SOCIAL QUESTIONS OF TO-DAY EDITED BY H. DE B. GIBBINS, M.A. THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED SOCIAL QUESTIONS OP TO-DAY Edited by H. de B. GIBB1NS, M.A. Crown 8vo., 2s. 6d. A series of volumes upon those topics of social, economic, and industrial interest that are at the present moment foremost in the public mind. Each volume is written by an author who is an acknowledged authority upon the subject with which he or she deals, and who treats his question in a thoroughly sympathetic but impartial manner, with special reference to the historic aspect of the subject. The following Vohimes of the Series are now ready. TRADE UNIONISM NEW AND OLD. G. HOWELL, M.P., Author of The Conflicts of Capital and Labour. Second Edition. PROBLEMS OP POVERTY : An Inquiry into the Industrial Condition of the Poor. J. A. HOBSON, M.A. Third Edition. THE CO-OPERATIVE MOVEMENT TO-DAY. G. J. HOLYOAKE, Author of The History of Co-operation. MUTUAL THRIFT. Rev. J. FROME WILKINSON, M.A., Author of The Friendly Society Movement. THE COMMERCE OF NATIONS. C. E. BASTABLE, LL.D., Professor of Political Economy in the University of Dublin. THE ALIEN INVASION. W. H. WILKINS, B.A., Secretary to the Association for Preventing the Immigration of Destitute Aliens. (With an Introductory Note by the Right Reverend the Bishop of Bedford.) THE RURAL EXODUS: Problems of Village Life. P. ANDERSON GRAHAM. LAND NATIONALISATION. HAROLD Cox, B.A. A SHORTER WORKING-DAY. R. A. HADFIELD, and H. DE B. GIB- BINS, M.A. BACK TO THE LAND. HAROLD E. MOORE, F.S.L TRUSTS, POOLS, AND CORNERS. J. STEPHEN JEANS. FACTORY LEGISLATION. R. W. COOKE TAYLOR, Author of The Modern Factory System, etc. WOMEN'S WORK. LADY DILKE, AMY BULLEY, and MARGARET WHITLEY. THE STATE AND ITS CHILDREN. GERTRUDE TUCKWELL. MUNICIPALITIES AT WORK. By FREDERICK DOLMAN. SOCIALISM AND MODERN THOUGHT. By M. KAUFMANN, M.A. MODERN CIVILISATION IN SOME OF ITS ECONOMIC ASPECTS. By W. CUNNINGHAM, D.D. THE HOUSING OF THE WORKING CLASSES. By F. BOWMAKER. Other Volumes are in preparation. METHUEN & CO., 36 ESSEX STREET, W.C. THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED AN ENQUIRY AND AN ECONOMIC POLICY JOHN A. HOBSON AUTHOR OF " PROBLEMS OF POVERTY ". METHUEN & CO. 36 ESSEX STREET, W.C. LONDON 1896 GENERAL PREFACE THE Unemployed Question has greatly suffered from the modern tendency of economic investigation in England to devote an almost exclusive attention to the study of s detailed facts, ignoring the larger facts or principles in which these smaller facts find their unity. It may be readily conceded that the treatment of no industrial subject has suffered more than this from vague and unfounded generalities, and that the close labour of historical research in collecting and grouping facts is a most urgent need. Such work to be effective requires a separate investigation and discussion of the several forms and aspects of Un- employment and of the forces which are engaged in causing it. I So the Unemployed Question easily bifurcates into the treatment of skilled and unskilled, able-bodied and inefficient, temporarily unemployed and surplus labour, country and town labour, while each trade is found to have its special characters and causes of seasonal irregularity or wider fluctuations^) But the need of this segmentary search for facts does not justify the common suggestion that there is not one Unemployed Problem but fifty, and that each must be 99474 vni PREFACE treated entirely by itself upon the basis of its special facts, without reference to wider or more general principles. The tendency thus to fritter away the unity of a great subject into an ever- widening number of component parts is a grave intellectual danger which induces a paralysis of all work of practical reform. My object in this book is to show that the Unemployed Question has a true unity which is clearly discernible amid the facts which are already ascertained, and which is inevitably hidden by the sectional treatment. After making due allowance for minor contribu- tory causes, I claim to establish the identity of Unemploy- ment as an aspect of Trade Depression and by further analysis of facts to establish Under-consumption as the direct economic cause of the industrial malady. The refusal to recognise that Industry both in volume and character, is directly determined by the effective demand . of Consumers, with due allowance for the prophetic or stimulative influence of Producers, is still the deepest source of error in the English theory of the structure of w Industry. The identification of Unemployment with Under-consump- tion demands an explanation of that failure of Consumption to keep pace with Producing-power which is recognised as a general feature of industry in highly developed countries. This explanation is found in causes which affect the distribution of power to consume arid induce individuals to endeavour to capitalise " unearned" elements of income at a greater pace than is economically needed to satisfy the demands of current consumption. This economic analysis of the phenomena of Trade Depressions does not claim to be new in substance. Several early economists, in particular Lauderdale and PREFACE ix Malthus, gave a brilliant and a sound analysis of these phenomena, which was never refuted. Their valid arguments were rejected not because they were disproved, but because they were associated with views and practical proposals often rightly regarded as misleading or mischievous. The general acceptance of illogical and inconsistent definitions of the terms Capital and Demand, and a neglect to study the actual mechanism of Saving, have caused the main body of English professional economists to evade all scientific recognition of the phenomenon of an excess of general producing-power which is visible in periods of trade depression. No sufficient consideration has been accorded to several recent statements of the case, both in England and in the United States. In the latter country Mr. Uriel Crocker of Boston was the first to apply clearly and effectively this analysis to the modern phenomena of "de- pressed trade" in advanced industrial communities, and his latest statement entitled " Hard Times" is by far the most convincing short popular rendering of the argument. Mr. J. M. Robertson in his " Fallacy of Saving" gave a powerful reading of one important aspect of the case, the false or " bogus" saving which a futile endeavour to establish exces- sive capital engenders. Some years ago in conjunction with the late Mr. A. F. Mummery I endeavoured, in The Physiology of Industry, to call attention to the large issues involved in this line of thought. Several other writers * during recent years have effectively exposed the fallacies of Adam Smith's doctrine of Parsimony and J. S. Mill's Fundamental Propositions concerning Capital, * E.g., R. S. Moffat in "The Economy of Consumption." Frank Fairman, in various pamphlets. Dr. Hertzka in "Freeland." See also "The Evolution of Modern Capitalism", by the present writer. x PREFACE though the force of their criticism in some instances is weakened by a disparagement of the habit of individual thrift, which is not rightly involved in the line of their attack and which indicates a failure to grasp the true relations between individual and social "saving." Their arguments have received little attention, in this country or in America, from the main body of economists, who still lean with childlike confidence upon a. theory of Cap- ital formulated by J. S. Mill, and afterwards abandoned in its most essential feature by its author. In spite of the general acceptance accorded to the new position by several important continental economists, they stubbornly refuse to re-open what they have chosen to regard as a dead controversy. It is hoped that this restatement of the position, by its specific application to the concrete problem of the " unem- ployed" and by the central importance assigned to the idea of Under-consumption, may avoid some of the mis- understanding to which earlier statements were liable. By its explanation of Unemployment as a natural and necessary result of a mal-distribution of consuming-power, vested in economic rent and monopoly elements of profit, the argument claims a distinct place in the theory of social progress. The latter half of the book is an endeavour to discover and apply true principles of remedial treatment, by marking the outlines of the larger economic policy which shall embody the principle of progressive consumption, and by the application of a scientific test to the several popular remedies or palliatives which occupy the public attention. CONTENTS CHAPTER I THE MEANING OF "UNEMPLOYMENT" PAG* 1. -Unemployment as Waste of Labour-power I 2. Leakage in " Season " Trades . 2 3. Is Winter Slackness Unemployment? Official View. . . 3 4. The Social Estimate of Waste Labour 5 5. v The "Unemployed" by Trade Depression 6 6. Summary of Official View of "Unemployment" 8 7. A wider Meaning of "Unemployed" is Legitimate ... 9 CHAPTER II THE MEASURE OF UNEMPLOYMENT 1. Defective General Statistics n 2. A Trade-Union Average 12 3. Trades which Contribute to the Board of Trade Returns. . 13 4. No full Measure of Unemployed Unionists 14 5. ^Prime Object of Unions to Avoid Unemployment. ... 1 6 6. A Larger Figure for Non-Unionists 17 7. Unemployed in Unorganised Trades 1 8 xii CONTENTS PAGE 8. * Skilled" versus "Unskilled" Trades 20 9. Are there Two Questions of the Unemployed? .... 20 10. Evidence of the Labour Bureaux 22 11. Summary of "Waste" in "Making" Industries .... 23 12. Proportion of Manufacturing to Distributive Work in England 24 13. Unemployment in Distributive, Transport, and Public Services 26 14. General Measure of the Problem 29 15. The Upper Class of Unemployed 30 1 6. Waste of "Pauper" Labour . t 30 APPENDIX A. Unemployment in Registers of Labour Bureaux 31 CHAPTER III DOES UNEMPLOYMENT GROW ? 1. Do Modern Forces Make for Irregular Employment? . . 35 2. Expansion of Market Areas 35 3. The Speculative Nature of Modern Industry 36 4. Influence of Taste and Fashion 37 5. Transferability of Labour. General versus Special Ability. . 38 6. Does Division of Labour Give Security of Employment in Manufacture ? . 40 7. Transferability of Labour in other Industries 42 8. Can the Displaced Worker Take up Another Trade?. . 43 CHAPTER IV MINOR CAUSES OF UNEMPLOYMENT 1. The Individual Moral View of the Problem 45 2. Nature of the Individualist Fallacy 46 3. Connection of Machinery with Unemployment 49 CONTENTS xin PAGE Estimate of Minor Causes Trade Depression Shown as Major Cause 5 Short Period and Long Period Fluctuations 51 Strikes as Causes of Unemployment 52 Unemployed Capital and Land as well as Labour ... 54 CHAPTER V THE ROOT CAUSE OF UNEMPLOYMENT Fallacy of the Piecemeal Treatment of the Unemployed Question 56 Need of a Unified Organic Treatment 57 Central Fact General Excess of Producing-power ... 59 A Priori Assumptions of Economists 60 True Meaning of "Over-production" 60 Authorities Admit a General Excess. Evidence of Commission 61 The Testimony of Recent Industrial History 63 Failure of Consumption to keep Pace with Growth of Productive Power 65 Wasteful Multiplication of Distributors 66 The Abnormal Growth of Retail-Traders ........ 68 The Causes of Waste of Distributive power 69 Why Waste Takes a Different Form in Distribution and in Manufacture 70 False Assumption that all Power to Consume must be Exercised 72 Is Desire to Consume the only Motive to Production? 73 Does all Saving Give Increased Employment? 74 Excessive forms of Capital do Exist 76 The Theoretic Limit of Socially Useful Forms of Capital. 78 How Excessive Forms of Capital Stop Production ... 79 xiv CONTENTS . PAGE 19. The Fallacy that Saving implies no Reduced Consump- tion 80 20. The Limit to Social "Saving" No Limit to Individual "Saving" 81 21. How Self-interest of Individuals Causes Social Waste of Capital 83 22. The Difference between Individual and Social Economy. . 85 23. A Nation is not a Community 86 24. The Motives of Under-Consumption 88 25. Excess of Capital a Result of "Unearned" Incomes . . 91 26. No Repudiation of Uses of Individual Thrift 92 APPENDIX B. Effect of Under-Consumption on Employ- ment 93 CHAPTER VI THE ECONOMIC REMEDY ^i. The Remedy lies in a Reformed Distribution of Con- suming-Power 98 2. Lines of Social Policy. Taxation of " Unearned " Income. . 99 3. Various Forms of Social Property Amenable to Taxation. . 100 4. Working-Class Movement for Higher Wages 103 5. Increased Consumption gives Validity to Increased Saving. . 104 6. Effect of a Shorter Working-Day upon Consumption Cases where Output is Maintained 105 7. Where a Shorter Working-day Means a Smaller Output. . 106 8. Where the Cost of a Shorter Day comes out of Profits. . 106 9. Where the Cost comes out of Higher Prices 107 10. Where International Competition Keeps down Prices and Profits 108 11. Increased Leisure a Condition of Rising Consumption. . 109 12. A Summary of the "High Consumption" Policy. ... no 13. This Policy Involves no Social Danger no CONTENTS xv CHAPTER VII BIMETALLISM AND TRADE DEPRESSION ' . PAGE 1. The Industrial and Financial Sides of Business .... 112 2. What takes Place when Prices Fall? 113 3. Illicit Jumps in Monetary Explanations of Depression. . 115 4. Bimetallism can only Raise Prices by Raising Consump- tion 116 5. Does a Fall of Prices come from Increased Supply or Diminished Demand? 118 6. The Test of Sauerbeck's Index Numbers 119 7. Want of "Confidence" not a Vera Causa Itself a Symptom 120 8. The Notion that Reduced Cost of Production cannot Reduce all Prices, Disproved 122 9. The Right Place of Money as an Agent in Falls of Prices 124 CHAPTER VIII PALLIATIVES OF UNEMPLOYMENT 1. A Test for Palliatives. Do they Raise Consumption? . 126 2. Labour Bureaux as Clearing-Houses 126 3. The Elimination of Minor Forms of Waste 129 4. Schemes for Increasing Employment 130 5. Labour Colonies Penal Conditions 131 6. Farm Colonies for Paupers 132 /. Mr. Charles Booth's Suggested Labour Colonies for Class B 133 8. Practical Difficulties of "Social Drainage" 136 9. German and Dutch Free Labour Colonies 137 10. The Starnthwaite Experiment 138 xvi CONTENTS PAGE 11. Educative Colonies at Hadleigh and Elsewhere .... 139 12. Mr. Mather's Scheme of Training and Agricultural Colonies 141 13. Economic Precautions Required in Labour Colonies . 143 14. Difficulties of disposing of Surplus Produce 145 15. Scheme of Afforestation 147 1 6. Establishment of Small Holders as a Means of Increased Agricultural Employment 148 17. An Illustration of a Small Holdings Scheme 149 1 8. Corporate Tenancy and Other Co-operative Elements . . 150 19. Economic Criticism. National versus International Policy. . 151 20. The Gain of Agricultural Revival should go Chiefly to Labour 153 21. Proposal of Secondary or Alternative Trades 154 22. Sound Distribution of Public and Private Work .... 155 23. Theory of Public Relief Works 156 24. Right Economic Conditions of Relief Works 157 --25. True and False Ideas of Public Industry and Employment. . 158 26. Danger of Resting upon Palliatives 159 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED AN ENQUIRY AND AN ECONOMIC POLICY CHAPTER I THE MEANING OF " UNEMPLOYMENT " i. Unemployment as Waste of Labour-Power " UNEMPLOYMENT" is perhaps the most illusive term which confronts the student of modern industrial society. This illusiveness exposes the subject to grave abuses. Well- meaning but somewhat hasty social reformers stretch the term and bloat it out to gigantic proportions; professional economists and statisticians, provoked by this unwarranted exaggeration, are tempted to a corresponding excess of extenuation, and are almost driven to deny the reality of any "unemployed" question, over and above that of the mere temporary leakages and displacements due to the character of certain trades, and to the changes of industrial methods, In order to get some clear understanding of the nature and size of the industrial malady of unemployment, we must, I think, set aside for the present the personal aspects of the subject which appeal most powerfully to human interest, and try to relate "unemployment" to 2 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED waste of labour-power regarded from the social point of view. This method has the advantage of strict accord with the position held by Mr. Charles Booth, who urges that " the total number of the superfluous is the true measure of the unemployed." Let us first try to ascertain how far the various classes of those who at any given time would be found to be "off work" can.be reckoned as "superfluous" or as waste of labour-power. Many workers, especially in employments which severely tax the muscular energy, prefer at times to earn their weekly wages by hard labour during four or five days in the week rather than spread their energy more evenly over the six days. This voluntary " play" of the miner or the gas-stoker clearly cannot rank as- " unem- ployment", nor does it, if confined within reasonable limits, involve any waste of labour-power. On the other hand, when " short time" is either forced upon employees, or accepted by them as an alternative to a reduction in the number of employed, such off-time will rightly rank as " unemployment", and implies waste of labour-power. 2. Leakage in " Season " Trades. Season trades with short engagements usually involve a certain "leakage," as in the intervals between "jobs" in the building trades. A census of "unemployed," taken on a given day, would be apt to include a certain number of masons, bricklayers, etc., who were at leisure for thiS reason. Yet, so far as this leakage belongs to an irregu- larity inherent in the trade, it cannot rank as "waste", nor could the labour thus temporarily displaced be regarded as "superfluous." But a strict limit must be assigned to IS WINTER SLACKNESS UNEMPLOYMENT? 3 this * necessary " leakage. If the building trade is slack, not only will a smaller number of workers be employed, but the intervals between jobs will be longer. Here there exists a genuine waste of labour-power, which would rightly rank as unemployment. A period of brisk trade in which intervals are smallest must be taken as the right measure of necessary leakage, and even then, if the leakage is due to inadequate organisation in the trade, it implies some waste. In various trades improved intelli- gence, cheaper travelling, travelling benefits of trade unions, have reduced what would formerly have been considered "necessary" leakage due to natural conditions of the trade. j. Is Winter Slackness Unemployment? Official View. How far can this view of necessary leakage be extended to the longer intervals of leisure in the building trades and other trades whose irregularity is due to natural causes? The recent Report of the Labour Depart- ment upon the Unemployed is disposed to rule out all * unemployment " in the building trades in the winter months. "A certain amount of time will be lost almost every year during frost. Are the men thus thrown out of work really * unemployed ' ? The loss of time may be considered as one of the ordinary trade risks; it recurs more or less every year; it may be supposed to be discounted in the rates of pay earned by members of these trades when fully at work. The bricklayers idle during frost are in no sense * superfluous,' if the whole year be taken as a unit; were they emigrated or planted in farm colonies, 4 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED or otherwise lifted permanently off the labour-market, the building trades would presently suffer from a deficiency of men. Nor are they necessarily insufficiently employed. There may be work enough for all, but the trade is such that the work it offers has to be concentrated in certain parts of the year." This view of compensation forcibly recalls the " eco- nomic man " of the old economists, with his infinite capacity for calculating chances, an absolute freedom to select his employment, and a full power to extort from his employer a higher wage to balance any specific disadvantage attending his work. Such a man, being in our present case a bricklayer, might be supposed to obtain such earnings, and so to regulate his expenditure as to hiber- nate comfortably during the annual period of slackness. The actual bricklayer, though he doubtless can make some provision against the idle season, is not economi- cally strong enough to fully discount in his earnings the irregularity incident to his trade, still less is the brick- layer's labourer able to do so. If the a priori reasoning in the Board of Trade view be accepted, it may be pushed so far as to show that all workers are able to discount all " ordinary trade risks," and to obtain wages adequate to support them during such portion of the year as trade sta- tistics show to represent the average " unemployment " in that trade. The casual docker, the fur-puller, and all the workers in "season" trades, whose irregularity can be foreseen, ought, according to this theory, to be able to make adequate provision against the "off" period, however long it may be; and since the work of all of them is THE SOCIAL ESTIMATE OF WASTE " LABOUR 5 necessary for the season, their idleness in the off period must not rank as " unemployment ", or be regarded as a waste of labour-power. 4. The Social Estimate of " Waste * Labour. We are not here, however, concerned to discuss how far workers in season trades might or ought to make provision against the times when they are unable to earn wages, but whether the labour-power in such periods is to be reckoned "superfluous" or "waste". Of the literal " superfluity " there can be no question, but is there "waste" from the social point of view? Surely there is. The case is not on all fours with the irregular distribution of work within the week. No true economy of human forces is able to compensate for a winter's idleness by excessive work in the spring and summer months. This " waste " may be due to inherent irregularities of trade, but it is not the less waste. The "unemployment" of the painter during the winter months is not rightly classed with the "leakage" between jobs. In the first place, a good deal of the seasonal unemployment in the building, dock, and many other trades is not necessary or inherent in the nature of the trade, but is attributable to the very existence of a chronic over-supply of labour. If there were not so large a " margin " of labour to make sudden calls upon, the irregularity of many trades would be largely modified. Climatic and other natural causes will doubtless impose a certain amount of irregularity, but a far more regular distribution of employment, even in the building trades, would be possible, if it became necessary ; and such readjustment would not imply a waste but ultimately an economy of labour-power, since it would 6 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED prevent the degradation of morale and industrial efficiency which every irregularity of trade produces. Just as in the case of the docks, the recent readjustment of methods of employment has squeezed out and exhibited as " super- fluous" a large mass of casual labour which formerly would have ranked as a necessary margin for occasional absorption, so in the building and other trades a similar pressure, modifying methods of work, would expose a like superfluity or " waste " of labour-power. But even if it be held that the distribution of employment throughout the year in these trades cannot be materially altered, it should be admitted that the necessary working of these trades involves a great waste of labour-power by reason of its irregularity. The bricklayers idle during frost clearly represent a superfluity of labour, though not necessarily of bricklaying labour. The. earnest desire expressed by some to provide these season workers with an alternative craft is a virtual admission of the present waste of labour-power. 5. The " Unemployed" by Trade Depression. A very large majority of the skilled workers who are "out of work" at a time like the present owe their unemployment, not to short leakages or seasonal fluctua- tions, but to great depressions in the manufacturing trade of the country. This, one might imagine, would be at once admitted to imply a superfluity and a waste of labour-power. But the Report on the Unemployed is disposed to think quite otherwise : " In a period of contraction like the present there are many men who are out of work. They are industrially ' superfluous,' if so short a period as a year be taken as THE "UNEMPLOYED" BY TRADE DEPRESSION 7 the unit, but over a period of seven years which for shipbuilding appears to be about the period of the cycle they are necessary, and were they lifted off the labour-market in slack years there would not be enough men to execute the work when trade revived." That is to say, when trade is good a large body of men are wanted to work, when trade is bad they are wanted to wait in case it may get better. While they wait their labour-power is not to be considered "waste", because, in the words of Mr. Booth, "our modern system of industry will not work without some unemployed margin, some reserve of labour." " They also serve who only stand and wait," Milton has told us, but this specific application of the truth has seldom been made clear. My chief criti- cism of the judgment made in the Report is that it begs the entire question with an almost humorous effron- tery. As an alternative to the suggestion that without this unhappy margin of "waiters" "there would not be enough men to execute the work when trade revived," I would put the following question : " May not the existence under normal conditions of an average margin of 5 per cent, 'unemployed' in the skilled trades, and possibly a larger margin in the ' unskilled ' trades, be a cause, as it is certainly a condition, of the fluctuations which make this year 'good 1 and that year 'bad'?" If there did not exist this "margin," it is evident trade would not "revive" to the extent it does in such a year as 1889 J but, on the other hand, is it not conceivable, that it might not decline so deeply as in 1887 ? In other words, is it not possible that the fluctuations would be less violent if there did not under normal conditions exist an average " reserve" force of labour to " play 8 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED with" ? The subject is, of course, far too large for paren- thetic treatment here, but I cannot forbear to raise this question in protest against the placid assumption in the Unemployed Report that there is no " superfluity" of labour, because the "superfluity," is sometimes for a brief period mopped up. But whatever may be the explanation of trade depres- sion to which we may incline, there can be no question but that " depression " is directly responsible for a vast amount of unemployment. Even the Unemployed Report admits that it would be a "strain of ordinary language to refuse to these men during slack years the title of 'unemployed'." I further claim that this "unemploy- ment" represents "superfluous," or waste labour-power, whether the trade depression from which they suffer be accounted the cause or the effect of the "superfluity." 6. Summary of the Official View of " Unemployment.'" If I correctly understand the Unemployed Report, the only "superfluity" or waste of labour-power which it admits consists of the following two classes : " Those members of various trades who are economic- ally superfluous, because there is not enough work in those trades to furnish a fair amount to all who try to earn a livelihood at them. "Those who cannot get work because they are below the standard of efficiency usual in their trades, or because their personal defects are such that no one will employ them." These classes are represented by a small fringe of the "skilled" trades who even in fairly good trade fail A WIDER MEANING OF UNEMPLOYED IS LEGITIMATE 9 to get sufficient employment, and who represent a genuine over-supply of labour-power, and by a large mass of low- skilled inefficient labour of the towns, that superfluous mass which Mr. Booth reckoned in East London to amount to 100,000. Although the Report confines "superfluity" of labour- power to these narrow limits, the question of " the un- employed" admittedly includes others viz., all that labour whose temporary displacement is due to changes in methods of industry, changes of fashion, changes in the field of employment, or other causes, which are unforeseen and cannot be reasonably discounted or provided against by the workers. The Unemployment Report thus narrows down " un- employment" by refusing to include not only " leakages" in employment but seasonal idleness, and it still further limits superfluity or waste of labour-power by excluding the large body of "unemployed" whose condition is due to trade depressions. J. A. Wider Meaning of Unemployed is Legitimate. I claim to have shown prima facie reasons for a wider application of the term "unemployment" than commends itself to the official mind, by the inclusion of all forms of involuntary leisure suffered by the working classes. This connotation has the advantage of being in closest accord with the general usage of "unemployed," and in this sense I shall continue to apply the term. The more scientific definition would, however, identify un- employment with the total quantity of human labour- power not employed in the production of social wealth, 10 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED which would rank, under present conditions, as super- fluity or waste. This latter, it can be clearly shown, is not narrower but far wider than the official unem- ployment. CHAPTER II THE MEASURE OF UNEMPLOYMENT i. Defective General Statistics. EXACT statistical measurement of "the unemployed", or even a close estimate of the total number of those " out of work " at any given time is impossible at present. The miserably defective character of our statistical machinery forms an adequate basis of ignorance upon which to form discreet official answers to awkward questions. But though we cannot directly measure the magnitude of the evil, we are able to show that it is very great. The only official figure relating to the general quantity of "unemployment" is that percentage calculated by the Board of Trade from the returns furnished to it by trade union officials. The official figure represents the average percentage of members of certain unions who are reported at a given date to be in receipt of unemployed benefit from the union funds. In the December number 1894 of the Labour Gazette the figure obtained by averaging the results of sixty-two trade union returns was 7 per cent. But this figure cannot be taken as a general measure of "unem- ployment." It is not designed as such by the Labour 12 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED Department, but is merely quoted as a serviceable index to the general condition of trade and employment in some of our staple manufactures. The Board of Trade exercises no power to compel all trade societies to make returns of "unemployed"; many unions have no record of " unemployed", many that have a record make no return, and many of the returns are too indefinite for use. 2. A. Trade Union Average. But though we cannot take the 7 per cent, average of sixty-two trade unions and apply it generally to the working classes in order to estimate the total of unem- ployed, we may use it as a serviceable starting-point for legitimate conjecture. In particular, I propose to bring evidence to show how far it is likely that the average of those who are involuntarily " unemployed " is greater or smaller than 7 per cent. This task requires an answer to three questions: 1. How far can the figure 7 per cent, be taken as a true estimate of "unemployment" among trade unionists? 