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£. s. d. to London, and put the money into the Bank for the benefit of my family; and as coaches were not so common as they are now, I rode my pack horse all the way up, and put my money in the saddle-bags; and when I arrived, I took the Guineas to the Bank, but to my great surprise and sorrow, they were all refused to be changed; being too light, owing to their rubbing each other in the bags on the journey: however, a gentleman I saw there, told me to take them to a shop in Leadenhall-street, the 8 corner of St. Mary Axe, where I could get the value for them, and I should not lose by them accordingly I went, and he weigh'd them, and gave me an account as under, 064 and the money all in Bank Notes:-300

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Light Guineas, weight 80 oz. at 110s. per oz. £440. I told him what I wanted to do O with the money, and he directed me to a man they call'd a Stock Broker, who went with me to the Bank, and gave me a Ticket for £800. 3 per cent. Cons. at 55 per cent. £440. and charged me I think, 10s. or 128. for his trouble; now Sir you must know, my eldest daughter Mary was just going to be married, and I know my other two girls will do so too if they can get husbands, so I thought I would go to London again, and fetch home the money from the Bank, so I 20 0 0 comed up by the coach this time, and went to take the money out, and they gave me another ticket with particulars, as follows:

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TO THE EDITOR OF THE AGRICULTU-
RAL AND INDUSTRIAL MAGAZINE.

Sold for Jno. Plowright £800, 3 per cent. Cons. at £90, £720.,

SIR, Near Pontefract. which I got all in sovereigns; I thought FARMER GUBBINS a near neighbour of there must be some mistake, they could not mine having showed me a Book about the be all gold, so I took them to the place Landed Interest, Money Matters and the where I formerly sold the light guineas, and like; I take the liberty of writing you a sure enough there was the same chap beLetter, to request the favour of your in-hind the counter, and I asked him all about

forming me how it come about that I have been such a lucky chap without knowing why.

You must first know, that in the year 1815, when farming was much better than

it is now;
I had saved up above Three Hun-
dred Guineas, all in Gold, and as I had three
children, all girls, I thought I would go up

them, and he assured me they were all as good gold as the guineas, and for my 300 guineas that weighed 80 oz. I had now got 720 sovereigns, which weighed above 184 oz. I could not help calling out in pure York,-"I ne'er see'd the loike ere sin I wor wick !"-I asked him how it all came about, but he requested me not to trouble my

head about what I could not understand; or other machines shall stand upon a fair but I very much wish to know who they are and equal footing with hand-looms and that give twenty-four sovereigns a-year for other implements. these last twenty years, and return back, when required, 720 gold sovereigns for 300 guineas lent in 1815.

I am your Humble Servant,
JNO. PLOWRIGHT.

11th May, 1835.

To the Honourable the Commons of the
United Kingdom in this present Parlia-

ment Assembled.

The Petition of the Hand-Loom Em-
ployers and Weavers of Bradford and
the Vicinity adopted at a Public
Meeting held at Bradford, Yorkshire,
on Monday, April 6th, 1835, (by Per-
mission of the Magistrates,) in Front
of the Court House, and attended by
at least Three Thousand Persons,
Most humbly sheweth,

That your Petitioners hail with satisfaction the reappointment of a Select Committee of the House of Commons, to investigate the deplorable condition of the hand-loom

weavers.

That your Petitioners attribute the great and increasing depression of this branch of trade to several causes, the principal of which is, the competition occasioned by capital invested in improved and continually improving machinery, particularly power. looms; the great object in all such improvements being to adapt the machinery to the youngest class of workers.

That your Petitioners conceive, that it is only JUST to require, that it shall be laid down by the Legislature as a PRINCIPLE, that the productions of power-loom shall contribute towards the national or public expences in an equal ratio with the productions of the hand-loom, (the same principle being applied in all similar cases), and also, that in this, as in all other cases, the capital or the ingenuity of one portion of the community shall not be allowed to deprive any other portion of profitable employment, but that power-looms

Your Petitioners cannot conceive how such a PRINCIPLE as this can be denied, without affirming as the opposite principle that wealth (or capital) is invested with a RIGHT to oppress and to "clear off" the industrious poor; and that, when any man has money enough to bring his ingenuity or science to a practical issue, he is entitled to a certain monopoly of trade, profits, and all other good things, although the absolute destruction of his industrious neighbours should be the consequence.

