LAISSEZ FAIRE 
“ Hitherto' the rude implements required for the cultiva- 
tion of the soil, or the household utensils needed for the 
comfort of daily life, had been made at home. The farmer, 
his sons, and his servants, in the long winter evenings carved 
the wooden spoons, the platters, and the beechen bowls; 
plaited wicker baskets; fitted handles to the tools; cut willow 
teeth for rakes and harrows, and hardened them in the fire; 
fashioned ox-yokes and forks; twisted willows into the traces 
and other harness gear. Travelling carpenters visited farm- 
houses at rare intervals to perform those parts of work which 
needed their professional skill. The women plaited the straw 
for the neck-collars, stitched and stuffed sheepskin bags for 
the cart-saddle, wove the straw or hempen stirrups and 
halters, peeled the rushes for and made the candles. The 
spinning-wheel, the distaff, and the needle were never idle; 
coarse home-made cloth and linen supplied all wants; every 
farm-house had its brass brewing kettle....All the domestic 
industries by which cultivators of the soil increased their 
incomes, or escaped the necessity of selling their produce, 
were now supplanted by manufactures.” 
and the While by-employments were dying out, there was also a 
onony to tendency for weavers and other craftsmen to migrate from 
io towne, the villages to the towns?, and this would certainly affect the 
village prosperity by reducing the demand for its produce. 
The small manufacturing population created a demand on 
the spot; and articles could be sold which might not perhaps 
bear the expense of transport to the towns. It might appear 
that the villager would gain by the improvement in produc- 
tion and would pay less for his clothes?; but the double cost 
of carriage, of his produce to the town and his purchased 
cloth to the village, would diminish his receipts, and might 
enhance the price which he had formerly paid, so that his 
gain from this source would hardly be appreciable. This 
destruction of local demand was certainly an imvnortant matter. 
122 
1 Prothero, Pioneers, 67. For an interesting picture of village life in Hamp- 
shire at a later date, see Thorold Rogers, Siz Centuries, 502. 
2 This trend of the industrial population had been foreseen by Sir J. Steuart, 
Works, 1. 113. 
8 On the change in the habits of farm servants compare Select Committee on 
Agriculture. in Reports. 1833, v. questions 6174-7. 10324 {.