2. How far would the average "unemployment" among trade unionists be reliable as a measure of unemployment in the whole manufacturing and ex- tractive industry of the country? 3. How will these industries compare with other branches of labour in respect of " unemployment " ? In order to deal effectively with the points involved in the first two questions, it is well to understand how far the sixty-two trade unions which yield the basic 7 per cent, are representative of the general trade of the country. The courtesy of the Labour Commissioner TRADES WHICH CONTRIBUTE TO THE BOARD 13 enables me to present the following distribution of the sixty-two unions in relation to the numbers of their members. To these figures I append a third column compiled from the returns of occupations in the last Census Report in order to furnish a general indication as to how far the trade unions in the general groups of industry are fairly representative of the whole body of workers. Number Number of Total Trades. of Members of Occupied in Unions. Unions. the Trade. * Engineering and Metal Trades II 111,889 342,231 Shipbuilding 4" m,8S I 7 Building and furnishing . . . 13 76,043 820,582 Textiles 2 10,629 1,128,589 Mining 2 68,030 561,637 Printing and Kindred Trades 20 34.632 H5,307 Clothing, Leather, Glass, etc. IO 4,973 unknown j. Trades which Contribute to the Board of Trade Returns. Now the first thing evident is that the trade union figure of unemployment^ based on returns which are in many cases too small to adequately represent the mass ^of industry to which they refer. Only in the case of the * Employers as well as employed are included here, and, in some cases, a large number of dealers as well as makers. Other difficulties of classification prevent these figures from being any- thing but a general indication of the relative importance of the several groups of industry. 14 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED engineering and metal trades, shipbuilding and printing, can the number of trade unionists, upon whose condition the return is based, be considered large enough to reflect with some degree of accuracy the whole trade to which they belong. In the other cases the condition of certain small sections of a trade or of certain districts can alone be accurately reflected in the returns. These figures are checked and rendered more serviceable in the Labour Gazette by the general reports of trades from the several districts. We are thus enabled to see that the large percentage of unemployed is in shipbuilding, engineering and kindred trades. Other information leads us directly or inferentially to the conclusion that the average for the other groups of trade was at the close of 1 894 comparatively small, not greatly in excess of what is due to normal trade displacement and personal causes. Indeed, if we take out the shipbuilding and engineering trades, the average of " unemployment " would seem to be so small as to furnish a contradiction to the general idea of slackness and de- pression which prevailed and which was even reflected in the descriptive reports of the several trades. 4. No Full Measure of Unemployed Unionists. Now it seems to me there is much reason to believe that, so far as the "making" industries are concerned, the figures of " unemployment" furnished to the Board of Trade do not adequately indicate the full measure of " unemployment." In the firsjt place, it ^ certain that the number of members returned by ttft trade union officials as in receipt of unemployed benefit does not fully represent the number of trade unionists out of work. A period of NO FULL MEASURE OF UNEMPLOYED UNIONISTS 1 5 twelve months' membership is commonly required as a qualification for the receipt of unemployed benefit; other conditions are often essential to full membership. Thus a considerable proportion of those included in the aggre- gate of members are not entitled to receive out-of-work pay, and their unemployment does not appear. For example, only 88 per cent, of iron-founders and only 50 per cent, of shipwrights were eligible for out-of-work pay in 1893 according to the Report on the Unemployed. In most unions "unemployed pay" is only given for a limited number of weeks, seldom extending over thirteen and in some cases for only six ; " unemployment" does not generally count as such until a member has been out of work for a week or longer ; many are disqualified by falling into arrears in their subscription, a misfortune to which they will be most liable in times of bad trade ; some better-to-do workers make it a point of personal pride not to come on their union fund until they are obliged. Owing to these causes, particularly the first, the returns made by the trade unions which only take account of the members who are in actual receipt of "unemployed benefit," gravely under- represent the "un- employment" of trade union members. Again, the strain of modern competition and the pressure of our great " driving" system bear more and more heavily upon working men who are past their prime of vigour ; the age when men are superannuated as no longer able to earn the standard wage is very early in the harder manual trades ; and members who are still pos- sessed of a fair measure of efficient labour-power no longer receive " unemployed" benefit, but are placed upon the superannuated or the sick list, receiving aid for a 1 6 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED certain period, after which they are left to shift for themselves. Not only among trade union members of skilled trades, but throughout the entire field of industry, the shortness of employment is most largely represented in the progressive under-employment of the middle-aged. In many departments of labour, for example, among miners, sailors, mule-spinners, in metal and machine making, it is practically impossible for a man to have any security of work over the age of forty-five or fifty. Notwith- standing all efforts to retain the appearance of youth, he finds employment slipping from his grasp ; his skill and experience avail him little in competition with the younger generation who can outstrip him in pace and muscular activity, In ideal schemes of industrial society it is often held that the twenty or twenty-five years which form the prime of manhood or womanhood afford an ample period for the expenditure of labour-power in the social service. Under present conditions the early compulsory retirement, not into honourable and comfortable leisure, but into a miserable and degrading struggle for the casual means of a bare subsistence, which becomes more precarious as old age advances, must be accounted one of the most terrible forms of the problem of unemployment. 5. Prime Object of Unions to Avoid Un employ m en t. In estimating the returns of " unemployed" by the textile, the mining, and other industries, it must be borne in mind that many of the strongly organised trades distribute the loss of employment among all their members, instead of allowing some to become wholly unemployed, working short time instead of allowing a reduction of the A LARGER FIGURE FOR NON-UNIONISTS 17 number employed. One of the chief objects in the practical programme of many trade unions is the arrange- ment with employers to work short time so as to avoid unemployment. This, of course, introduces an element of genuine "unemployment" as measured in superfluity or waste of labour-power, which is not returned in the statistics of "unemployed." If all the members of a trade work half time for a period, in any scientific measurement this must reckon at 50 per cent, unemployed. The amount of economic "unemployment" due to this cause is growing all the time as trade organisations become stronger and are able to bring pressure on the employers to distribute a spell of bad trade so as to inflict least injury to the body of workers. It is then certain that, even among the trade unions whose figures form our basis of calculation, the actual amount of unemployment is greater than is reported. 6. A Larger Figure for Non-unionists. If we turn to the further question, how far the condition of the trade union is a just indication of the condition of the whole trade, we shall, I think, be driven to conclude that unemployment is greater among non-unionists than among unionists. In most cases, the members of trade unions must be regarded as the pick of their trade in skill, strength, character and intelligence ; and one chief economic object of trade unionism is to secure as far as possible a mo- nopoly of regular well-paid employment for its members, limiting membership by the test of capacity to earn a standard wage. In a period of slack or depressed trade the trade unionist, both by virtue of personal 2 1 8 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED efficiency and by the strength of his union, is more likely to retain employment than the outsider. The less efficient members of a union, whose employment is less secure, fail, in slack times, to keep up their weekly subscriptions, and drop out of the union, whose official report takes no account of them as "unemployed." It is true that against this we must set the ability of the non-unionist to hold his work by a readier acceptance of lower wages. Moreover, as he has no "unemployed benefit" to fall back upon, he will often be driven to take what casual labour of any sort he can get. In measuring the chances of "unemployment," these proba- bilities must be set against the superior position of the union man; but taking the term "unemployed" as com- monly applied to members of a skilled trade, we must without doubt expect to find a larger percentage of " unemployed" among non-unionists than among union members. 7. Unemployed in Unorganised Trades. Since the unions which effectively maintain out-of-work funds and keep books with sufficient care to be utilised in Board of Trade Reports, are generally the strongest unions, competent to secure for their members the largest share of whatever work is going, the advantage of union- ists compared with non-union members as regards employment will be greatest in those trades. This fact impairs still further the validity of the Board of Trade returns, as indicative of the state of employment in whole trades. Again, in regarding the trade unions which make returns as a general index of the condition of trade, we cannot UNEMPLOYED IN UNORGANISED TRADES 19 fail to observe that the trades which they represent are in most cases the highly skilled and well-organised trades. It is true that some skilled trades are among the most fluctuating, and this is particularly true of shipbuilding, which furnishes so high a percentage of unemployment in the quoted returns. It is sometimes stated that the great fundamental and staple industries which are here represented are more fluctuating in their employment than the minor trades. We have here no means of accurate comparison, but it does not seem reasonable to suppose that this is the case. On the contrary, it seems more than likely that the minor manufactures, which are con- cerned largely in the supply of luxuries, or at any rate of "unnecessaries", and are subject to innumerable freaks of fashion, or genuine change of natural taste, and which are, moreover, the first to suffer from any depression which affects the spending powers of the community, should on an average present an amount of displacement of labour in excess of that which occurs in the more necessary trades. That this is certainly the case in the present case is, I think, clearly illustrated from the textile trades. The trade union returns refer only to the Lancashire cotton trade. If the minor textile industries in the woollen trade, and particularly in the silk, lace, and linen trades, had been faithfully recorded, a very large quantity of " unemployment " would have been registered. * Between 1881 and 1891 the employment in the lace trade as indicated by the table of occupations in the Census fell off to the extent of 21.3 per cent., the English linens trade fell off 32.3 per cent., while the number engaged in silk and kindred manufactures was diminished 2O THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED by 24.2 per cent. These figures in declining trades do not, it is true, represent the number of those who are at any time unemployed, but they do indicate a large actual displacement of labour. 8. "Skilled" versus " Unskilled" Trades. Finally, the important question confronts us as to how far " unemployment " is greater in the " unskilled " or 11 low-skilled " than in the " high-skilled " trades. The Labour Gazette 7 per cent, is derived exclusively from the picked members of skilled trades. Is there not a strong pre- sumption that in the low-skilled trades the proportion of economic "unemployment" or waste is much greater? One result of the organisation of the skilled trades has been to render it more difficult for outsiders to equip themselves for effective competition in a skilled trade. To some extent, at any rate, the skilled unions have limited the labour-market in their trade. The inevitable result of this has been to maintain a continual glut in the low-skilled labour market. This permanent pool of over-supply of low-skilled casual labour is fed by the periodic trade depressions which thrust the weaker members of the skilled trades into the seething mass of low-skilled town workers to struggle for a bare subsistence by irreg- ular labour. 9. Are there Two Questions of " the Unemployed" ? It is sometimes sought to separate entirely the problem of the low-skilled superfluous labour of our towns from the problem of " unemployment " to which skilled workers are subject. But, while the severance may be sound and ARE THERE TWO QUESTIONS OF UNEMPLOYMENT ? 2 I serviceable in considering modes of relief or remedies, any deeper diagnosis of industrial disorder shows a close organic connection constantly maintained between the two classes of "unemployed". It is true that, in times of good trade, nearly all the members of skilled trades find full employment, while a close investigation among the poorest quarters of our towns would show that even at these times there was a large superabundance of low- skilled, inefficient casual labour. But more minute exami- nation would show that this " sediment " of labour was the gradual accumulation of deposits from the various regular grades of workers, dislodged from their former place in the course of agricultural or manufacturing dis- turbances, weakened by irregular town life, and breeding weaklings and incapables. That there does exist, even in periods of normally good trade, a large permanent over-supply of low-skilled and casual labour in all our large towns, there can be no possible doubt. In East London alone Mr. Charles Booth estimated the "waste" or "superfluity" at 100,000 (n per cent, of the whole), not counting therein the lowest dregs of the population: " It may not be too much to say that if the whole of Class B (100,000) were swept out of existence, all the work they do could be done, together with their own work, by the men, women and children of classes C and D; that all they earn and spend might be earned, and could very easily be spent, by the classes above them; that these classes, and especially class C, would be im- mensely better off, while no class nor any industry would suffer in the least." This same class B numbers no less than 317,000 in 22 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED the whole of London. The metropolis may be somewhat worse than other cities, but we are brought face to face here with a huge mass of "waste" labour-power which finds no reflection in the reports of the Labour Gazette. Much, if not most, of this low-graded town labour, taken as it is, differs widely in respect of " unemployment" from the case of skilled workers in times of depression. Unemployment here, even more than in the case of skilled workers, becomes a question of "degree." Living by casual and essentially irregular work, few of them could be definitely said to be " out of work " at one time more than another: some scraps of work they must be getting constantly, or they sink into pauperdom. The true meas- ure of unemployment here would clearly be the waste of such labour-power as they possess. This, I take it, is what Mr. Booth meant by his estimate of superfluous labour in East London. Now, if we bear in mind the large mass of our growing town population which is subjected either to the essential irregularities of the low- skilled trades or ekes out a living by casual labour, we shall recognise that even in periods of good trade such a figure as the 7 per cent, which is applicable to skilled trade unionists, would be far below the measure of eco- nomic " unemployment " in these classes. 10. Evidence of the Labour Bureaux. This view of the higher rate of " unemployment" among low-skilled and casual workers seems to be borne out by such direct evidence as is available from the reports of the Labour Bureaux in London, Liverpool, Salford, and other places. Among male applicants for work, general labourers form by far the largest class, while clerks and a WASTE * IN "MAKING" INDUSTRIES 23 warehousemen, porters and messengers, contribute a very large proportion of the whole, and far outweigh the members of skilled trades, which are chiefly represented by the building, engineering, and metal trades. Similarly, among female applicants for work, charwomen and other general workers have a large predominance. Although no close statistical conclusions as to distribution of unem- ployment can be drawn from such sources, because the greater helplessness of low-paid labour would more readily drive it to have recourse to these Labour Bureaux, the evidence does warrant us in concluding that "unemploy- ment" is greater among the low-skilled and casual than among the high-skilled labourers. n. Summary of tf Waste" in " Making" Industries. Following this line of argument, we shall conclude that the 7 per cent, which was taken as our starting-point, is not a full measure of the "unemployment" in trade unions of skilled trades, still less is it a measure of the " unemployment" or the waste labour in the whole body of these trades, and that when we turn from the skilled trades to the less skilled, and from them to the casual labour of our towns, we shall expect to find a far higher average rate of economic waste or " unemployment." If to this we add the inevitable tendency of modern industrial forces, attested plainly by statistics of occupations, to assign an ever-diminishing proportion of national employ- ment to the great staple manufactures engaged in supplying common "routine" wants, and an ever-increasing propor- tion to subsidiary and luxury trades, which are in their nature prone to irregularity, we shall find good reason. 24 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED to believe that the "waste" of labour-power and the economic "unemployment" in the extractive and manu- facturing trades taken as a whole is very much under- represented by the evidence which is drawn exclusively from the higher grades of the best organised trades. But it must be remembered that our enquiry has so far confined itself almost entirely to the wage-earners in the manufacturing trades and in mining. How far can the conclusions which apply there be extended to employ- ment in general ? $ 12. Proportion of Manufacturing to Distributive Work in England. We are so accustomed to regard ourselves as a manu- facturing nation as to forget that less than one- third of the occupied classes of the English nation are engaged in manufacture. Unfortunately, the method of our Census Returns does not enable us to say with any precision how many persons are engaged in manufactures as wage- earners; but the careful investigations of Mr. Booth into the Census Returns lead to the conclusion that the proportion of English people engaged, not merely in the staple manufactures but in manufactures as a whole, has been gradually declining since 1861. The percentages up to 1 88 1 run as follows : 1841 . 27.1 per cent. 1851 327 1861 33.0 1871 . 31.6 1881 30.7 If we could separate the " makers" from the " dealers" in our latest Census Report, I feel sure we should find PROPORTION OF WORK IN ENGLAND 25 that the proportion of our people engaged in manufactures could not be placed higher than 30 per cent. Taking into account the two great branches of "extractive" industry, agriculture and mining, the recent increase in the latter as regards employment is approximately balanced by the decline of the former. A considerable majority of the "employed" classes, alike in England and in the United Kingdom, are engaged in occupations which we have not yet placed under survey for the purpose of estimating "unemployment" or "waste." An ever larger proportion of our workers and employers are continually engaged in commercial and transport trades and in the various sorts of professional, civil, and domestic service. Now it must be at once admitted that in many large departments of these occupations the quantity of direct "unemployment" and of other labour-waste will be much less than in the manufacturing trades. If, as a rough estimate, we take 13,000,000 as the number of wage- earners in the United Kingdom, it is not likely that more than 4,000,000 * are engaged in manufactures. The large class engaged in retail-dealing, which, from official evi- dence, seems to be growing more than twice as fast as the population, and which affords an ever-growing propor- tion of employment, and the " commercial" classes, which in most departments are growing still more rapidly, cannot, I think, be charged with so large a proportion of "un- employment" as belongs to the manufactures. * The general summary of groups of occupations from the Census of course includes large bodies of employers as well as the whole class of dealers. 26 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED jj. Unemployment in Distributive, Transport, and Public Services. The chief waste of labour in distribution takes the form, not of "unemployment," but of employment which is excessive and useless from the social standpoint, the multiplication of clerks, warehousemen, shop-assistants, etc., which proceeds far faster than the growth of wares to be distributed. It is true that the evidence of Labour Bureaux shows that large numbers of clerks, shop assistants, and warehousemen are " unemployed", and the heightened competition in these departments of work leads doubtless to an increased precariousness of employment. But in taking a present estimate we should be obliged to assign a lower figure of "unemployment" to commercial than to manufacturing industry. Again, the " transport" industries constantly afford more employment, occupying more than 6^ per cent, of the employed classes. Some large depart- ments of work connected with road-transport show a great " superfluity" of labour, and carmen, stablemen, and others connected with street- traffic figure largely in the lists of the Labour Bureaux : while, apart from absolute " unem- ployment", there must be an enormous waste of labour- power in cab-driving, etc. The evidence provided by the registers of Labour Bureaux, though it has a value of its own, must not, I think, be taken as even an approximate test of the proportion of unemployed in the several trades of the localities. The preponderance of general labourers and of those belonging to the building trades amongst men, and dressmakers and seamstresses and charwomen amongst women do, I think, rightly indicate a very large excess UNEMPLOYMENT IN PUBLIC SERVICES 27 of labour-power as well as a great irregularity in its demand in these trades, but the very large register of clerks and messengers, warehousemen and porters, I am disposed rather to impute partly to the fact that such workers often cannot take the ordinary means of seeking work by personal application which is open to those engaged in manufactures and large-scale industries, and partly to the absence of trade union organisation upon which most skilled and some unskilled workers rely to assist them to a place. But though the classes of road- transport are evidently subject to great irregularity, against this must be set the steady and large employment on railways and in large departments of navigation. On the contrary dockers and all branches of riverside labour will yield a very large quantity of "waste." If we accept Mr. Geoffrey D rage's estimate of the number of London dock labourers at 22,000 (exclusive of those who drift in occasionally from other trades), and compare it with the average of those actually employed on any given day, which for the year 1894 amounted to 7,006,. we shall perceive that after allowance is made for the fairly full work of " permanent " hands, the quantity of unemployment for the mass must be enormous. Much of this irregularity is inherent in the nature of a trade so largely dependent on season and on weather, which yields a difference of about 25 per cent, for the numbers, employed in March and in November, while the daily fluctuations are much wider. But even if we take the maximum employed on the busiest day of the year we shall find it falls short by some thousands of the number of " dockers ", indicating a large net surplus of " unem- ployed " not wanted even for short emergencies. In other 28 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED ports than London work is not quite so irregular and the permanent surplus of " dockers " is probably much less, but in spite of all efforts to organise and regulate dock employment, the total " waste " of labour in this branch of transport trade must be very large. On the whole, the workers engaged in " the conveyance of men, goods, and messages " would yield a far lower rate of unemployment than the manufactures. We must next add in the rapidly growing department of public services, State, county and municipal, together with the semi-public services of gas, water, electricity, etc. These routine services are essentially regular and would yield no appreciable quantity of "unemployment" either in their civil or military departments, unless we include under the latter the lamentable and criminal waste of " labour" represented by the constant flow of soldiers from regular military service into the Army Reserve, which helps to swell the standing host of untrained and low-skilled labour. One other large class of wage-earners requires mention, those engaged in domestic service. The conditions of this work impose a high degree of regularity in employment, and though the multiplication of registry-offices indicates a large constant flow from "place" to " place ", which doubtless involves a certain " leakage " of employment, there cannot, if we take the country as a whole, be a large percentage of "unemployment" or direct " waste " in domestic service. I think that the " unemployment " of servants which figures considerably in the accounts of Labour Bureaux, belongs rather to the large-town problem of general low-skilled labour than to the specific conditions of domestic service. Some over- supply, however, in the lower grades, must be admitted. GENERAL MEASURE OF THE PROBLEM 29 14. General Measure of the Problem. The conditions of this estimate of " unemployment " among wage- earners forbid us from venturing even upon an approximate figure for the total of unemployment. I am on the whole disposed to think that if it were pos- sible to take an accurate census upon the subject, we should find that the average for our manufactures as a whole was considerably higher than the figures of the Board of Trade Return (applying the term " unemployed " as usually interpreted by trade unions), but that the bulk of other wage-earning occupations would tend to lower the average of " absolute " unemployment. Interpreted more liberally and more logically as " waste of social labour- time," I think that a figure like 7 per cent, must be considered far below the true measure of this waste. In other words, great as is the evil of complete "unem- ployment", the evil of irregular and insufficient employ- ment is far greater. Taking a wider survey of this "unemployed " problem from the social standpoint, we cannot fail to see that it by no means exclusively applies to the wage-earners. That all the professions and the higher arts are "over- stocked " has long been a commonplace. Turn where you will to the law, to medicine, engineering, architecture, teaching, to literature and journalism you find large numbers of men who are only " nominal " members of their calling, still larger numbers who are always under- employed. Neither here nor in the case of manual workers is it a question of competency or qualifications: set what standard of efficiency you will, the number of well-qualified applicants for any fixed employment, how- 30 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED ever moderate the salary, indicates that every grade of the arts and professions is over-supplied. $ 75. The Upper Class of Unemployed. In viewing the subject, not from the exclusive stand- point of poverty, but from that of the social economy of labour-power, two other classes must be taken count of before we realise the full waste of labour-power. The first is the class of upper " unemployed", euphemistically described in the Census Reports as " unoccupied. '^ In 1891 there were in England and Wales no fewer than 233,446 males between the age of twenty and sixty-five who were not even nominal members of any trade or profession. This represents a large mass of adult labour- power* utterly wasted for purposes of social work, subsisted out of the labour of others and contributing nothing in return. A large proportion of this class are well-nourished, capable men, whose idleness injures both themselves and the society upon which they live. The casual voluntary work which some of these may undertake cannot be regarded as a serious contribution to the aggregate of social work, being amateur in character and commonly misdirected, since from the economic nature of the case It is not amenable to social direction and control. 