But during the period covered by the two quotations, another change had taken place which is referred to by Guest. He informs us that it was in 1740 that “the Manchester merchants began to give out warps and raw cotton to the weavers, receiving them back in cloth and paying for the carding, roving, spinning and weaving”[141] and that about 1750 there arose, chiefly in the country districts, a class of “second-rate merchants called fustian-masters,” who “gave out a warp and raw cotton to the weaver, paying the weaver for the weaving and spinning.”[142] [Footnote 141: Guest, _Compendious History of the Cotton Manufacture_ (1823), p. 9.] [Footnote 142: _Ibid._, p. 11.] In view of the legislation just referred to, it is evident that the first date mentioned by Guest cannot be taken as marking the beginning of the system of giving out work in the fustian trade, and perhaps the second date relating to the appearance of country fustian masters should not be strictly regarded. With these reservations, however, there is much evidence that Guest’s statements were based upon facts which belong to the first part of the eighteenth century. The increased prominence of printed fustians and the proceedings which led to the Act of 1736 indicate that the fustian trade was expanding. About the same time, changes were taking place in commercial organisation, and it is exceedingly probable that the number of fustian manufacturers was increasing with accompanying changes in industrial organisation. In 1772, when we get definite evidence, it is certain that a large number of fustian manufacturers existed in the country districts, and altogether their number was far greater than either check or smallware manufacturers.[143] The conclusion that may be drawn from the statements of both Ogden and Guest, and from other evidence, is that even if it be true that before the first part of the eighteenth century the greater proportion of fustian weavers were semi-independent producers, who themselves bought their raw materials, and sold their product to traders, by the middle of the century they were certainly the workpeople of capitalist employers, as probably many of them were long before that time. [Footnote 143: _Infra_, pp. 67-69.] II