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mime, or, with a very few exceptions, and all those who dance moft at their have almost all ceafed to be fo.

This remarkable difference of character between the ancient and the modern dances feems to be the natural effect of a correspondent difference in that of the mufic, which has accompanied and directed both the one and the other.

In modern times we almost always dance to inftrumental mufic, which being itself not imitative, the greater part of the dances which it directs, and as it were infpires, have ceased to be fo. In ancient times, on the contrary, they feem to have danced almoft always to vocal mufic; which being neceffary and effentially imitative, their dances became fo too. The ancients feem to have had little or nothing of what is properly called inftrumental mufic, or of mufic compofed not to be fung by the voice, but to be played upon inftruments, and both their wind and their stringed instruments seem to have served only as an accompaniment and direction to the voice.

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In the country it frequently happens that a company of young people take a fancy to dance, though they have neither fiddler nor piper to dance to. A lady undertakes to fing while the rest of the company dance; in most cafes the fings the notes only, without the words, and then the voice being little more than a mufical inftrument, the dance is performed in the ufual way, without any imitation. But if the fings the words, and if in those words there happens to be fomewhat more than ordinary fpirit and humour, immediately all the company, efpecially all the beft dancers,

eafe, become more or lefs pantomimes, and by their geftures and motions exprefs, as well as they can, the meaning and story of the fong. This would be ftill more the cafe, if the fame perfon both danced and fung; a practice very common among the ancients: it requires good lungs and a vigorous conftitution; but with thefe advantages and long prac tice, the very highest dances may be performed in this manner. I have feen a negro dance to his own fong, the wardance of his own country, with fuch vehemence of action and expreffion, that the whole company, gentlemen as well as ladies, got up upon chairs and tables, to be as much as poffible out of the way of his fury. In the Greek language there are two verbs which both fignify to dance; each of which has its proper derivatives, fignifying a dance and a dancer. In the greater part of Greek authors, thefe two fets of words, like all others which are nearly fynonimous, are frequently confounded, and ufed promifcuously. According to the best critics, however, in ftrict propriety, one of thefe verbs fignifies to dance and fing at the fame time, or to dance to one's own music. The other to dance without finging, or to dance to the music of other people. There is faid, too, to be a correfpondent difference in the fignification of their refpective derivatives. In the choruffes of the ancient Greek tragedies, confifting fometimes of more than fifty perfons, fome piped and fome fung; but all danced, and danced to their own music.

OBSERVATIONS ON THE OBJECTIONS AGAINST MACHINES TO SHORTEN LABOUR:

WITH SOME IMPORTANT CONSIDERATIONS ON THE DUTIES OF MANUFAC TURERS RESPECTING THE HEALTH AND MORALS OF THEIR WORKMEN.

OBJECTIONS of a moral nature they are difmiffed almoft without any are fometimes urged against the intro- warning, or at least a warning fufficient duction of machines, by which human to afford fuch of them, as are qualified labour is confiderably shortened. Great to undertake another occupation, an numbers of men and women, it is faid, opportunity of providing one. But are thus thrown out of employment: most of them, it is added, even if they

