HKB
60 passages · search this phrase →
Often appears with: trade, markets, and merchants · agriculture and the land · labor, wages, and the division of work · rank, class, and social order · fate, destiny, and necessity · religious persecution and toleration · education and the training of the young · value, price, and exchange · poverty and wealth · custom and the manners of a people · famine, scarcity, and plenty · public finance and debt
Usually: argument (285) · curiosity (267) · detachment (266) · narrative (251) · wonder (94) · praise (76) · commentary or gloss (74) · skepticism (64) · description (49) · censure (43)
“I endeavored to convince him that the bodily strength afforded by beer could only be in proportion to the grain or flour of the barley dissolved in the water of which it was made; that there was more flour in a pennyworth of bread; and therefore, if he would eat that with a pint of water, it would give him more strength than a quart of beer.” Benjamin Franklin, The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin · observation
“We never worked on Saturday, that being Keimer's Sabbath, so I had two days for reading.” Benjamin Franklin, The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin · observation
“...by accident the free one struck a bush, and its revolving motion being thus destroyed, it immediately fell to the ground, and, like magic, caught one hind leg of my horse.” Charles Darwin, The Voyage of the Beagle · vivid
“The Indians ended all their complaints by saying, "And it is only because we are poor Indians, and know nothing; but it was not so when we had a King.” Charles Darwin, The Voyage of the Beagle · observation
“if, reader, thou art not disgusted and disappointed) six fulling hammers which by their alternate strokes made all the din.” Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Don Quixote · vivid
“One should think (said I,) that the proprietor of all this MUST be happy.”--‘“Nay, Sir, (said Johnson,) all this excludes but one evil--poverty.” James Boswell, Boswell's Life of Johnson · insight
“He kept it wrapt up in the tablecloth in his lap during the time of dinner, from an avidity to have one entertainment in readiness when he should have finished another; resembling (if I may use so coarse a simile) a dog who holds a bone in his paws in reserve, while he eats something else which has been thrown to him.” James Boswell, Boswell's Life of Johnson · vivid
“It is to prevent this reduction of price, and consequently of wages and profit, by restraining that free competition which would most certainly occasion it, that all corporations, and the greater part of corporation laws have been established.” Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth · insight
“As the accumulation of stock must, in the nature of things, be previous to the division of labour, so labour can be more and more subdivided in proportion only as stock is previously more and more accumulated.” Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth · insight
“Thus the labour of a manufacturer adds generally to the value of the materials which he works upon, that of his own maintenance, and of his master’s profit.” Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth · insight
“Neither of them had either knowledge or foresight of that great revolution which the folly of the one, and the industry of the other, was gradually bringing about.” Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth · observation
“Great nations are never impoverished by private, though they sometimes are by public prodigality and misconduct.” Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth · insight
Pepys discusses the timber business with Sir G. Carteret and Mr. Deane, drafts a report, then mixes news and entertainments, including the Paul's commission, a Moorefields craft riot, lottery winnings, and plague reports.
having her picture taken there. There was the King and twenty more I think, standing by all the while, and a lovely creature she in the dress seemed to be. 18th. Sir G. Cateret and I did talk together in the Parke about my Lord Chancellor's business of the timber; he telling me freely that my Lord Chancellor was never so angry with him in all his life, as he was for this business, and in a great passion; and that w…
Pepys tours Nonsuch and Blackwell (wood and rare ancient trees found during dock digging), then later returns to the fleet to bargain for goods and reflects on plague decreases and the broader war.
in the family had been very great, and they too had most of them many children, and grandchildren, and great-grand-children. This he tells as a most known and certain truth. 25th. Found ourselves come to the fleet, and so aboard the Prince, and there, after a good while in discourse, we did agree a bargain of 5000l. for my Lord Sandwich for silk, cinnamon, nutmegs, and indigo. And I was near signing to an undertak…
Pepys attends Gresham College, dines with officials, plans merriment for his own dinner, buys household items, and discusses inventions and fashionable household life.
