LETTER LXIII
Thursday, August 1, 1850
Having now set forth the earnings and condition of the
Wood-workers who are engaged in the construction of our houses, I shall treat of
those who are engaged in the furnishing of them.
Cabinet-making is the one generic term applied to the
manufacture of every description of furniture. Upholstery is, however, a
distinct art or handicraft, dealing with different materials. The cabinet-maker
is a pure wood-worker; and that, perhaps, of the very highest order. Being
generally engaged upon the most expensive woods, his work is required to be of
the most finished and tasty description. The art is constantly calling forth a
very high exercise of skill, ingenuity, and invention. It is a trade which
perhaps, more intimately than any other, is mixed up with the fine arts.
Marqueterie is mosaic work in wood; as wood-carving, in its higher branches, is
sculpture in wood. The upholsterers, who confine themselves to their own proper
branch, are the fitters-up of curtains and their hangings, either for beds or
windows; they are also the stuffers of the chair and sofa cushions, and the
makers of carpets and of beds; that is to say, they are the tradesmen who, in
the language of the craft, "do the soft work" or in other words, all connected
with the cabinet-maker's art in which woven materials are the staple.
The cabinet-maker's trade of the best class, where
society-men are employed, is now divided into the General and Fancy
Cabinet-makers. There are also the Chair-makers and the
Bedstead-makers. The General Cabinet hand makes every description of
furniture apart from chairs or bedsteads. "A general hand," I was told by an
intelligent workman, "must be able to make everything, from the smallest
comb-tray to the largest bookcase. If he can't do whatever he's put to, he must
go." He is usually kept, however, to the manufacture of the larger articles of
furniture as tables, drawers, chiffoniers, sideboards, wardrobes, and the
like.
The Fancy Cabinet-maker, on the other hand, manufactures all
the lighter or more portable articles of the trade, and such as scarcely come
under the head of furniture. In the language of the craft he is a "small
worker," and makes ladies work-boxes and tables, tea-caddies, portable desks,
dressing cases, card, glove, gun, and pistol cases, cribbage-boards, and such
like.
The Chairmaker constructs every description of chairs and
sofas, but only the framework: the finishing, when stuffed backs or cushions, or
stuffing of any kind, is required, is the department of the upholsterer.
The Bedstead-maker is employed in the making of bedsteads;
but his work is considered less skilled than that of the other branches, as the
woodcarver or the turner's art is that called upon for the formation of the
handsome pillars of a bedstead of the best order.
To estimate the numerical strength of the cabinet-makers as a
distinct body is impossible, for unfortunately the census of 1841 lumps them
with the upholsterers (who are a totally different class of workmen, operating
upon different materials) because their arts happen to be locally
associated. The two trades are certainly conjoined in commerce, but the
two arts are essentially distinct; that is to say, the employers are
master upholsterers as well as cabinet-makers, but the operatives themselves
seldom or never follow both occupations. The circumstances which govern the
classification of trades are totally different from those regulating the
division of work. In trade the convenience of the purchaser is mainly studied,
the sale or manufacture of such articles being associated as are usually
required together. Hence the master coachmaker is frequently a harness
manufacturer as well, for the purchaser of the one generally stands in need of
the other. The painter and house decorator not only follows the trade of the
glazier, but of the plumber, too, because these arts are one and all connected
with the "doing up" of houses. For the same reason the builder combines the
business of the plasterer with that of the bricklayer, and not unfrequently that
of the carpenter and joiner in addition. In all of these businesses, however, a
distinct set of workmen are required, according as the materials operated upon
are different; for, as I before showed, it is the nature of the materials that
regulates the character of the work.
The cabinet-makers and upholsterers then, at the time
of taking the last census, numbered altogether in Great Britain as many as
30,712; of these, 25,000 and odd were resident in England, 4,000 in Scotland,
650 in Wales, and 350 in the British Isles. Besides these, there were the
chair-makers, who amounted throughout Great Britain to 5,123; of whom upwards of
4,800 belonged to England, and 218 to Scotland. The bedstead-makers in Great
Britain were 396, and they were wholly located in England; so that, adding
together these three classes, we arrive at the conclusion that there were in
1841 as many as 36,231 cabinet-makers, upholsterers, chair-makers, and
bedstead-makers dispersed throughout Great Britain, and that upwards of 30,000,
or five-sixths, of these resided in England.
The number of cabinet-makers and upholsterers located in the
metropolis at the time of taking the last census was 6,956. The London
chair-makers were 1,325, and the bedstead-makers 296: making altogether as many
as 8,577 belonging to the different branches of the London trade. According to
the "Post-office Directory" no less that, 1,008 of these were masters in
business for themselves, so that it may be said that in 1841 the London
operative cabinet-makers amounted to 7,500 and odd. Such are the Government
returns of 1841; and on comparing them with those of 1831, we arrive at the
following curious results as to the increase or decrease of the trade in the
different countries during that time:
The greatest increase of cabinet makers from 1831-41 occurred
in the county of Sutherland, where in amounted to as much as 272 per cent. above
the increase of the population. In Inverness, and in Orkney and Shetland, the
increase was 130 per cent.; in Roxburgh, 110 per cent; in Huntingdonshire, 70
per cent.; in Bedfordshire, 62 per cent.; in Flintshire, 55 per cent.; in Banff,
54 per cent.; in York city and county, 35 per cent.; and in Buckinghamshire, 32
per cent. above the increase of the population. The greatest decrease, on the
other hand, took place in Anglesey, where the number of the cabinet-makers, in
comparison with the population, declined no less than 98 per cent. in the ten
years. In Renfrew the decrease was 95 per cent.; in Linlithgow, 86 per cent.; in
Derbyshire, 73 per cent.; in Cheshire and Cumberland, each 68 per cent.; in
Merioneth, 67 per cent.; in Caithness, 66 per cent.; in the West Riding of
Yorkshire, 62 per cent.; in Durham, 61 per cent.; and in Bute, 60 per cent.