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had much longer notice, would be unable to avail themselves of that refource; from ther fex, their age, or their habits of life, they are incapable of commencing a new line of business; and even if they are capable, other trades are full, and will not receive them. Thus multitudes of honest and induf. trious poor are deprived of the poffibili ty of procuring a livelihood for them. felves and their families; they pine in mifery, in sickness, and in want; and driven at length to repel famine and nakednefs by violence and plunder, from being the fupports, become the pests of fociety. That thefe objections, which compaffion has fuggefted on the fight of incidental diftreis, are to be difregarded, is by no means to be affirmed. But they are pufhed to an unreasonable length, when they are urged as generally conclufive against the admiffion of new machines by which labour is greatly diminished. How has mankind been enabled to emerge from a state of barbarism to civilization, to exchange dens and caves for comfortable houses, coverings of raw skins for clean and convenient cloths, acorns and wild fruits for falubrious food, unlettered ignorance for books and knowledge, but by the progreffive introduction and the rapid improvements of machinery? And are we prepared to fay that human life has attained to its highest degree of refinement? Or that the means which have brought it to its present state ought not to be permitted to carry it further? Or that, while every nation around us is advancing in improvement, Great Britain alone is to and fill? Thofe fimple machines and implements, with out which we should now be at a lofs how to fubfift, were new in their day; and in many inftances the invention of them undoubtedly diminished, perhaps annihilated, the demand for that fpecies of labour which was before in great request. The boat-maker of early times, who first undermined the tree, and then formed it into fhape by scrapping it with oyfter-fhelis, and hollowing it with fire,

had probably to lament the lofs of employment when a competitor arrived from a diftance, armed with the recently difcovered hatchet, and able to complete more canoes in a month than the other could in a year. The makers of hand-barrows and fcuttles would perceive the demand for their craft materially leffened, when a more commodious method of carriage took place on the introduction of carts. The fabricators of hand-mills found their work speedily fall into difufe on the erection of machines for grinding corn by means of wind and water. In what fituation would the world now be, had these inventions been fucceffively profcribed out of favour to the old workmen ?

But let us not deny to the objections under confideration the weight which they poffefs; nor be betrayed, by a partiality for meafures productive of general good, into a neglect of any attendant misfortunes of the poor. If, on the one hand, the mannfacturer acts laudably when he exerts himself in the difcovery of, or the introduction of new machines, or in the improvement of machines already exifting, by which his manufacture may be rendered cheaper or better; on the other hand, he is highly criminal if he does not with equal earnestnefs exert himself to guard against that diftrefs, which the hafty adoption of inventions calculated for difpatch, frequently occafions at first among the workmen, whose labour they fuperfede. Let him not be hurried by unfeeling avarice, or blind emulation, fuddenly to bring them into use to a great extent. Let him ftudy to provide employment for. his ancient fervants in fome other line, especially for the women and the old men: and, at all events, let him not turn them adrift, until they have means of immediately procuring bread for themfelves and their children in another occupation. This attention to the welfare of his fellowcreatures, by whofe induftry and toil he has been enriching himself, is required of him by his and their common

mafter.

mafter. Did it force him to refrain from increafing his profits, he would be bound in confcience to refrain; did it impose a heavy drawback on the increafe, he ought to pay it with cheerfulnefs. But the diftreffes in queftion will rarely be great or permanent. Remedies are every where at hand; and they are commonly multiplied in a little time by the very circumftance which renders them neceffary. The general effect of fhortening labour is not to leffen the number of labourers wanted, but to enlarge the mass of produce, and to augment the comforts of life. Every fuccessful invention ultimately increafes the number of working hands; partly by employing many in fabricating and conducting the new machinery, and in performing various fubfequent operations on the articles produced by it; but principally by rendering manufactures better and cheaper, and thus creating fo vaft an additional demand for them at home and abroad, as to caufe a much larger quantity of workmen to be occupied in preparing them, than was employed when they were made in the old manner, and fold at the ancient price. Such, for example, has evidently been the effect of the introduction of cotton-mills. And further; the new invention itself frequently furnifhes fome collateral and auxiliary branches of employment, to which the Jabour rendered needlefs by it may eafily be transferred. Most of those for whom provifion cannot thus be made, will be able to find a place in a country like this, if time be allowed them by the manufacturer for fearch and inquiry, in one or other of the numerous trades open to receive them. Inftances how ever will occur, in fpite of the wifeft and kindeft precautions on the part of the mafter, of individual workmen deprived of fubfiftence by the erection of his machinery. These the hand of him who has been the innocent cause of their diftrefs fhould be stretched out to relieve. But every man ought willingly to contribute in a reasonable proportion toward

alleviating the evils incidentally produced by any one of thofe improvements in conducting manufactures, to which, collectively taken, fo large a fhare of the national ftrength and profperity is to be afcribed.