altar, there to lie for ever: and there was a sermon made to them upon this text, "Arida ossa, audite verbum Dei;" and a most eloquent sermon, as they say. 17th. To the Excise-office, where I met Mr. Ball, and did receive my paper I went for; and there fell in talk with him, who being an old cavalier do swear and curse at the present state of things, that we should be brought to this, that we must be undone and can…
Pepys attends council about Hemskirke’s shipbuilding scheme, then describes Sir Thomas Teddiman’s illness and death, including his funeral procession, last words, and ballads in the sea-related burial crowd.
believe it did in good part, that the business of the Parliament did break his heart, or at least put him into this fever and disorder that; caused his death. 15th. To a Committee for Tangier; where God knows how my Lord Bellasses' accounts passed: understood by nobody but my Lord Ashly, who, I believe, was allowed to let them go as he pleased. But here Sir H. Cholmly had his propositions read about a greater pric…
Pepys criticizes naval and council management of fleet spending, tours the Mulberry Garden area, and records conversations about casting fleet charges and setting up ships within parliamentary limits.
Buckingham-House was erected.] where I never was before; and find it a very silly place, worse than Spring-garden, and but little company, only a wilderness here that is somewhat pretty. 21st. To the office, where meets me Sir Richard Ford; who among other things congratulates me, as one or two did yesterday, on my great purchase; and he advises me rather to forbear if it be not done, as a thing that the world will…
At Bath’s Cross Bath Pepys soaks in the hot waters, watches high-status visitors and music, then travels in coach to Bristol, touring the quay and shipbuilding and giving to local poor.
expected, but yet pleasant; and the town most of stone, and clean, though the streets generally narrow. I home, and being weary, went to bed without supper; the rest supping. 13th. Saturday. Up at four o'clock, being by appointment called up to the Cross Bath; where we were carried after one another, myself and wife and Betty Turner, Willet, and W. Hewer. And by and by, though we designed to have done before comp…
Pepys continues London business: presenting Balty to Wren, discussing Navy regulation, consulting eye surgeons and dissecting animal eyes, meeting Coventry, and attending committees.
was bad enough too. This morning Mr. May showed me the King's new buildings at White Hall, very fine; and among other things, his cielings and his houses of office. JULY 1, 1668. To White Hall, and so to St. James's where we met; and much business with the Duke of York. And I find the Duke of York very hot for regulations in the Navy; and I believe is put on it by Sir W. Coventry; and I am glad of it: and particu…
Pepys reports the Duke of York’s approval of his letter, arranges its transcription, discusses proposed office reforms to avoid removal, and describes major urban and church construction work, followed by a long dance and feast.
forthwith to the office. So with as much satisfaction as I could possibly or did hope for, and obligation on the Duke of York's side professed to me, I away. 25th. Up, and by water to St. James's; and there with Mr. Wren did discourse about my great letter, which the Duke of York hath given him; and he hath set it to be transcribed by Billings his man, whom, as be tells me, he can most confide in for secresy; and i…
Pepys hosts Hugh May and Sir Henry Capell, visits the Old Artillery Ground to watch a new gun tested, discusses patents and profit, and hears that the Duke of Buckingham has a spite against him and that Sir T. Allen is not his ally.
that he do still remain incognito, and so intends to do all the time he stays here, for avoiding trouble to the King and himself, and expence also to both. 20th. At noon comes my guest Mr. Hugh May, and with him Sir Henry Capell, my old Lord Capell's son, and Mr. Parker. And I had a pretty dinner for them; and both before and after dinner had excellent discourse; and showed them my closet and my office, and the me…
Pepys praises books sent to him, then on 30th describes commissioning and shopping for his coach and clothing, visiting craftsmen, and celebrating the loud, popular word “Punch” for a fat short child.
too late. This morning Mr. Sheres sent me in two volumes, Marian his History of Spaine in Spanish, an excellent book; and I am much obliged to him for it. 30th. Up, and by coach to the coachmaker's; and there I do find a great many ladies sitting in the body of a coach that must be ended by to-morrow, (they were my Lady Marquess of Winchester, [Isabella, daughter of William Viscount Stafford, third wife to James fi…
It continues Elizabeth St. Michel’s story: her father Alexander St. Michel’s business failures, his patents and petitions, the episode of her being placed briefly in the Ursuline nunnery, and Pepys’s own stone operation and its later commemoration.
over-served with drink ye night before. This was done in the presence of all the Fellows then resident, in Mr. Hill's chamber.--JOHN WOOD, Registrar." (From the Registrar's-book of Magdalene College.)] His time, however, was not wasted, and there is evidence that he carried into his busy life a fair stock of classical learning and a true love of letters. Throughout his life he looked back with pleasure to the time …
Ulysses travels to Eumaeus’s hut, finds a well-kept pig yard and sties, the swineherd warns him about fierce dogs, and Ulysses is welcomed and fed while Eumaeus explains his role and the suitors’ ongoing eating.
