[Russia by Donald Mackenzie Wallace]@TWC D-Link book
Russia

CHAPTER IX
19/19

Ask a Lancashire manufacturer if he could allow a large portion of his workers to go yearly to Cornwall or Caithness to mow a field of hay or reap a few acres of wheat or oats! And if Russia is to make great industrial progress, the manufacturers of Moscow, Lodz, Ivanovo, and Shui will some day be as hard pressed as are those of Bradford and Manchester.

The invariable tendency of modern industry, and the secret of its progress, is the ever-increasing division of labour; and how can this principle be applied if the artisans insist on remaining agriculturists?
The interests of agriculture, too, are opposed to the old system.
Agriculture cannot be expected to make progress, or even to be tolerably productive, if it is left in great measure to women and children.

At present it is not desirable that the link which binds the factory-worker or artisan with the village should be at once severed, for in the neighbourhood of the large factories there is often no proper accommodation for the families of the workers, and agriculture, as at present practised, can be carried on successfully though the Head of the Household happens to be absent.

But the system must be regarded as simply temporary, and the disruption of large families--a phenomenon of which I have already spoken--renders its application more and more difficult..


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