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OX THE POSITION

be well acquainted. The very circumstance of col-lecting periodically, at one place, as large a number aspossible both of those who supply the market andthose who require its produce, tends strongly tocheck those accidental fluctuations to which a smallmarket is ever subject, as well as to render theaverage of the prices paid much more uniform inits course.

(223.) When capital has been invested in machi-nery, and in buildings for its accommodation, andwhen the inhabitants of the neighbourhood haveacquired a knowledge of the modes of working atit, reasons of considerable weight are required tocause its removal. Such changes of position dohowever occur; and they have been alluded to bythe Committee on the Fluctuation of Manufacturers’Employment, as one of the sources interfering mostmaterially with an uniform rate of wages : it is there-fore of particular importance to the workmen to beacquainted with the real causes which have drivenmanufactures from their ancient seats.

“ The migration or change of place of any manufacture“ has sometimes arisen from improvements of machinery“ not applicable to the spot where such manufacture was“ carried on, as appears to have been the case with the“ woollen manufacture, which has in great measure mi-“ grated from Essex, Suffolk, and other southern counties,“ to the northern districts, where coal for the use of the“ steam-engine is much cheaper. But this change has, in“ some instances, been caused or accelerated by the conduct“ of the workmen, in refusing a reasonable reduction of“ wages, or opposing the introduction of some kind of im-“ proved machinery or process ; so that, during the dispute,“ another spot has in great measure supplied their place in