280

GILDING.

CIIAP. XXVI.

which it is used. The trade in gilt buttons ischiefly carried on in Birmingham , but extensivelyalso in London . In the first town there areupwards of fifty large, and many small establish-ments ; in the latter a much smaller number, butthese are calculated to expend about three timesthe quantity of gold on the same number of buttons.From the influence of fashion within the three orfour last years the number of gilt buttons fabricatedhas somewhat declined, though the whole produceis still very large. Many of those for the use ofthe officers of the navy and army and othergentlemen are made at Birmingham , as are thosedestined for foreign markets, whilst the trade inLondon supplies a portion of them to the higherclasses, and has an almost exclusive monopoly ofsuch livery buttons as have arms or crests stampedon them.

Communications received from ten of the largestmanufacturers in Birmingham led to the con-clusion that their weekly consumption of fine goldhad till within the last three years amounted totwo hundred ounces weekly, and that the severalsmaller houses, from their greater number, mightuse about three hundred ounces. Within thelast three years the demand has declined, and theconsumption of gold is estimated not to exceedthi’ee hundred and sixty ounces. The quantityused in London is not supposed to amount to