Your Petitioners are aware of the various means which have been recommended, for restraining those evil effects of capital in'vested in machinery, of which we complain, and your Petitioners would here declare, that, it is the wholesome regulation, and not the destruction of machinery at which they aim, but the most simple and beneficial of those REMEDIES, as your Petitioners believe, would be to limit generally the working hours of machinery employed in manufactures.

This plan would also be attended with other advantages, religious, moral and social, especially to the rising generation, by affording proper TIME for wholesome and useful learning, and for the acquisition of a due knowledge of those domestic duties, so essential to the female. And your Petitioners believe, that by this redemption of time, for such and similar purposes, (which in a Christian Country we have a right to expect), vice and immorality would generally decrease; drunkenness, often resulting from exhaustion, would diminish, and happiness, with Christian virtues, would be diffused.

Such restriction in regard to time would also bring the supply of manufactured goods more nearly equal to the profitable demand, would prevent that ruinous diminution both of profits and wages, which always attends a glutted market, would increase buyers and consumers in the home market by employing more hands at better and more steady wages, and would cause that portion of our goods

which is exported to foreign markets to be sold or exchanged for full value, and not often at half value or less, as the published evidence before the hand-loom weaver's committee of last Session clearly proves to have been the case.

Your Petitioners cannot see what anxiety we ought to have about FOREIGN TRADE, unless it can be shown to be profitable to the nation. But if the home trade has to pay the losses of foreign trade, the miseries of the working classes must increase as a ruinous foreign trade extends. If we must lose in this race of "foreign competition," we had better never run at all.

But if the restraint upon the time of working, which would check over production in yarn, and in the first processes, as well as in weaving, should prove not sufficiently effective, your Petitioners would respectfully urge upon the Legislature to follow up the principle laid down, of fair and equal competition, by the impost of some such direct tax upon the power-loom or machine, or its productions, as shall be most effectual for the purpose.

Your Petitioners also perceive by the evidence aforesaid, that large quantities of YARN, both cotton and worsted, are constantly EXPORTED to be manufactured by the continental weavers, who can both work and live for much less than the hand-loom weavers of this country; now, unless it can be proved that an adequate national advantage is derived from such export of yarn, it seems to your Petitioners very unjust, that in order to enrich a few individuals, whose capital is employed in spinning and first process machines, nearly a million of handloom weavers should be distressed by such an unequal competition with the foreign weaver, who not only weaves our British yarn, but sends his web when woven to depreciate the British market.

Your Petitioners humbly urge that the foreigner ought not thus to be preferred to the industrious subjects of this realm.

Your Petitioners would also humbly represent to your Honourable House, that the

PRESENT ARRANGEMENT OF TAXATION bears very unequally upon the productive classes; so that (as is proved by more than one witness before the aforesaid Committee) a labouring man is liable to pay nearly half his income in taxes, directly or indirectly. At the same time, large masses of capital, the natural tendency of which is to accumulate, are never touched by the finger of the taxgather. Your Petitioners presume to suggest, that if the taxes were taken off the back of industry and laid upon property and income above a certain amount, it would remove a burden from those who cannot and ought not to sustain it, to a degree which now depresses their energies both of body and mind. Your Petitioners also venture to suggest, that a very considerable reduction might be made in the amount of taxation without detriment to the public service or injustice to the public creditor, who has now a greater command over the productions of our industry by more than 100 per cent. than he had when the last public loan was contracted, and who is therefore receiving more than his debt. Or if your Honourable House prefer it to be stated in other terms, it may be said, that we, the labouring classes, are receiving only one half of what we ought to have, if duly paid (according to the rate of the public creditor) for our labour, and that we are filched of so much of our equitable share of the national wealth, which is mainly created by the labour of our hands.

Your Petitioners have also to complain of a great disparity of wages often existing in one and the same neighbourhood, and for the same sort of work both as to quality and execution. These variations naturally lead to general reductions, and render an arbitrary and uncalled for depression of wages easy to any considerable employer who from avarice or humour may resolve to effect it.

Until a more healthy state of trade can be established, your Petitioners beg to suggest that some BOARD OF TRADE OR OTHER AU

THORITATIVE COURT for the regulation of wages should be formed. But in thus ven

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