beneficent principle operates in a quarter where, perhaps, it might have least been expected. To discover such wonderful plans for the propagation of life, and the diffusion of enjoyment, does elevate our conceptions of Divine Goodness, and afford a peculiar pleasure to the contemplative mind.

SEVENTH WEEK.-THURSDAY.

CLOTHING. THE COTTON MANUFACTURE-ITS FOREIGN

HISTORY.

66

In Arabia, and the neighbouring countries, cottons and muslins came gradually into use; and the manufacture was spread, by the commercial activity and enterprise of the early followers of Mohammed, throughout the extended territories subdued by their arms. It is recorded of the fanatical Omar, the immediate successor of the Arabian impostor, that "he preached in a tattered cotton gown, torn in twelve places;" and of Ali, his contemporary, who assumed the caliphate after him, that, on the day of his inauguration, he went to the mosque, dressed in a thin cotton gown, tied round him with a girdle, a coarse turban on his head, his slippers in one hand, and his bow in the other, instead of a walking-staff.”+ In these lively pictures of Eastern manners, "the Arabian Nights' Entertainments," muslins are occasionally mentioned; but it appears that the fabrics which first received the name of muslins, from being made at Mosul, in Mesopotamia, were not cotton, or at least not exclusively so, as Marco Polo says, "All those cloths of gold and silk, which we call muslins (mossoulini), are of the

* In the history of the cotton manufacture, I have made free use of the recent publication of Mr Baines, a work of much intelligence and research. And to this, and Dr Ure's scientific work on the Philosophy of Manufactures, I am chiefly indebted for my materials in this department.

† Crichton's History of Arabia.

manufacture of Mosul." It must not be supposed that cotton fabrics have, at any time, wholly superseded the use of linen in Mohammedan countries, or that they were esteemed as comparable in beauty with silks. Linen is still extensively used in Egypt and Arabia, as is shown by many passages in the works of Pococke, Neibuhr, and Burkhardt; but it is also evident from the travels of Thevenot, Burkhardt, Hamilton, Buckingham, and many others, that cotton is the principal article of clothing, even in those two countries, and still more in Syria, Mesopotamia, Persia, and Asia Minor.

Marco Polo* traces the progress of the cotton manufacture, with minute industry, through the various countries of the East, and dwells especially on the excellence of the art in India, from a very early period, notwithstanding the comparative inferiority of the raw material. As a proof of the skill of the Indian weaver, in the use of the very imperfect loom already described, an account is given of webs of extreme fineness manufactured in that country. From Tavernier, a mercantile traveller, he quotes the following passages :- "Some calicuts are made so fine you can hardly feel them in your hand; and the thread, when spun, is scarcely discernible." "There is made at Secouge (in the province of Malwa), a sort of calicut, so fine, that when a man puts it on, his skin shall appear as plainly through it as if he were quite naked." The same writer, speaking of the turbans of the Mohammedan Indians, says, "The rich have them of so fine cloth, that twenty-five or thirty ells of it put into a turban, will not weigh four ounces.' Another author, Mr Ward of Serampore, a missionary, mentions that, in two places in Bengal, muslin is made so exceedingly fine that, when the web is laid upon the grass, and the dew has fallen upon it, it is no longer discernible. Such works of art have been poetically called "webs of woven wind.” In the India-house is preserved a specimen of Dacca mus

* A Venetian traveller, who visited nearly all the countries of Asia, at the close of the 13th century.

lin, of exquisite delicacy, softness, and transparency, brought by Sir Charles Wilkins from India, in 1786, to which is affixed a note, in the handwriting of Sir Joseph Banks, of the following tenor :—

"The portion of skein which Mr Wilkins gave to me, weighed 34 three-tenths grains; its length was 5 yards 7 inches; and it consisted of 196 threads. Consequently its whole length was 1018 yards and 7 inches. This, with a small allowance for fractions, gives 29 yards to a grain; 203,000 to a pound avoirdupois, of 7000 grains; that is, 115 miles 2 furlongs and 60 yards."