below that of the population. In England generally the cabinet-makers and
upholsterers, twenty years of age and upwards, in comparison with the population
of that age, decreased from 1831-41 as much as 22 per cent. In Wales there was
also a decrease of 11 per cent., while in Scotland there was a still greater
decrease the number of cabinet-makers and upholsterers located there having
diminished as much as 33 per cent. in the same space of time. The total for
Great Britain shows a decrease in the cabinet makers and upholsterers, of 20
years and upwards, of 4 per cent.; and an increase in the population of the same
age of 20 per cent., thus making, in comparison with the increase of the
population, a total decrease of as much as 24 per cent. In the metropolis, with
which we are here more particularly concerned, the decrease was 1 per cent.
whilst the population, above twenty years, increased as much as 32 per cent.,
making a decline in the numbers of this class (in comparison with the rest of
the population) to the amount of 33 per cent.
The next question that naturally presents itself is, how has this reduction of
the number of hands throughout the country affected the trade? According to the
law of supply and demand, the decrease of workmen should have given rise to a
proportionate increase in the wages, provided there was no corresponding
diminution in the quantity of work to be done. As to the effect produced by the
decrease of the hands upon the weekly income of the workmen in the provinces, I
have no means of arriving at an accurate conclusions. Concerning the metropolis,
however, I am differently situated, and to the kindness and consideration of the
West-end branch of the General Cabinet-Makers' Society, I stand indebted for
much important information. Of course the diminution in the number of workmen
between 1831 and 1841 is a fact from which few or no deductions can be drawn,
unless we can likewise arrive at some equally authentic facts concerning the
increase or decrease of work during the same period. With a view, therefore, of
obtaining the best information on this point, I applied to the Cabinetmakers'
Society for an account of the number of their unemployed members for a series of
years, as well as the number of days they had been out of employment, and the
sum the society had paid them during that time. The committee immediately gave
directions that I should be furnished with all the information I needed, and the
secretary devoted himself for several days to the compilation of a tabular
statement, in which the wished-for facts were given for every quarter of a year
since 1834. This table, however, being much too long to print here, I have taken
the average of the four quarters of each year, and the following is the result:
-
Number of Members | Number of Unemployed | Days Unemployed | Paid to Unemployed | |||
1831 | 342 | |||||
1832 | 290 | |||||
1833 | 318 | |||||
1834 | 371 | 40 | 632 | £60 | 18 | 8½ |
1835 | 435 | 41 | 748 | 67 | 7 | 8Ύ |
1836 | 506 | 40 | 566 | 53 | 10 | 1Ύ |
1837 | 527 | 90 | 1675 | 156 | 6 | 10½ |
1838 | 513 | 82 | 2025 | 185 | 13 | 3 |
1839 | 518 | 61 | 1321 | 120 | 13 | 11½ |
1840 | 504 | 77 | 1873 | 170 | 15 | 7 |
Average from 1834-40 | 482 | 62 | 1368 | 125 | 14 | 7 |
1841 | 516 | 102 | 2958 | 278 | 3 | 7Ύ |
1842 | 464 | 110 | 3482 | 367 | 10 | 10Ύ |
1843 | 412 | 85 | 2006 | 216 | 19 | 11Ό |
1844 | 419 | 43 | 934 | 84 | 17 | 5½ |
1845 | 460 | 26 | 383 | 35 | 12 | 9½ |
1846 | 546 | 47 | 878 | 86 | 18 | 6Ό |
1847 | 506 | 98 | 2901 | 256 | 14 | 8 |
1848 | 413 | 125 | 4201 | 387 | 13 | 4½ |
1849 | 340 | 98 | 2204 | 204 | 13 | 5½ |
Average from 1840-49 | 452 | 81 | 1158 | 213 | 4 | 11½ |
A superficial glance at this account will not enable us to come to any conclusion with regard to the state of the trade of the cabinet-makers in the different years above mentioned. In order to do this, we must find out the ratio of the employment to the non-employment of the members of the society; for the number of the unemployed is of no value per se. Nor is the number of members out of work alone sufficient for this purpose, for, unless we know the number of days that they were collectively unoccupied in each quarter, the true ratio of the employment to the non-employment cannot be obtained. Again, the sum paid to the unemployed members during any particular quarter is no criterion, unless we ascertain the amount that the employed members would collectively earn in the same time. It is the ratio between these several facts that will alone enable us to arrive at any definite result with regard to the state of the trade. To show the reader at a glance, therefore, the proportion that these facts bear to each other, I have in the first column of the following table given the per centage of the ratio of the days unemployed to those employed. This has been arrived at by finding first the number of days that the whole of the members in the society would have worked in the quarter, provided they had had full employment, and then calculating the proportion between that amount and the aggregate number of days unemployed. In the second column of the same table, I have likewise shown the ratio of the loss to the society by the non-employment of some of its members in comparison with its gains by the employment of the others. This I have ascertained by estimating the value of the unemployed days at the regular wages of the trade, and adding this sum to the amount paid to the members out of work, and then finding the proportion that this sum bears to the amount that the whole of the members would have earned had they been fully employed.