16. Waste of "Pauper* Labour. The sum of labour-waste is not complete without an allusion to the lowest class of "unemployed" the able- bodied pauper class. There were on January i of last year, in England and Wales alone, 116,478 able-bodied adult papers. It is true that most of these, regarded from the working point of view, would be found hope- REGISTERS OF LABOUR BUREAUX 31 lessly inefficient. But a full consideration of their case would show that this physical, moral, industrial incapacity is inseparable from the disorder of a society which has failed to furnish opportunities of educating and utilising in the social service the labour-power which in some kino^ and degree attaches to every human being. This able-, bodied pauper class cannot be regarded as a wholly separate problem, out of organic relation to general problems of industrial and social order. The forces which are respon- sible for other forms of " unemployment" are* engaged in depositing and maintaining at the bottom of society the sediment of pauperism. The able-bodied pauper represents so much potential labour-power which is wasted now. APPENDIX A. Unemployment in Registers of Labour Bureaux. The following statistics, furnished by the Labour Bureaux established by private philanthropy in nine places, yield some information as to the occupations of the unem- ployed during 1894. It must, however, be borne in mind that five of the nine registers are in. cities (London, Liverpool, Salford, Plymouth, Ipswich) and that four of them are in the Metropolis (Chelsea, St. Pancras, Batter- sea, Islington), so that the results bear only upon the unemployed problem in large centres of population. More- over, the absolute numbers on the registers are too small to furnish any close indication of the proportion of un- employment in the several trades, while the number of THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED J ioco f> CM M CM ^t* r>. c~>. in CM Tl- CO M CO O O CN. CO oo Ov M M miomcM IVOMMVOVO CO m o CO M 1 CM CM CO N CO M CM i CF\ rj- in M M rJ-QvO O\ fx. MM CM M CM C^. M CM 1 CM CO CM vO 10 OO CM o ft M r-slOM M Tf CO CO ON O CM M CM M CM Tj- CM O ? CM CO TfOO CO m CM CM vO CM CM" CJD 3 OOvOvO M MOO Tf O m t^> OO o\ M CM COOO M in m CM O M^ ^^l^^i^? co rr r-s o M CS M N M 1O CM ^ CM M CM >, VO'M^ S" 5- S cTc^^- [^ 5 M N Tf CM O vO CO s M CM OO M f^CMvO GNOO T}-cOcO vo M Tj- M CO vO CM M CM M CM C^ CM O\ CM M M co "s M CM n' 1O CM ^l-OO O CM M CO Q> M m CM <}- ONVO O CM M vO CO CM M CO M CM 00 CM CO CM CM CO 3 CM ^ ONO C^^M CO1OOO CM CM O CO in in M o CM CM M co in vO CO CM CO M CM M CM oo CM P*n M CM" CO o cTS 2" ^^ ^ 2 ^ ^ co CM* <* covo CO CO COCO M CM m rl flj XOMM CMMCOtOM CM M M OO > 5 CM CM '. to '. '. " j j 1 j j a g w 1 If 0) f -2 3 r-H* Occupatio g : ^ -o g '1 1 B | I o V} 'd a na CO . 3 -s-i a rtT3 CJ g W j rf g CJ d rt g 6 t3 i n liifllliii 3 pi^'C^ rt^ o >3 pq W ^ PH U U U PH O O ^lil 11511 ^QUcgS 3 REGISTERS OF LABOUR BUREAUX 33 centres from which the figures are drawn are not enough to prevent the effects of one or two special local disturb- ances of industry from exercising an undue influence upon the results, considered as indicative of general conditions of trade. The totals seem to conform very closely to the general law that employment is better in the summer than in the winter months in the case of men. The statist^; of women are so slight and irregular as to have little value. It will be observed that the building trades and general labourers furnish nearly half the total of unem- ployed men, but that they are closely followed by the town "transport" trades: carmen, stablemen, horsemen porters and messengers forming a significant feature in the list. The figures, however, considered as representative of the "unemployed," in the several trades, are vitiated by various considerations. Members of skilled trades would seldom place themselves upon the Bureaux registers, preferring to seek work through their business or by personal application at known quarters. Many skilled workmen, clerks and others, would not care to publicly register themselves as unemployed. Charwomen and other day workers will often use the Labour Bureaux as a means of enlarging their connection, misrepresenting the extent of their "unemployment" for this purpose. The workers in irregular trades of the home or small workshop will rarely know the existence of Labour Bureaux. This will possibly account for the small number of men and women belonging to the clothing trades who appear on the registers. Knowledge or ignorance of the existence, purpose, or value of the Labour Bureaux, will- ingness or unwillingness to publicly acknowledge them- 3 34 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED selves as unemployed, existence of other facilities for obtaining work, probability of effectual aid from the Bureaux these are only a few of the "factors" which determine the register and which render it of small account in its present condition as an index of the distri- bution of " unemployment " among different classes of industry. CHAPTER III DOES UNEMPLOYMENT GROW? i. Do Modern Forces Make for Irregular Emp loym en t ? Is this waste of labour-power arising from chronic in- sufficiency or from irregularity of employment tending to increase? The question is often put and answered in the affirmative or negative with equal confidence. As we possess no just measure of present " unemployment," and no measure at all of past "unemployment," no direct evidence can decide the point. There are, however, some considerations derived from knowledge of the changes in the character of different industries and the proportion of those employed in these several industries, which will lead us to believe that the general condition of employ- ment in England is one of greater irregularity, and that the waste of time and energy is larger than it was half a century ago or during the i8th century. ^ O 2. Expansion of Market Areas. Three conditions are specially calculated to impress irregularity of employment upon a business. First the 35 36 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED wideness of area of the market to the supply of which it contributes. When a manufacturer or a trader supplied a small local market of known customers whose habits of consumption were pretty fixed, and who were practically unable to go for their supply outside this small market, a regularity of local demand prevailed which also implied a regularity of production. The resources and methods of production of one's trade competitors were known and were not subject to such rapid changes as would enable them to draw away quickly a " custom " once established. The expansion of market area, directly attributable to improved methods of com- munication and transport, renders every business man liable to the keen competition of rivals in distant parts of the country or in foreign lands with whose existence, economic resources, and methods of production he is not familiar. Although he does his best to keep himself ait courant with the movements of the wider market, that market is constantly growing larger and more complex, and he finds it quite impossible to obtain a knowledge of the corn or wool or iron market of the world so reliable as that which he once possessed of the narrower area. To take a familiar example, the education of the English farmer is utterly inadequate to enable him to follow the world-market for wheat or pigs, which is con- stantly expanding or contracting by the influence of economic and political factors which are utterly outside his ken. This applies more or less to an ever-increasing number of trades. j. The Speculative Nature of Modern Industry, Not only are the individual businesses compelled to INFLUENCE OF TASTE AND FASHION 37 compete with a larger number of unknown competitors in a market with a wider space -area, but a corresponding expansion is taking place in the time-area. Manufacture is less and less to supply present known wants, more and more to provide against future expected wants, and to assist in those auxiliary branches of the machinery of capitalist production which are always becoming more and more complex. A less and less proportion of work is done to supply definite orders, more and more is done for the chance of an unknown sale. In other words a larger proportion of trade is taking on the character of "speculation." Miscalculation and misdirection of industrial energy belong essentially to speculative trade and impress irregularity on employment. In dealing directly with causes of unemployment we shall see how closely this irregularity is connected with the application of modern machinery and power. Although the co-operation of large fixed capital in plant and machinery in itself tends to enforce continuity of work upon each business, since the loss incurred by stoppage or contraction is greater the individual finds that the matter is less and less dependent upon his own will and energy, and more and more upon the wider trade forces beyond his control, which, operating by upward and downward pressure of prices, oblige him to an oscillating policy of expansion and contraction which involves a waste in the use of capital and labour. 4. Influence of Taste and Fashion. The increased influence of taste and fashion makes in the same direction. A larger proportion of labour is constantly engaged in the production and distribution of 38 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED comforts and luxuries which are more amenable to the caprices of the consumer or of the dealers who are responsible for changes in fashion. The silk trade has always been more irregular iri its prices and its employ- ment than the cotton or the woollen trades, and that irregularity is increasing as the refinement and rapidity of fashion-changes obtain a hold over a larger proportion of the consuming public. Formerly there was a constant and fairly steady demand for certain kinds of silk ribbon which it was safe to make "to stock," now changes of fashion spread so rapidly and reach so quickly the mass of the consumers that it is no longer possible to make to stock. The same holds generally of articles of conve- nience or luxury. These rapid changes of taste can of course only find satisfaction on the assumption that there either exists a great surplusage of productive power which only obtains full use at certain periods and is kept in abeyance at other times, or that the transferability of capital and labour is so great as to enable production to follow the changes of consumption without any consider- able waste. No one acquainted with trade will assert the validity of this latter supposition. It follows thus that with the increased control of taste and fashion over industry and the increased adaptability of industry to this control which arises from the great expansion of productive power, irregularity of employment tends to grow. j. Transferability of Labour. General versus Special Ability. It is sometimes held that any increased irregularity of employment thus caused is more than compensated by the greater facilities which labour possesses for transferring TRANSFERABILITY OF LABOUR 39 itself from one place to another place, and from one trade to another trade. So far as the transferability from one locality to another is concerned, the same causes which have expanded the area of the market for most commodities have certainly expanded the labour-market. A man who is thrown out of work by some local decline of trade is more easily and more quickly able to find an opening in the same trade in another place than was once the case, but I do not believe that this increased fluidity of labour has kept pace with the increased fluidity of general trade. Adam Smith's dictum still holds good that "a man is of all sorts of luggage the most difficult to be transported." The increased ability of the modern worker who is displaced from one trade to find employment in another trade is frequently asserted by economists. The tendency is, it is maintained, to substitute "general" ability for special manual skill. Formerly a handicrafts-man spent many years in getting a particular form of manual dexterity, and, if he were obliged to find some other occupation, he would have to acquire a new skill in the same slow fashion, besides being limited in his new choice by the specialisation of powers which had warped his general development. Nowadays, it is said, a man, engaged in some particular process, who is displaced can learn in a few weeks or months another process in another trade, or can find in another trade a species of work analogous to that upon which he was formerly engaged. The broad question whether there exists for the average workman to-day an increased transferability of his labour-power depends for its answer upon two sets of considerations. The first has reference to the structure of trades. 40 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED $ 6. Does Division of Labour give Security of Employment in Manufacture? In modern manufacturing industry the labour of employees must be roughly divided into three classes, (i) general labour in the care of machinery and superintendence of labour, including the work of overseers, of foremen, and of engineers and smiths who are responsible for the right working of machinery and for repairs ; (2) machine-tending specialised to work with some particular machine employed in a single process; (3) highly-skilled work in a special process by handicraftsmen or by those who direct and control a special machine. When the increased transferability of labour is asserted the first class and a portion of the third class are taken into account. It is evident that the work of superintend- ing labour is mostly of a "general" character and can be transferred without much loss from one trade to another. So, too, the engines and general machinery for producing power, and some of the machinery for trans- mitting it to specific machines are similar in many in- dustries; so that a good deal of labour in the engineering and in the machine and tool making trades will be transferable. A man who looks after engines in a cotton- spinning mill can find employment in any other kind of mill which uses similar engines. A smith, or a carpenter, or a fitter can adapt himself to a good many different trades. It is obvious that many trades have some " com- mon " foundational character, and that workers engaged upon such work have great transferability. Again in the metal or the textile trades there will be certain special skilled processes, which, since they deal with similar DOES DIVISION OF LABOUR GIVE SECURITY? 41 properties of similar material, will be analogous. The passage of weavers from the woollen mills of Yorkshire to the cotton mills of Lancashire has been not uncommon ; watchmakers in Coventry have adapted themselves to the less refined processes of the bicycle trade, while this last has also drawn indiscriminately from the Birmingham metal trades those who could easily adapt themselves to the new work. But when writers dwell with enthusiasm upon these signs of " despecialisation " of labour, as proving the increasing importance of general over special attainments and of bringing an increased freedom and choice of occupation to the workers, they fail to take account of two counter-acting forces. Along with this " despecialisation " and more general in its operation is the constant and finer sub-division of labour, among the great mass of subordinate workers. The machine-tender, the typical modern worker, is constantly being narrowed in his work; the "general" mechanic in the building trades has disappeared, the elaborate and many-sided work of the "plumber" has been so specialised and taken over by machinery that he is now nothing but a "fitter." This subdivision, this "specialisation" is surely the main stream of tendency of which the other is only a counter-acting current of inferior power. Those who speak of the increased importance of " general " as opposed to special capacities in the modern worker deceive them- selves, if they think, as they appear to do, that the fact implies greater economic freedom. The modern workman is not " despecialised " ; on the average he is more highly " specialised " but he is less deeply set in his special groove and therefore loses less if he is taken out of it. It is not so much that his work nowadays calls for a 42 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED larger absolute amount of general ability but that it calls for a smaller quantity of special skill. General ability is only relatively more important in the modern mechanic and machine-worker. 7. Transferability of Labour in Other Industries. If we turn from manufacture to the extractive industries concerned directly with getting the raw materials of food or manufacture, we shall not find any net increase of ability to transfer labour-power, except from one locality to another. The Scotch or the Durham coalminer may try his luck in Pennsylvania, or the Cornish tin miner may migrate to South Africa, but the saying " once a miner always a miner " still holds good, and there is every reason to believe that a miner is more narrowly specialised and that in the modern strain of competition a thin-seam " hewer " has less chance than formerly of working advantageously in a thick-seam mine. The young agricultural labourer no doubt has more freedom of choice and can take up town work or work on the line, but when he is once inured to agricultural work he can no more quit it for factory or other town work than can the sailor, the soldier, or the fisherman. The various departments of the transport and the dis- tributive trades do unquestionably contain a large amount of labour which is more transferable. Though much railway labour and some dock labour, as for example the work of many of the stevedores, is highly skilled, the bulk of it, together with the work of draymen, messengers, and the like, rests for its value upon certain common qualities of muscular vigour and intelligence which can be diverted without much loss to another branch of the THE DISPLACED WORKER AND ANOTHER TRADE 43 transport services. A railway-porter, a warehouseman, a man accustomed to drive and to care for horses, has a large and I think an ever larger range of employments open for him. In mercantile and retail industry the writing clerk and the shop assistant are serviceable by reason of certain ca- pacities of quick perception, accuracy, and address which belong to trade in general rather than to any specific trade. The increased proportion of the labour of the community which is engaged in distribution and in trans- port tends here to assign more importance to the common as distinguished from the special elements of labour power. But there is some reason to believe that as machinery obtains larger control over those branches of industry, the subdivision of labour which prevails in manufacture will find its way there also, reducing the extent of the present transferability of labour. The labour of the railway worker and of the " sailor " on a steamship is more specialised than the work of the coachman and the sailor on a sailing-vessel which they have displaced. We therefore cannot look with confi- dence to the operation of new economic forces to secure greater regularity of work by means of improved trans- ferability of labour. 8. Can the Displaced Worker Take up Another Trade? Even if it be admitted that a special process in modern industry (especially in manufacture) does not generally require so much time and energy to acquire as formerly, and that a man can thus more easily give up one special work and fit himself for another, it by no means follows 44 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED that he can get that other work. It is here that we strike that second false assumption of those who maintain a general increase of transferability of labour. Suppose the structure of modern industry did favour transferability from one trade to another, the transfer can only be effective provided the demand for labour in these other trades gives openings to outsiders. Individuals endowed with special energy and enterprise are no doubt often able to turn their hand to another trade, but the average man, though he could take up some other skilled trade, if he had the chance, finds that he does not get the chance. Trade Unions from the practical standpoint see, what the theoretic economist often refuses to see, that generally throughout the field of industry the supply of labour, skilled as well as unskilled, is normally in excess of the demand, and, acting in their own interests, rightly direct their energies to making it difficult for an outsider to compete for their kind of work. As the organisation of labour grows stronger this policy will be enforced more rigidly, and that transfer of labour from one trade or process to another which the structure of industry might permit, will be prevented by the operation of other social forces. Taking a general view of the situation we are driven to the conclusion that the alleged greater transferability of labour is not adequate to counteract the forces which make for irregularity of employment and displacement of labour. Since a larger proportion of the total number of employed are coming under the new conditions of in- dustrial life, the absolute quantity of " unemployment " at any given time due to these causes must be increasing. CHAPTER IV MINOR CAUSES OF UNEMPLOYMENT /. The Individual Moral View of the Problem. IN order to realise the relative importance of the economic causes which are directly responsible for "unemployment," some deductions from our earlier analysis may be of service. The common notion of the "philanthropist" and the moralist who, wholly untrained in economic thought, thinks the only thorough treatment of this and other problems of poverty consists in the treatment of indivi- dual character, need not detain us long. The fallacy is one necessary to all individualist views of society. A depression of the staple trade in a town throws out of employment 10 per cent, of those who are normally employed. The charity organiser with his individual scrutiny sets to work, and a close investigation of each "case" discloses in most of this 10 per cent, some moral or economic defect : there is drink, laziness, inefficiency , or some other personal fault discernible in, or imputed to, most of these "unemployed." Our "thorough" in- vestigator, having, as he thinks, found a sufficient reason why each man should be unemployed, reaches the con- 45 46 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED elusion, that " unemployment" is due to individual causes. Such conclusion is, of course, wholly fallacious. Personal causes, no doubt, explain in a large measure who are the individuals that shall represent the 10 per cent, "unem- ployed", but they are in no true sense even contributory causes of the "unemployment." When economic causes lower the demand for labour, competition will tend to squeeze out of employment those individuals who, for reasons, sometimes moral, sometimes industrial, are less valuable workers than their fellows. J If these individuals had not been morally or industrially defective they would have kept their work, but necessarily by pushing out other 10 per cent. Personal causes do not to any appreci- able extent cause unemployment, but largely determine who shall be unemployed. The individualist-moralist is keen to detect the fallacy involved in supposing that poverty can be stopped by regarding it as a number of holes to be filled up by pouring in promiscuous charity. But he does not perceive that this analysis and treatment of " unemployment" involves a fallacy closely analogous to that which he has condemned. $ 2 . Nature of the Individualist Fallacy. Character Determining Who Shall be Unemployed. The moral and industrial elevation of defective indivi- duals is, for their individual sakes and on general moral grounds, highly desirable, but it will have no direct effect in diminishing unemployment. This may appear to some a hard saying. But it is strictly true. The effect of the McKinley tariff in causing depression of trade and unemployment in Bradford is not really dependent upon the moral or industrial qualities of those workers who are displaced. If these latter, who NATURE OF THE INDIVIDUALIST FALLACY 47 will be found less efficient or less reliable on the average than those whose services were retained during the depres- sion, could be morally and technically educated above the level of their fellows, this fact would not prevent the same external forces from operating upon Bradford with the same effect as before. Different individuals might be displaced from employment, that is all. A sudden fall of the fashion for wearing silk ribbons will reduce the employment of Coventry weavers, and no moral or industrial elevation of the workers will affect the quantity of unemplyo- ment which is caused. Even if it be allowed that a rise of the average efficiency of the Bradford or Coventry workers would enable them to keep some of their trade by underselling the competitors in other towns or other countries in a time of depressed trade, they would only escape unemployment by throwing out of work their weaker competitors in other places : the trade as a whole would suffer just as much from unemployment as before. The notion that an increase of productive power will be a safeguard against employment will not stand for one moment when confronted with the fact, that during each period of unemployment a large existing excess of productive power is the most striking phenomenon. Indirectly there is no doubt that all forces which contribute to the intellectual and moral education of the workers help to maintain employment in so far as they stimu- late a demand for a higher standard of life, which will find expression in an increased effective demand for commodities. But this does not justify us in stating that moral or technical inefficiency are considerable causes of unemployment in face of the fact that during periods of ordinarily good trade most of those very individuals whose " unemployment" is imputed to " personal defects" are found to be in regular 48 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED work, or in supposing that moral and technical education will help directly either to prevent or cure unemployment. It is perhaps almost inevitable that those who are absorbed in work amongst the poor should often be dupes of this individualist fallacy. Personal defects commonly appear as direct and sufficient reasons why A or B or C fail to get regular work, and if Society at large is regarded merely as a conglomerate of particular instances of A and B and C, these personal defects appear to furnish a sufficient explanation of the total amount of poverty or of unemployment in the whole society. But this conclusion, very natural to those immersed in detailed cases, and unable to see the forest for the trees, ignores utterly the interrelations of the various individuals and the organic unity which they express. Regarded as furnish- ing an explanation of "unemployment," it rests upon a total denial of the operation of wider economic forces determining the quantity of employment available at a given time for a working community. If it is true, as all students of economics assert, that there are forces operating from without which are liable to cause a shrink- age of employment in the woollen or the iron trade, amounting to (say) 30 per cent, of the former volume of employment, it is idle for those who, working as philan- thropists, shut their eyes to these economic forces, to adduce as causes of " the unemployment" those personal causes which merely decide whether A or B or C among the workers shall be among the 30 per cent, unemployed. It has been necessary to emphasise this point because the grasp of an organic conception of industrial life and its necessary implications is still very weak, and the notion that investigation which confines itself to particular instances MACHINERY AND UNEMPLOYMENT 49 alone contributes a thorough and a scientific treatment is very prevalent among many of those who claim to speak with authority on the questions of poverty and unemployment. j. Connection of Machinery with Unemployment. It can, I think, be clearly shown that the great mass of " unemployment" and " underemployment" is not due to those "minor" leakages which belong to the character of certain trades or even to the detailed changes of machinery, industrial method, and locale of markets, which we saw were verce causes in the problem. At certain periods, large sudden displacements have, of course, been attributable to the substitution of machinery for handlabour or to some great political event affecting markets. If, however, we confine ourselves to British trade in recent years we cannot explain by these means the great fluctuations of employment. It is a mistake to regard as one of the necessary effects of improvements in machinery and their substitution for hand-labour a great mass of unemployment. The introduction of new machinery into a trade must under existing circumstances inflict a twofold injury upon those whose labour it affects. It reduces or destroys the market- value of the special skill they have acquired, and it imposes upon some or all of them the necessity of finding other work, where their special skill is not available. But if the general condition of the labour-market were such that the demand for labour pressed upon the supply, such displaced labour would be rapidly re-absorbed and the total waste by "unemployment" would be very small. In the prosperous period 1871-4 machinery made con- siderable strides in many English industries, and many "savings" of labour were effected, especially in the metal 4 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED trades ; but the expanding demand for labour was so great that a very small proportion of the working popula- tion was at any time out of employment. Where im- provements of machinery occur during periods of " booming" trade they do not occasion any large quantity of unem- ployment or distress. It cannot therefore be held that the application of improved machinery, is itself a chief and necessary cause of unemployment. 4. Estimate of Minor Causes. Trade Depres- sion shown as Major Cause. These machinery changes and specific trade movements are, of course, extremely numerous and of continual oc- currence. For this very reason, in taking a term of years their influence may be discounted. The amount of "unemployment" due to these causes must be taken as a pretty constant quantity. A glance at the statistics of unemployment recorded by the Board of Trade during the last nine years will indicate the importance of this conclusion. At End of each Month. 1887 1888 1889 1890 1891 1892 1893 1894 i895 January .... February . . . March .... 10.3 8-5 7.7 7.8 7.0 $.7 3-i 2.8 2.2 1.4 1.4 1.7 3.4 2.6 ? 8 5-o 5-7 C.7 1 0.0 9.5 8 7 7.0 5-6 6 S 8.2 7.9 65 April 68 ^.2 2.O 2.O 2.7 5-4 69 6 T 6,3 May.. 85 1 8 2.8 2.O 3.8 5.9 6.2 6.3 6.0 June . . 80 1 6 T 8 T 8 2.9 ^.2 5 8 63 5 6 Tuly . 