With British machinery, cotton-yarn has been spun about a third finer than this, so that a pound weight of the thread would extend to 167 miles; but none which would stretch farther than 119 one-third miles, was ever formed into a web. It cannot but seem astonishing that, in a department of industry where the raw material has been grossly neglected, where the machinery is so rude, and where there is so little division of labour, the result should be fabrics of such exquisite fineness and beauty as to be almost unrivalled by any other nations, with all the assistance of the mechanic arts. Mr Mill thus accounts for this remarkable fact:-" Weaving is a sedentary occupation, and thus in harmony with the Indian's predominant inclination. It requires patience, of which he has an inexhaustible fund. It requires little bodily exertion, of which he is always exceedingly sparing; and the finer the production, the more slender the force which he is called upon to apply. But this is not all: The weak and delicate frame of the Hindoo, is accompanied with an acuteness of external sense, particularly of touch, which is altogether unrivalled, and the flexibility of his fingers is equally remarkable. The hand of the Hindoo, therefore, constitutes an organ adapted to the finest operations of the loom, in a degree which is almost, or altogether, peculiar to himself."* To this may be added, what is perhaps not the least important element in the Mill's History of British India, book ii. chap. 8.

case, though not mentioned by Mr Mill, the hereditary continuance of a particular species of manufacture, in families, through many generations, which leads to the careful training of children, from their very infancy, to the processes of the art.

It is worthy of remark, that the cotton manufacture was found existing, in considerable perfection, in America, on the discovery of that continent by the Spaniards. It formed, indeed, the principal article of their clothing, as they had neither wool, hemp, nor silk, and did not make use, for this purpose, of the flax which they possessed. We are informed by the Abbé Clavigero, that "of cotton the Mexicans made large webs, and as delicate and fine as those of Holland, which were, with much reason, highly esteemed in Europe. They wove their cloths of different figures and colours, representing different animals and flowers. Of feathers, interwoven with cotton, they made mantles and bed-curtains, carpets, gowns, and other things, not less soft than beautiful. With cotton also they interwove the finest hair of the belly of rabbits and hares, after having made and spun it into thread. Of this they made most beautiful cloths, and, in particular, winter waistcoats for the lords."*

Among the presents sent by Cortes, the conqueror of Mexico, to Charles V., were "cotton mantles, some all white, others mixed with white and black, or red, green, yellow, and blue; waistcoats, handkerchiefs, counterpanes, tapestries, and carpets of cotton;" and the colours of the cotton were extremely fine, as the Mexicans had both indigo and cochineal among their native dyes. They also used cotton in making a species of paper; one of their kinds of money consisted in small cloths of cotton, and their warriors wore cuirasses of cotton, covering the body from the neck to the waist.

"It is scarcely to be doubted," says Mr Baines, after detailing this information," that the cotton and indigo plants are indigenous in America, as well as in India;

* History of Mexico, book vii. sect. 57, 66.

but the arts of spinning and weaving were probably carried over by the wanderers, whoever they may have been, by whom that continent was first peopled. The manufacture of cotton must therefore be supposed to be coeval with the original settlement of America; but learned men are much divided as to the date of the invention, some carrying it nearly as high as the deluge,* and others contending for a much later period. The American manufacture may, at all events, claim a high degree of antiquity."

Whatever obscurity may rest on the origin of the manufacturing art, it is striking to observe how universally materials were, from the earliest times, distributed over the world, fit to gratify the natural propensity of man, for furnishing himself with clothing. Flax appears to have been indigenous in Egypt, and probably in other countries; the sheep is supposed to be a native of the mountainous ranges of Asia; the silk-worm was given to China; and the cotton-plant to India and America.

SEVENTH WEEK-FRIDAY.

CLOTHING. THE COTTON MANUFACTURE--ITS BRITISH HIS

TORY.

PASSING Over the history of the cotton manufacture on the European continent, in which there appears to be little to interest the general reader, I shall devote this, and some subsequent papers, to a short sketch of the art in England, which may be considered its modern birthplace, as India seems to have had the honour of its original invention.

Not more than a century ago the cotton fabrics of India were so beautiful and cheap, that nearly all the governments of Europe thought it necessary to prohibit them, or to load them with heavy taxes, in order to pro

This is the opinion of the Abbe Clavigero. Dr Robertson offers no opinion on the subject, owing to its extreme difficulty.