There are other calamities affecting workmen in a very ferious manner, and with confequences deeply to be lamented, against which the proprietor of a manufactory ought molt anxiously to guard; the dangers, namely, to which their health and morals are frequently expofed by the nature and circumftances of their employment. Such dangers will fitly be noticed in this place; fince, although they exist in nearly all manufactures, they are commonly moft formidable in thofe in which large and complicated machines collect a great number of workmen under the fame roof.

Some manufactures impair the health of the workmen by the deleterious quality of the materials used; others, by the crowded rooms and vitiated air in which they are carried on. Of the first clafs are feveral proceffes on metallic fubftances. The pernicious effects of lead are proverbial, and the palfies and other complaints frequent among thofe who are employed upon it. I have seen a young man at work in a manufactory of white lead, whofe complexion was rendered by his occupation as livid as the fubftance which he was preparing for fale. "The men who are employed in filvering looking-glaffes often become paralytic; as is the cafe also with those who work in quickfilver mines. This is not to be wondered at, if we may credit Mr Boyle; who affures us that mercury has been feveral times found in the heads of artificers expofed to its fumes. In the Philofophical Tranfactions there is an account of a man who, having ceafed working in quickfilver for fix months, had his body still so impregnated with it, that by putting a piece of copper into his mouth, or rubbing it with his hands, it inftantly acquired a filver colour, I

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remember having feen at Birmingham a very ftout man rendered paralytic in the space of fix months, by being employed in fixing an amalgam of gold and filver on copper. He stood before the mouth of a small oven ftrongly heated; the mercury was converted into vapour; and that vapour was inhaled by him, The perfon I faw was very fenfible of the cause of his diforder; but had not courage to withstand the temptation of high wages, which enabled him to continue in a state of intoxication for three days in the week, inftead of, what is the ufual practice, two." Of manufactures which injure the health of the workmen, not by any noxious quality in the article operated upon, but by external circumstances ufually attending the operation, an example may be produced in that of cotton. "The ready communication of contagion to numbers crowded together, the acceffion of virulence from putrid effluvia, and the injury done to young perfons, through confinement and too long continued labour," are evils which we have lately heard afcribed to cotton-mills by perfons of the first medical authority affembled to inveftigate the fubject. To thefe must be added, if report fpeaks truth concerning the practice of fome cottonmilis, the cuítom of obliging a part of the children employed there to work all night; a practice which muft greatly contribute toward rendering them feeble, diseased, and unfit for other labour, when they are difmiffed at a more advanced period of youth from the manufactory.

tion his workmen in large, dry, and well ventilated rooms. Let him conftantly prefer giving them their work to perform at home, whenever it can be done with tolerable convenience, to collecting them together into the fame apartment. Let him encourage them, where opportunity offers, to refide in villages and hamlets, rather than in a crowded town. Let him inculcate on them in how great a degree cleanliness contributes to health; and impress them with the neceffity of invariably observing thofe many little regulations, which, though fingly too minute to be noticed in this place, have collectively much effeet in preventing difeafe. Where his own efforts feem likely to fail, let him lay the matter before the ableft physi cians, and fteadily put in practice the inftructions which he receives. And finally, let him exert his utmost abilities to difcover innoxious proceffes which may be fubftituted for fuch as prove detrimental to the perfons who conduct them; and direct by private folicitation, and on proper occafions, by public premiums, the attention of experienced artists and manufacturers to the fame object. The fuccefs of his endeavours may in many cafes be found highly advantageous to him, not merely by preferving the lives of his moft skilful workmen, but by faving fome valuable material formerly loft in the operation. But whether that be the cafe or not, he will at least reap a fatisfaction from them which he could not otherwife have enjoyed, that of reflecting on his profits with a quiet conscience.