8 ; 3.9 1.7 2.3 3.3 5-0 6,7 7.4 5.3 August 83 4,8 2.5 2.3 4.2 5.1 7.1 7.7 5.2 September . . October .... November . . December. . . 7-5 8.6 8-5 6.9 4.4 4.4 3-1 3-3 2.1 1.8 i-5 1-7 2.6 2 -5 2.4 3.0 4-5 4.4 3-8 4-4 6.2 7.3 8.3 10.2 7-3 7.3 7-2 7.9 7.6 74 7.0 7-7 4-9 4-9 4-3 4.8 FLUCTUATIONS 5 1 5. Short Period and Long Period Fluctuations. Now, if in the skilled trades here represented we are justified in counting the minor " leakages " and special displacement due to introduction of new machinery, etc., as a fairly constant quantity, taking one year with an- other, we cannot fail to recognise that some greater forces are at work which account for the large bulk of the unemployment here displayed. In January, 1890, the necessary minor " leakages " and specific displacements were going on, and yet these only caused 1.4 unemploy- ment. If, then, we are called upon to explain why in January, 1887, 10.3 men are "unemployed," we must seek another cause or causes. A further comparison of one year as a whole with another will disclose the fact that the force to which we must attribute the mass of unemployment is one which operates over wider periods than a year. We are driven irresistibly to the conclusion that the great tidal movements of trade, and not the minor detailed movements of special trades, are the root- causes of the evil we are investigating. No accumulation of minor short-period causes will explain why, on the average, throughout 1889 the rate of "employment" was only 2.1, while in 1887 it was 8.1, and in 1893, 7.5. So far as these statistics of skilled trades can be taken as an index of general trade movements, we must con- clude that the great trade depressions are the vital factor with which we have to deal, and that no palliatives or cures will be of much service unless they serve to miti- gate the force of these vast world-movements in trade. 52 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED 6. Strikes as Causes of Unemployment. It is not infrequent for business men and others who have not followed sufficiently closely the periodic fluc- tuations in prices and volume of trade during the last half century to assign Strikes as the chief cause or as an important contributory cause of bad trade and of unem- ployment. So it is urged by a writer in the National Review * that the high percentage of " unemployment " at the opening of 1893 must be attributed to the "cotton strike", the suggestion being that all "unemployment" which is not explained by necessary leakage and specific trade displacements is a voluntary suspension of work arising from excessive claims of the workers. " These people rebel against their masters, make extortionate and impossible demands, and after striking work or being locked out assume the role of men unable to get work and wages" is the frequent comment made by the unthinking members of all classes. Now in the first place there is no close correspondence between the great strikes and a high rate of unemployment : comparatively few strikes of any importance have occurred in the trades whose unions are well-ordered enough to furnish proper statistics to the Board of Trade, or in trades which closely affect them. The coincidence of the cotton strike with the high general percentage of " unemployment " was exceptional. But even were it true that all periods of great unemployment were marked by strikes or by lock- outs resulting from action of the workers, we should be quite unjustified in stopping our enquiry at this point. * Miss. H. Dendy, "Socialistic Propaganda," September 1895. STRIKES AS CAUSES OF UNEMPLOYMENT 53 There is an overwhelming weight of evidence to show that most great strikes are symptoms and results of trade- depressions, not causes. The three large strikes of recent years, those connected with Dock Labour, the Cotton Trade, and Coal Mining, were all of this character. Schulze-Gaevernitz in his careful and impartial investi- gation of English industry finds the real cause of the great Dock Strike in 1889 in the financial weakness of the Dock Companies, attributable to the fact that "Too many Mocks had been built and there was the fiercest compe- tition between the Companies. " * The persistent fall of , prices due to " over-production " is assigned as the explan- ation of the cotton-strike of 1893. f The cutting down of contract prices under the pressure of the same forces brought about the great lock-out in the Coal-mining industry. Other ostensible causes are sometimes to the front, but most modern strikes are conditioned by an ex- cess of producing power in the several trades, which drives employers to lower prices which they can only render profitable by reducing wages or by introducing new labour-saving machinery or by other economies which directly diminish the demand for labour. The only strikes which we are entitled to count as voluntary unem- ployment and for which allowance should be made in our analysis of economic causes, are those made for a rise in the standard wage or some other definite improve- ment in the economic condition of a class of workers, or the rare case of a sympathetic strike. Speaking generally a strike is not a cause but an effect of depressed trade * "Social Peace," p. 262. t Cf. De Rousier, "La Question Ouvricre en Angleterre" pp. 455-458. 54 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED and is preceded by a fall of prices in the goods with the production of which the trade is concerned. 7. Unemployed Capital and Land as well as Labour. One final statement belongs to an understanding of the nature and magnitude of the disease. " Unemployment " of labour, waste of labour-power, does not stand alone. At the great periods of depression, we have not only " unemployed " labour, but " unemployed " capital. Nor can it be accounted a mal-adjustment of capital and labour as between trade and trade. The special charac- teristic of industry during a period of trade depression is that, not in this or that trade, but over the general field of industry, there is labour-power and capital lying " unemployed." The actual phenomenon is a general excess of productive power. The waste of labour-power in our modern communities is evidently but one import- ant aspect of an even larger economic problem. This question is one we may well allow to germinate in our minds. " Why is it that, with a wheat-growing area so huge and so productive that in good years whole crops are left to rot in the ground, thousands of English labourers, millions of Russian peasants, cannot get enough bread to eat? Why is it that with so many cotton-mills in Lancashire that they cannot all be kept working for any length of time together, thousands of people in Manchester cannot get a decent shirt to their backs? Why is it that, with a growing glut of mines and miners, myriads of people are shivering for lack of coal?" These questions are not conceived in a spirit of sensationalism, but merely to bring home the nature of the vital problem UNEMPLOYED CAPITAL AND LAND 55 which is forced more and more upon thinking men and women : " Has our general standard of consumption risen to a degree commensurate with the prodigious increase of productive power brought about by modern improve- ments in machinery and methods of industry, and vested in modern forms of labour and capital ? " CHAPTER V THE ROOT-CAUSE OF UNEMPLOYMENT /. Fallacy of the Piecemeal Treatment of the Unemployed Question. A MISAPPLIED respect for thoroughness often leads students of society to a piecemeal treatment of industry which blinds them to a perception of large organic operations. It is natural that men of business, whose interests and sympathies are absorbed in some special trade and some special locality, should mistake their knowledge of local symptoms for a thorough diagnosis of industrial disease. But it is not so creditable that statesmen and economists should do their best to make it appear that the "unem- ployed " is not one, but a hundred different questions to be studied only in detail and to be solved by a hundred different little local remedies. This detailed research is highly necessary, but it can lead us only to a knowledge of secondary and contributory causes; no clear under- standing of the problem is attained until this fragmentary knowledge is gathered into the unity of a higher synthesis. 0H/\The piecemeal method which commends itself so r signally to Royal Commissions upon Labour or Committees 56 NEED OF A UNIFIED ORGANIC TREATMENT 57 upon " The Unemployed " does not really deserve the character it claims of being "thorough." Refusing to investigate the wider operation of economic forces and discarding all "theoretic" considerations, these practical persons confine themselves to collecting elaborate memor- anda of minor facts, while ignoring the major facts by which alone they can order and interpret their_jdetaiL&, When the British mind is driven to take in hand a question like that of " the unemployed " its first instinct is to chop it up into a number of little questions, and again to subdivide these into an infinite number of smaller portions. It then proceeds to collect " evidence " huge quantities of little local facts and figures which it serves up in crude masses through Blue Books. An attempt is sometimes made to reach minor generalisations bearing upon some detailed aspects of the general ques- tion, but no endeavour is made to focus the evidence in any bearing upon the unity of the subject. 2. Need of a Unified Organic Treatment. All this work of laborious detail is useful, it ought to be done, but not the other left undone. The method is really not scientific but the reverse. It attempts to treat a unified organic subject by a piecemeal inorganic"/^" method. Its collections of facts never attempt to go hind concrete phenomena into the /wider movements of industrial life, so as to find out what mal-adjustment of the larger economic forces is really represented in unem- ployment. The notion that scientific thoroughness consists in breaking up an organic whole into a number of inor- ganic pieces would be simply humorous if it were not fraught with the most injurious effects upon the reputation 58 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED of sociological studies. It is not really scientific to speci- alise without any " fundamentum divisionis ", and without any attempt or intention to apply the results of speci- alised enquiry to a philosophic interpretation of the sub- ject as a single whole. "There is no Social Problem, there are only social problems," Gambetta is reported to have said. This is the attitude of most of our statesmen and many of our economists: it is the typical position of the politician and the academic person. Being a practical denial of the possibility of Social Science, the very exist- ence of which depends on the admission of unity in the subject matter, the prevalence of this falsehood explains why progress in social study is so slow. It also explains the vague and chaotic character of the general judgments to which our public bodies of enquiry commit themselves when they occasionally break loose from the tabulation of raw facts. A delightful example of this judgment is contained in the Final Report of the Labour Commission, when that body, confronted with the necessity of saying something on the wider aspects of Irregularity of Employ- ment, gives vent to the following: fluctuations of trade in this country are due to a variety of causes, the chief of which may be briefly indicated here. The majority of these periodical changes are connected in some way with the state of commercial credit, and the willingness or unwillingness of business men to embark on new ventures. The state of credit in every country depends each year more and more upon the general conditions of business throughout the world." Omitting the middle terms of this syllogistic argument, we attain the valuable conclusion that irregularity of employment is attributable to " the general conditions of business M ! GENERAL EXCESS OF PRODUCING POWER 59 3. Central Fact General Excess of Producing Power. Neither in the proceedings of the Labour Commission nor in the analysis of causes of unemployment contained in the Report of the Board of Trade do we find the faintest recognition of the central fact of the "unemployed" problem viz., the simultaneous general unemployment , of labour, capital, and land in periods of depressed trade. Our analysis of the available statistics forced us to the conclusion that the "unemployed" question was in the main a leading aspect of the problem of trade depression. From the financial point of view bad trade appears as a general lowness of prices and of profits, but, regarded as a disease of the industrial structure, it takes the shape of a general slackness or under-use of the various factors of production. Now, no serious attempt has been made, by what may provisionally be called the orthodox school of English economists, to explain why it is that at one and the same time there can be in existence more labour, more capital, and more land, than are wanted. There might exist, according to their theory, more labour than could be employed, owing to an insufficiency of capital with which to assist labour to produce ; but, since capital and labour are the only requisites for the production of wealth, they could not both be in excess. The common mode of meeting the difficulty was to deny the fact of a general excess of producing-power. There might, it was alleged, be an excessive application of capital and labour to certain trades, but this was a malady of mis- direction, general excess of producing-power was impossible. 60 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED 4. A. Priori Assumptions of Economists. This view has always been based upon an a priori assump- tion that whatever is produced can be sold and must be sold because it was produced for no other motive, the validity of which assumption I shall discuss later on. Here it is enough to say that the theory that over- production in some trades implies under-production in others, and that the malady is only the necessary mis- direction of productive energy arising from imperfect acquaintance with markets, is inconsistent with the facts at a time of depressed trade. Where are then to be found the under-producing trades, those which are insuffi- ciently fed with capital and labour, and where, in conse- quence of the growing inability to satisfy demand, prices are rising ? There are no such trades. The fall of prices, the depression of trade, the slack employment are general not special in application. The glut of loanable capital is sufficient proof. If there were trades which were under-producing this free capital would flow into them. A continued glut of loanable capital seeking investment is only consistent with the admission that all avenues of sound investment are already occupied. 5. True Meaning of " Over-production* But when the state is described as one of over- production, a certain misconception often arises. If by over-production is meant a continued process of glutting the markets with goods which cannot find purchasers and are accumulated in ever-increasing quantities, such an operation is not possible. A comparatively small quantity of goods which are " over-produced" in the EVIDENCE OF COMMISSION 6 I sense that their addition to supply drives prices below the margin of profitable production will suffice to " congest" a trade. If fixed expenses are very heavy, production may be carried on for some time at a loss, but always at a slackened pace, while it is only a question of time when the weaker businesses are driven to suspend opera- tions and the stronger to a close restriction of their output, sometimes accompanied by a trade dispute which checks for a time the whole volume of production. In no trade can actual over-production of goods continue for any long period, though the liability to over- produce may manifest itself in actual gluts from time to time over a long period of years. The true signification \ of over-production as used to designate the immediate cause of depression is the continued existence of a general excess of producing-power in the forms of capital and labour beyond what is economically required to supply the current or prospective rate of consumption of the community. $ 6. Authorities Admit a General Excess. Evidence of Commission. But if what is signified is a long continued existence of a general excess of producing-power beyond what is economically required to supply the current rate of con- sumption, such excess is plainly attested by modern industry. Moreover, it was admitted in unmistakable language by the same Majority Report of the Commission on the Depression of Trade in 1885, which rejected with scorn the notion of "a general over-production." In its general summary this Report says, "That owing to the nature of the times the demand for our commodities does 62 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED not increase at the same rate as formerly ; that our capacity for production is consequently in excess of our requirements, and could be considerably increased at short notice ; that this is due partly to the competition of the large amount of capital which is being steadily accumulated in the country." The Minority Report finds the gist of trade depressions in " a long-continued fall of prices in many cases the result either of actual over-production or of a capacity of production in excess of the demand.* This Commission entirely throws over the notion, which every man of wide business experience has long repudiated, that an excess of producing-power in some trades must be balanced by a deficiency in others, and that there can be no general excess. The idea that depressed trade means a mis-application of capital and labour as between trade and trade is entirely rejected by both bodies of Commis- sioners, who find the malady they are investigating common to all " productive industries." The Minority expressly asserts over-production, in the sense above taken, as the chief agent in depression : " Over-production, by which we understand the produc- tion of commodities (or existence of the agencies of production) in excess, not of the capacity of consumption, if their distribution were gratuitous, but of the demand for export at remunerative prices, and of the amount of income or earnings available for their purchase in the home market that is, of profitable employment for the people. The depression under which we have so long been suffering is undoubtedly of this nature/^ x The Majority, though rejecting the general term " over- production," admit, as we saw, the phenomena. RECENT INDUSTRIAL HISTORY 63 $ 7. The Testimony of Recent Industrial History. The one fact which emerges with striking clearness from the whole investigation of the period 1875-1885 is that the producing-power of capital and labour, to which full employment was given in the years immediately following the Franco-German war, was found excessive in quantity during the ten years which ensued. The same trade-malady general under-employment of capital and labour has been plainly visible since 1890. In trade after trade it has been made manifest that the capacity of production is far in advance of the current or expected demand at a profitable price, -and in all of them brief bursts of activity have alternated with long periods of torpor, during which weaker mills, mines and works are closed, while others are working short time, and large bodies of workers are kept half-employed. In three staple industries, docks, cotton, coal-mining, the attempts to fully utilise existing powers of production were directly responsible for prolonged stoppages, during which the congestion was relieved at a terrible cost of suffering to the workers. A strike or a lock-out, attributable to a fall of prices, would, as we have seen, rightly rank as so much "unemployment" in any true economic analysis, though the immediate cause might be a disagreement between capital and labour in reference to wages or other terms of employment. All business men are compelled to admit that at the present time there exists, not in this industry or that, but in all the important industries of the country, a considerably larger quantity of plant and labour than can be profitably employed. A general consensus of practical opinion would sustain the judgment recently 64 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED affirmed by an experienced business man, "So rapid has been the advance in production, whether agricultural or mechanical, so greatly have the means of transportation and communication improved and cheapened that supply always now outruns demand"* Indirect testimony of the most valuable kind is afforded by Von Halle in his treatment of the American Trust. " Before the establish- ment of the combinations, hardly any industry had been able to utilise its full capacity. For instance, even before the days of the Cotton Oil Trust, numerous presses and refineries had for a long time been inactive. The Trust closed at once more than a dozen of the small old- fashioned mills. The same thing happened with the Sugar Trust, which can supply the whole market with the ' product of one fourth of the plant it owns. The Whiskey Trust immediately closed 68 of its 80 distilleries, and with the remaining 12 was enabled to furnish the same output as before and soon to largely increase it." f In other words, with the means of production which now exist a far larger quantity of commodities could be produced than are actually produced. It is probable that the percentage of unemployed or under-employed capital in the shape of mills, ironworks, dockyards, mines, and plant and machinery of various kinds is far larger than the 8 or 10 per cent, which may represent the waste of labour-power. From the financial point of view the excess is attested by the universal glut of loanable capital to which Mr. A. J. Wilson has recently directed public attention. Another financial authority, Mr. Van Oss, * J. H. Trotson, " The Assault on the Standard." f Von Halle, "Trusts." p. 66. "Investor's Review," January 1895. CONSUMPTION AND PRODUCTIVE POWER 65 rightly associates the glut of money with a glut of capital, affirming that " the amazing production of wealth under the new industrial conditions is rapidly altering the pro- portion between the supply of capital and the demand for it." * ITY 70 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED wealth to be effectively distributed without any considerable increase of the labour or capital engaged in distributive industries. Even if some increase of distributors be economically necessary, it will not be denied that the actual increase of all classes of middle-men and retailers has passed far beyond this wholesome necessary limit. A diminishing proportion of commercial effort is expended in the actual work of distribution, an increasing proportion in the work of getting business. A proof of this is the phenomenal growth of commercial travellers, local agents, jobbers, touts, and the enormous expenditure in every form of advertisement. The actual energy given out in trades, directly or indirectly concerned in distribution, is thus swollen far beyond the demands of such wholesome and effective competition as will ensure for the consuming public a cheap and rapid service of supply. The keenness of competition among rival distributors is admittedly re- sponsible for much of the adulteration and other deceitful practices which tend to the deterioration of commodities. Unfortunately, we possess no official or reliable records of the general movements in retail trade, which we can compare with the statistics of wholesale prices prepared by Mr. Sauerbeck. It is, however, generally believed, and such fragmentary evidence as we possess accords with the belief, that the great fall of wholesale prices since 1873 has not been attended by a commensurate fall of retail prices. 12. Why Waste takes a Different Form in Distribution and in Manufactures. Nor is it unreasonable that this should be the case. The effects of competition are somewhat different in manufacturing and in distributing industries. In the former WASTE IN DISTRIBUTION AND IN MANUFACTURES 7 I an excess of producing-power, after exhibiting itself in a comparatively trifling glut of actual manufactured goods, shows its " waste " in the form of " unemployed " labour and capital, which operate in some measure as a check upon further application of labour and capital. In the latter, no such natural check is provided. Small quan- tities of capital, unable to enter manufacture with any reasonable prospect of success, may embark in distribution, especially in retail trade, with some hope of attracting to their businesses a fair proportion of the trade of others. It is not easy for a new business to succeed even in retail trade, but it is less difficult than in manufacture. The same amount of business may thus come to be divided among a larger number of persons. It may even supply a livelihood to all, on the single condition that the margin of profit in each sale is larger; which means, in a period of falling wholesale prices, that retail prices fall more slowly and more slightly. It can scarcely be doubted that this is a true description of the actual phenomena exhibited in distributive trade. The assumption commonly made by statesmen, and even by economists, that the consumer gains the advantage of the full decline of wholesale prices, and that such decline is therefore a matter of comparative indifference, is unwarranted. The cautious, opinion expressed by J. S. Mill has been closely borne out by the experience of the last twenty years. " Retail price, the price paid by the actual consumer, seems to feel very slowly and imperfectly the effects of competition : and where competition does exist, it often, instead of lowering prices, merely divides the higher prices among a larger number of dealers." * * "Principles of Political Economy," vol. ii., ch. iv. 3. 72 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED In other words, an increased proportion of the prices paid by consumers goes to support agents, middle-men, shopkeepers, and their dependents, who thus receive a growing share of the national income paid for services of distribution. Without seeking to disparage the value of genuine services of necessary distribution, I may point out that this diseased swelling of labour and capital in distributive trade represents from the social standpoint a waste of power strictly analogous to the " unemployment " in manufacture, though different in the concrete aspect it assumes/ ' In distribution, the waste does not for the most part show itself as " unemployed " and " unpaid " capital and labour, but as unnecessary reduplication of distributive machinery. In any scientific treatment of the " unemployed " question, this form of waste must rank as an important aspect of the social malady. T 9 & ij. False Assiimption that all Power to Consume Must be Exercised. The business man readily admits the existence of an excess of general producing-power in forms of capital and labour which are either unemployed or wastefully employed. But many economic theorists, misled by loose deductive reasoning, still persist in their denial of a phenomenon which stares the practical man in the face. It is not possible, they urge, that a general excess of capital and labour could exist, for these are the sole requisites of production, and since everything that is produced can find a market at a price, whatever can be produced will be produced, and whatever is produced will be consumed. Now, this line of reasoning is thoroughly fallacious. Since all business is the exchange of commodities for commodities, MOTIVE OF PRODUCTION 73 it is evident that some one possesses the power to consume whatever can be produced. It may also be asserted that, since the desires of man are unlimited, and many keenly felt wants remain unsatisfied, there exists a desire to con- sume whatever can be produced. But in order to an " effective demand " the power to consume and the desire to consume must be vested in the same persons. The denial by economists of the possibility of general excess of producing-power involves the assumption of this coinci- dence. This assumption is, however, false. (Those who draw profit, interest, and rents from modern manufactures are thereby vested with the power to consume huge quan- tities of cotton and other textile wares, of coals, hardware, pottery, etc., but they have the desire to consume a com- paratively small quantity of these commodities./ "But," it may be urged, " they will have the desire to consume other commodities, and in order to obtain these they will exchange their superfluous cotton and iron goods with others who want to consume these articles." This, however, is not the case. After a certain tolerably high accustomed standard of consumption has been attained in cotton and iron wares, and in other articles for which these are exchanged, there still remains a large surplus power to consume which has no desire behind it to convert it into effectual demand. 