ULYSSES IN THE HUT WITH EUMAEUS. Ulysses now left the haven, and took the rough track up through the wooded country and over the crest of the mountain till he reached the place where Minerva had said that he would find the swineherd, who was the most thrifty servant he had. He found him sitting in front of his hut, which was by the yards that he had built on a site which could be seen from far. He had made them spac…
He explains how human perception of small novelties, large breeding populations, careful breeding attention, and practices like enclosure and selective mating enable the formation and stabilization of new domestic breeds.
more than the turbit now does the upper part of its oesophagus,—a habit which is disregarded by all fanciers, as it is not one of the points of the breed. Nor let it be thought that some great deviation of structure would be necessary to catch the fancier’s eye: he perceives extremely small differences, and it is in human nature to value any novelty, however slight, in one’s own possession. Nor must the value which …
Du Bois praises Atlanta as a future-facing postwar city shaped by the war and industry, then uses the Atalanta-Hippomenes myth to warn against greedy gold corrupting work and ideals.
on each other, the blazing passion of their love profaned the sanctuary of Love, and they were cursed. If Atlanta be not named for Atalanta, she ought to have been. Atalanta is not the first or the last maiden whom greed of gold has led to defile the temple of Love; and not maids alone, but men in the race of life, sink from the high and generous ideals of youth to the gambler’s code of the Bourse; and in all our Na…
Du Bois describes Southern labor exploitation as patterned on early nineteenth-century industrial England before factory acts, blaming New South industrial captains and laws like the crop-lien system for trapping Black workers and farmers in debt.
with the best of modern workingmen under an economic system where every participant is fighting for himself, and too often utterly regardless of the rights or welfare of his neighbor. For we must never forget that the economic system of the South to-day which has succeeded the old regime is not the same system as that of the old industrial North, of England, or of France, with their trade-unions, their restrictive l…
Skilled craftsmen Bezalel and Ahaliab produce tabernacle textiles and wooden structures, while Moses orders the people to stop bringing offerings because enough material has been gathered.
And Bezaleel wrought and Ahaliab and all wise hearted men to whom the LORD had given wisdom and understanding, to know how to work all manner work for the holy service, in all that the LORD commanded. And Moses called for Bezaleel, Ahaliab and all the wise hearted men in whose hearts the LORD had put wisdom, even as many as their hearts couraged to come unto the work to work it. And they received of Moses all the hea…
Venus convinces Vulcan with arguments about making arms for Troy, then Vulcan’s arousal and early-morning household rhythms lead into a detailed description of Vulcan’s forge and the making of a hero’s shield.
Not half so swift the rattling thunder flies, Or forky lightnings flash along the skies. The goddess, proud of her successful wiles, And conscious of her form, in secret smiles. Then thus the pow’r, obnoxious to her charms, Panting, and half dissolving in her arms: “Why seek you reasons for a cause so just, Or your own beauties or my love distrust? Long since, had you requir’d my helpful hand…
It legislates guidance about vineyards, palms, agriculture taxes (pay due on harvest day), rules for livestock and pair-based animals, bans certain prohibited foods, and enacts general ethical commands about parents, orphans, justice, and covenants.
foolishly slain their children, and have forbidden that which God hath given them for food, devising an untruth against God! Now have they erred; and they were not rightly guided. He it is who produceth gardens of the vine trellised and untrellised, and the palm trees, and the corn of various food, and olives, and pomegranates, like and unlike. Eat of their fruit when they bear fruit, and pay the due thereof on the …
He describes family dwellings built for convenience, walls of red earth, reed thatched roofs, separate houses for wives and sleeping areas, slave quarters, building assistance by neighbors, and furniture and beds of skins and plantain materials.