The morals of manufacturers affembled together in numerous bodies are at leaft as much endangered as their health. The danger fometimes arifes from time and opportunities for inftruction being denied; fometimes from the contagion of vice being unrestrained, and fhame itself extinguished by the universality of

To have recourse to every reasonable precaution, however expenfive, by which the health of the workmen may be fecured from injury, and to refrain from profecuting unwholesome branches of trade, until effectual precautions are discovered, is the indifpenfable duty of the proprietor of a manufactory. Let him not think himself at liberty to bar- guilt. The former of thefe evils takes ter the lives of men for gold and filver. Let him not feek profit, by acting the part of an executioner. Let him fta

place in manufactories where children are employed; the latter, in all manufactories where multitudes of work

ing hands, whatever be their age, are tendance of his people on religious worcollected. In proportion as virtue is fhip, and to lead them to use some short more valuable than bodily ftrength, in and fimple form of family prayer every proportion as eternity is more import- evening in their own houfes. Let him ant than the prefent life, the manufac- acquire their confidence and fecure their turer who pays no attention to the reli- attachment, by joining uniform mildgious principles and morals of the peo- nefs and affability of behaviour to the ple under his care, is more criminal firmnefs requifite for the maintenance than if he had fuffered them to put poi- of his authority. Scrupulously abftainfon to their mouths without apprifing ing from every mark of pride and superthem of its qualities. Several of the cilioufnefs, let him convince them that meafures already indicated as preferva- he has their intereft at heart, by studytives of health, are equally adapted for ing their comforts; by advancing them the prefervation of morals. The em- little fums of money before-hand, when ployment, for example, of as fmall a fickness, or an approaching rent day, number of perfons as may be in the or the neceffity of laying in fuel againit fame room; encouragement afforded to winter, or fome other emergency, difworkmen to refide in villages, where treffes them. Let him acquaint himconvenience will allow, rather than in felf, as far as may be practicable, with the midst of the infection of a great each of his workmen individually, and town; permiffion given them to perform obferve his temper and difpofitions, his their work at their own homes, when habits of life, and the ftate of his cirthe nature of the fabric will admit that cumftances, that he may be able to aḍpractice; and strong and repeated in- monith him occafionally in fuch a manculcation of habits of cleanlinefs, are ner as may be most likely to be benemeans adapted to the accomplishment ficial. Let him uniformly fhow favour of both purposes. But thefe are not to the meritorious, and check the idle the only or the moft efficacious means and the profligate. And never let him of preventing the inroads of vice. Let forget the efficacy which he may give to the proprietor of the manufactory em- his inftructions and reproofs, by his own ploy the different fexes apart from each virtuous example. other. Let him provide for the establishment of schools for the religious inftruction of all who can be induced to attend them, whether children or of mature age, on Sundays at leaft, if not in the evenings of week days. Let bim diftribute, from time to time, religious books level to the capacities of the readers. Let him establish a little library, from which proper treatises may be lent out for a limited period, and under proper regulations, to all who defire them. Let him appoint penalties for drunkennefs, oaths, and improper language; and exact them regularly and with impartiality. Let him take every fit measure to fecure the conftant at

By thus diligently watching over the health, the comforts, and the morals of his workmen, the manufacturer will obvioufly promote his own fatisfaction and emolument, while he is difcharging an indifpenfable duty. He will render a large proportion of his workmen robuft, induftrious, and honeft. He will infpire them with that perfonal attachment to himself which, among other advantages, will contribute to fecure him from the machinations of any unprincipled competitor, who may be bafe enough to tempt them by bribes to betray their malter's operations, or to defert him for the purpose of entering into a rival manufactory."

ON DWARFS AND GIANTS.

THE ancients fuppofed that a race a peculiar nation. Homer gives an acof men of diminutive ftature compofed count of a pigmy nation contending

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