Ratio of days unemployed to those employed | Ratio of loss by non-employment to gains by employment | |
1834 | 2.1 per cent. | 2.9 per cent. |
1835 | 2.2 | 2.9 |
1836 | 1.4 | 1.9 |
1837 | 4.0 | 55.5 |
1838 | 5.0 | 6.8 |
1839 | 3.2 | 4.3 |
1840 | 4.7 | 6.3 |
1841 | 7.1 | 9.9 |
1842 | 9.4 | 13.2 |
1843 | 6.4 | 8.9 |
1844 | 2.8 | 3.8 |
1845 | 1.0 | 1.4 |
1846 | 2.0 | 2.8 |
1847 | 7.3 | 9.7 |
1848 | 13.4 | 17.5 |
1849 | 8.3 | 11.2 |
A glance at the above table will show us that the ratio of
loss by non-employment rises and falls in the same manner, though not precisely
to the same manner, though not precisely to the same extent as the ratio of days
unemployed.
We are now in a position to ascertain in what proportion the
wages of a trade rise and fall, according as the hands and the work decrease or
increase. It may however be said, that since the society-men of a trade never
work for less than an established rate of pay, the earnings of its members
cannot be influenced by any such means. This, however, we shall find, is far
from the fact; for though it may be true individually, still collectively it is
untrue. Even a moment's reflection is sufficient to ensure us that if a body of
men contribute a certain sum in the quarter to the support of their unemployed
members, it is the same as if their wages had been reduced precisely that sum.
If their collective earnings amounted in the year to £40,000, and out of that
they gave £250 per quarter to the maintenance of those members who might be out
of work, of course their gross income must be reduced one-fortieth. Whether they
receive the £40,000 in full and pay the thousand pounds out of it afterwards, or
whether they receive collectively £1,000 less for their labour, the result is
the same - their aggregate earnings or wages have fallen from £40,000 to £39,000
- the burden is only removed from one shoulder to the other; the pressure, it is
true, may not be felt so severely by shifting it, but still there it is, not one
atom the lighter, though more easily borne. We can, then, by comparing the ratio
of the loss to the society by non-employment to its gains by employment, at one
period with that existing at another, obtain an accurate account of the increase
or decrease in the earnings of the trade at any given time. By doing the same
with the ratio of the unemployed days to those employed, we can likewise
ascertain the increase or decrease of work for the same period - while a
comparison of the number of workmen belonging to the society in different years
will further give us the increase or decrease of the workmen. We have thus a
means of demonstrating whether the wages of a trade really depend on the
quantity of work to be done and the number of hands to do it.
Increase or decrease of hands. | Increase or decrease of work | Increase or decrease of wages | |
1835 | +17.2 per cent | -0.1 per cent | 0.0 per cent |
1836 | +16.3 | +0.8 | -1.0 |
1837 | +4.1 | -2.6 | -3.6 |
1838 | -2.6 | -1.0 | -1.3 |
1839 | +.9 | +1.8 | +2.5 |
1840 | -2.7 | -1.5 | -2.0 |
1841 | -2.3 | -2.4 | -3.6 |
1842 | -10.0 | -2.3 | -3.3 |
1843 | -11.2 | +3.0 | +4.3 |
1844 | -1.7 | +3.6 | +5.1 |
1845 | +9.7 | +1.8 | +2.4 |
1846 | +18.6 | -1.0 | +1.4 |
1847 | -7.3 | -5.3 | -6.9 |
1848 | -18.3 | -6.1 | -7.8 |
1849 | -17.6 | +5.1 | +6.3 |
By the above table we perceive that in the year 1835 there
were 17 per cent. more hands, and one-tenth per cent. less work than in 1834,
and yet the earnings remained the same in that year as in the previous one. In
1836 the hands increased 16 per cent., and the work only 8-10ths per cent., but
still the gains rose 1 per cent. In 1842 the hands decreased 10.0 per cent., and
the work only 2 per cent., and yet the earnings fell 3 percent. In 1849,
however, the number of workmen declined no less than 17½ per cent., while the
quantity of work rose 5 per cent.; the consequence was, that the gains of the
members were upwards of 6 per cent. more than they were in the year before. Such
facts as these show us that the principle of supply and demand, though
undeniably true in general, still is not sufficient to account for all the
fluctuations of wages. This will be even more evident when I come to treat of
the Slop Cabinet Trade, for then I shall show that notwithstanding the number of
cabinet-makers in the metropolis, compared with the rest of the population,
decreased no less than 32 per cent.! between 1831 and 1841, still the
wages of the non-society men (whose earnings are regulated solely by
competition) have fallen as much as 400 per cent. - and this while the amount of
work done has increased rather than decreased. The cause of this extraordinary
decline will be found to be due chiefly to the rapid spread of what are called
"Garret Masters" - a class of petty "trade-working-masters," who are precisely
equivalent to the Chamber Masters among the boot and shoe makers, and to whom we
found the decline of the wages in that trade were mainly attributable. This,
indeed, appears to be the great evil likewise of the turner's trade, where,
while hands have decreased, and work increased, wages have also fallen almost to
the same extent as in the cabinet trade, and that from precisely the same
reason, viz. - the increase of the "Small Masters," who are continually
underselling each other.