which thrown into the fire diffuses a most powerful odour[D]. We beat this wood into powder, and mix it with palm oil; with which both men and women perfume themselves. In our buildings we study convenience rather than ornament. Each master of a family has a large square piece of ground, surrounded with a moat or fence, or enclosed with a wall made of red earth tempered; which, when dry, is as hard as brick. Within …
Washington recounts the difficulty of starting Tuskegee brickmaking—from failed kilns and students quitting in disgust to pawning a watch for $15 and eventually producing bricks successfully.
had always sympathized with the “Children of Israel,” in their task of “making bricks without straw,” but ours was the task of making bricks with no money and no experience. In the first place, the work was hard and dirty, and it was difficult to get the students to help. When it came to brickmaking, their distaste for manual labour in connection with book education became especially manifest. It was not a pleasant …
He counters fears of British naval superiority by stressing that most ships are unfit and American forces concentrate on home waters, proposes merchant-built wartime ships in peacetime, and lists American resources for defense.
can be of little use, and on sudden emergencies, none at all. Wherefore, if we must hereafter protect ourselves, why not do it for ourselves? Why do it for another? The English list of ships of war, is long and formidable, but not a tenth part of them are at any one time fit for service, numbers of them not in being; yet their names are pompously continued in the list, if only a plank be left of the ship: and not a …
Plutarch argues that great public building projects should be executed with speed and skilled design, and he praises Pericles’s works for their “bloom” of freshness lasting through time.
and body for the performance of the service. Thus, to say all in a word, the occasions and services of these public works distributed plenty through every age and condition. As then grew the works up, no less stately in size than exquisite in form, the workmen striving to outvie the material and the design with the beauty of their workmanship, yet the most wonderful thing of all was the rapidity of their execution. …
Walking toward the water and hammering, Don Quixote and Sancho find fulling-mill houses where six fulling hammers pound cloth, causing Don Quixote to be mortified and Sancho to laugh until Don Quixote strikes him with his pike.
contrary, hiding what he felt as well as he could, he began to move towards that quarter whence the sound of the water and of the strokes seemed to come. Sancho followed him on foot, leading by the halter, as his custom was, his ass, his constant comrade in prosperity or adversity; and advancing some distance through the shady chestnut trees they came upon a little meadow at the foot of some high rocks, down which a…
The captive begins his autobiography, saying his family came from a poor mountain village in León, that his father spent his wealth, and that he proposes dividing the sons’ inheritances into four parts.
WHEREIN THE CAPTIVE RELATES HIS LIFE AND ADVENTURES c39a.jpg (137K) Full Size My family had its origin in a village in the mountains of Leon, and nature had been kinder and more generous to it than fortune; though in the general poverty of those communities my father passed for being even a rich man; and he would have been so in reality had he been as clever in preserving his property as he was in spending it. Thi…
Ricardo extends the idea to capital and tools, arguing that relative value reflects total labor embodied not only in immediate production but also in forming the implements and capital used.
its mark; one beaver would naturally be of more value than two deer, and precisely for this reason, that more labour would on the whole be necessary to its destruction. All the implements necessary to kill the beaver and deer might belong to one class of men, and the labour employed in their destruction might be furnished by another class; still, their comparative prices would be in proportion to the actual labour b…
Using examples of shoemakers, steam-engines, and hunter versus fisherman, he classifies capital as fixed or circulating and explains how differences in durability and value affect profits and commodity price fluctuations.
same consideration of the various quantities of labour which have been bestowed on those other things, will equally govern the portion of them which will be given for the stockings. To convince ourselves that this is the real foundation of exchangeable value, let us suppose any improvement to be made in the means of abridging labour in any one of the various processes through which the raw cotton must pass, before t…
Ricardo analyzes how the durability of fixed capital affects how wages and profit changes translate into commodity prices, arguing longer-lived machinery causes larger price drops when profits fall.
labour so rose, that 21,153*l.* were required, profits would fall to 4 per cent. and if it rose, so that 21,359*l.* was employed, profits would fall to 3 per cent. But, as no wages would be paid by the owner of the machine, which would last 100 years, when profits fell to 5 per cent. the price of his goods must fall to 1007*l.* 13*s.* 8*d.* viz. 1000*l.* to pay his profits, and 7*l.* 13*s.* 8*d.* to accumulate for 1…
He addresses received doctrines by arguing that when wages rise, competitive pressure prevents machinery prices from staying higher and instead machinery lowers the prices of durable goods compared with wages-only production.