14. Is Desire to Consume the only Motive to Production? It has generally seemed to economists of the last two generations a sufficient refutation of the theory of over- production to assert that it is impossible, and to assume that this impossibility is proved by asking what motive 74 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED prompts a person to produce except the desire to consume what is produced or its equivalent. " Each may not want more of what he himself produces, but each wants more of what some other produces, and by producing what the other wants, hopes to obtain what the other produces. There will always be consumption for everything which can be produced, until the wants of all who possess the means of producing are completely satisfied and the production will not increase any further." * Now though it must be allowed that a desire to consume is in general the motive force behind production, it does not operate so closely and so generally as to preclude the waste of over-production. A great many persons in whose hands rests the control of industry are not regulated in the quantity of production which they set on foot by the quantity of consumption which they desire, nor indeed does the desire to consume form the whole or the chief part of their conscious motive in their work of production. /j. Does all "Saving" Give Increased Employment? Mill assumes that all who own the power to consume want to consume all they can and to do so without delay. Now, a large part of the power to consume is in the hands of those who have not the desire to consume. What, then, do these men desire to do? They desire to save. But saving, if we look behind the operation of putting money in a bank, means paying labour to set up plant, machinery, and other material forms of capital. But does not this give as much employment to capital and labour as the same power used to demand consumables? Quite * J. S. Mill, "Unsettled Questions," p. 49. SAVING AND INCREASED EMPLOYMENT 75 true, the " saving " which employs labour to build a factory and stock it with machinery will cause as much employ- ment as the same amount of spending, though not more employment, as J. S. Mill sought to maintain. Moreover, in the one case, when the money is " spent " there is nothing to show for it, in the other case there is a factory and machinery. But when our theoretic friend goes on to assume that this factory can be profitably worked, and that the work it affords signifies a net increase of em- ployment both of labour and capital, he jumps to a con- clusion which is quite unwarranted. It can only be ; profitably worked on one of two suppositions. It may by successful competition obtain the orders which would have gone to another factory, ousting from employment the capital and labour there engaged. In this case it is clear that no general increase of employment has taken place. An individual has made good his "saving," but has done > so by negativing the previous " saving " of some one else ; the productive power of the community is increased, but no more actual production than before is brought about. \ The other supposition is that the demand for the class of commodities which the factory makes will be greater in the future, and that more capital and labour can therefore be employed in the trade. So far as this supposition is valid, the " saving " is socially useful, and, indeed, necessary; but it should be plainly recognised that the dependence of capital and labour for employment upon a rising standard of consumption places an absolute limit at any given time upon socially useful saving. It is therefore not true that the existence of a general desire for increased consumption is any sufficient guarantee that too much saving will not take place. Even if it be 76 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED allowed that the ultimate object of persons who save is always the desire to consume an increased quantity in the future, this individual policy may and does result in a congestion of forms of capital which is suicidal from the collective point of view. In a society composed of A, B, C, D, E, F, any three, say ABC, might save as much as they liked, or each and all might save a definite proportion of their income, but any policy of the individual members which collectively exceeded this aggre- gate would be wasteful. Yet it might be quite possible that all individuals in this over-saving community were actuated by a genuine desire to consume largely in some distant future. An individual may save any proportion of his income, provided he can induce others to spend their income and give him liens upon their present property or future production. But the proportion of a community's income which it can save and usefully store up in plant, machinery and other forms of capital is strictly limited by the rate of current or prospective consumption. Only a very small proportion of " saving" can profitably be invested in forms of capital that fructify in the distant future ; the current or immediately prospective rate of consumption determines pretty closely the proportion of current income which can be usefully saved. 16. Excessive Forms of Capital do Exist. To the suggestion that an excess of saving is possible it is often deemed a sufficient answer to point to the infinitude of human wants and the new industrial enter- prises which they can vitalise. Why, it is urged, should you assume that any trade will be over-stocked with EXCESSIVE FORMS OF CAPITAL DO EXIST 77 new-saved capital, when the self-interest of savers will naturally lead them to prefer new uses. With the pure theory of this answer I have no quarrel. If all the " saved"" incomes do in fact take shape in fixed forms of capital which supply increased consumption-goods in the shape of new public or private comforts and conveniences to the present or even to the next generation, we can thoroughly approve this saving : it is no cause of diminished employment. Well, it may be said, does that not settle the matter? Are there not ample opportunities for the supply of new or improved public and private needs? Are our towns as well-built, commodious and beautiful as they might be ? Are they perfectly supplied with water, lighting, trans- port, and other services ? Could not public education provide a good field of investment for capital and labour both on the material and intellectual planes? Is it not self-evident that without passing the barrier of wholesome personal conveniences a vast and ever-growing number of good and reasonable wants remain unsatisfied because there is no capital and labour directed to their satisfaction ? How in the face of this can over-saving be possible ? Still more how can it be asserted to actually exist? The answer is that a sufficient portion of new savings- does not in fact seek these new avenues of socially useful investment, that a large proportion of it does flow into channels which are admittedly full, and that when this congestion is made manifest, much fresh " saving" instead of seeking new fields of investment accumulates in the hands of bankers and other persons. That portion of new savings which embodies itself in forms of capital that satisfy new wants is both morally and economically justi- fied : that portion which embodies itself in the socially 78 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED useless multiplication of existing forms of capital is harmless as regards employment so long as it continues to embody itself thus, but when by clogging the wheels of industry it stops the machinery and checks the investment of new "savings", it contributes to that state of under- employment and under-production which we call " tradedepression." if. The Theoretic Limit of Socially Useful Forms of Capital. The theory that all new savings should and must find socially useful employment is contradicted by the facts. It is also unsound as a theory. Those who urge it show no motive force sufficient to compel new savings to invest themselves in socially useful ways. The individual saver does not want to raise the general level of consumption, he simply wants to find a remunerative investment for his capital. This he can often find, and still oftener thinks he can find, in setting up new forms of capital in trades which are already sufficiently provided for the supply of current consumption. No guarantee can be offered to him that that heterogeneous body of consumers called the public will pay him a higher rate of interest for putting his savings into untried ventures which shall stimulate and satisfy a new want. Public improvements of an enduring order do indeed absorb a large and a growing quantity of new saving. But even here the quantity of capital which the most enlightened public body could safely apply, with reason- able regard to social, industrial, and other changes in the future, is strictly limited at any given time. A lavish ex- penditure with a view to a far distant consumption would often be a wasteful and an antisocial policy. EXCESSIVE FORMS STOP PRODUCTION 79 Indeed, as matters actually stand, such capital expen- diture by public bodies is very limited, and there are no sufficient economic powers to drive the requisite propor- tion of new savings into the ideally correct channels. Hence the frequent congestion of all ordinary channels of investment, and the excess of loanable capital. It is quite possible that as large a proportion of our present general income as is now " saved " might under different economic conditions be advantageously applied in forms of new capital. But as matters actually stand some of it represents ' " oversaving " and brings about the state of congestion and stoppage of industry which has for one of its leading aspects the malady of " unem- ployment "^> 18. How Excessive Forms of Capital Stop Production. Our saving class is therefore not necessarily causing an increase of " employment " by paying workers to put up more factories instead of using their moneys to demand consumables. ^ So long as the " saving " is ac- tually in progress z'.., so long as the factory and machin- ery are being made the net employment of the community is just as large as if the money were spent to demand commodities; more labour is engaged in making factories, less in working them. But after the new factories are made, they can only be worked on condition that there is an increase of consumption correspondent to the in- crease of producing-power i.e., on condition that a sufficient number of persons are actuated by motives different from those which animated the " saving " class, and will consent to give validity to the saving of the former by 80 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED " spending " on commodities an increased proportion of their incomes. \ Where no such expectation is realised, an attempt to " operate " the new factories does not give any net increase of employment, it only gluts the markets, drives down prices, closes the weaker factories, imparts irregularity to work, and generally disorganises trade. The frequent recurrence of these phenomena in most departments of trade is the strongest presumptive evidence of an attempt of the capitalist classes to place and to operate more capital than is required to maintain the current flow of consumption. An individual may be a rich miser, a community cannot. To the average reason- able man it is a self-evident fact that a community cannot advantageously save more than a certain proportion of its annual income, unless for the express purpose of con- suming a larger proportion at some not distant date. $ 19. The Fallacy that Saving Implies no Reduced Consumption. The economist is, however, too often blinded by the acceptance of a strange sophism to the affect that " saving implies no reduction in current consumption," "; a wild notion which is due to a failure to analyse the process of saving. The following simple refutation of this theory will suffice. Suppose the case of two economic commun- ities, each with a net annual income of 1,500,000,000. One nation spends the whole, saving nothing; this means that, after providing against wear and tear of existing plant, all the productive energy is devoted to producing "consumables" which are consumed. The other nation " saves " 200,000,000 annually : this means that, after the same provision for wear and tear, two-fifteenths of THE LIMIT TO SOCIAL SAVING 8 1 the productive energy is devoted, not to producing " con- sumables," but to setting up new plant, machinery, and unfinished goods, which are, in their form or their economic position, not consumable, and which are, in fact, not consumed. It would seem unnecessary to thus demonstrate that the consumption of the latter nation amounted to 1,300,000,000 (i.e., that 152 = 13), were it not for the general prevalence of the notion that saving implies no reduction in consumption. Adam Smith is perhaps chiefly responsible for the misconception, by urging that "What is annually saved is as regularly con- sumed as what is annually spent, and nearly in the same time too, but it is consumed by a different set of people." * The heart of the fallacy, which has been effectively exposed by various writers, consists in failing to perceive that the difference between " spending " and " saving " , is that the former, as an economic cause, causes " consum- ables " to be made, while the latter, so far as it finds an embodiment in actual forms of capital, causes " non- consumables" to be made. The forms of capital which represent " saving " correspond to the extra consumption which would have taken place if the persons saving had not saved, but had applied the money in demand for consumables. 20. The Limit to Social Saving. No Limit to Individual Saving. This simple truth that real saving implies diminished con- sumption for the time being is the kernel of a true understand- ing of the" unemployed " question. If we find labour and * "Wealth of Nations," p. 1496, McCulloch ; cf. Mill's "Polit- ical Economy," vol. i. ch. v. 6. 82 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED capital unemployed in our manufactures, if we find them wastefully employed in our distributing industry, it can only mean an undue diminution of consumption, or, in other words, an attempt to establish as " savings " a larger number of forms of capital than are economically required to assist in maintaining current or prospective consumption. These results of over-saving are not, of course, made manifest at once. So long as the over-saving is being stored in new plant or machinery and so long as this new plant is engaged in turning out increased supply of goods, there is no reduction of employment and no fall of general prices./ It is when the admitted glut of goods checks further investment and over-saving can find no vent that prices fall, production is slackened and unem- ployment shows itself. The failure to give proper recognition to the obvious fact that the quantity of serviceable forms of capital at the several stages of production is absolutely limited by the rates at which consumable goods are drawn out of the industrial machine, arises from the refusal to consider industry from the social organic standpoint. Because an individual or a class of individuals can " save" without any other limit than that imposed by the necessity of living, it has been wrongly supposed that the same rule holds good of a whole community. This blind individualistic conception of industry was aided by the recognition of the moral and material value which attaches to the exercise of effectual thrift by individual members of a society, and which within the limits imposed by the aggregate consump- tion must be recognised as necessary and beneficial to society. Although the famous dictum of Adam Smith that " the study of his own advantage naturally, or rather SELF-INTEREST CAUSES WASTE OF CAPITAL 83 necessarily, leads him to prefer that employment which is most advantageous to the society," * has been largely replaced in modern minds by a perception that "the mere conflicts of private interests will never produce a well-ordered commonwealth of labour, "f the implications of this new doctrine have not been properly digested. Many of those who most fully recognise the necessity of imposing restraints upon "conflicts of private interests" in the competition of the labour-market and in the sale of goods, still hold that the selfishness of individual " savers" can be relied upon to secure the most economical disposition of capital at the several points of the industrial machine. We have seen that this is not true in fact, that the operation of saving individuals under the existing industrial dispensation leads to a wasteful accumulation of forms of capital. It remains to ask, Why should this be so ; why should the free selfish action of saving in- dividuals disturb the right adjustment between " saving" and " spending" from the standpoint of the community ? Why should it be possible for us to endeavour to establish new capital to the extent of 200,000,000 a year, when 150,000,000 might, perhaps, suffice to supply the current rate of consumption, increased by 50,000,000? 21. How Self-interest of Individuals Causes Social Waste of Capital. We have already seen that in retail trade the self- interest of individual traders may and does lead them to establish a far larger number of shops than are required for the effective distribution of commodities in a district. * " Wealth of Nations, M book iv., chap. ii. -j- Article on Political Economy in "Encyclopaedia Britannica." 84 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED Similarly in manufacture it is often to the interest of a Capitalist to set up and to work new spinning-mills or iron-works, although there may already exist enough mills and works to supply every possible demand, provided he sees a fair prospect of getting away from his competitors a sufficient proportion of the trade. Nor is it an ade- quate reply to say that the new-comer can only get the trade by producing a better or a cheaper article, and that in this way the community, as a body of consumers, is advantaged by his action. In the first place, this state- ment is not true ; it is commonly by superiority in the arts of competition, which do not necessarily involve superiority of production, that the modern business firm is able to get business. Secondly, even supposing that the new capital is made effective by some trifling economy in methods of production, it by no means follows that the consuming public gains by the lowering of prices, or gains to a corresponding extent. For we have already seen that the constant cutting of prices in manufacturing trades has been a chief operative cause of the multiplication of middle-men and retailers, whose maintenance prevents a fall of retail prices equivalent to the fall of wholesale prices. Lastly, the fall of retail prices to the consuming public must not be taken as the just and final test and measure of a net industrial gain to the community. The gain may be bought too dearly if it involves, as it often does, a large and unforeseen displacement of capital and labour in earlier use, the vested interests of which receive neither compensation nor ^consideration under the stern rule of competitive trade. This is no plea for conservatism in industry, or for the rejection of new and improved forms of machinery and method. It is only designed as a INDIVIDUAL AND SOCIAL ECONOMY 85 protest against the waste of the wrecking policy in modern commerce, by which old businesses are ruined by the speculative operation of new competitors who bring with them no intrinsic superiority of production sufficient to compensate the destruction of capital value and the disturbance of employment which they cause. 22. The Difference between Individual and Social Economy. It is important to recognise that an economy of pro- duction which is sufficient to enable a new firm to cut prices and to get business is not necessarily an economy at all from the standpoint of the whole commercial com- munity. If a new firm can set up plant to produce one-tenth per cent, more cheaply the goods which are now supplied by other firms, it will clearly be to its interest to do so. But if an established firm discovered this new cheaper method of production, it would only set up the new plant on condition that the cheapening of production was sufficiently great to compensate for the cancelling of the old plant with which it had operated hitherto. The new firm would not take into consideration the cancelling of old capital, the established firm would set this against the advantages of the new method, and would only adopt the new method, if there was a net economy. Now the industrial community, which in- cludes all its members and their property, may, for the purpose of this argument, be regarded as the owners of all the forms of capital; their net interest then is measured not by the advantage of the new competing firm, but by that of the firm which owns the older forms of capital 86 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED which it is proposed to displace. It follows then that in a competitive society, it may be the distinct interest of individuals to set up " savings " in new forms of capital, which, having no regard to the destruction of the value of older forms of capital, confer no net economic advantage on the community. This free play of individual self-interest in saving leads to a purchase of each step of industrial progress by a most expensive cancelment of old " savings." ' Since obsolete forms do not at once perish, but struggle to keep the breath of industrial life and to play their accustomed part, we find in existence at any given time a large excess of plant of various kinds beyond what is fully utilised for actual work of production. 23. A Nation is not a Community. In ascribing necessary limits to the "savings" of a community, it must be borne in mind that in mode.n industry a " nation" is by no means coterminous with a "community." Every year more and more the whole body of nations, which are related by close ties in common world-markets, or are otherwise in direct or indirect commer- cial relations with one another, must be regarded as a single commercial community. This being so, it is clear that no absolute limit is set at any given time to the " savings " of a single nation, other than the total field of investment of the industrial world. It would therefore follow that not only is there no theoretic limit to the proportion of his income which any individual Englishman might legitimately save, but that no limit could be placed upon the proportion of the national income which can be saved, provided that the surplus savings beyond what can A NATION IS NOT A COMMUNITY 87 find useful occupation in home trade dispose themselves in foreign countries. Since our enquiry into the facts of Unemployment was chiefly confined to England, it may seem that the wider causal treatment is not strictly relevant. It is indeed quite true that here as elsewhere, .in all industrial problems, the international factor is of so great importance that a full scientific investigation should stand upon a basis of international statistics. These we cannot yet obtain with any degree of accuracy. There is, however, we have seen, a general agreement both among business men and scientific experts that those phenomena of depressed trade which we study chiefly in England and America are simultaneously visible in different shapes and degrees throughout those other countries which make up the industrial world. Since the money-market is the most perfect of world -markets, the unimpeachable testimony to a large and general glut of loanable capital affords conclusive evidence that the "unemployed" question on the side of capital is of general application. / On the side of labour the gigantic armaments maintained by certain continental countries absorb large masses of labour which would otherwise swell the ranks of " unemployed " or displace those at present in work. Many structural differ- ences of industrial society in less developed countries conceal the waste, which there is every reason to believe exists, j \^N Lastly it does not devolve on me to prove that all the phenomena which we have found in England exist elsewhere, in order to show that there exists " over-saving " and an excess of forms of capital in the whole international community. If there were no " unemployment " of capital and labour in England, that would not prove there were 88 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED no unemployment in the whole community, but might be attributable to the superior ability of English capital and labour to find employment. But if in any considerable part of the industrial community of nations such general " unemployment " or excess of producing-power does exist, it is proof of the over-saving of the community, whether it is also found in other nations of the community or not. 24. The Motives of Under- Consumption. A Natural Law of Consumption. But thus far I have only explained the mechanism of r over-capitalisation/ the central fact of the unemployed question. What are the motive forces which act upon individuals impelling them to a line of action which, from the wider standpoint of the community, is uneconomical? Why does the free play of individual interests fail to secure the interest of the whole community? The answer to this vital question is found in the region of Distribution. The reason why attempts are made by individuals to establish more forms of capital than are socially required, is that they possess certain elements of income which are not earned by effort, and which are therefore not required to satisfy any present legitimate wants. In spite of all attempts to make an artificial severance between a " producing " and a " consuming " class, the natural relation between production and consumption, between effort and satisfaction, exercises a strong influence in the social economy. It is possible for individuals and for classes who draw large incomes alieni vultus sudore, or without any considerable con- tribution of effort, to be large and profuse consumers. But, after all, the law which relates effort to satisfaction is a " natural " law, which, finding its simplest expression in the physical MOTIVES OF UNDER-CONSUMPTION 89 fact that a man cannot eat and digest a good dinner unless he has made some output of physical energy in exercise, penetrates in some unseen way the whole region of consumption, denying satisfaction that is not compensated by some corresponding personal effort. This "natural" law finds an economical expression in the fact that an attempt to be a very large consumer and a very small producer in the long run defeats itself, and, when it cannot by force of social circumstances stimulate production, it limits consumption. This, interpreted into simple language, means that a man who draws a large income without working for it cannot and does not spend it. This will seem to some a strange assertion, at variance with the lavish luxury imputed to and practised by many members of the upper unemployed class, but it is literally true. Though the bulk of the painful abstinence and thrift in our modern communities is practised by the working and poorer trading and professional classes, the bulk of the " saving " is effected by the wealthy. The accumulated savings of the manual workers of the country, even if we place to their account the whole of the 200,000,000, which in round figures represents the total capital of savings banks, trade unions, benefit, building, co-operative and mutual societies of every kind, does not amount to more than two per cent, of the total accumulated wealth of the country. Although we have no means of exactly apportioning the ownership of capital value among the various classes of the community, we know that a large proportion represents the accumulation of the surplus income of the wealthy classes after their wholesome and even their luxurious wants are satisfied. The portentous growth of the capital wielded by a few successful business go THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED men in America affords an extreme case of the self- accumulative power of capital. There are on both sides of the Atlantic a small number of families whose most profuse expenditure yet leaves an enormous surplus income to accumulate. " I can do nothing with my income," said Mr. J. J. Astor, " but buy more land, build more houses, and lend money on mortgage. In short, I am found with the necessaries of life, and more than that I cannot get out of my money." The absorption of interest and the specialisation of activities required for the successful practice of money-making are commonly such as to leave undeveloped or to disable the capacities for spending even upon the lower planes of material enjoyment. Hence " we see as a rule that men who have made money in business are not great spenders of it in the present, and have often no other notion of spending it than to make new businesses to bring them in future returns."* Turning from these leviathans to the merely wealthy classes, we find most of them living well within their incomes and furnishing large sums for investment. It would, I think, be pretty safe to conclude that a very large percentage of incomes received as rents and interest are not used for current expenditure, but are left to grow by compound interest. Since these elements of income are not earned by present efforts, they are not, as a rule, required to satisfy present desires. In thus stating my position, I do not wish to be under- stood as denying the utility or even the "productive power" of that abstinence which may rightly rank as " present effort " in the case of the savings of less wealthy * Dr. Bonar, "Philosophy and Political Economy," p. 222. EXCESS OF CAPITAL AND " UNEARNED " INCOMES 9 1 members of the community. My point is simply this, that a large proportion of " new capital " does not represent "saving" due to painful abstinence, careful postponement of present to future use, but represents the merely automatic accumulation of an idle surplus of income after all genuine and wholesome needs are fully satisfied. Where incomes flow in, yielding a power of consumption wholly disproportionate to the output of personal effort, a natural tendency to " save " is manifested, which is sharply distinguishable from the reasonable "saving" made out of legitimate earnings. It is this automatic " saving " which upsets the balance between consumption and producing-power, and which from the social standpoint may be classed as "over-saving." No class of men whose " savings " are made out of their hard-won earnings is likely to oversave, for each unit of " capital v will represent a real want, a piece of legitimate consumption deferred. But where "savings" represent the top portion of large incomes, drawn from economic rents of land, profits of speculation, high interest of capital derived from monopolies, no natural limit is set upon the amount which is saved. 25. Excess of Capital a Result of " Unearned" Incomes. If this reasoning is correct, the over-capitalisation which is found to exist is identified with those elements of individual incomes which are unearned in the sense that their "incoming" is not attended by any corresponding " outgoing " of effort on the part of the recipient. This is no doubt largely an ti priori argument, but it contains the only hypothesis which serves to explain the facts. This hypothesis may be formally summarised in the Q2 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED following terms. Modern machinery and methods of production have brought about a vast and continuous increase in the power of producing wealth : the rate of consumption has likewise risen, but less rapidly. This decrepancy in the pace of progress is manifested in the existence of a permanent surplus of producing-power i.e., though every producing-power implies the existence of a corresponding consuming-power the latter is not fully utilised. This failure to fully utilise consuming-power is due to the fact that much of it is owned by those who, having already satisfied all their strong present desires, have no adequate motive for utilising it in the present, and therefore allow it to accumulate. 