Of these a large proportion is of Irish manufac. tore.
It remains to add a few words in regard to the transit trade of England in foreign linen. This sub. ject was, so lately as 1817, brought under the con sideration of Parliament, and arguments of weight were offered for taking off the duty, collected for many years back on the German and Russian linen which through this country. Government, however persisted in retaining it; less, in all proba bility, with a view to revenue, than to prevent fo reign linens from rivalling British in the supply of our colonies.
In the silk manufacture, as in linen, we have bad to contend with established manufacturers in other countries, particularly in France and Italy. We have had also to import the whole of the raw material. Such a manufacture was, therefore, un suited to England, and would not have been at tempted by our countrymen, but for the great pro fits expected from an article of general use among the higher classes. Its introduction among us goes back to the fifteenth century. About the beginning of the seventeenth, it seems to have been carried to a considerable extent, owing certainly not to the luxury of the age, or to any great proportion of affluent persons in the community, but to silks being almost the only article of apparel in which the vanity of dress could display itself. Towards the end of the reign of Charles II., about the year 1680, raw sllk began to be imported in quantities from In dia; and the English manufacture received a sub stantial addition by the numbers and ingenuity of the Frenchmen who settled in this country, after the re vocation of the edict of Nantes in 1683. Various circumstances thus contributed to preserve, and even to extend the silk manufacture; and, as our rate of wages did not then materially exceed those of our neighbours, it teems to have experienced no great or general shock hill the rivalship of cotton, after the surprising improvements introduced into that branch, between 1785 and 1795 ; but such was that rival. ship, that it became in vain for the East India Com pany to increase their imports of silk, or to intro duce, as they did at this period, into Bengal the i Italian method of winding it. Nothing could coun.
terbalance the cheapness and elegance of the new subetitutes; and the weavers of Spittalfields became reduced to that penury, which, with few exceptions, has continued their lot ever since. It was a radical error to attempt establishing a great manufacture in London, where provisions, fuel, and house-rent, are necessarily higher than in the country. According ly, Coventry, Leek in Staffordshire, Macclesfield in Cheshire, Manchester, and other places, proved suc cessful rivals to the metropolis. The present distress of the workmen in Coventry appears, by a very cir cumstantial exposition,* to be greater than has for some time existed in Spittalfields; but any superi. ority in the latter must be but temporary, and must arise from the operation of the poor's rate, or from the regulation of wages by act of Parliament.
The persons, young and old, employed in the silk manufacture in London, are computed at about 25,000; the number in all the provincial towns about 40,000; but the total value manufactured, in an ar ticle of such price, exceeds the proportion suggest. ed by these numbers. It is calculated at L.4,000,000 Sterling a-year ; an amount which is probably with in one-fourth of the most flourishing 'state of the ma. nufacture about the year 1785; and the magnitude of which, notwithstanding the general adoption of printed cottons, is chiefly to be accounted for from our augmented population.
The following years are selected to show the pe riodical variations in the supply of silk from different countries: Bengal has thus gained greatly over the south of Europe. In an article of such value for its bulk, the freight even from India is of little consequence ; but there is another and a more substantial reason in the difference of duty. Raw silk from Bengal Pa Ys on warehousing only 5d. per lb., and 8s. 9d. addi tional when entered for home consumption; raw silk ftom China is taxed considerably higher; and that from other countries is no less than 5s. 6d. per lb. Each are entitled to a drawback, when re-exported in a manufactured state.