crippled this branch of industry for the moment, yet in 1827 more was
produced than ever, the mechanical skill and experience of the English
having secured their twisting machinery the supremacy over the awkward
devices of their competitors. In 1835 the British Empire possessed 263
twisting mills, employing 30,000 workers, located chiefly in Cheshire, in
Macclesfield, Congleton, and the surrounding districts, and in Manchester
and Somersetshire. Besides these, there are numerous mills for working
up waste, from which a peculiar article known as spun silk is
manufactured, with which the English supply even the Paris and Lyons
weavers. The weaving of the silk so twisted and spun is carried on in
Paisley and elsewhere in Scotland, and in Spitalfields, London, but also
in Manchester and elsewhere. Nor is the gigantic advance achieved in
English manufacture since 1760 restricted to the production of clothing
materials. The impulse, once given, was communicated to all branches of
industrial activity, and a multitude of inventions wholly unrelated to
those here cited, received double importance from the fact that they were
made in the midst of the universal movement. But as soon as the
immeasurable importance of mechanical power was practically demonstrated,
every energy was concentrated in the effort to exploit this power in all
directions, and to exploit it in the interest of individual inventors and
manufacturers; and the demand for machinery, fuel, and materials called a
mass of workers and a number of trades into redoubled activity. The
steam-engine first gave importance to the broad coal-fields of England;
the production of machinery began now for the first time, and with it
arose a new interest in the iron mines which supplied raw material for
it. The increased consumption of wool stimulated English sheep breeding,
and the growing importation of wool, flax, and silk called forth an
extension of the British ocean carrying trade. Greatest of all was the
growth of production of iron. The rich iron deposits of the English
hills had hitherto been little developed; iron had always been smelted by