In the present Letter, however, I purpose confining myself to
the "honourable" part of the general cabinet-makers' trade. I shall first give a
description of the work executed by the cabinet-makers, and then state the
regulations of the trade. After which I propose speaking of the social condition
of the men generally employed in it, and concluding with the statements of some
of the best informed members of the craft.
The general Cabinet hands make the following articles, on
which they are principally employed: - Pembroke Tables, which are
square-cornered, with a wide "bed" (surface) and two small flaps. They are
generally of solid mahogany. Loo Tables, which are generally round,
though a few are oblong. The making of the highest branches of the
cabinet-maker's art. The carving alone of one of the most beautiful ever made,
for the Army and Navy Club, cost, I am assured, £40. Loo tables are
generally veneered; rosewood, maple, and mahogany being the most frequent
materials. The Dining Table has a narrow bed, with two long "flaps." The
"extensible" dining table has telescope slides. Dining tables are all solid. The
Card Table turns on a frame, and folds over into half the space. There
are also "library," "sofa." "occasional," and other tables, which I need not
describe. For the furniture of drawing rooms oak is now a fashionable wood: the
small tables in recesses, or for the display of any bust or ornament; are now
often made of this material. Fine English oak for such a purpose is far costlier
than mahogany. Chairs are the most changeable in their fashion of all the
furniture formed by the cabinet-maker. The Louis Quatorze style, has now come
again into fashion a style which I am informed is always alternating, for,
after some very opposite mode in style and form has been established for a
limited period, "it works round again to the Louis Quatorze." Nearly all chairs
are "worked solid," except that the "splat, " or top of the back, is sometimes
veneered. Of dining-room chairs I need not speak. Drawing-room chairs are of
rosewood, maple, or walnut, and are, in the present fashion (of which alone I
speak), covered with rich silk tabaret, or elaborate needlework. The bedroom
chairs are of polished or stained birch; sometimes they are japanned, with
cane-work or osier bottoms. The chairmaker is, moreover, the artisan employed in
the making of sofas. These are known as cabriole, couch, and tete-a-tete is the
form of the letter S, and is adapted for two persons only, who occupy the
respective bends. Sideboards are most frequently made of mahogany, solid
or veneered, but in most cases solid. Oak, however, is now the fashionable
material for a sideboard, and is elaborately carved. Cabinets also are
now made, as in the old times, of oak and walnut. For a lady's apartment
rosewood is often the material used for a cabinet. Cheffoniers are of
rosewood or mahogany, solid or veneered. Drawers and Wardrobes are
of the wood which is considered most en suite with the other furniture, and with
the general decoration of the chamber. Book-case making of the best
quality is accounted a highly skilled portion of the cabinet-maker's
productions. One at the Carlton Club, for its beauty of proportion, and strength
as well as delicacy of workmanship, is pronounced by the trade, I heard in
several quarters, a perfect masterpiece. It extends 90 feet. The surface is
mahogany, veneered; the inferior is the finest deal.
In most large establishments the work is begun and completed
on the premises; general cabinet-makers, bedstead-makers, upholsterers, wood
carvers, French polishers, and sawyers, all being employed there.
The mode of workmanship pursued by cabinet-makers is very
remarkable, as showing a dependance on the skill of the individual workman
unknown, perhaps, in any other trade. The best workman among the tailors in a
large establishment has but to exert his skill to put together the materials
which have been cut to the nicest proportions before they are placed in his
hands. So it is with the boot-maker. With the cabinet-maker, however, it is
different. The foreman gives him a sketch of the article he has to make, and
points out the material in the yard or the ware-room which is to be used in its
construction. The journeyman then measures, saws, and cuts the wood to the shape
required, and is expected to do so with the greatest economy of stuff, and so to
cut it that the best portion of the wood shall occupy the most prominent part of
the furniture, and any defective part be placed where it is least visible, or,
in the language of the trade, "he must put the best side to London." The
journeyman cuts out every portion; not only the front of the article, but every
shelf required for the interior, and the minutest partitions or drawers.- He
then takes the material to his bench in the workshop, and puts it together
without any subdivision of labour. The journeymen will assist one another in any
elaborate article which is being made by piece-work, but this is an arrangement
merely among themselves. The master, requires every workman to be able to
complete whatever article he is told to make. In a large establishment, at a
very busy time (and in some establishments at all times), a foreman, called a
chalk foreman, is employed to mark or cut out, in order to facilitate the
business; but the method I have described is that usually observed.
The cabinet-makers find all their own tools, a complete set
of which is worth from £30 to £40. They all work on the master's premises,
which, in, establishments where many men are employed, are, with a few
exceptions, spacious and well-ventilated rooms, open to the skylighted roof.
Valuable timber is generally placed along the joists of the workshop, and there
it remains a due time for "seasoning." When the men are at work there is seldom
much conversation, as each man's attention is given to his own especial task,
while the noise of the saw, the plane, or the hammer, is another impediment to
conversation. Politics, beyond the mere news of the day, are, I am assured by
experienced parties, little discussed in these workshops. I am told, also, that
the cabinet-makers, as a body, care little about such matters.
