerate a silken dress as sufficient protection from cold. Yet, no sooner had it become possible to procure this light and glossy substance in abundance, than vanity appropriated it as its

VOL. XXXIV. NO. LXVII.

E

own.

own. Nothing can be more characteristic than the precedency which it had over woollens, in the favour of the rulers of France; for, as we have already mentioned, it was admired and protected by Francis I. in the year 1520, while the establishment for broadcloths, at Sedan, does not date until 125 years later. The expenses incurred by Henry IV. in the year 1589, and afterwards, together with his efforts to establish the manufacture of silk throughout his realm, were much greater in proportion to his æra and situation, than the million which Lewis XIV. contributed, in 1664, toward encouraging woollens; and the attention paid to the fabrication of fine rather than of common cloths, confirms the tendency of the nation to luxurious in preference to necessary industry.

In 1818, the value of silk manufactured in France was computed at £4,250,000. In 1739, the value of woollens wrought in England was computed to be £16,000,000. Now this is a very awkward account for M. Dupin, and we do not know how he will surmount this single fact, even if we were to spare him a legion of others which we have in reserve for him. We here take a staple commodity of each kingdom; we find that the annual value of woollens manufactured in England, in 1739, was four times as great as the value of silk manufactured in France seventynine years later. But the diminution in the value of money during that time has certainly been much more than half; and the increase of industry has been more than four. Hence then a manufacture which, in 1818, produced £8, ought, in 1739, to have produced but £1; and the four millions of silk just mentioned, would have been reckoned at £500,000; that is to say, at of our cloth manufactures in the same year. Now we do not wish to give this fact more importance than it merits; we know that, wherever silks and woollens are worn in European climates, the consumption of the latter is much more extensive; we know too that the cases are not quite parallel; yet, upon the whole, this single fact affords a strong presumption that the superiority of industry was in favour of England at the period related; and one or two facts more of the same nature would be sufficient utterly to disprove M. Dupin's assertion.

Although the staple of England, early as well as late, was woollens-coarse, common, popular woollens-yet it cannot be supposed that a country trading as she does with the whole world, having at her command the produce of every climate, and able to furnish all with what they do not possess, should strictly and eternally confine herself to necessary industry. This indeed must be the first to employ a nation situated amidst superable difficulties; but should such a nation ever prosper, a time must come

when

« PreviousContinue »