its received doctrines, which maintain that every rise in wages is necessarily transferred to the price of commodities, that it may not be superfluous to elucidate the subject still further. A manufacturer of hats employs a hundred men at an annual expense of 50*l.* each, who produce him commodities of the value of 8000*l.* A machine calculated to last precisely a year, and to do equally well the same work as the 10…
He shows agricultural improvements can lower rent by avoiding cultivation of poorer land, and distinguishes improvements that raise land’s powers from those that reduce labour use.
shall have the same effect of diminishing the necessity of cultivating the poorer lands, or of expending the same amount of capital on the cultivation of the more fertile portions. If a million of quarters of corn be necessary for the support of a given population, and it be raised on land of the qualities of No. 1, 2, 3; and if an improvement be afterwards discovered by which it can be raised on No. 1 and 2, withou…
He distinguishes improvements in land productivity from efficiency in tools and capital formation, claiming such changes may lower corn rent only when they reduce differences between productive capitals.
115 = 10 } adequate to the wants of the { 115 -- } population, for it would be 345 { 105 30 } quarters, or { --- { 345 the demand being only for 340 quarters.--But there are improvements which may lower the relative value of produce without lowering the corn rent, though they will lower the money rent of land. Such improvements do not increase the productive powers of the land, but they enable us to obtain its produ…
He claims comparative manufacturing skill, not merely distance to mines, regulates relative value of gold and hence commodity prices; if Poland industrializes first, gold stays less valuable there than in England.
different nations excel in particular manufactures, although distance will still enter into the calculation, the value of the precious metals will be chiefly regulated by the superiority of those manufactures. Suppose all nations to produce corn, cattle, and coarse clothing only, and that it was by the exportation of such commodities that gold could be obtained from the countries which produced them, or from those w…
He explains that a raw-material tax affects commodities unevenly depending on their raw-input labor composition, which may distort the best allocation of capital, but still won’t place England at lasting competitive disadvantage.
of money; whilst hats, which had risen from 30*s.* to 33*s.*, will again fall from 33*s.* to 30*s.*, at which point the relation between cloth and hats will be restored. To simplify the consideration of this subject, I have been supposing that a rise in the value of raw materials would affect, in an equal proportion, all home commodities; that if the effect on one were to raise it 10 per cent., it would raise all 10…
Ricardo argues that productivity improvements can double output and national wealth without increasing the total value of commodities, because relative exchange proportions adjust downward.
scarcity the value of commodities is raised; but if Adam Smith be correct, if riches consist in necessaries and enjoyments, then they cannot be increased by a diminution of quantity. It is true, that the man in possession of a scarce commodity is richer, if by means of it he can command more of the necessaries and enjoyments of human life; but as the general stock out of which each man's riches are drawn, is diminis…
Ricardo criticizes Jean-Baptiste Say for mixing up utility, value, and riches; he insists that production creates utility not matter, and that improvements can reduce exchange value while leaving society’s useful abundance higher.
done, whether they be produced by the labour of 100 or of 200 men; but they will be of twice the value if 200 have been employed on their production. M. Say appears to me to have been singularly unfortunate in his definition of riches and value in the first chapter of his excellent work: the following is the substance of his reasoning: riches, he observes, consist only of things which have a value in themselves: ric…
Ricardo argues that natural agents and machinery increase value in use but not exchangeable value, because replacing human labor makes the corresponding output fall in value as labor saved.
natural agents, such as the sun, the air, the pressure of the atmosphere &c., which are sometimes substituted for the labour of man, and sometimes concur with him in producing.[29] But these natural agents, though they add greatly to *value in use*, never add exchangeable value, of which M. Say is speaking, to a commodity: as soon as by the aid of machinery, or by the knowledge of natural philosophy, you oblige natu…
Ricardo challenges Adam Smith’s view by arguing that nature’s contributions to production cannot be limited to agriculture, since wind, water, steam, and atmospheric effects also assist manufacturing.
of dyeing and fermentation. There is not a manufacture which can be mentioned, in which nature does not give her assistance to man, and give it too, generously and gratuitously. In remarking on the passage which I have copied from Adam Smith, Mr. Buchanan observes, "I have endeavoured to shew, in the observations on productive and unproductive Footnote: labour, contained in the fourth volume, that agricultur…
Gibbon argues that in the Roman empire agriculture underpins manufacturing and that luxury-driven work by mechanics and artists circulated wealth between provinces, benefiting the empire so long as commerce stayed within its bounds.