26. No Repudiation of Uses of Individual Thrift. To all who have followed carefully the line of reasoning adopted here it ought to be manifest that no depreciation of the merit and uses of individual "thrift" is intended or conveyed. But so firmly implanted in the mind of most men is the individualist conception of the commercial community, that they are exceedingly apt to transfer the limit set upon the " saving " of a community to the case of an individual. The temptation to defend an orthodox position in " economics " by representing its assailants as engaged in an insidious attack upon the character and moral habits of the members of the working classes has proved too powerful for many critics. It may therefore be well to conclude this chapter by a distinct pronounce- ment to the effect that an acceptance of the doctrine, that the quantity of socially useful " saving " for a community at a given time is limited, does not in any EFFECT OF UNDER-CONSUMPTION 93 shape or degree impair the obligation of individuals to make provision out of their current incomes for future contingencies of sickness, unemployment, old age, etc., nor does it lend the least suggestion of disparagement to any policy of "saving," either on the part of an individual or a community, which takes the shape of deferred consumption. Such right distribution of spending-power over periods of time belongs to the conduct of every rational man or society of men. The only limit is that imposed upon the total fund of sound investment at any given time by the quantity of current consumption in the community, and the impossibility of forecasting and pro- viding for any save a very small proportion of the con- sumption of the future. APPENDIX B. Effect of Under- Consumption on Employment. It seems best to reserve one important point in the Economics of Saving for separate statement here. The admission made in the text of this chapter; that over- saving or the establishment of socially unnecessary forms of capital gives as much employment while it is going on as spending does, and that the attempt to work an excessive number of factories, etc., may for a time yield full employment, is liable to be misunderstood. It may appear that, after all, no net increase of employment would be caused by a well-adjusted balance between saving and spending, and that the malady is only one affecting the distribution of employment, and not the total volume; that the only effect of over-saving is to 94 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED balance periods of under-employment and over-employment against one another. Now I think this conclusion is not well founded. The following line of illustration will, I think, make it apparent that a net loss of employment over a long period is caused by under consumption and not merely a mal- distribution of employment. In order to test the case, take a community with stable population where there has existed a right economic rela- tion between forms of capital and rate of consumption. Suppose an attempt is initiated to increase saving by abstention from consumption of some class of goods, say, Cotton. Increased saving has no legitimate economic channel, if we suppose this parsimonious policy is to continue and not to be balanced by an early period of abnormal spending. Since no trade requires increase of capital, the new savings may as well be invested in the form of new cotton mills as in any other way. Let us suppose that the over-saving of the first year is capitalised in this form. What has occurred during this first year is that an increased employment of capital and labour in making cotton mills has balanced a diminished employ- ment in making cotton goods. Assuming an absolute fluidity of capital and labour, the net employment for the community is not affected by the change. People have simply been paid to make cotton mills instead of to make cotton goods. At the end of the year there exists an excess of cotton mills over what would have been required if consumption of cotton goods had stood firm, a double excess over what is needed to supply the now reduced demand for cotton goods. If it seems unfair to anyone that I should apply the over-saving to the only trade EFFECT OF UNDER-CONSUMPTION 95 where the demand is absolutely reduced, I can only reply that it simplifies the argument and makes no real difference in its validity. If we assumed the "saving" to be equally distributed among all trades, then at the end of the year all trades would be to a minor degree in the same con- dition as the cotton trade is according to my illustration. If savers were mad enough to continue this policy, preferring the growing ownership of useless cotton-mills to the satisfaction of consuming commodities, the process might continue indefinitely, without reducing or affecting in any way the aggregate employment of labour and capital. It would simply mean that a number of persons take their satisfaction in seeing new cotton-mills rising and going to decay. But it is conceivable that in the second year of over- saving, the savers instead of continuing to pay people to put up more mills might employ people to operate the excess of cotton-mills, lending their money to buy raw material and to pay wages. Cotton goods which ex hypothesi can find no markets are thus accumulated. If the savers chose to take their pleasure in such a way, they might go on indefinitely without the aggregate of employment of capital or labour being affected. If they continued this impolicy for a twelvemonth, we should say that whereas in the first year they saved useless mills, in the second year they saved useless cotton goods. In neither the first nor the second year is there any net increase or decrease of employment due to the new policy of saving. In fact, assuming sanity of individual conduct, affairs would work out differently. Admitting an attempt to work the surplus mills, the actual overproduction of goods could not proceed far. Let us assume savers to g6 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED use, throughout, the agency of Banks, which are to find investment for their savings. Suppose the Banks, not realising the mcfde of this new saving, have invested the first year's savings in superfluous cotton mills. These cotton mills or others in the next year cannot continue to work without advances from Banks, since they are unable to effect profitable sales. Soon after the beginning of the second year the Banks will refuse to make further advances for over-production : markets being congested and prices falling, the demand for bank accommodation will grow, but banks will not be justified in making advances. Now the weaker mills must stop work, general short time fol- lows, and the result is an employment of labour and forms of capital. This is the first effect of the attempt to over-save upon employment. We have now for the first time a reduction of the aggregate of production. The result of reduced employment (under-production) will be a reduction of real incomes. This will tend to proceed until the reduced reward of saving (real interest) gradually restores the right proportion of saving to spending a very slow and wasteful cure. It thus appears that so long as " saving " can be vested in new forms of capital, whether these are socially useful or not, no net reduction of employment is caused, the portion of income which is " saved " employs as much labour as, though not more than, that which is " spent," but when the machinery of production is so glutted that attempted saving takes shape in the massing of " loanable capital" unable to find an investment, the net production and the net employment of labour in the community is smaller than it would have been had saving been confined to the minimum required by the needs of society. EFFECT OF UNDER-CONSUMPTION 97 From the standpoint of " employment " the injury done by over-saving is thus seen to consist not in the over- production of plant or goods but in the condition ofunder- production which follows the financial recognition of this glut. The real waste of power of capital and labour is measured by the period and the intensity of the under- production in which forms of capital and labour stand idle. I Briefly, the order of causation is this : f Under-consumption or over-saving causes over-capitali- / sation, first in forms of fixed capital, then in a glut of , { goods ; the glut checks the investment of loanable capital ; this check restricts production and a period of under- production with low prices ensues. Thus it appears that the immediate cause of the under- production and unemployment is the inability of would-be savers and investors to find any forms of capital capable of embodying their savings. It makes no immediate difference as regards aggregate employment in the com- munity, whether incomes are spent in demand for consumption-goods or for plant or for production-goods : so long as savers who hold money-tokens are able to apply them anywhere in the actual field of industry they equally stimulate production and employment, but when misdirection compels them to withhold their application, production falls off and unemployment ensues. It is the identification of this refusal to apply the money- tokens of saving with lack of confidence that induces economists like Bagehot to explain bad trade by lack of confidence. This lack of confidence is shown * to be merely the subjective side of lack of openings for investment, an objective fact due to over-saving. * See Chapter VII. 7 CHAPTER VI THE ECONOMIC REMEDY i. The Remedy lies in a Reformed Distribution of Consuming Power. THIS is the only rationale of the simultaneous unemploy- ment of labour, land, and capital which forms the problem of the " unemployed." Under-consumption is the economic cause of unemployment. The only remedy, therefore, which goes to the root of the evil is a raising of the standard of consumption to the point which shall fully utilise the producing-power, after making due allowance for such present "saving" as is economically needed to provide for further increase of consumption in the future. If the analysis of causes in the last chapter is correct, this remedy can only be made operative by a line of policy which shall affect the ownership of increased consuming-power. Unfortunately this last conclusion was not admitted by economic writers whose diagnosis of trade-disease was in close accord with that taken here. The brilliant analysis of Malthus in particular was never rebutted, but it could be disregarded safely by the economists of his day, 9 8 LINES OF SOCIAL POLICY 99 because he used it in defence of the luxury of the classes. Mai thus saw that the over-saving of the wealthy was the direct economic force which kept trade back. His remedy was an increase of luxurious expenditure. But this, even were it otherwise desirable, is wholly impracticable. We have seen that the motives which induce the wealthy to withhold the present use of consuming-power are natural and necessary. A piece of academic advice, unbacked by any economic force, is absolutely futile. The owners of " unearned" elements of income, as we see, must accumulate capital which from the social standpoint is excess. A more natural distribution of consuming-power, under which the power to consume shall be accompanied by the desire to consume not, as now, severed from it is the only possible remedial policy. 2. Lines of Social Policy. Taxation of " Unearned" Income. Towards this policy, parties of social progress are slowly gravitating. Unfortunately their path is lighted by no clear intellectual conceptions, and they move with hesitant, uneven, staggering steps, often by circuitous routes, along a road which should be recognised as clear, straight, and fairly smooth. The policy of progressive consumption has two direct lines of advance which may here be briefly indicated. The surplus of consuming-power in the hands of the rich may be " unearned " by its owners, but it is not, for all that, "unearned." Part of it for example, the grow- ing value of town lands is earned by public effort, and forms a property designed for public consumption in the support of wholesome public life. 100 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED 3- Various forms of " Social Property " Amenable to Taxation. "It certainly is true that any increase in the rental value or selling value of land is due, not to the exertions and sacrifices of the owners of the land, but to the exer- tions and sacrifices of the community. It is certainly true that economic rent tends to increase with the growth of wealth and population, and that thus a larger and larger share of the product of industry tends to pass into the hands of the owners of land, not because they have done more for society, but because society has greater need of that which they control." * Here then is indicated a large property " earned " by the work of the community which might be usefully consumed by the community. .But these land values by no means exhaust and probably do not form the largest . portion of that annual property directly created by public effort or the pressure of public needs. Part of the profits of all monopolies or protected businesses and of many businesses not formally protected but assisted by some dependence upon land, some advantage of position or vicinity to markets, is clearly due to the same social causes as are operative in the direct growth of land values. Profits obtained from various branches of local services, many departments of the transport trades and of retail dis- tribution are often enhanced by this extraneous support. In some cases the profits which thus arise go to swell rent, as is largely the case with the profits of shops in advantageous positions, in other cases sufficient competition, direct or indirect, may survive to enable the consuming * Professor Francis Walker ( tf First Lessons in Political Economy"). "SOCIAL PROPERTY" AMENABLE TO TAXATION 101 public to reap the advantage in lower prices. But any one who goes over the most remunerative kinds of industry will find that many of these derive their character from dependence upon natural or legal monopoly. The strong position of such a trade as brewing is explained by a combination of natural and legal monopoly. In all such trades elements of profits are apt to emerge which are not the necessary interest upon capital, nor results of skill in production or enterprise in management, but are simply due to a power of monopoly or in other words to the pressure of public needs. Even where no direct assistance is derived from natural or legal monopoly, a combination of capital strong enough to crush out or keep down effective competition may obtain so strong a control of the market through a "ring," a "syndicate," * trust, " or other business structure, as to exercise a similar power of taxing the public for its private profit. All this body of rents and profits represents a property made by public efforts and needs which might, wherever it can be discovered, legitimately pass into the public possession. In many cases it may be difficult, in some perhaps impossible, to discriminate economic rents and monopoly profits from those growths of value which are needed for the maintenance of the private effort and enterprise which co-operated to produce them. But economic analysis discloses the fact that there does exist a large fund of " unearned " incomes, the private ownership of which is justified neither by natural "right" nor by expediency, which could economically be taken by the public and used for public purposes. These unearned elements of income are not needed to induce the appli- cation of individual effort in those who at present own 102 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED them; they are needed for the improvement and enlarge- ment of public life. Our civic and, in general, our public life, is narrow, meagre, inefficient, and undignified in comparison with what it ought to be, if the wealth due to public effort was wisely and economically laid out in the public service. Taxation, or State assumption on equitable terms, of properties whose increasing values are due to public activity and public need, to be administered in the supply of common wants and the enrichment of the common life, is likely to be of material assistance in raising the general standard of consumption. The adoption of pro- gressive taxation of accumulated wealth through the Death Duties is based on an instinctive recognition that this assertion of a public claim is both just and expedient. The same is true of the progressive income-tax, so adjusted as to secure for purposes of public use that portion of the income of the well-to-do which otherwise would materially assist to swell the excess of accumulated forms of capital. The direct and progressive taxation of ground rents and values, so far as they can be ascertained, would accord with this policy. The economist, while insisting upon the necessity of securing to all private investors whose "saving" is needed to furnish capital, the market price of such saving, i.e., the minimum interest required to draw sufficient capital into the several channels of production, would sanction the taxation of dividends which exceeded that necessary limit. The application of this purely economic principle would of course be liable to be overruled by considerations of practical politics. At present many elements of "unearned" income accrue MOVEMENT FOR HIGHER WAGES 103 in the course of private business which cannot be assessed, and even in the case of public companies, the possibility of evading heavy taxation by watering stock, distributing bonuses and by other means of concealing profits, would have to be considered by statesmen guided by an economic policy. Economists will declare that these elements of income are a legitimate object of taxation wherever they can be reached, in that they are the result of public activities and public needs. How far and in what ways they can best be reached are questions for politics as distinguished from economics. These practical qualifications do not, however, impair the value of the light which economic analysis throws upon the paths of the progressive policy. If the public mind once firmly fastens on the economic principle that taxation, in whatever way imposed, tends * to settle on the economic rent of land, high profits of monopolies and other " unearned" elements of individual income, it is likely that the assumption of public property by means of progressive taxation will be more rapid and more systematic than hitherto. $ 4. Working- Class Movement for Higher Wages. The other line of advance is the organised pressure of the working classes for an increasing proportion of the * This tendency is of course in many instances thwarted or retarded by the effect of leases and other contracts and by various forms of friction which impede the strictly "economic" settlement of taxation here indicated, imposing for a time new burdens upon those who are ill able to bear them. The tendency, however, of practical politicians is to over-estimate the length of time taken by a tax to settle on rents. 104 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED national income, which they will use in raising their standard of consumption. By effective trade organisation they may raise wages, by co-operation of consumers they may expend their wages more economically, by organised use of the franchise they may secure such equality of educational and economic opportunities as will remove or abate the dangers of ignorance and destitution, which at present bar the progress of the rear-guard of labour. The low rate of interest and profits in many trades is no sufficient barrier to the wisely regulated pressure of trade- organisations for higher wages. Setting aside all consider- ation of the greater efficiency of higher paid labour, we cannot fail to see that the effective demand for higher wages tends like a tax to settle on unearned elements of income. A rise of wages, in a trade where profits lie at a minimum, tends to lower rents, or, in default of rent, by raising prices, falls upon those consumers whose money incomes will not be affected by a rise of prices. Increased Consumption gives Validity to Increased Saving. Let it be clearly understood that this policy of in- creased consumption by the public and by the working classes of the country contains no repudiation either of the principle or the practice of saving. On the contrary, v each rise of general consumption signifies, not merely an increased employment of labour, but of capital as well. A rise in the general standard of consumption is a demand for more saving and it alone can give economic validity to more saving, by enabling it to assist in the satisfaction of increased needs. The very gist of our analysis lay in the disclosure that every increase of effective EFFECT OF SHORTER WORKING-DAY 105 saving was dependent upon an increase of consumption. It is in a country where new-felt needs are constantly clamouring for satisfaction, where men spend freely, as in the United States, that the growth of valid forms of capital is largest. 6. Effect of a Shorter Working-day upon Consumption. Cases where Output is Maintained. The pressure towards a shorter working-day must like- wise be held to conduce, both in its direct and in its indirect influence, to the same end, the elevation of the general standard of consumption. It is true this may not hold of all trades and all circumstances. The plea for an Eight Hours Day on the ground that it will absorb the unemployed does not admit of general accept- ance. In many occupations, as Mr. Rae and others have shown, the shorter working-day will simply mean an increased compression of labour, the same output being produced in an eight hours day as previously in a nine or ten hours day. In all cases where, either by this intensification of labour or by improved machinery and method, the shorter day is as productive as the longer day was formerly, there will be no absorption of "the unemployed** and no direct effect upon the aggre- gate volume of employment. This would probably be the result of shortening the hours of labour in some of the mining and metal industries, in those branches of textile and other manufactures where machinery is not yet perfected or speeded to full pitch, and in the bulk of the distributive trades. In these it is likely that a shorter day would be made as productive as a longer day. 106 THE PROBLEM OF THE UNEMPLOYED 7. Where a Shorter Day Means a Smaller Output. But in many other departments of work there would be a loss of productivity by shortening the working day. In this case one of three things might happen. First : the former output might be maintained by reduction of the daily wage and an increase in the number of those employed at the lower wage. On this supposition there would be no increase in the total consumption of the working classes, no increase in the volume of employment, but only a distribution of the former volume of employ- ment among a larger number of persons. It is quite conceivable that this might happen in the engineering and other trades, were trade unions able and willing to enforce their resolutions against the use of over-time. Since the absorption of the whole or a part of the unemployed would strengthen trade-organisation and im- prove the position of workers in bargaining with masters, it is considered unlikely that the shorter working-day, even in trades where the output was diminished, would be attended by an actual reduction in daily wages. Supposing the same wage was paid for the reduced product, one of two results would follow. a-8 fl H DJD vo. 2s. [Classical Translations. PASSAGES FOR UNSEEN TRANSLATION. By E. C. MARCHANT, M.A., Fellow of Peterhouse, Cambridge; and A. M. COOK, M.A., late Scholar of Wadham College, Oxford: Assistant Masters at St. Paul's School. Crown Svv. 35. 6d. This book contains Two Hundred Latin and Two Hundred Greek Passages, and has been very carefully compiled to meet the wants of V. and VI. 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Illustrated by W. ST. J. HARPER. Crown 8vo. 6s. A romance of the reign of Charles II., and Mr. Anthony Hope's first historical novel. TRAITS AND CONFIDENCES. By The Hon. EMILY LAW- LESS, Author of ' Hurrish,' * Maelcho,' etc. Crown %vo. 6s. THE VINTAGE. By E. F. BENSON, Author of ' Dodo. ; Illus- trated by G. P. JACOMB-HOOD. Crown %vo. 6s. A romance of the Greek War of Independence. A VOYAGE OF CONSOLATION. By SARA JEANETTE DUNCAN. Author of 'An American Girl in London.' Illustrated by ROBERT SAUBER. Crown %vo. 6s. The adventures of an American girl in Europe. THE CROOK OF THE BOUGH. By MNIE MURIEL DOWIE, Author of ' Gallia.' Crown $vo. 6s. ACROSS THE SALT SEAS. By J. BLOUNDELLE-BURTON. Crown ovo. 6s. SONS OF ADVERSITY. By L. COPE CORNFORD, Author of ' Captain Jacobus. ' Crown 8vo. 6s. A romance of Queen Elizabeth's time. MISS ERIN. By M.*B. FRANCIS, Author of * In a Northern Village. ' Crowsz %vo. 6s. WILLOWBRAKE. By R. MURRAY GILCHRIST. Crown Zvo. 6s. THE KLOOF BRIDE. By ERNEST GLANVILLE, Author of * The Fossicker. ' Illustrated. Crown %vo. $s. 6d. A story of South African Adventure. BIJLI THE DANCER. By JAMES BLYTHE PATTON. Illus- trated. Crown %vo. 6s. A Romance of India. JOSIAH'S WIFE. By NORMA LORIMER. Crown %vo. 6s. BETWEEN SUN AND SAND. By W. C. SCULLY, Author of * The White Hecatomb.' Crown 8vo. 6s. CROSS TRAILS. By VICTOR WAITE. Illustrated. Crown %vo. 6s. A romance of adventure in America and Australia. THE PHILANTHROPIST. By LUCY MAYNARD. Crown %vo. 6s. VAUSSORE. By FRANCIS BRUNE. Crown Svo. 6s. A LIST OF MESSRS. METHUEN'S PUBLICATIONS Poetry EUDYAED KIPLING'S NEW POEMS Rudyard Kipling. THE SEVEN SEAS. By RUDYARD KIPLING. Third Edition. Crown %vo. Buckram, gilt top. 6s. 1 The new poems of Mr. Rudyard Kipling have all the spirit and swing of their pre- decessors. Patriotism is the solid concrete foundation on which Mr. Kipling has built the whole of his work.' Times. ' The Empire has found a singer ; it is no depreciation of the songs to say that states- men may have, one way or other, to take account of them.' Manchester Guardtxn. ' Animated through and through with indubitable genius. ' Daily Telegraph. 'Packed with inspiration, with humour, with pathos.' Daily Chronicle. ' All the pride of empire, all the intoxication of power, all the ardour, the energy, the masterful strength and the wonderful endurance and death-scorning pluck which are the very bone and fibre and marrow of the British character are here. ' Daily Mail. Rudyard Kipling. BARRACK-ROOM BALLADS. By RUDYARD KIPLING. Thirteenth Edition. Crown %vo. 6s. 1 Mr. Kipling's verse is strong, vivid, full of character. . . . Unmistakable genius rings in every line.' Times. ' The ballads teem with imagination, they palpitate with emotion. We read them with laughter and tears ; the metres throb in our pulses, the cunningly ordered words tingle with life > and if this be not poetry, what is?' Pall Mall Gazette. Q." POEMS AND BALLADS. By "Q." Crown ^vo. $s. 6d. f This work has just the faint, ineffable touch and glow that make poetry.' Speaker. " Q." GREEN BAYS : Verses and Parodies. By " Q.," Author of 'Dead Man's Rock,' etc. Second Edition. Crown 8v0. 35. 6d. E. Mackay. A SONG OF THE SEA. By ERIC MACKAY, Second Edition. Fcap. %vo. $s. ' Everywhere Mr. Mackay displays himself the master of a style marked by all the characteristics of the best rhetoric.' Globe. Ibsen. BRAND. A Drama by HENRI K IBSEN. Translated by WILLIAM WILSON. Second Edition. Crown 8vo. $s. 6d. The greatest world-poem of the nineteenth century next to "Faust." It is in the same set with "Agamemnon," with "Lear," with the literature that we now instinctively regard as high and holy.' Daily Chronicle. MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST 9 "A.G." VERSES TO ORDER. By "A. G." Cr. Zvo. 2s.6d. net. A capital specimen of light academic poetry. These verses are very bright and engaging, easy and sufficiently witty.' St. James's Gazette. Cordery. THE ODYSSEY OF HOMER. A Translation by J. G. CORDERY. Crown %vo. Js. 6d. 1 This new version of the Odyssey fairly deserves a place of honour among its many rivals. Perhaps there is none from which a more accurate knowledge of the original can be gathered with greater pleasure, at least of those that are in metre. ' Manchester Guardian. Belles Lettres, Anthologies, etc. R. L. Stevenson. VAILIMA LETTERS. By ROBERT Louis STEVENSON. With an Etched Portrait by WILLIAM STRANG, and other Illustrations. Second Edition. Crown %vo. Buckram. *]s. 6d. ' Few publications have in our time been more eagerly awaited than these " Vailima Letters," giving the first fruits of the correspondence of Robert Louis Stevenson. But, high as the tide of expectation has run, no reader can possibly be disappointed in the result.' St. James's Gazette. Henley. ENGLISH LYRICS. Selected and Edited by W. E. HENLEY. Crown 8vo. Buckram gilt top. 6s. 1 It is a body of choice and lovely poetry.' Birmingham. Gazette. ' Mr. Henley's notes, in their brevity and their fulness, their information and their sug- gestiveness, seem to us a model of what notes should be.' Manchester Guardian. Henley and Whibley. A BOOK OF ENGLISH PROSE. Collected by W. E. HENLEY and CHARLES WHIBLEY. Crown 8vo. Buckram gilt top. 6s. 'A unique volume of extracts an art gallery of early prose.' Birmingham Post. 'An admirable companion to Mr. Henley's "Lyra Heroica." 1 Saturday Review. ' Quite delightful. A greater treat for those not well acquainted with pre-Restoration prose could not be imagined. ' A thenceum. H. C. Beeching. LYRA SACRA : An Anthology of Sacred Verse. Edited by H. C. BEECHING, M.A. Crown 8vo. Buckram. 6s. 1 A charming selection, which maintains a lofty standard of excellence. ' Times. "Q." THE GOLDEN POMP : A Procession of English Lyrics from Surrey to Shirley, arranged by A. T. QUILLER COUCH. Crown $vo. Buckram. 6s. 'A delightful volume : a really golden "Pomp."' Spectator. W. B. Yeats. AN ANTHOLOGY OF IRISH VERSE. Edited by W. B. YEATS. Crown %vo. $s. 6d. ' An attractive and catholic selection.' Titnes. A 2 io MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST G. W. Steevens. MONOLOGUES OF THE DEAD. By G. W. STEEVENS. Foolscap Svo. 3-r. 6d. A series of Soliloquies in which famous men of antiquity Julius Caesar, Nero, Alcibiades, etc., attempt to express themselves in the modes of thought and language of to-day. 1 The effect is sometimes splendid, sometimes bizarre, but always amazingly clever. Pall Mall Gazette. Victor Hugo. THE LETTERS OF VICTOR HUGO. Translated from the French by F. CLARKE, M. A. In Two Volumes. Demy &vo. los. 6d. each. Vol.1. 1815-35. 0. H. Pearson. ESSAYS AND CRITICAL REVIEWS. By C. H, PEARSON, M.A., Author of * National Life and Character.' With a Portrait. Demy 8vo. los. 6d. W. M. Dixon. A PRIMER OF TENNYSON. By W. M. DIXON, M.A., Professor of English Literature at Mason College. Crown 8v0. 2s. 6d. ' Much sound and well-expressed criticism and acute literary judgments. The biblio- graphy is a boon." Speaker* W. A. Craigie. A PRIMER OF BURNS. By W. A. CRAIGIE. Crown 8vo. 2s. 6d. 'A valuable addition to the literature of the poet. 1 Times. 'An admirable introduction." Globe. Magnus. A PRIMER OF WORDSWORTH. By LAURIE MAGNUS. Crown Svo. 2s. 6d. 'A valuable contribution to Wordsworthian literature.' Literature. 'A well-made primer, thoughtful and informing. 1 Manchester Guardian. Sterne. THE LIFE AND OPINIONS OF TRISTRAM SHANDY. By LAWRENCE STERNE. With an Introduction by CHARLES WHIBLEY, and a Portrait. 