In the first place, any surplus of male labour was met at once by a corresponding new demand for recruits and the drafting of many hundreds of thousands of young men into the army, aided by the rush of employment in Government factories and workshops, served to correct the dislocation of the male labour market. Women were unfortunate in that the cotton trade, by far the largest staple industry in which a majority of the employees are women, was also the trade to suffer the greatest injury by the war. _The Cotton Trade._--Employment had begun to be slack some time previously, and the cutting off of the German market was naturally a considerable blow. Exact statistics are almost impossible to obtain, as the numbers of looms stopped or working short time varied from week to week; but figures collected for the week ending October 3 show that between 58,000 and 59,000 members of the Amalgamated Weavers' Association were out of work, and over 30,000 were on short time. At Burnley, over half the looms were stopped; at Preston, over a third. In November, when things had greatly improved, about 36 per cent of the looms were still standing idle. The amount of short time, or "under-employment," was also very considerable, as is shown by the fact that the reduction in earnings exceeded the reduction in numbers employed. The following table is taken from the _Labour Gazette_, December 1914, and shows the state of employment in the principal centres of the cotton trade. The figures include men as well as women; but as women predominate in the industry, they may be considered as a fair index to the women's position. WEEK ENDING NOVEMBER 28, 1914, COMPARED WITH SAME MONTH IN PREVIOUS YEAR. +-------------------------------------------------+ | |Decrease per cent in| | Districts. | Numbers | Amount of| | |Employed.| Earnings.| |----------------------------|---------|----------| |Ashton | 17·6 | 26·2 | |Stockport, Glossop, and Hyde| 11·6 | 22·0 | |Oldham | 8·4 | 17·5 | |Bolton | 2·6 | 13·5 | |Bury, Rochdale, etc. | 7·4 | 17·7 | |Manchester | 3·3 | 15·5 | |Preston and Chorley | 14·6 | 31·7 | |Blackburn, etc. | 18·0 | 40·9 | |Burnley, etc. | 4·3 | 47·6 | |Other Lancashire towns | 15·4 | 32·0 | |Yorkshire towns | 13·0 | 20·1 | |Other districts | 11·2 | 20·6 | | |---------|----------| | Total | 12·1 | 27·1 | +-------------------------------------------------+