100 (return) [ See the agreeable Essays on Agriculture by Mr. Harte, in which he has collected all that the ancients and moderns have said of Lucerne.] Agriculture is the foundation of manufactures; since the productions of nature are the materials of art. Under the Roman empire, the labor of an industrious and ingenious people was variously, but incessantly, employed in the service of the rich. …
Gibbon continues by arguing that limited access to gold, silver, and iron, and weak use of money, explains German material backwardness, while he claims iron and money are the universal engines of industry.
20 (return) [ Tacit. Germ. 15.] 21 (return) [ When the Germans commanded the Ubii of Cologne to cast off the Roman yoke, and with their new freedom to resume their ancient manners, they insisted on the immediate demolition of the walls of the colony. “Postulamus a vobis, muros coloniæ, munimenta servitii, detrahatis; etiam fera animalia, si clausa teneas, virtutis obliviscuntur.” Tacit.…
Gibbon estimates imperial costs and labor for building Constantinople, praises material sources (Euxine forests, Proconnesus marble), and says Constantine recruited architects while imperial taste stripped Greece and Asia of monuments.
a circumference of ten or twelve miles. The extravagant computation of Tournefort (Lettre XI) of thirty-tour or thirty miles, without including Scutari, is a strange departure from his usual character.] 35 (return) [ The sycæ, or fig-trees, formed the thirteenth region, and were very much embellished by Justinian. It has since borne the names of Pera and Galata. The etymology of the former is obvio…
The passage describes monastic poverty, manual labor, and in-monastery trades, arguing that monastic study often fostered superstition while preserving Greek and Roman literature, especially through copying and crafts in Egypt.
legamus vinum omnino monachorum non esse, sed quia nostris temporibus id monachis persuaderi non potest; he allows them a Roman hemina, a measure which may be ascertained from Arbuthnot’s Tables.] The candidate who aspired to the virtue of evangelical poverty, abjured, at his first entrance into a regular community, the idea, and even the name, of all separate or exclusive possessions. 50 The breth…
At Don Juan Fuentes’s estancia Darwin witnesses cattle slaughter preparations and describes harsh domestic conditions, a meat-only supper, smoking and impromptu guitar music, and separate seating of women (“signoritas”).
spent in smoking, with a little impromptu singing, accompanied by the guitar. The signoritas all sat together in one corner of the room, and did not sup with the men. So many works have been written about these countries, that it is almost superfluous to describe either the lazo or the bolas. The lazo consists of a very strong, but thin, well-plaited rope, made of raw hide. One end is attached to the broad surcing…
Darwin links niata cattle to extinct Indian ruminant Sivatherium by structural similarity and explains how niata traits show strong transmission from niata cows even when crossed with common bulls.
are rather longer compared with the front legs than is usual. Their bare teeth, their short heads, and upturned nostrils give them the most ludicrous self-confident air of defiance imaginable. Since my return, I have procured a skeleton head, through the kindness of my friend Captain Sulivan, R. N., which is now deposited in the College of Surgeons. [1] Don F. Muniz, of Luxan, has kindly collected for me all the inf…
Darwin argues Fuegian tribes lack government, fight over subsistence, live on inhospitable rocky terrain, show limited domestic affection and extreme violence toward infants, and claims their tool and canoe design has not improved over centuries.
thieves who had been driven from their tribes; but other obscure speeches made me doubt this; I have sometimes imagined that the most probable explanation was that they were insane. The different tribes have no government or chief; yet each is surrounded by other hostile tribes, speaking different dialects, and separated from each other only by a deserted border or neutral territory: the cause of their warfare appea…
Darwin rides along Punta Huantamo’s rugged coast, describes plants used for sweet pulp and cider-making, discusses the difficulty of coastal travel, and notes islanders clearing land by burning during fine weather.