2 vols. *]s. ' Very dainty volumes are these ; the paper, type, and light-green binding are all very agreeable to the eye. Simplex munditiis is the phrase that might be applied to them.' Globe. Congreve. THE COMEDIES OF WILLIAM CONGREVE. With an Introduction by G. S. STREET, and a Portrait. 2 vols. Js. Morier. THE ADVENTURES OF HAJJI BABA OF ISPAHAN. By JAMES MORIER. With an Introduction by E. G. BROWNE, M.A., and a Portrait. 2 vols. 'js. Walton. THE LIVES OF DONNE, WOTTON, HOOKER, HERBERT, AND SANDERSON. By IZAAK WALTON. With an Introduction by VERNON BLACKBURN, and a Portrait. 3*. 6d. Johnson. THE LIVES OF THE ENGLISH POETS. By SAMUEL JOHNSON, LL.D. With an Introduction by J. H. MILLAR, and a Portrait. 3 vols. los. 6d. MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST n Burns. THE POEMS OF ROBERT BURNS. Edited by ANDREW LANG and W. A. CRAIGIE. With Portrait. Demy 8vo, gilt top. 6s. This edition contains a carefully collated Text, numerous Notes, critical and textual, a critical and biographical Introduction, and a Glossary. 'Among the editions in one volume, Mr. Andrew Lang's will take the place of authority.' Times. F. Langbridge. BALLADS OF THE BRAVE: Poems of Chivalry, Enterprise, Courage, and Constancy. Edited by Rev. F. LANGBRIDGE. Crown 8vo. $s. 6d. School Edition. 2s. 6d. 'A very happy conception happily carried out. These "Ballads of the Brave" are intended to suit the real tastes of boys, and will suit the taste of the great majority.' ^Spectator. ' The book is full of splendid things.' World. Illustrated Books Bedford. NURSERY RHYMES. With many Coloured Pictures. By F. D. BEDFORD. Super Royal 8vo. $s. An excellent selection of the best known rhymes, with beautifully coloured pictures exquisitely printed.' Pall Mall Gazette. ' The art is of the newest, with well harmonised colouring.' Spectator. S. Baring Gould. A BOOK OF FAIRY TALES retold by S. BARING GOULD. With numerous illustrations and initial letters by ARTHUR J. GASKIN. Second Edition. Crown Svo. Buckram. 6s. 'Mr. Baring Gould is deserving of gratitude, in re- writing in honest, simple style the old stories that delighted the childhood of " our fathers and grandfathers.'" Saturday Review. S. Baring Gould. OLD ENGLISH FAIRY TALES. Col- lected and edited by S. BARING GOULD. With Numerous Illustra- tions by F. D. BEDFORD. Second Edition. Crown^vo. Buckram. 6s. 'A charming volume. The stories have been selected with great ingenuity from various old ballads and folk-tales, and now stand forth, clothed in Mr. Baring Gould's delightful English, to enchant youthful readers.' Guardian. S. Baring Gould. A BOOK OF NURSERY SONGS AND RHYMES. Edited by S. BARING GOULD, and Illustrated by the Birmingham Art School. Buckram, gilt top. Crown 8v0. 6s. 1 The volume is very complete in its way, as it contains nursery songs to the number of 77, game-rhymes, and jingles. To the student we commend the sensible intro- duction, and the explanatory notes.' Birmingham Gazette. H. C. Beeching. A BOOK OF CHRISTMAS VERSE. Edited by H. C. BEECHING, M.A., and Illustrated by WALTER CRANE. Crown 8vo, gilt top. $s. A collection of the best verse inspired by the birth of Christ from the Middle Ages to the present day. 'An anthology which, from its unity of aim and high poetic excellence, has a better right to exist than most of its fellows.' Guardian. 12 MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST History Gibbon. THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE. By EDWARD GIBBON. A New Edition, Edited with Notes, Appendices, and Maps, by J. B. BURY, M.A., Fellow of Trinity College, Dublin. In Seven Volumes. Demy 8vo. Gilt top. os. 6d. each. Also crown 8vo. 6s. each. Vols. I. ,11., III., and IV. 1 The time has certainly arrived for a new edition of Gibbon's great work. . . . Pro- fessor Bury is the right man to undertake this task. His learning is amazing, both in extent and accuracy. The book is issued in a handy form, and at a moderate price, and it is admirably printed.' Times. ' This edition, so far as one may judge from the first instalment, is a marvel of erudition and critical skill, and it is the very minimum of praise to predict that the seven volumes of it will supersede Dean Milman's as the standard edition of our great historical classic.' Glasgow Herald. ' The beau-ideal Gibbon has arrived at last.' Sketch. f At last there is an adequate modern edition of Gibbon. . . . The best edition the nineteenth century could produce.' Manchester Guardian. Flinders Petrie. A HISTORY OF EGYPT, FROM THE EARLIEST TIMES TO THE PRESENT DAY. Edited by W. M. FLINDERS PETRIE, D.C.L., LL.D., Professor of Egyptology at University College. Fully Illustrated. In Six Volumes. Crown %vo. 6s. each. Vol. I. PREHISTORIC TIMES TO XVlTH. DYNASTY. W. M. F. Petrie. Third Edition. Vol. II. THE XVIlTH AND XVIIlTH DYNASTIES. W. M. F. Petrie. Second Edition. 1 A history written in the spirit of scientific precision so worthily represented by Dr. Petrie and his school cannot but promote sound and accurate study, and supply a vacant place in the English literature of Egyptology.' Times. Flinders Petrie. EGYPTIAN TALES. Edited by W. M. FLINDERS PETRIE. Illustrated by TRISTRAM ELLIS. In Two Volumes. Crown Svo. 3-y. 6d. each. * A valuable addition to the literature of comparative folk-lore. The drawings are really illustrations in the literal sense of the word.' Globe. 1 It has a scientific value to the student of history and archaeology. Scotsman. 'Invaluable as a picture of life in Palestine and Egypt.' Daily News. Flinders Petrie. EGYPTIAN DECORATIVE ART. By W. M. FLINDERS PETRIE. With 120 Illustrations. Cr. $vo. 3$. 6d. 1 Professor Flinders Petrie is not only a profound Egyptologist, but an accomplished student of comparative archaeology. In these lectures he displays both quali- fications with rare skill in elucidating the development of decorative art in Egypt, and in tracing its influence on the art of other countries." Times. S. Baring Gould. THE TRAGEDY OF THE CAESARS. With numerous Illustrations from Busts, Gems, Cameos, etc. By S. BARING GOULD. Fourth Edition. Royal 8vo. i$s. * A most splendid and fascinating book on a subject of undying interest. The great feature of the book is the use the author has made of the existing portraits of the Caesars, and the admirable critical subtlety he has exhibited in dealing with this line of research. It is brilliantly written, and the illustrations are supplied on a scale of profuse magnificence.' Daily Chronicle. MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST 13 H. de B. Gibbins. INDUSTRY IN ENGLAND : HISTORI- CAL OUTLINES. By H. DE B. GIBBINS, M.A., D.Litt. With 5 Maps. Second Edition. Demy 8v0. los. 6d. This book is written with the view of affording a clear view of the main facts of English Social and Industrial History placed in due perspective. H. E. Egerton. A HISTORY OF BRITISH COLONIAL POLICY. By H. E. EGERTON, M.A. Demy 8vo. 12s. 6d. This book deals with British Colonial policy historically from the beginnings of English colonisation down to the present day. The subject has been treated by itself, and it has thus been possible within a reasonable compass to deal with a mass of authority which must otherwise be sought in the State papers. The volume is divided into five parts: (i) The Period of Beginnings, 1497-1650; (2) Trade Ascendancy, 1651-1830 ; (3) The Granting of Responsible Government, 1831-1860; (4) Laissez Aller, 1861-1885 ; (5) Greater Britain. * The whole story of the growth and administration of our colonial empire is compre- hensive and well arranged, and is set forth with marked ability.' Daily Mail. ' It is a good book, distinguished by accuracy in detail, clear arrangement of facts, and a broad grasp of principles ' Manchester G^tard^an. 'Able, impartial, clear. ... A most valuable volume.' Athenczum. A. Clark. THE COLLEGES OF OXFORD: Their History and their Traditions. By Members of the University. Edited by A. CLARK, M.A., Fellow and Tutor of Lincoln College. 8vo. 12s. 6d. ' A work which will certainly be appealed to for many years as the standard book on the Colleges of Oxford.' Athenaum. Perrens. THE HISTORY OF FLORENCE FROM 1434 TO 1492. By F. T. PERRENS. 8vo. i2s. 6d. A history of Florence under the domination of Cosimo, Piero, and Lorenzo de Medicis. J. Wells. A SHORT HISTORY OF ROME. By J. WELLS, M.A., Fellow and Tutor of Wadham Coll., Oxford. With 4 Maps. Crown 8vo. $s. 6d. This book is intended for the Middle and Upper Forms of Public Schools and for Pass Students at the Universities. It contains copious Tables, etc. 'An original work written on an original plan, and with uncommon freshness and vigour. ' Speaker. 0. Browning. A SHORT HISTORY OF MEDIAEVAL ITALY, A.D. 1250-1530. By OSCAR BROWNING, Fellow and Tutor of King's College, Cambridge. Second Edition. In Two Volumes. Crown 8vv, $s. each. VOL. I. 1250-1409. Guelphs and Ghibellines. VOL. II. 1409-1530. The Age of the Condottieri. 1 Mr. Browning is to be congratulated on the production of a work of immense labour and learning.' Westminster Gazette. O'Grady. THE STORY OF IRELAND. By STANDISH O'GRADY, Author of ' Finn and his Companions.' Cr. Svo. 2s. 6d. Most delightful, most stimulating. Its racy humour, its original imaginings, make it one of the freshest, breeziest volumes.' Methodist Times. 14 MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST Biography S. Baring Gould. THE LIFE OF NAPOLEON BONA- PARTE. By S. BARING GOULD. With over 450 Illustrations in the Text and 12 Photogravure Plates. Large quarto. Gilt top. 36 s. 'The best 'biography of Napoleon in our tongue, nor have the French as good a biographer of their hero. A book very nearly as good as Southey's "Life of Nelson." ' Manchester Guardian. 'The main feature of this gorgeous volume is its great wealth of beautiful photo- gravures and finely-executed wood engravings, constituting a complete pictorial chronicle of Napoleon I.'s personal history from the days of his early childhood at Ajaccio to the date of his second interment under the dome of the Invalides in Paris.' Daily Telegraph. 'Particular notice is due to the vast collection of contemporary illustrations.' Guardian. 1 Nearly all the illustrations are real contributions to history.' Westminster Gazette. Morris Fuller. THE LIFE AND WRITINGS OF JOHN DA YEN ANT, D.D. (1571-1641), Bishop of Salisbury. By MORRIS FULLER, B.D. Demy %vo. los. 6d. 'A valuable contribution to ecclesiastical history.' Birmingham Gazette. J. M. Rigg. ST. ANSELM OF CANTERBURY : A CHAPTER IN THE HISTORY OF RELIGION. By J. M. RIGG. DemySvo. 7s. 6d. ' Mr. Rigg has told the story^ of the great Primate's life with scholarly ability, and has thereby contributed an interesting chapter to the history of the Norman period.' Daily Chronicle. F. W. Joyce. THE LIFE OF SIR FREDERICK GORE OUSELEY. By F. W. JOYCE, M.A. With Portraits and Illustra- tions. Crown Sv0. *]s. 6d. 1 This book has been undertaken in quite the right spirit, and written with sympathy, insight, and considerable literary skill.' Times. W. G. Collingwood. THE LIFE OF JOHN RUSKIN. By W. G. COLLINGWOOD, M.A. With Portraits, and 13 Drawings by Mr. Ruskin. Second Edition. 2 vols. 8vo. 32$. * No more magnificent volumes have been published for a long time. 1 Times. ' It is long since we had a biography with such delights of substance and of form. Such a book is a pleasure for the day, and a joy for ever.' Daily Chronicle. 0. Waldstein. JOHN RUSKIN : a Study. By CHARLES WALDSTEIN, M.A., Fellow of King's College, Cambridge. With a Photogravure Portrait after Professor HERKOMER. Post Svo. 5*. A thoughtful, impartial, well-written criticism of Ruskin's teaching, intended to separate what the author regards as valuable and permanent from what is transient and erroneous in the great master's writing.' Daily Chronicle. MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST 15 Darmesteter. THE LIFE OF ERNEST RENAN, By MADAME DARMESTETER. With Portrait. Second Edition. Cr. Svo. 6s. A biography of Renan by one of his most intimate friends. ' A polished gem of biography, superior in its kind to any attempt that has been made of recent years in England. Madame Darmesteter has indeed written for English readers " The Life of Ernest Renan.'" Athen&um, 'It is a fascinating and biographical and critical study, and an admirably finished work of literary art.' Scotsman. ' It is interpenetrated with the dignity and charm, the mild, bright, classical grace of form and treatment that Renan himself so loved ; and it fulfils to the uttermost the delicate and difficult achievement it sets out to accomplish.' Academy. W. H. Hutton. THE LIFE OF SIR THOMAS MORE. By W. H. HUTTON, M.A, With Portraits. Crown Svo. $s. ' The book lays good claim to high rank among our biographies. It is excellently, even lovingly, written.' Scotsman. ' An excellent monograph.' Times. Travel, Adventure and Topography Johnston. BRITISH CENTRAL AFRICA. By Sir H. H. JOHNSTON, K.C.B. With nearly Two Hundred Illustrations, and Six Maps. Second Edition, Crown ^to. 30^. net. ' A fascinating book, written with equal skill and charm the work at once of literary artist and of a man of action who is singularly wise, brave, and experi- enced. It abounds in admirable sketches from pencil.' Westminster Gazette. ' A delightful book . . . collecting within the covers of a single volume all that is known of this part of our African domains. The voluminous appendices are of extreme value.' Manchester Guardian. ' The book takes front rank as a standard work by the one man competent to write it.' Daily Chronicle. ' The book is crowded with important information, and written in a most attractive style ; it is worthy, in short, of the author's established reputation.' Standard. Prince Henri of Orleans. FROM TONKIN TO INDIA. By PRINCE HENRI OF ORLEANS. Translated by HAMLEY BENT, M.A, With 100 Illustrations and a Map. Second Edition. Crown 4/0, gilt top. 2$s. The travels of Prince Henri in 1895 from China to the valley of the Bramaputra covered a distance of 2100 miles, of which 1600 was through absolutely unexplored country. No fewer than seventeen ranges of mountains were crossed at altitudes of from n,ooo to 13,000 feet. The journey was made memorable by the discovery of the sources of the Irrawaddy. ' A welcome contribution to our knowledge. The narrative is full and interesting, and the appendices give the work a substantial value.' Times. * The Prince's travels are of real importance ... his services to geography have been considerable. The volume is beautifully illustrated.' Atheneeum. 'The story is instructive and fascinating, and will certainly make one of the books of 1898. The book attracts by its delightful print and fine illustrations. A nearly model book of travel.' Pall Mall Gazette. 'An entertaining record of pluck and travel in important regions.' Daily Chronicle. ' The illustrations are admirable and quite beyond praise.' Glasgow Herald. ' The Prince's story is charmingly told, and presented with an attractiveness which will make it, in more than one sense, an outstanding book of the season.' Birmingham Post. ' An attractive book which will prove of considerable interest and no little value. A narrative of a remarkable journey.' Literature. ' China is the country of the hour. All eyes are turned towards her, and Messrs. Methuen have opportunely selected the momen$ to launch Prince Henri's work,' Liverpool Daily Post. 16 MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST R. S. S. Baden-Powell. THE DOWNFALL OF PREMPEH. A Diary of Life in Ashanti, 1895. ^Y Colonel BADEN-POWELL. With 21 Illustrations and a Map. Demy &vo. IQS. 6d. ' A compact, faithful, most readable record of the campaign.' Daily News. R. S. S. Baden-Powell. THE MATABELE CAMPAIGN 1896. By Colonel BADEN- POWELL. With nearly 100 Illustrations. Second Edition. Demy 8vo. l$s. ' As a straightforward account of a great deal of plucky work unpretentiously done, this book is well worth reading. The simplicity of the narrative is all in its favour, and accords in a peculiarly English fashion with the nature of the subject.' Times. Captain Hinde. THE FALL OF THE CONGO ARABS. By L. HINDE. With Plans, etc. Demy %vo. I2s. 6d. The book is full of good things, and of sustained interest.' St. James's Gazette. 'A graphic sketch of one of the most exciting and important episodes in the struggle for supremacy in Central Africa between the Arabs and their^ Europeon rivals. Apart from the story of the campaign, Captain Hinde 1 s book is mainly remark- able for the fulness with which he discusses the question of cannibalism. It is, indeed, the only connected narrative in^ English, at any rate which has been published of this particular episode in African history.' Times. W. Crooke. THE NORTH-WESTERN PROVINCES OF INDIA : THEIR ETHNOLOGY AND ADMINISTRATION. By W. CROOKE. With Maps and Illustrations. Demy Svo. IQS. 6d. 1 A carefully and well -written account of one of the most important provinces of the Empire. In seven chapters Mr. Crooke deals successively with the land in its physical aspect, the province under Hindoo and Mussulman rule, the province under British rule, the ethnology and sociology of the province, the religious and social life of the people, the land and its settlement, and the native peasant in his relation to the land. The illustrations are good and well selected, and the map is excellent. ' Manchester Guardian. A. Boisragon. THE BENIN MASSACRE. By CAPTAIN BOISRAGON. With Portrait and Map. Second Edition. Crown %vo. 3J. 6d. 1 If the story had been written four hundred years ago it would be read to-day as an English classic.' Scotsman. 'If anything could enhance the horror and the pathos of this remarkable book it is the simple style of the author, who writes as he would talk, unconscious of his own heroism, with an artlessness which is the highest art.' Pall Mall Gazette. H. S. Cowper. THE HILL OF THE GRACES : OR, THE GREAT STONE TEMPLES OF TRIPOLI. By H. S. COWPER, F.S.A. With Maps, Plans, and 75 Illustrations. Demy %vo. los. 6d. ' The book has the interest of all first-hand work, directed by an intelligent man towards a worthy object, and it forms a valuable chapter of what has now become quite a large and important branch of antiquarian research.' Times. Kinnaird Rose. WITH THE GREEKS IN THESSALY. By W. KINNAIRD ROSE, Reuter's Correspondent. With Plans and 23 Illustrations. Crown 8vo. 6s. W. B. Worsfold. SOUTH AFRICA. By W. B. WORSFOLD, M.A. With a Map. Second Edition. Crown %vo. 6s. 1 A monumental work compressed into a very moderate compass. 1 World. MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST 17 Naval and Military G. W. Steevens. NAVAL POLICY : By. G. W. STEEVENS. Demy 8v0. 6s. This book is a description of the British and other more important navies of the world, with a sketch of the lines on which our naval policy might possibly be developed. 'An extremely able and interesting work.' Daily Chronicle. D. Hannay. A SHORT HISTORY OF THE ROYAL NAVY, FROM EARLY TIMES TO THE PRESENT DAY. By DAVID HANNAY. Illustrated. 2 Vols. Demy Svo. 1s.6d.each. Vol. I. , 1200-1688. ' We read it from cover to cover at a sitting, and those who go to it for a lively and brisk picture of the past, with all its faults and its grandeur, will not be disappointed. The historian is competent, and he is endowed with literary skill and style.' Standard. 'We can warmly recommend Mr. Hannay's volume to any intelligent student of naval history. Great as is the merit of Mr. Hannay's historical narrative, the merit of his strategic exposition is even greater.' Times. ' His book is brisk and pleasant reading, for he is gifted with a most agreeable style. His reflections are philosophical, and he has seized and emphasised just those points which are of interest. ' Graphic. Cooper King. THE STORY OF THE BRITISH ARMY. By Lieut. -Colonel COOPER KING, of the Staff College, Camberley. Illus- trated. Demy &vo. Js. 6d. f An authoritative and accurate story of England's military progress. 1 Daily Mail. ' This handy volume contains, in a compendious form, a brief but adequate sketch of the story of the British army.' Daily News. R. Southey. ENGLISH SEAMEN (Howard, Clifford, Hawkins, Drake, Cavendish). By ROBERT SOUTHEY. Edited, with an Introduction, by DAVID HANNAY. Second Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 'Admirable and well-told stories of our naval history.' A rmy and Navy Gazette. 1 A brave, inspiriting book.' Black and White. W. Clark Russell. THE LIFE OF ADMIRAL LORD COL- LINGWOOD. By W. CLARK RUSSELL, With Illustrations by F. BRANGWYN. Third Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 1 A book which we should like to see in the hands of every boy in the country.' St. James s Gazette. ' A really good book.' Saturday Review. E. L. S. Horsburgh. THE CAMPAIGN OF WATERLOO. By E. L. S. HORSBURGH, B. A. With Plans. Crown 8vo. 5-r. 'A brilliant essay simple, sound, and thorough.' Daily Chronicle. H. B.George. BATTLES OF ENGLISH HISTORY. ByH.B. GEORGE, M.A., Fellow of New College, Oxford. With numerous Plans. Third Edition* Crown 8vo. 6s. 1 Mr. George has undertaken a very useful task that of making military affairs in- telligible and instructive to non-military readers and has executed it with laud- able intelligence and industry, and with a large measure of success.' Times. A3 1 8 MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST General Literature S. Baring Gould. OLD COUNTRY LIFE. By S. BARING GOULD. With Sixty-seven Illustrations. Large Crown Svo. Fifth Edition. 6s. '"Old Country Life," as healthy wholesome reading, full of breezy life and move- ment, full of quaint stories vigorously told, will not be excelled by any book to be published throughout the year. Sound, hearty, and English to the core.' World. S. Baring Gould. HISTORIC ODDITIES AND STRANGE EVENTS. By S. BARING GOULD. Fourth Edition. Crown Svo. 6.?. ' A collection of exciting and entertaining chapters. The whole volume is delightful reading. ' Times. S. Baring Gould. FREAKS OF FANATICISM. By S. BARING GOULD. Third Edition. Crown Svo. 6s. 1 Mr. Baring Gould has a keen eye for colour and effect, and the subjects he has chosen give ample scope to his descriptive and analytic faculties. A perfectly fascinating book.' Scottish Leader. S Baring Gould. A GARLAND OF COUNTRY SONG : English Folk Songs with their Traditional Melodies. Collected and arranged by S. BARING GOULD and H. F. SHEPPARD. Demy qto. 6s. S. Baring Gould. SONGS OF THE WEST: Traditional Ballads and Songs of the West of England, with their Traditional Melodies. Collected by S. BARING GOULD, M.A., and H. F. SHEPPARD, M.A. Arranged for Voice and Piano. In 4 Parts Parts /., II. , ///., T>S. each. Part IV., $s. In one Vol., French morocco, l$s. f A rich collection of humour, pathos, grace, and poetic fancy.' Saturday Review. S. Baring Gould. YORKSHIRE ODDITIES AND STRANGE EVENTS. Fourth Edition. Crown Svo. 6s. S. Baring Gould. STRANGE SURVIVALS AND SUPER- STITIONS. With Illustrations. By S. BARING GOULD. Crown Svo. Second Edition. 6s. S. Baring Gould. THE DESERTS OF SOUTHERN FRANCE. By S. BARING. GOULD, 2 vols. Demy Svo. 32*. Cotton Minchin. OLD HARROW DAYS. By J. G. COTTON MINCHIN. Crown Svo. Second Edition. $s. ' This book is an admirable record. 1 Daily Chronicle. ' Mr. Cotton Minchin 's bright and breezy reminiscences of ' Old Harrow Days' will delight all Harrovians, old and young, and may go far to explain the abiding enthusiasm of old Harrovians for their school to readers who have not been privi- leged to be their schoolfellows." Times. W. E. Gladstone. THE SPEECHES OF THE RT. HON. W. E. GLADSTONE, M.P. Edited by A. W. HUTTON, M.A., and H. J. COHEN, M.A. With Portraits. Svo. Vols. IX. and X. 12s. 6d. each. MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST 19 J. Wells. OXFORD AND OXFORD LIFE. By Members of the University. Edited by J. WELLS, M.A., Fellow and Tutor of Wadham College. Crown 8v0. $s. 6d. ' We congratulate Mr. Wells on the production of a readable and intelligent account of Oxford as it is at the present time, written by persons who are possessed of a close acquaintance with the system and life of the University.' A thenaum. J. Wells. OXFORD AND ITS COLLEGES. By J. WELLS, M. A., Fellow and Tutor of Wadham College. Illustrated by E. H. NEW. Second Edition. Fcap. 8vo. $s. Leather. ^s. This is a guide chiefly historical to the Colleges of Oxford. It contains numerous illustrations. 'An admirable and accurate little treatise, attractively illustrated.' World. 'A luminous and tasteful little volume.' Daily Chronicle. ' Exactly what the intelligent visitor wants.' Glasgow Herald. 0. G. Robertson. VOCES ACADEMICS. By C. GRANT ROBERTSON, M.A., Fellow of All Souls', Oxford. With a Frontis- piece, Pott. %vo. 3-r. 6d. ' Decidedly clever and amusing.' Athenceum. ' The dialogues are abundantly smart and amusing.' Glasgow Herald. 'A clever and entertaining little book.' Pall Mall Gazette. L. Whibley. GREEK OLIGARCHIES : THEIR ORGANISA- TION AND CHARACTER. By L. WHIBLEY, M.A., Fellow of Pembroke College, Cambridge. Crown 8v0. 6s. 'An exceedingly useful handbook : a careful and well-arranged study.' Times. L. L. Price. ECONOMIC SCIENCE AND PRACTICE. By L. L. PRICE, M.A., Fellow of Oriel College, Oxford. Crown 8vo. 6s. ' The book is well written, giving evidence of considerable literary ability, and clear mental grasp of the subject under consideration.' Western Morning' News. J. S. Shedlock. THE PIANOFORTE SONATA : Its Origin and Development. By J. S. SHEDLOCK. Crown 8v0. 55. ' This work should be in the possession of every musician and amateur. A concise and lucid history of the origin of one of the most important forms of musical composition. A very valuable work for reference.' Athenceum. E. M. Bowden. THE EXAMPLE OF BUDDHA: Being Quota- tions from Buddhist Literature for each Day in the Year. Compiled by E. M. BOWDEN. Third Edition, ibmo. 2s. 6d. Morgan-Browne. SPORTING AND ATHLETIC RECORDS. By H. MORGAN-BROWNE. Crown ^vo. is. paptr ; 2 s. cloth. 'Should meet a very wide demand.' Daily Mail. 1 A very careful collection, and the first one of its kind. 1 Manchester Guardian. 'Certainly the most valuable of all books of its kind. ' Birmingham Gazette. Science Freudenreich. DAIRY BACTERIOLOGY. A Short Manual for the Use of Students. By Dr. ED. VON FREUDENREICH. Translated byj. R. AINSWORTH DAVIS, B.A Crown Sv0. 2s.6d. 20 MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST Chalmers Mitchell. OUTLINES OF BIOLOGY. By P. CHALMERS MITCHELL, M.A., Illustrated. Crown 8vo. 6s. A text-book designed to cover the new Schedule issued by the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons. G.Massee. A MONOGRAPH OF THE MYXOGASTRES. By GEORGE MASSEE. With 12 Coloured Plates. Royal 8vo. i8s. net. ' A work much in advance of any book in the language treating of this group of organisms. Indispensable to every student of the Myxogastres. ' Nature. Technology Stephenson and Suddards. ORNAMENTAL DESIGN FOR WOVEN FABRICS. By C. STEPHENSON, of The Technical College, Bradford, and F. SUDDARDS, of The Yorkshire College, Leeds. With 65 full-page plates, and numerous designs and diagrams in the text. Demy %vo. js. 6d. 1 The book is very ably done, displaying an intimate knowledge of principles, good taste, and the faculty of clear exposition.' Yorkshire Post. HANDBOOKS OF TECHNOLOGY. Edited by PROFESSORS GARNETT and WERTHE1MER. HOW TO MAKE A DRESS. By J. A. E. WOOD. Illustrated. Crown 8vo. is. 6d. A text-book for students preparing for the City and Guilds examination, based on the syllabus. The diagrams are numerous. 1 Though primarily intended for students, Miss Wood's dainty little manual may be consulted with advantage by any girls who want to make their own frocks. The directions are simple and clear, and the diagrams very helpful.' Literature. 1 A splendid little boak.'JSvtttfUf News. Philosophy L. T. Hobhouse. THE THEORY OF KNOWLEDGE. By L. T. HOBHOUSE, Fellow of C.C.C, Oxford. Demy Svo. 2is. ' The most important contribution to English philosophy since the publication of Mr. Bradley's "Appearance and Reality." Full of brilliant criticism and of positive theories which are models of lucid statement.' Glasgow Herald. 1 A brilliantly written volume.' Times. W H. Fail-brother. THE PHILOSOPHY OF T. H. GREEN. By W. H. FAIRBROTHER, M.A. Crown 8vo. %s. 6d. 1 In every way an admirable book.' Glasgow Herald. F. W. Bussell. THE SCHOOL OF PLATO : its Origin and its Revival under the Roman Empire. By F. W. BUSSELL, D.D., Fellow and Tutor of Brasenose College, Oxford. Demy %vo. los. 6d. 1 A highly valuable contribution to the history of ancient thought.' Glasgow HeraU. 1 A clever and stimulating book, provocative of thought and deserving careful reading.' Manchester Guardian. MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST 21 F. S. Granger. THE WORSHIP OF THE ROMANS. By F. S. GRANGER, M.A., Litt.D., Professor of Philosophy at Univer- sity College, Nottingham. Crown 8z>0. 6s. 1 A scholarly analysis of the religious ceremonies,beliefs, and superstitions of ancient Rome, conducted in the new light of comparative anthropology.' Times, Theology HANDBOOKS OF THEOLOGY. General Editor, A. ROBERTSON, D.D., Principal of King's College, London. THE XXXIX. ARTICLES OF THE CHURCH OF ENG- LAND. Edited with an Introduction by E. C. S. GIBSON, D.D., Vicar of Leeds, late Principal of Wells Theological College. Second and Cheaper Edition in One Volume. Demy %vo. I2s. 6d. * Dr. Gibson is a master of clear and orderly exposition, and he has enlisted in his service all the mechanism of variety of type which so greatly helps to elucidate a complicated subject. And he has in a high degree a quality very necessary, but rarely found, in commentators on this topic, that of absolute fairness. His book is pre-eminently honest.' Times. 'After a survey of the whole book, we can bear witness to the transparent honesty of purpose, evident industry, and clearness of style which mark its contents. They maintain throughout a very high level of doctrine and tone." Guardian. 'An elaborate and learned book, excellently adapted to its purpose." Speaker. *The most convenient and most acceptable commentary.' Expository Times. AN INTRODUCTION TO THE HISTORY OF RELIGION. By F. B. JEVONS, M.A., Litt.D., Principal of Bishop Hat field's Hall. Demy 8vo. los. 6d. ' Dr. Jevons has written a notable work, which we can strongly recommend to the serious attention of theologians and anthropologists.' Manchester Guardian. * The merit of this book lies in the penetration, the singular acuteness and force of the author's judgment. He is at once critical and luminous, at once just and suggestive. A comprehensive and thorough book.' Birmingham Post. THE DOCTRINE OF THE INCARNATION. By R. L. OTTLEY, M.A., late fellow of Magdalen College, Oxon., and Principal of Pusey House. In Two Volumes. Demy^vo. 15*. ' Learned and reverent : lucid and well arranged.' Record. 'Accurate, well ordered, and judicious.' National Observer. 