32. THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION. Between the years 1770 and 1840 England be came the workshop of the world. She changed radically in character; from an agricultural nation she became primarily a manufacturing one. She became dependent for her raw materials on foreign nations and on markets abroad for the sale of her goods. Her interna. tional position, therefore. was vastly affected and her prosperity became dependent on the state of trade. No less remarkable was the change in the relations of persons. A new middle class of manufacturers arose and the moneyed interest permanently overtopped the landed interest in social importance. Alongside of the employing class grew up the class of factory hands, and the business relations of the two classes had to be settled afresh and not without considerable friction. The industrial revolution involved, therefore, industrial recon struction with all the disintegration and suffer ing that drastic reconstruction always causes.
Not more striking than the alteration in the character of English industry and in English social relations was the remarkable shifting which took place of centres of importance, for suddenly the North sprang into prominence and the South correspondingly declined. In this new industrial region huge masses of people were congregated on certain spots, and the problem of the large towns arose, with all the sanitary housing and other questions connected therewith.
Then came the problem of feeding these agglomerations of people and of getting rid of the goods they made, which questions were answered by the great revolution in the means of transport and the changes in the English fiscal system.
The industrial revolution is generally dated from the coming of machinery and is usually connected with the invention by Arkwright of a cotton-spinning machine in 1775 which was worked by water. It was the application of mechanical power to industry that constituted the novelty, for it was the invention of a sub stitute for man himself.
But events had been preparing for more than half a century for the introduction of manufacturing on a large scale in England. In
ventors had always been numerous, but the con ditions were present about 1770 which enabled an inventor to bring his ideas to a successful issue. In the first place there was in the England of that time an abundance of capital, owing to the development of the banking sys tem, so that an enterprising man could get money to try experiments. Arkwright's ma chine is said to have cost $60,000 before it was perfected. Then, too, there was every prospect of large sales, without which machine production would have been unnecessary. England's mar kets were developing steadily in the 18th cen tury, both at home and abroad. At home the revolution caused by smelting iron with coal had given rise to canals to transport the fuel and the result was a general quickening of in tercommunications. New centres rose up and a greater demand for goods was created. The export of English goods was steadily rising in value and there was every chance of increasing the sales if goods were cheaper. Moreover in the 18th century the capitalist employer had become prominent. There was, therefore, a class of men trained to production on a large scale. The old mercantile companies with their rules as to limited sales had lost their power to dictate as to quantities and prices and there was no hindrance on that side to the enterprising man.
Yet although these forces were all making for a great change in the methods of industry the England of 1760 was an agricultural coun try. The leading branch of trade was cloth; cotton goods and muslins were imported from India and re-exported; fine cotton goods could not be made in England as the warp was too weak and linen had to be used. The iron trade had been threatened with extinction owing to the lack of timber and was only just beginning to revive when coal could be utilized for smelt ing owing to the invention of the Darbys about 1740; but mach remained to be done, and it was not until Cort's invention of a means of puddling iron in 1784 that the iron trade made great advances.