In view of this mass of evidence, statements which imply that, in the eighteenth century, the Lancashire textile industry was carried on by part-time industrialists would seem to have solid foundation. Nevertheless, even more cautious statements require considerable qualification. In the first place, for obvious reasons, we must rule out the great majority of those engaged in the industry who lived in Manchester and its immediate neighbourhood, and also those in the other centres of congregated population.[421] These were evidently in a similar position to the first class mentioned in the above quotation. In the eighteenth century, as in the early nineteenth, those who were associated with both agriculture and industry have to be sought in country districts such as that to which Radcliffe refers. [Footnote 421: “The domestic manufacturers resided generally in the outskirts of large towns or at still more remote distances” (Gaskell, _The Manufacturing Population of England_ (1833), p. 17).] But a careful reading of what Radcliffe says will show that, even in Mellor, a distinction has to be drawn between the small farmers who “got their rent partly in some branch of trade, such as weaving woollen, linen, or cotton,” and the cottagers who “were employed entirely in this manner, except for a few weeks in the harvest.” Evidently the members of the latter class could not be regarded as agriculturalists in any reasonable sense, although, apparently, they had small gardens attached to their cottages. What proportion the cottagers bore to the small farmers it is impossible to say with certainty, but it seems extremely probable that they were in a considerable majority.