The operative cabinet-makers of the best class are, to speak
generally, men possessed of a very high degree of intelligence. I must be
understood to be here speaking of the best paid. Of the poor artisans of the
East-end I have a different tale to tell. I was told by a cabinet-maker and,
judging by my own observations, with perfect correctness that of all classes
of mechanics the cabinet-makers have the most comfortable abodes. The same thing
may be said also, if in a less degree, of the joiners and carpenters; and the
reason is obvious a steady workman occupies his leisure in making articles for
his own use. Perhaps there are not many stronger contrasts than one I have
remarked in the course of my present inquiry that between the abode of the
workman in a good West-end establishment, and the garret or cellar of the toiler
for a "slaughter-house" at the East-end. In the one you have the warm, red glow
of polished mahogany furniture; a clean carpet covers the floor; a few
engravings in neat frames hang against the papered wall; and book-shelves or a
bookcase have their appropriate furniture. Very white and bright-coloured pot
ornaments, with sometimes a few roses in a small vase, are reflected in the
mirror over the mantelshelf. The East-end cabinetmaker's room has one piece of
furniture, which is generally the principal the workman's bench. The walls are
bare, and sometimes the half-black plaster is crumbling from them; all is dark
and dingy, and of furniture there is very little, and that, it must be borne in
mind, when the occupant is a furniture-maker. A drawer-maker whom I saw in
Bethnal-green had never been able to afford a chest of drawers for his own use;
"besides," he added, "what do I want with drawers? I've nothing to put in them."
What is meant by a "slaughter-house" will be seen in my account of the
non-society cabinet-makers in Spitalfields and the adjacent districts. The same
establishments in the West-end are generally described as "linendrapers;" they
are indeed the drapers who sell every description of furniture and upholstery,
but the workmen from whom they receive their goods are the "East-enders." These
"linendrapers," and indeed all masters who employ non-society men, are known in
the trade as "black" masters. "He's nothing but a black," is a sentence
expressive of supreme contempt in a cabinetmaker's mouth.
"Within my recollection," said an intelligent cabinet-maker,
"there was much drinking, very much drinking, among cabinet-makers. This was
fifteen years back. Now I'm satisfied that at least seven-eighths of all who are
in society are sober and temperate men. Indeed, good masters won't have tipplers
now-a-days." According to the Metropolitan Police returns, the cabinet-makers
and the turners are two of the least criminal of all the artizans; I speak not
of any one year, but from an average taken for the last ten.
The great majority of the cabinet-makers are married men, and
were described to me by the best informed parties as generally domestic men,
living, whenever it was possible, near their workshops, and going home to every
meal. They are not much of play-goers, a Christmas pantomime or any holiday
spectacle being exceptions, especially where there is a family. "I don't know a
card-player," said a man who had every means of knowing, "amongst us. I think
you'll find more cabinet-makers than any other trade members of mechanics'
institutes and literary institutions, and attenders at lectures." Some
journeymen cabinet-makers have saved money, and I found them all speak highly of
the advantages they, as well as their masters, derive from their trade society."
The majority of the cabinet-makers in London are countrymen. There are some very
good workmen from Scotland. One who has been an apprentice to a good London
master however, considered to rank with the very highest as a skilled workman.
In the honourable trade bonuses to foremen, and "improvers,"
and "contracts," and "sub-letting," among the journeymen, are at present
unknown. "I don't know," it was said to me, "that we have any great grievances
to complain of except one and that's the East-end." I find, however, that the
"strapping system," known in this trade as the "cut and run" work is becoming
very general among the trade working masters while any of the more respectable
shops are beginning to give out their work by the "lump," instead of the
"piece." To the non-existence of contracts, however, there is one exception in
the cabinet work of a great pianoforte and musical instrument maker. There the
letting and sub-letting is carried on through the several grades, to the
complete or comparative impoverishment of a great majority of the workmen, and
the enriching of a few contractors.
The cabinet-maker's trade is generally learned by
apprenticeship, and the apprentices to superior masters are often the sons of
tradesmen, and are well-educated lads. There is no limit to the number a master
may take, but the great firms in the honourable trade take very few, while the
masters not in the honourable trade will, I am informed, take very many (one has
eleven), and even put run-away apprentices to work. "They go for one thing,
sir," a cabinet-maker said to me, "to get things done for half-price; it's
little matter how." A journeyman can have his own son apprenticed to him, but
only one at a time.
The payment of the journeyman cabinet-maker is, both by the
piece and by the week, 32s. a week, being the minimum allowed by the rules of
the society as the remuneration for a week's labour, or six days of ten hours
each. The prices by piece are regulated by a book, which is really a remarkable
production. It is a thick quarto volume, containing some 600 pages. Under the
respective heads the piece-work price of every article of furniture is
specified; and immediately after what is called the "start" price, or the price
for the plain article, follows an elaborate enumeration of extras, according as
the article may be ordered to be ornamented in any particular manner. There are
also engravings of all the principal articles in the trade, which further
facilitate the clear understanding of all the regulations contained in the work.
The date of this book of prices is 1811, and the wages of the society men have
been unchanged since then. The preparation of this ample and minute statement of
prices occupied a committee of masters and of journeymen between two and three
years. The committee were paid for their loss of time from the masters' and the
journeymen's funds respectively; and what with these payments, what with the
expense of attending the meetings and consultations, the making and remaking of
models, the cost of printing and engravings, the cabinet-makers' book of prices
was not compiled, I am assured, at a less cost than from £4,000 to £5,000.