The Indians ended all their complaints by saying, "And it is only because we are poor Indians, and know nothing; but it was not so when we had a King." The next day after breakfast, we rode a few miles northward to Punta Huantamo. The road lay along a very broad beach, on which, even after so many fine days, a terrible surf was breaking. I was assured that after a heavy gale, the roar can be heard at night even at…
On March 20-21 Darwin compares Andean scenery and weathering, discusses snow-shattering of rocks and spring detritus avalanches forming natural ice-houses, then reaches the Valle del Yeso with gypsum used to make wine.
as yet had been good with a steady but very gradual ascent, now changed into a steep zigzag track up the great range, dividing the republics of Chile and Mendoza. I will here give a very brief sketch of the geology of the several parallel lines forming the Cordillera. Of these lines, there are two considerably higher than the others; namely, on the Chilian side, the Peuquenes ridge, which, where the road crosses it…
Kriemhild furnishes Gunther and Siegfried’s party with luxurious silks and jewels for the journey to Brunhild; they travel by skiff, weeping at departure, as Siegfried vows to bring Giselher back safely.
"Now sit you down, dear brother," spake the royal maid, "and let me hear aright who these ladies be whom ye fain would woo in the lands of other kings." By the hand the lady took the chosen knights and with the twain she walked to where she sate afore upon a couch, worked, as well I wot, with dainty figures embossed in gold. There might they have fair pastime with the ladies. Friendly glances and kindly looks passed…
Engels continues with silk and argues that mechanical power transformed all branches of industry, driving demand for coal, iron, and machinery, and reshaping transport, agriculture, and related sectors across Britain.
environs, 25 in Belfast, Ireland, and the rest in Dorset and Lancashire. Weaving is carried on in the South of Scotland, here and there in England, but principally in Ireland. With like success did the English turn their attention to the manufacture of silk. Raw material was imported from Southern Europe and Asia ready spun, and the chief labour lay in the twisting of fine threads. Until 1824 the heavy import duty…
Engels details the iron industry’s rise—puddling, hot blasts, large-scale furnaces, bridge-building in cast iron, and expanding coal use—along with pottery and scientific agriculture, all driven by industrial demand.
of hot blasts, and iron could thus be produced so cheaply that a multitude of objects which had before been made of stone or wood were now made of iron. In 1788, Thomas Paine, the famous democrat, built in Yorkshire the first iron bridge, which was followed by a great number of others, so that now nearly all bridges, especially for railroad traffic, are built of cast- iron, while in London itself a bridge across the…
Engels outlines his investigation of industrial proletarians, linking their rise to manufacturing and steam machinery, and explains how centralised manufacture creates and concentrates a new working class.
industrial, we shall have first to examine the condition of the industrial proletariat as a whole, in order later to notice more particularly each separate division with its own peculiarities. It has been already suggested that manufacture centralises property in the hands of the few. It requires large capital with which to erect the colossal establishments that ruin the petty trading bourgeoisie and with which to …
Engels shifts across Blackstone Edge into South Lancashire and the Manchester region, arguing Manchester is the classic modern manufacturing town and will be examined at greater length.
in pools, in consequence of which the adjoining dwellings must inevitably be bad and filthy, so that in such places diseases arise and threaten the health of the whole town." If we cross Blackstone Edge or penetrate it with the railroad, we enter upon that classic soil on which English manufacture has achieved its masterwork and from which all labour movements emanate, namely, South Lancashire with its central city …
Engels contrasts Manchester with surrounding industrial towns, listing many cotton-manufacturing places while focusing on the grim housing of workers in Bolton, Stockport, and Ashton-under-Lyne.
building material. Cellar dwellings are general here; wherever it is in any way possible, these subterranean dens are constructed, and a very considerable portion of the population dwells in them. Among the worst of these towns after Preston and Oldham is Bolton, eleven miles north-west of Manchester. It has, so far as I have been able to observe in my repeated visits, but one main street, a very dirty one, Deansga…
Engels contrasts the grimy mill towns around Manchester, describing Stalybridge’s narrow ravine of cottages and mills as filthy and disorderly, while noting he will focus on such towns’ construction.
