One illustration more. Thirty years ago there were few more wretched trades than the shoemakers of Northampton. Wages were low, the labour was severe, the social condition of the workmen was necessarily low also. The sewing-machine, with some special adaptations to make it sew leather, increased about sixfold the bootmaking power of a workman. It is needless to say that the Northampton shoemakers met the introduction of this machine with the fiercest opposition: they said five-sixths of their number must be thrown out of employment. The struggle was won by the machine (as in other cases); shoemakers' wages have ruled 50 to 100 per cent higher ever since, at the same time that the shoemaking population has largely increased; and the social comforts and character of the workpeople have improved vastly too. This is an example that has always puzzled the workmen themselves; but it requires no explanation after what has been said about the efficiency of labour. The puzzle to the shoemakers is what becomes of the additional boots and shoes made. They do not reflect that, even of a necessary of life, only a certain quantity is used at a certain price. Nothing is more necessary in London, especially in winter, than coal; but, when coal some years ago went up to 40s. a ton in London, it was marvellous how people in all ranks managed to reduce their consumption of coal. Much more in the case of boots, which will bear the cost of export to remote countries, did the demand increase as the price fell. A fall of 10 per cent only in the price of boots would cause every wholesale boot exporter to export on the largest scale. No doubt the invention of a self-acting machine which should turn out 1000 pairs of boots an hour at a nominal cost of workmanship per pair would reduce the shoemakers of Northampton to idleness and starvation. But in practice it has rarely happened that any machine has been introduced in any trade that has thus completely choked the increased demand. It has happened often that the workmen who could only work the old way, and were not able to take up the new machine, have been reduced to starvation. Even then, after this generation has passed away, the new machine-workers have been better off than their predecessors. Employers of labour cannot pay as wages more than the labour is worth: no organisation or rules will make them. But employers may pay a good deal less than the labour is worth, and often have done so. However great their profits, there is, according to J. S. Mill, always a tacit understanding among all employers of labour to pay the minimum the labourers can be induced to accept. It is only by combination that the labourers can get the full value of their efficiency. Here Mr. Arch comes in: I have little doubt that the flail-threshers might, under a well-managed large trade combination, have got nine shillings a week instead of eight shillings forty years ago.