'A clear and remarkably full account of the main currents of speculation. Scholarly precision . ._ . genuine tolerance . . . intense interest in his subject are Mr. Ottley's merits.' Guardian. C. P. Andrews. CHRISTIANITY AND THE LABOUR QUESTION. By C. F. ANDREWS, B.A. Crown Sw. 2s. 6d. S. R. Driver. SERMONS ON SUBJECTS CONNECTED WITH THE OLD TESTAMENT. By S. R. DRIVER, D.D., Canon of Christ Church, Regius Professor of Hebrew in the Uni- versity of Oxford. Crown 8vo. 6s. 1 A welcome companion to the author's famous ' Introduction.' No man can read these discourses without feeling that Dr. Driver is fully alive to the deeper teaching of the Old Testament/ Guardian. 22 MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST T. K. Cheyne. FOUNDERS OF OLD TESTAMENT CRITI- CISM. By T. K. CHEYNE, D.D., Oriel Professor at Oxford. Large crown 8vo. *]s, 6d. This book is a historical sketch of O. T. Criticism in the form of biographical studies from the days of Eichhorn to those of Driver and Robertson Smith. 'A very learned and instructive work.' Times. H. H. Henson. LIGHT AND LEAVEN : HISTORICAL AND SOCIAL SERMONS. By the Rev. H. HENSLEY HENSON, M.A., Fellow of All Souls', Incumbent of St. Mary's Hospital, Ilford. Crown 8vo. 6s. ' They are always reasonable as well as rigorous, and they are none the less impres- sive because they regard the needs of a life on this side of a hereafter.' Scotsman. W. H. Bennett. A PRIMER OF THE BIBLE. By Prof. W. H. BENNETT. Second Edition. Crown Svo. 2s. 6d. ' The work of an honest, fearless, and sound critic, and an excellent guide in a small compass to the books of the Bible.' Manchester Guardian, ' A unique primer. Mr. Bennett has collected and condensed a very extensive and diversified amount of material, and no one can consult his pages and fail to acknowledge indebtedness to his undertaking.' English Churchman. C.H.Prior. CAMBRIDGE SERMONS. Edited by C.H. PRIOR, M.A., Fellow and Tutor of Pembroke College. Crown %vo. 6s. A volume of sermons preached before the University of Cambridge by various preachers, including the late Archbishop of Canterbury and Bishop Westcott. E. B. Layard. RELIGION IN BOYHOOD. Notes on the Religious Training of Boys. By E. B. LAYARD, M.A. iSmo. is. W. Yorke Faussett. THE DE CATECHIZANDIS RUDIBUS OF ST. AUGUSTINE. Edited, with Introduction, Notes, etc., by W. YORKE FAUSSETT, M.A., late Scholar of Balliol Coll. Crown %vo. $s. 6d. An edition of a Treatise on the Essentials of Christian Doctrine, and the best methods of impressing them on candidates for baptism. A Kempis. THE IMITATION OF CHRIST. By THOMAS A KEMPIS. With an Introduction by DEAN FARRAR. Illustrated by C. M. GERE, and printed in black and red. Second Edition. Fcap. Sve. Buckram. $s. 6d. Padded morocco^ $s. 'Amongst all the innumerable English editions of the " Imitation," there can have been few which were prettier than this one, printed in strong and handsome type, with all the glory of red initials.' Glasgow Herald. J. Keble. THE CHRISTIAN YEAR. ByJOHNKEBLE. With an Introduction and Notes by W. LOCK, D. D. , Warden of Keble College, Ireland Professor at Oxford. Illustrated by R. ANNING BELL. Second Edition. Fcap. %vo. Buckram. 3-y. 6d. Padded morocco, $s. 'The present edition is annotated with all the care and insight to be expected from Mr. Lock. The progress and circumstances of its composition are detailed in the Introduction. There is an interesting Appendix on the MSS. of the "Christian Year," and another giving the order in which the poems were written. A " Short Analysis of the Thought" is prefixed to each, and any difficulty in the text is ex- plained in a note. ' Guardian. MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST 23 oC Edited by H. C. BEECHING, M. A. With Portraits, crown Svo. A series of short biographies of the most prominent leaders of religious life and thought of all ages and countries. The following are ready CARDINAL NEWMAN. By R. H. HUTTON. JOHN WESLEY. By J. H. OVERTON, M.A. BISHOP WILBERFORCE. By G. W. DANIEL, M.A. CARDINAL MANNING. By A. W. HUTTON, M.A. CHARLES SIMEON. By H. C. G. MOULE, M.A. JOHN KEBLE. By WALTER LOCK, D.D. THOMAS CHALMERS. By Mrs. OLIPHANT. LANCELOT ANDREWES. By R. L. OTTLEY, M.A. AUGUSTINE OF CANTERBURY. By E. L. CUTTS, D.D. WILLIAM LAUD. By W. H. HUTTON, B.D. JOHN KNOX. By F. M'CUNN. JOHN HOWE. By R. F. HORTON, D.D. BISHOP KEN. By F. A. CLARKE, M.A. GEORGE FOX, THE QUAKER. By T. HODGKIN, D.C.L. JOHN DONNE. By AUGUSTUS JESSOPP, D.D. Other volumes will be announced in due course. Fiction SIX SHILLING NOVELS Marie Corelli's Novels Crown Svo. 6s. each. A ROMANCE OF TWO WORLDS. Seventeenth Edition. VENDETTA. Thirteenth Edition. THELMA. Eighteenth Edition. ARDATH. Eleventh Edition. THE SOUL OF LILITH Ninth Edition. WORMWOOD. Eighth Edition. BARABBAS : A DREAM OF THE WORLD'S TRAGEDY. Thirty-first Edition. 4 The tender reverence of the treatment and the imaginative beauty of the writing have reconciled us to the daring of the conception, and the conviction is forced on us that even so exalted a subject cannot be made too familiar to us, provided it be presented in the true spirit of Christian faith. The amplifications of the Scripture narrative are often conceived with high poetic insight, and this "Dream of the World's Tragedy " is, despite some trifling incongruities, a lofty and not inade- quate paraphrase of the supreme climax of the inspired narrative.' Dublin Review. 24 MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST THE SORROWS OF SATAN. Thirty-seventh Edition. ' A very powerful piece of work. . . . The conception is magnificent, and is likely to win an abiding place within the memory of man. . . . The author has immense command of language, and a limitless audacity. . . . This interesting and re- markable romance will live long after much of the ephemeral literature of the day is forgotten. ... A literary phenomenon . . . novel, and even sublime.' W. T. STEAD in the Review of Reviews. Anthony Hope's Novels Crown %vo. 6s. each. THE GOD IN THE CAR. Seventh Edition. 1 A very remarkable book, deserving of critical analysis impossible within our limit ; brilliant, but not superficial ; well considered, but not elaborated ; constructed with the proverbial art that conceals, but yet allows itself to be enjoyed by readers to whom fine literary method is a keen pleasure.' The World. A CHANGE OF AIR. Fourth Edition. 'A graceful, vivacious comedy, true to human nature. The characters are traced with a masterly hand.' Times. A MAN OF MARK. Fourth Edition. 1 Of all Mr. Hope's books, " A Man of Mark " is the one which best compares with ' ' The Prisoner of Zenda." ' National Observer. THE CHRONICLES OF COUNT ANTONIO. Third Edition. 'It is a perfectly enchanting story of love and chivalry, and pure romance. The Count is the most constant, desperate, and modest and tender of lovers, a peerless gentleman, an intrepid fighter, a faithful friend, and a magnanimous foe.' Guardian. PHROSO. Illustrated by H. R. MILLAR. Third Edition. * The tale is thoroughly fresh, quick with vitality, stirring the blood, and humorously, dashingly told.' St. James's Gazette. ' A story of adventure, every page of which is palpitating with action.' Speaker. ' From cover to cover " Phroso " not only engages the attention, but carries the reader in little whirls of delight from adventure to adventure.' Academy. S. Baring Gould's Novels Crown 8v0. 6s. each. 'To say that a book is by the author of " Mehalah" is to imply that it contains a may be very generally accepted. His views of life are fresh and vigorous, his language pointed and characteristic, the incidents of which he makes use are striking and original, his characters are life-like, and though somewhat excep- tional people, are drawn and coloured with artistic force. Add to this that his descriptions of scenes and scenery are painted with the loving eyes and skilled hands of a master of his art, that he is always fresh and never dull, and under such conditions it is no wonder that readers have gained confidence both in his power of amusing and satisfying them, and that year by year his popularity widens.' Court Circular. ARM I NELL : A Social Romance. Fourth Edition. URITH : A Story of Dartmoor. Fifth Edition. ' The author is at his best.' Times. MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST 25 IN THE ROAR OF THE SEA Sixth Edition. 'One of the best imagined and most enthralling stories the author has produced. 1 Saturday Review. MRS. CURGENVEN OF CURGENVEN. Fourth Edition. 1 The swing of the narrative is splendid.' Sussex Daily News. CHEAP JACK ZITA. Fourth Edition. ' A powerful drama of -human passion.' Westminster Gazette. 'A story worthy the author.' National Observer. THE QUEEN OF LOVE. Fourth Edition. 1 Can be heartily recommended to all who care for cleanly, energetic, and interesting fiction.' Sussex Daily News. KITTY ALONE. Fourth Edition. ' A strong and original story, teeming with graphic description, stirring incident, and, above all, with vivid and enthralling human interest. ' Daily Telegraph. NOEMI : A Romance of the Cave-Dwellers. Illustrated by R. CATON WOODVILLE. Third Edition. ' A powerful story, full of strong lights and shadows.' Standard. THE BROOM-SQUIRE. Illustrated by FRANK DADD, Fourth Edition. 1 A strain of tenderness is woven through the web of his tragic tale, and its atmosphere is sweetened by the nobility and sweetness of the heroine's character.' Daily News. THE PENNYCOMEQUICKS. Third Edition. DARTMOOR IDYLLS. ' A book to read, and keep and read again ; for the genuine fun and pathos of it will not early lose their effect.' Vanity Fair. GUAVAS THE TINNER. Illustrated by FRANK DADD. Second Edition. ' There is a kind of flavour about this book which alone elevates it above the ordinary novel. The story itself has a grandeur in harmony with the wild and rugged scenery which is its setting.' Athen&um. B L AD YS. Second Edition. 1 A story of thrilling interest.' Scotsman. 1 A sombre but powerful story.' Daily Mail. Gilbert Parker's Novels Crown 8v0, 6s. each. PIERRE AND HIS PEOPLE. Fourth Edition. * Stories happily conceived and finely executed. There is strength and genius in Mr. Parker's style.' Daily Telegraph. MRS. FALCHION. Fourth Edition. 1 A splendid study of character.' Athenceum. 1 But little behind anything that has been done by any writer of our time.' Pall Mall Gazette, * A very striking and admirable novel.' St. James's Gazette. THE TRANSLATION OF A SAVAGE. ' The plot is original and one difficult to work out ; but Mr. Parker has done it with great skill and delicacy. The reader who is not interested in this original, fresh, and well-told tale must be a dull person indeed.' Daily Chronicle. 26 MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST THE TRAIL OF THE SWORD. Fifth Edition. Illustrated. 1 A rousing and dramatic tale. A book like this, in which swords flash, great sur- E rises are undertaken, and daring deeds done, in which men and women live and >ve in the old passionate way, is a joy inexpressible .' Daily Chronicle. WHEN VALMOND CAME TO PONTIAC : The Story of a Lost Napoleon. Fourth Edition. 1 Here we find romance real . breathing, living romance. The character of Valmond is drawn unerringly. The book must be read, we may say re-read, for any one thoroughly to appreciate Mr. Parker's delicate touch and innate sympathy with humanity.' Pall Mall Gazette. AN ADVENTURER OF THE NORTH : The Last Adven- tures of ' Pretty Pierre.' Second Edition. 'The present book is full of fine and moving stories of the great North, and it will add to Mr. Parker's already high reputation.' Glasgow Herald. THE SEATS OF THE MIGHTY. Illustrated. Ninth Edition. 1 The best thing he has done ; one of the best things that any one has done lately.' St. James's Gazette. ' Mr. Parker seems to become stronger and easier with every serious novel that he attempts. He shows the matured power which his former novels have led us to expect, and has produced a really fine historical novel. The finest novel he has yet written.' Athenaum. 1 A great book.' Black and White. 1 One of the strongest stories of historical interest and adventure that we have read for many a day. ... A notable and successful book.' Speaker. THE POMP OF THE LAVILETTES. Second Edition. $s.6d. ' Living, breathing romance, genuine and unforced pathos, and a deeper and more subtle knowledge of human nature than Mr. Parker has ever displayed before. It is, in a word, the work of a true artist.' Pall Mall Gazette. Conan Doyle. ROUND THE RED LAMP. By A. CONAN DOYLE, Author of 'The White Company/ 'The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes,' etc. Fifth Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 1 The book is, indeed, composed of leaves from life, and is far and away the best view that has been vouchsafed us behind the scenes of the consulting-room. It is very superior to "The Diary of a late Physician." ' Illustrated London News. Stanley Weyman. UNDER THE RED ROBE. By STANLEY WEYMAN, Author of ' A Gentleman of France. 1 With Twelve Illus- trations by R. Caton Woodville. Twelfth Edition. Crown Svo. 6s. 1 A book of which we have read every word for the sheer pleasure of reading, and which we put down with a pang that we cannot forget it all and start again.' Westminster Gazette. 1 Every one who reads books at all must read this thrilling romance, from the first page of which to the last the breathless reader is haled along. An inspiration of manliness and courage.' Daily Chronicle. Lucas Malet. THE WAGES OF SIN. By LUCAS MALET. Thirteenth Edition. Crown 8v0. 6s. Lucas Malet. THE CARISSIMA. By LUCAS MALET, Author of 'The Wages of Sin,' etc. Third Edition. Crown Svo. 6s. MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST 27 S. E. Crockett. LOCHINVAR. By S. R. CROCKETT, Author of * The Raiders,' etc. Illustrated. Second Edition. Crown ^vo. 6s. 1 Full of gallantry and pathos, of the clash of arms, and brightened by episodes of humour and love. . . . Mr. Crockett has never written a stronger or better book. An engrossing and fascinating story. The love story alone is enough to make the book delightful.' Westminster Gazette. Arthur Morrison. TALES OF MEAN STREETS. By ARTHUR MORRISON. Fourth Edition. Crown 8z>0. 6.?. ' Told with consummate art and extraordinary detail. In the true humanity of the book lies its justification, the permanence of its interest, and its indubitable triumph.' A thenceum. ' A great book. The author's method is amazingly effective, and produces a thrilling sense of reality. The writer lays upon us a master hand. The book is simply appalling and irresistible in jts interest. It is humorous also ; without humour it would not make the mark it is certain to make.' World. Arthur Morrison. A CHILD OF THE JAGO. By ARTHUR MORRISON. Third Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 1 The book is a masterpiece.' Pall Mall Gazette. 'Told with great vigour and powerful simplicity.' Athenceum. Mrs. Clifford. A FLASH OF SUMMER. By Mrs. W. K. CLIF- FORD, Author of ' Aunt Anne,' etc. Second Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. ' The story is a very sad and a very beautiful one, exquisitely told, and enriched with many subtle touches of wise and tender insight.' Speaker. Emily Lawless. HURRISH. By the Honble. EMILY LAW- LESS, Author of ' Maelcho,' etc. Fifth Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. A reissue of Miss Lawless' most popular novel, uniform with ' Maelcho.' Emily Lawless. MAELCHO : a Sixteenth Century Romance. By the Honble. EMILY LAWLESS. Second Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. * A really great book.' Spectator. 'There is no keener pleasure in life than the recognition of genius. A piece of work of the first jorder, which we do not hesitate to describe as one of the most remarkable literary achievements of this generation.' Manchester Guardian. Jane Barlow. A CREEL OF IRISH STORIES. By JANE BARLOW, Author of 'Irish Idylls.' Second Edition. Crown ^vo. 6s. 'Vivid and singularly real.' Scotsman. * Genuinely and naturally Irish.' Scotsman. 'The sincerity of her sentiments, the distinction of her style, and the freshness of her themes, combine to lift her work far above the average level of contemporary fiction.' Manchester Guardian. J. H. Findlater. THE GREEN GRAVES OF BALGOWRIE. By JANE H. FINDLATER. Fottrth Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 'A powerful and vivid story.' Standard. ' A beautiful story, sad and strange as truth itself.' Vanity Fair. ' A work of remarkable interest and originality.' National Observer. ' A very charming and pathetic tale.' Pall Mall Gazette. * A singularly original, clever, and beautiful story.' Guardian. * Reveals to us a new writer of undoubted faculty and reserve force.' Spectator. 1 An exquisite idyll, delicate, affecting, and beautiful. 'Black and White. 28 MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST J. H. Pindlater. A DAUGHTER OF STRIFE. By JANE HELEN FINDLATER, Author of 'The Green Graves of Balgowrie.' Crown 8vo< 6s. 'A story of strong human interest.' Scotsman. 1 It has a sweet flavour of olden days delicately conveyed.' Manchester Guardian. 1 Her thought has solidity and maturity.' Daily Mail. Mary Findlater. OVER THE HILLS. By MARY FINDLATER. Second Edition. Crown Svo. 6s. ' A strong and fascinating piece of work.' Scotsman. 1 A charming romance, and full of incident. The book is fresh and strong.' Speaker. ' There is quiet force and beautiful simplicity in this book which will make the author's name loved in many a household.' Literary World. 'Admirably fresh and broad in treatment. The novel is markedly original and excellently written.' Daily Chronicle. 'A strong and wise book of deep insight and unflinching truth.' Birmingham Post. 1 Miss Mary Findlater combines originality with strength.' Daily Mail. H. G. Wells. THE STOLEN BACILLUS, and other Stories. By H. G. WELLS. Second Edition. Crown %vo. 6s. 1 The ordinary reader of fiction may be glad to know that these stories are eminently readable from one cover to the other, but they are more than that ; they are the impressions of a very striking imagination, which, it would seem, has a great deal within its reach.' Saturday Review. H. G. Wells. THE PLATTNER STORY AND OTHERS. By H. G. WELLS. Second Edition. Crown %vo. 6s. ' Weird and mysterious, they seem to hold the reader as by a magic spell.' Scotsman. ' No volume has appeared for a long time so likely to give equal pleasure to the simplest reader and to the most fastidious critic.' Academy. E. F. Benson, DODO : A DETAIL OF THE DAY. By E. F. BENSON. Sixteenth Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 1 A delightfully witty sketch of society.' Spectator. ' A perpetual feast of epigram and paradox.' Speaker. E. F. Benson. THE RUBICON. By E. F. BENSON, Author of Dodo.' Fifth Edition. Crown Svo. 6s. Mrs. Oliphant. SIR ROBERT'S FORTUNE. By MRS. OLIPHANT. Crown Svo. 6s. 1 Full of her own peculiar charm of style and simple, subtle character-painting comes her new gift, the delightful story. ' Pall Mall Gazette. Mrs. Oliphant. THE TWO MARYS. By MRS. OLIPHANT. Second Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. Mrs. Oliphant. THE LADY'S WALK. By Mrs. OLIPHANT. Second Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 'A story of exquisite tenderness, of most delicate fancy.' Pall Mall Gazette. ( It contains many of the finer characteristics of her best work.' Scotsman. * It is little short of sacrilege on the part of a re\ iewer to attempt to sketch its out- lines or analyse its peculiar charm.' Spectator. MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST 29 W. E. Norris. MATTHEW AUSTIN. By W. E. NORRIS, Author of * Mademoiselle de Mersac,' etc. Fourth Edition. Crown Svo. 6s. "An intellectually satisfactory and morally bracing novel.' Daily Telegraph. W. E. Norris. HIS GRACE. By W. E NORRIS. Third Edition. Crown %vo. 6s. ' Mr. Norris has drawn a really fine character in the Duke of Hurstbourne, at once unconventional and very true to the conventionalities of life.' Athen&um. W. E. Norris. THE DESPOTIC LADY AND OTHERS. By W. E. NORRIS. Crown Svo. 6s. 1 A budget of good fiction of which no one will tire. 1 Scotsman. W. E. Norris. CLARISSA FURIOSA. By W. J. NORRIS, Crown 8vo. 6s. ' As a story it is admirable, as a jeu d! esprit it is capital, as a lay sermon studded with gems of wit and wisdom it is a model.' The World. W. Clark Russell. MY DANISH SWEETHEART. By W. CLARK RUSSELL, Author of 'The Wreck of the Grosvenor,' etc. Illustrated. Fourth Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. Robert Barr. THE MUTABLE MANY. By ROBERT BARR, Author of ' In the Midst of Alarms,' ' A Woman Intervenes,' etc. Second Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 1 Very much the best novel that Mr. Barr has yet given us. There is much insight in it, much acute and delicate appreciation of the finer shades of character and much excellent humour.' Daily Chronicle. ' An excellent story. It contains several excellently studied characters, and is filled with lifelike pictures of modern life.' Glasgow Herald. Robert Barr. IN THE MIDST OF ALARMS. By ROBERT BARR. Third Edition. Crown %vo. 6s. ' A book which has abundantly satisfied us by its capital humour. Daily Chronicle. 'Mr. Barr has achieved a triumph whereof he has every reason to be proud.' Pall Mall Gazette. J. Maclaren Cobban. THE KING OF ANDAMAN : A Saviour of Society. By J. MACLAREN COBBAN. Crown $vo. 6s. ' An unquestionably interesting book. It contains one character, at least, who has in him the root of immortality, and the book itself is ever exhaling the sweet savour of the unexpected.' Pall Mall Gazette. J. Maclaren Cobban. WILT THOU HAVE THIS WOMAN ? By J . M . COBBAN, Author of ' The King of Andaman. * Crown 8vo. 6s. 30 TRESSES. METHUEN'S LIST Eobert Hichens. BYE WAYS. By ROBERT HICHENS. Author of ' Flames,' etc. Crown %vo. 6s. c A very high artistic instinct and striking command of language raise Mr. Hichens' work far above the ruck. ' Pall Mall Gazette. { The work is undeniably that of a man of striking imagination and no less striking powers of expression.' Daily News. Percy White. A PASSIONATE PILGRIM. By PERCY WHITE, Author of * Mr, Bailey- Martin.' Crown 8vo. 6s. ( A work which it is not hyperbole to describe as of rare excellence.' Pall Mall Gazette. ' The clever book of a shrewd and clever author.' Athenceum. ' Mr. Percy White's strong point is analysis, and he has shown himself, before now, capable of building up a good book upon that foundation. ' Standard. W. Pett Ridge. SECRETARY TO BAYNE, M.P. By W. PETT RIDGE. Crown &vo. 6s. ' Sparkling, vivacious, adventurous. St. James's Gazette. ' Ingenious, amusing, and especially smart.' World. 1 The dialogue is invariably alert and highly diverting.' Spectator. J. S. Fletcher. THE BUILDERS. By J. S. FLETCHER, Author of ( When Charles I. was King.' Second Edition. Crown %>vo. 6s. ' Replete with delightful descriptions.' Vanity Fair. 1 The background of country life has never, perhaps, been sketched more realistically.' World. Andrew Balfour. BY STROKE OF SWORD. By ANDREW BALFOUR. Illustrated by W. CUBITT COOKE. Fourth Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 1 A banquet of good things.' Academy. 1 A recital of thrilling interest; told with unflagging vigour.' Globe ' An unusually excellent example of a semi-historic romance.' World. 1 Manly, healthy, and patriotic.' Glasgow Herald. I. Hooper. THE SINGER OF MARLY. By I. HOOPER. Illustrated by W. CUBITT COOKE. Crown %vo. 6s. ' Its scenes are drawn in vivid colours, and the characters are all picturesque.' Scotsman. 1 A novel as vigorous as it is charming.' Literary World. M. C. Balfour. THE FALL OF THE SPARROW. By M. C. BALFOUR. Crown %vo. 6s. ' A powerful novel.' Daily Telegraph. ' It is unusually powerful, and the characterization is uncommonly gocd.' World. 1 It is a well-knit, carefully-wrought story.' Academy. H. Morrah. A SERIOUS COMEDY. By HERBERT MORRAH. Crown 8vo. 6s. H. Morrah. THE FAITHFUL CITY. By HERBERT MORRAH, Author of ' A Serious Comedy. ' Crown 8vo. 6s. L. B. Walford. SUCCESSORS TO THE TITLE. By Mrs. WALFORD, Author of ' Mr. Smith,' etc. Second Edition. CrownZvo. 6s. MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST 31 Mary Gaunt. KIRKHAM'S FIND. By MARY GAUNT, Author of * The Moving Finger. ' Crown Svo. 6s. ' A really charming novel.' Standard. f A capital book, in which will be found lively humour, penetrating insight, and the sweet savour of a thoroughly healthy moral.' Speaker. M. M. Dowie. GALLIA. By MNIE MURIEL DOWIE, Author of * A Girl in the Carpathians. ' Third Edition. Crown 8vo. 6s. 1 The style is generally admirable, the dialogue not seldom brilliant, the situations surprising in their freshness and originality, while the characters live and move, and the story itself is readable from title-page to colophon.' Saturday Review. J. A. Barry. IN THE GREAT DEEP. BY J. A. BARRY. Author of * Steve Brown's Bunyip.' Crown $>vo. 6s. 'A collection of really admirable short stories of the sea, very simply told, and placed before the reader in pithy and telling English.' Westminster Gazette. J. B. Burton. IN THE DAY OF ADVERSITY. ByJ.BLOUN- DELLE-BURTON.' Second Edition. CrownKvo. 6s. 1 Unusually interesting and full of highly dramatic situations. Guardian. J. B. Burton. DENOUNCED. By J. BLOUNDELLE- BURTON. Second Edition. Crown Sv0. 6s. 'The plot is an original one, and the local colouring is laid on with a delicacy and an accuracy of detail which denote the true artist.' Broad Arrow. J. B. Burton. THE CLASH OF ARMS. By J. BLOUNDELLE- BURTON, Author of * In the Day of Adversity.' Second Edition, Crown 8vo. 6s. A brave story brave in deed, brave in* word, brave in thought.' St. James's Gazette. 'A fine, manly, spirited piece of work.' World. W. 0. Scully. THE WHITE HECATOMB. By W. C SCULLY, Author of ' Kafir Stories.' Crown %vo. 6s. ' It reveals a marvellously intimate understanding of the Kaffir mind, allied with literary gifts of no mean order.' African Critic. Julian Corbett. A BUSINESS IN GREAT WATERS. By JULIAN CORBETT. Second Edition. Crown 8v0. 6s. 'Mr. Corbett writes with immense spirit. The salt of the ocean is in it, and the right heroic ring resounds through its gallant adventures.' Speaker. L. Cope Cornford. CAPTAIN JACOBUS : A ROMANCE OF THE ROAD. By L. COPE CORNFORD. Illustrated. CrownZvo. 6s. ' An exceptionally good story of adventure and character.' World. L. Daintrey. THE KING OF ALBERIA. A Romance of the Balkans. By LAURA DAINTREY. Crown 8v0. 6s. M. A. Owen, THE DAUGHTER OF ALOUETTE. By MARY A. OWEN. Crown Sv0. 6s. 32 MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST Mrs. Pinsent. CHILDREN OF THIS WORLD. By ELLEN F. PINSENT, Author of * Jenny's Case.' Crown Svo. 6s. G. Manville Fenn. AN ELECTRIC SPARK. By G. MANVILLE FENN, Author of ' The Vicar's Wife,' 'A Double Knot,' etc. Second Edition. Crown Svo. 6s. L. S. McChesney. UNDER SHADOW OF THE MISSION. By L. S. McCHESNEY. Crown Svo. 6s. ' Those whose minds are open to the finer issues of life, who can appreciate graceful thought and refined expression of it, from them this volume will receive a welcome as enthusiastic as it will be based on critical knowledge.' Church Times. J. F. Brewer. THE SPECULATORS. By J. F. BREWER. Second Edition. Crown Svo. 6s. Ronald Ross. THE SPIRIT OF STORM. By RONALD Ross, Author of ' The Child of Ocean. ' Crown Svo. 6s. C. F. Wolley. THE QUEENSBERRY CUP. A Tale of Adventure. By CLIVE P. WOLLEY. Illustrated. Crown Svo. 6s. T. L. Paton. A HOME IN INVERESK. By T. L. PATON. Crown Svo. 6s. John Davidson. MISS ARMSTRONG'S AND OTHER CIR- CUMSTANCES. By JOHN DAVIDSON. Crown Svo. 6s. E. Johnston. DR. CONGALTON'S LEGACY. By HENRY JOHNSTON. Crown Svo. 6s. R. Pryce. TIME AND THE WOMAN. By RICHARD PRYCE. Second Edition. Crown Svo. 6s. Mrs. Watson. THIS MAN'S DOMINION. By the Author of * A High Little World. ' Second Edition. Crown Svo. 6s. Marriott Watson. DIOGENES OF LONDON. By H. B. MARRIOTT WATSON. Crown Svo. Buckram. 6s. M. Gilchrist. THE STONE DRAGON. By MURRAY GIL- CHRIST. Crown Svo. Buckram. 6s. E. Dickinson. A VICAR'S WIFE. By EVELYN DICKINSON. Crown Svo. 6s. E. M. Gray. ELSA. By E. M'QuEEN GRAY. Crown %vo. 6s. MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST 33 THREE-AND-SIXPENNY NOVELS Crown Svo. DERRICK VAUGHAN, NOVELIST. By EDNA LYALL. MARGERY OF QUETHER. By S. 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Edited by J. E. SYMES, M.A., Principal of University College, Nottingham. Crown 8vo. Price (with some exceptions] 2s. 6d. The following 1 volumes are ready : THE INDUSTRIAL HISTORY OF ENGLAND. By H. DE B. GIBBINS, D.Litt., M.A., late Scholar of Wadham College, Oxon., Cobden Prizeman. Fifth Edition, Revised. With Maps and Plans. 3^. 'A compact and clear story of our industrial development. A study of this concise but luminous book cannot fail to give the reader a clear insight into the principal phenomena of our industrial history^. The editor and publishers are to be congrat- ulated on this first volume of their venture, and we shall look with expectant interest for the succeeding volumes of the series.' University Extension Journal. A HISTORY OF ENGLISH POLITICAL ECONOMY. By L. L. PRICE, M.A., Fellow of Oriel College, Oxon. Second Edition. PROBLEMS OF POVERTY : An Inquiry into the Industrial Conditions of the Poor. By J. A. HOBSON, M.A. Third Edition. VICTORIAN POETS. By A. SHARP. THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. By J. E. SYMES, M.A. PSYCHOLOGY. By F. S. GRANGER, M.A. Second Edition. THE EVOLUTION OF PLANT LIFE : Lower Forms. By G. MASSEE. With Illustrations. AIR AND WATER. By V. B. LEWES, M.A. Illustrated. THE CHEMISTRY OF LIFE AND HEALTH. By C. W. KIMMINS, M.A. Illustrated. THE MECHANICS OF DAILY LIFE. By V. P. SELLS, M.A. Illustrated. ENGLISH SOCIAL REFORMERS. By H. DE B. GIBBINS, D.Litt., M.A. ENGLISH TRADE AND FINANCE IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY. By W. A. S. HEWINS, B.A. THE CHEMISTRY OF FIRE. The Elementary Principles of Chemistry. By M. M. PATTISON MUIR, M.A. Illustrated. A TEXT-BOOK OF AGRICULTURAL BOTANY. By M. C. POTTER, M.A., F.L.S. Illustrated. 3*. >d. THE VAULT OF HEAVEN. A Popular Introduction to Astronomy. By R. A. GREGORY. With numerous Illustrations. METEOROLOGY. The Elements of Weather and Climate. By H. N. DICKSON, F.R.S.E., F.R. Met. Soc. Illustrated. A MANUAL OF ELECTRICAL SCIENCE. By GEORGE J. BURCH, M.A. With numerous Illustrations. 3^. 36 MESSRS. METHUEN'S LIST THE EARTH. An Introduction to Physiography. By EVAN SMALL, M.A. Illustrated. INSECT LIFE. By F. W. THEOBALD, M.A. Illustrated. ENGLISH POETRY FROM BLAKE TO BROWNING. By W. M. DIXON, M.A. ENGLISH LOCAL GOVERNMENT. By E. JENKS, M.A., Professor of Law at University College, Liverpool. THE GREEK VIEW OF LIFE. By G. L. DICKINSON, Fellow of King's College, Cambridge. Second Edition. Social Questions of To-day Edited by H. DE B. GIBBINS, D.Litt, M.A. Crown Sv0. 2s. 6d. A series of volumes upon those topics of social, economic, and industrial interest that are at the present moment foremost in the public mind. Each volume of the series is written by an author who is an acknow- ledged authority upon the subject with which he deals. The following Volumes of the Series are ready : TRADE UNIONISM NEW AND OLD. By G. HOWELL. Second Edition. THE CO-OPERATIVE MOVEMENT TO-DAY. By G. J. HOLYOAKE, Second Edition. MUTUAL THRIFT. By Rev. J. FROME WILKINSON, M.A. PROBLEMS OF POVERTY. By J. 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