whitewash inside; streets, whose dirty, smoke-begrimed aspect is nowise different from that of the other towns of the district, except that in Ashton, this is the exception, not the rule. A mile eastward lies Stalybridge, also on the Tame. In coming over the hill from Ashton, the traveller has, at the top, both right and left, fine large gardens with superb villa-like houses in their midst, built usually in the Eli…
He insists his Old Town description is not exaggerated, argues these conditions are products of the industrial epoch, and claims the industrial system profits by crowding workers into unhealthy rented “cattle-sheds.”
any one should be led by curiosity to pass through one of the numerous passages which lead into the courts, he will find this piggery repeated at every twenty paces. Such is the Old Town of Manchester, and on re-reading my description, I am forced to admit that instead of being exaggerated, it is far from black enough to convey a true impression of the filth, ruin, and uninhabitableness, the defiance of all consider…
He argues that workers’ food is systematically inferior and often spoiled due to market timing, poverty, Sunday closures, and adulteration, citing repeated seizures of tainted meat in Manchester and nearby towns.
manufacturing town there is now to be seen a multitude of people, especially women and children, going about barefoot, and their example is gradually being adopted by the poorer English. As with clothing, so with food. The workers get what is too bad for the property-holding class. In the great towns of England everything may be had of the best, but it costs money; and the workman, who must keep house on a couple …
Cortés addresses economic abuses including gold alloying with copper (“tepuzque”), orders corrupt goldsmiths hanged, and then sends officers to form settlements across provinces including Tuztepec, Panuco, Colima, Mechoacán, Oaxaca, and Zacatula.
and no debt was considered valid unless it had been examined by them; and two years were allowed to liquidate a debt we were unable to pay at the moment. In the smelting of the gold there was also allowed an eighth of alloy to every ounce, to assist the men in the purchase of the necessaries of life, as about that time a number of vessels had arrived at Vera Cruz with various kinds of merchandise. But we derived no …
He claims Americans’ eagerness for wealth and bodily gratification makes democratic people respect scientific pursuits, pushing them toward applied science that quickly yields wealth, fame, and power.
of those things only whose beauty and subtilty had in them no admixture of necessity." Such is the aristocratic aim of science; in democratic nations it cannot be the same. The greater part of the men who constitute these nations are extremely eager in the pursuit of actual and physical gratification. As they are always dissatisfied with the position which they occupy, and are always free to leave it, they think of …
He argues that democratic conditions of mediocre fortunes and desire for comfort make people prefer useful arts, and he contrasts aristocratic guild privilege with open democratic professions.
It would be to waste the time of my readers and my own if I strove to demonstrate how the general mediocrity of fortunes, the absence of superfluous wealth, the universal desire of comfort, and the constant efforts by which everyone attempts to procure it, make the taste for the useful predominate over the love of the beautiful in the heart of man. Democratic nations, amongst which all these things exist, will theref…
Tocqueville contends that in democracies consumers’ wants rise faster than means, pushing artisans to make imperfect but cheaper goods, fostering rapid production and mediocrity rather than perfection.
imperfection. In aristocracies, then, the handicraftsmen work for only a limited number of very fastidious customers: the profit they hope to make depends principally on the perfection of their workmanship. Such is no longer the case when, all privileges being abolished, ranks are intermingled, and men are forever rising or sinking upon the ladder of society. Amongst a democratic people a number of citizens always e…
He says that when art is abundant yet inferior and cheap, democracy is mixing ranks, as artisans try to make products look better than they are, even using impostures.
at what it hits. In aristocracies, on the contrary, workmen always do all they can; and when they stop, it is because they have reached the limit of their attainments. When I arrive in a country where I find some of the finest productions of the arts, I learn from this fact nothing of the social condition or of the political constitution of the country. But if I perceive that the productions of the arts are generall…
He argues that although democracy grows manufactures, the division of labor can weaken workers and bind them to craft while simultaneously raising wealthy masters, potentially creating new aristocracy.
led to engage in commerce, not only for the sake of the profit it holds out to them, but for the love of the constant excitement occasioned by that pursuit. The United States of America have only been emancipated for half a century [in 1840] from the state of colonial dependence in which they stood to Great Britain; the number of large fortunes there is small, and capital is still scarce. Yet no people in the world …