The trade societies in connection with this branch of art, are those of the
cabinet, chair, and bedstead makers. They are divided into three districts,
viz., West-end, Middle, and East-end. These districts contain five societies
one at the West-end, another in the centre of the metropolis, and the others at
the East-end. Three of these societies are in connection with the cabinet
makers' trade; the remaining two belong to the bedstead makers and the
chair-makers. The following table shows the number of men in connection with
each society, together with the non-society men appertaining to each branch:
Society Men | Non-Society Men | Total of Society and non-Society | |
West-end General Cabinet-makers | 300 | 1400 | 1700 |
East-end ditto | 1140 | 1000 | 1140 |
Fancy Cabinet-makers | 47 | 500 | 547 |
Chair-makers | 130 | 1428 | 1558 |
Bedstead-makers | 25 | 238 | 263 |
642 | 4566 | 5208 |
Thus we perceive that the society men
constitute not quite one-seventh part of the trade, from which it should be
remembered that the upholsterers are here excluded.
These several societies, as is usually the case, have for
their object the upholding of the standard rate of wages, and providing such
assistance to their members as has been found to best suit the peculiar
circumstances in which the workman is placed. They are mostly offered by a
secretary, president, and committee, who are differently paid, according to the
importance of the body and the nature of the duties required, while the payments
of the members partake of the same variable character. The West-end
cabinet-makers meet weekly, and pay 6d. per week as their regular trade
contribution, and the members who are unemployed obtain for a given time 10s.
per week from the funds, and when on strike 16s. There is also a payment for the
insurance of tools, for which 1 s. 6d. is paid every quarter. The West-end
General Cabinet-Makers' Society have paid no less than Ј11,000 to the unemployed
members within the last sixteen years, which is at the rate of very nearly £700
a year. They have also expended in the insurance of tools, since 1836, £1,758,
and have received during that time Ј708 for loss of them by fire.
The members of the East-end body differ from those at the
West-end in their rate of pay. They receive 30s. instead of 32s. per week, and
when on piece-work they are paid by the job, or in the "lump;" that is to say, a
given labour-value is put upon the entire article, whereas the West-end workman
receives an additional price, for everything which can be considered as coming
under the denomination of an "extra." In the East-end, the members likewise meet
weekly, but pay the less contribution of 4d. The unemployed members get 8s. per
week, and when on strike 15s. The tools of the members are also insured by the
society, but at a less rate than in the West-end.
The contributions of the fancy cabinet-makers are lower than
in either of the foregoing instances, being but 3d. per week. They in like
manner meet weekly. The assistance received by the unemployed, however, is
mainly dependent on the state of the society's funds, 2s. per week being the
lowest amount to be granted and 6s. the highest. They also have a legitimate
weekly wage of 30s.; but this at present is very rarely to be obtained. The
generality of this class work in their own homes, and take out the work in the
"lump," the custom of paying for extras in the fancy cabinet trade being
virtually extinct.
The chair-maker's weekly contribution is 6d., the same as
that of the West-end cabinet maker; he gets, also, 10s. a week when unemployed;
while, in cases of strike, the pay is as high as £1 per week for four weeks, and
16s. for another four weeks. Their standard wages are 32s. per week, while their
piece work is regulated by their book of prices, with every description of extra
or additional work carefully specified. Like the general cabinet makers, they
prefer this mode of employment to being paid by the week. An insurance is also
taken out by this society for the tools of the members.
The bedstead-makers only meet once a month, and pay their
contributions by the month, which is 1s. 4d. When employed by the week they get
32s.; but they receive 3s. 6d. per day when sent out to a gentleman's house, to
do such repairing (including cleaning) as may be required in their line of
trade. This society also insures the tools of members, at the optional values of
£12, £18, or £25, the latter sum being the highest. No payments have been made
by this body either to the unemployed, or to parties on strike, for so long a
time now that the custom in these cases has fallen into total disuse.
As a general rule the members of all the above societies are opposed to strikes,
preferring the system of arbitration.
There is no superannuation or sick fund in connection with
any of these societies. When the societies of cabinet-makers first commenced,
the houses of call were established upon the same principle as the tailors'
that is to say, as the labour market of the trade; but now it is oftener the
case that a man calls upon the master or his foreman, instead of receiving a
call from the society house. Sometimes a man gets recommended to a master or
foreman by a brother workman, and so obtains employment. The non-society men
call upon the masters and ask for work.
Tramps are not encouraged, as these societies have no
correspondence with the country societies. If, perchance, a tramp should call at
a shop, he may get a few halfpence, but that is all. The brisk season continues
during the spring and summer, and the autumn and winter months are the slack
period of the trade. The following table shows the average ratio of
non-employment at different seasons from 1834 to 1849. It will here be seen that
the periods of greatest slackness are the first and last quarters, and the
period of the greatest briskness the second quarter of the year:
TABLE SHOWING THE AVERAGE RATIO OF DAYS UNEMPLOYED TO THOSE EMPLOYED IN EACH QUARTER OF THE UNDERMENTIONED YEARS
August 1st Quarter | August 2d Quarter | August 3d Quarter | August 4th Quarter | |
1834-40 | 4.5 per cent | 3.0 per cent | 3.9 per cent | 3.8 per cent |
1840-49 | 8.3 | 4.6 | 6.0 | 6.2 |
1834-49 | 6.9 | 3.9 | 5.1 | 5.1 |
A good-looking man, who spoke with a
hardly perceptible Scotch accent, gave me the following account of his
experience as a general cabinet-maker of the best class. His room was one of the
sort I have described in my preliminary remarks:
"I am a native of , in Scotland," he said, "and have been in
London a dozen years or so. My mother was left a widow when I was very young,
and supported herself and me as a laundress. She got me the very best schooling
she could, and a cabinet-maker without some education is a very poor creature. I
got to be apprenticed to Mr. , who took me because he knew my father. I got on
very well with him, and lived at home with my mother. When I had been five years
or so at the business I went with my master to Lord 's a few miles off, to do
some work, and among other things we had to unpack some furniture that had come
from London, and to see that it wasn't injured. My lord came in when he had
unpacked a beautiful rosewood loo table, and said to my master, 'you can't make
a table like that.' `I think I can, my lord,' said my master, and he got an
order for one, and set me to make it as I had seen the London table, but he
overlooked me, and it gave great satisfaction, and that first made me think of
coming to London, as it gave me confidence in my work. I had only occasional
employment from my master when I was out of my time, and as my mother was then
dead I started off for London before I got through my bit of money. I walked to
Carlisle and was getting very tired of the road, and very footsore. What a lot
of thoughts pass through a countryman's mind when he's first walking up to
London! At Carlisle I had about a month's work, or better, as an order had just
come in to Mr. from a gentleman who was going to be married, and the
furniture was wanted in a hurry. I gave satisfaction there and that encouraged
me. I walked to London all the way, coming by Leeds and Sheffield, and
Leicester, and the great towns, where I thought there was the best chance for a
job. I didn't get one, though. In my opinion, sir, there ought to be a sort of
lodging-house for mechanics and poor people travelling on their honest business.
You must either go to a little public-house to sleep, and it's very seldom you
can get a bed there under 6d., and many places ask 9d. and 1 s. or you may go
to a common lodging house for travellers, as they call it, and it would sicken a
dog. Then, in a public-house, you can't sit by the fire on a wet or cold night
without drinking something, whether you require or can afford it or not. I knew
nobody in London except two or three seafaring people, and them I couldn't find.
I went from place to place for three weeks, asking for work. I wasn't a society
man then. At last I called at Mr. 's, and met with the master himself. He asked
me where I'd worked last, and I said at Mr. 's, of , and Mr. 's, of Carlisle.
'Very respectable men,' said he, 'I haven't a doubt of it, but I never heard
their names before. And he then asked me some questions, and called his foreman
and said, 'R , we want hands; I think you might put on this young man; just try
him.' So I was put on, and was there four or five years. I had many little
things to learn in London ways, to enable a man to get on a little faster with
his work, and I will say that I've asked many a good London hand for his
opinion, and have had it given to me as a man should give it. I do the same
myself now. A good workman needn't be afraid: he won't be hurt. I work by the
piece. I have been very fortunate, never having been out of work more than a
month or six weeks at a time but that's great good fortune. These are my
earnings for the last eight weeks. I've only lately begun to keep accounts, all
at piecework, and a busy time: 32s. 2d., 41s. 3d., 40s. Id., 36s., 29s. 6d.,
28s., 35s. 10d., 35s. 9d. An average of near 35s. is it? Well, no doubt I make
that all the year round. I can keep a wife and child comfortably. I wouldn't
hear of my wife working for a slop tailor. I'd rather live on bread and water
myself than see it. Slop means slavery. In my opinion, if the black master, or
the slaughtermen, as they call them at the other end, didn't keep men always
going, or didn't force them to keep them always going, they'd be troubled to get
hands. But when men are always struggling for a living, they have no time to
think or talk, and so they submit, and, indeed, their wives and families make
them submit."
A young man, well spoken, and well dressed, gave me the
following account as to the earnings of a chair-maker of the better class:
"I was brought up as a general hand in the country, in
Yorkshire, and in country towns a cabinet-maker makes everything in his own
line, and sometimes does a little joiner's work. I came right away to London,
between eight and nine years ago, as soon as I was out of my time. My master had
seven apprentices, and didn't employ any journeymen. His was a 'cutting' shop,
but he made very capital furniture, when he had a fair price. I have heard the
old men in the trade say that when they were young, 40 or 50 years back, a
cabinet-maker wanting work used to try York, or Leeds, or Sheffield, or
Manchester, or Liverpool, before he thought of London; but now we all make for
London. If a man asks for work at a country master's now, the first question
generally is, 'Have you worked in London?' I was two months out of work in
London, and then got on for a very good man who fitted up offices in the best
style; such as for banks and insurance offices that's cabinet-maker's work;
but it's often done by joiners. We consider that they encroach on our department
there. I was at this work about a year, making better than 30s. of a week, and
then was out of work seven weeks. I knew a man who worked for a 'linendraper'
just started in the tally system, in Westminster; and I went to make a few
chairs along with him, just not to be idle. I worked a week alongside of him,
and he hawked my chairs on the Saturday with his. For that week's hard work I
got 7s. 3d. clear, and my chairs were abused by the tallyman as if they weren't
good enough for his rubbishing place. But after he'd growled out his
fault-finding, he said `You may bring the same next week, if you like, at is.
the half dozen less.' I made a resolution just then and there that I'd starve
before I'd touch a piece of slaughter-house stuff again; and I haven't but
then I was a single man, and am still. If I'd had a family, I suppose I must
have `slaughter-housed' on. They couldn't have waited. By pawning my watch I
raised 25s., and that kept me going for three weeks, until I got work at a good
shop. I had joined the society before, and have been pretty lucky in keeping
work ever since. I haven't kept any particular account, but I know I make about
34s. every week. I make nothing but chairs and sofa frames; chiefly drawing-room
chairs. I can do best at them, and have been a chairman these four or five
years. I'm afraid the linendrapers will pull down the good masters, and down
with them must go the good men."
Bedstead making is, as I have stated, a distinct branch of
the cabinetmaker's business. It is, however, generally carried on in the same
premises as the other branches, but in some establishments bedsteads are the
principal manufacture. The bedstead-maker has not to cut out his material in the
same way as the cabinet-maker, as the posts are fashioned by the turner or the
wood-carver ready for his purpose, and the other portions of his work are
prepared by the sawyers in the sizes he requires. He is the putter together of
the article, in every part, except the insertion of the sacking bottom, which is
the work of the porter.
From a well-informed man, a member of "society," I had the
following statement, which embodies information (which I found fully
corroborated) of the social condition of the men, and the fashions of the trade.
I am informed that in the society of bedstead-makers there is not one unmarried
man.
"When I first knew the business, 40 years ago, I could earn
at bedstead-making, by hard work, 50s. or 60s. I have heard men brag in a
public-house that they could make more than 60s. and masters got to hear of it,
and there was great dis-satisfaction. We always work by piece and did so when I
was an apprentice in London. The prices paid to society men are, on the whole,
the same as in 1811. We all find our own tools, and a good kit is worth £30. I
consider the bedstead-makers an intelligent, sober
class. I'm speaking of society men gentlemen I may call them. I don't know
much of the others. The majority of us are members of literary institutions, and
some of us have saved money. There is great improvement since I first knew
bedstead-makers, in point of temperance. There used to be hard drinking and less
working. In 1810, when we met for society purposes, our allowance of fourpence a
night per man that had to attend was drunk in an hour; now its rot consumed in
the course of the meeting. Several of us are house-keepers, and can support our
wives and families comfortably. I don't think one of he wives of the members of
our society work in any way but for the family. I lave brought up seven children
well, and now five are working at other trades, and two girls at home. Very few
good hands now earn less than 30s. a week, and some 8s. or 9s. more I do that,
and I've been very rarely out if work. There is no importation of French
bedsteads now; there used to be, but they didn't stand. When I first made
bedsteads, tents, four-posters, and half-testers were the run; now half testers
and tents are never asked for. Then came the Waterloo bed, which turns up with a
curtain over it. The French bedstead next came in, with and without canopies.
The Arabian bed is the present fashion. It resembles a half-tester. The
iron-work has interfered greatly with my trade. I remember when there were no
iron bedsteads at all; nowsends out 60 or 70 in some weeks. The iron bedsteads
came into more general use about ten years ago. People fancy they're free of
vermin, but I have had to take some to pieces, and have found them full of bugs
in the lath and sacking parts. We've no grievances not a bit of them. I think
workmen themselves might remedy some of their grievances. They should be united,
and they shouldn't encourage low-priced shops of any kind by buying things
there. I pay 12s. a pair for my shoes, and one of my sons tells me it's foolish
to do so, but the shoemaker has as good a right to a good week's earnings as I
have, and to encourage slop work is to help on our own trouble."
I shall now concluded with the following statement, which I
received from an elderly man, the second member, in point of seniority, of the
present Cabinet-makers' Society of the eastern district of London. My informant
is a freeman of the Ancient Joiners' Company of the City:
"I went apprentice to a cabinet-maker," he said, "my friends
paying £50 premium with me, a sum which very few can pay now. That was in 1812.
Trade was then in full swing. There was a general war in Europe and men and
subsidies were required to keep up the armies. When peace came, in 1815, and
large armies came to be disbanded, the men naturally sought employment at the
trades they were taken from. Then trade came to a stand still. To meet one
declining markets, employers began to reduce wages; the corn-laws were passed,
so that no great reduction in the price of provision took place. Workmen found
they could not get so remunerative a price for their labour, and a great many
commenced masters on their own account. Trade not improving caused further
competition, so that by the time my term of apprenticeship expired, in 1819, I
found the price of work reduced from 20 to 30 per cent. From that period to the
present, fashion and style have been continually altering; while those
alteration have generally thrown more work into jobs, with no proper
remunerating pay for the same. Understand at the East-end there is no regular or
fixed price to work for the jobs are invariably what is called "lump" little
day-work employ, with few exceptions. From the above circumstances men have been
induced, and especially those who do not belong to the society, to confine
themselves to one line of work -- taking apprentices and employing youngsters
from the country, who are not proficient workmen. Timberyards now carry on a
profitable business by retailing small lots, so that a man can purchase stuff
for a job in the same way one can for a pair of shoes say, for a chest of
drawers, the top ends, fronts, sides, &c., &c. So with a table, and other
furniture. These articles are hawked from Bethnal-green, Curtain-road, and along
Holborn, Fleet-street, taking the west route to Hammersmith and its vicinity, of
a Saturday, the wood having been in the timber-yard the Saturday previous."
(Here my informant gave an account of the system of hawking to the "slaughter"
houses similar to what I have given, and to the injury they inflicted upon the
masters in the honourable trade, as well as upon the men. He continued.) "As for
me, I have before now been driven, in a slack time, to purchase material to make
up a job; and in some instances I have not been able to realise the price of a
day's work, say 5s., above the cost of materials, though upwards of a week has
been consumed in manufacturing the article the consequences being short fare,
scanty clothing, a selling and pledging of all the necessary articles of home,
neglect of children's education, and, should a longer continuance of want of
employment have ensued, every vestige of home must have been swept away. The
question seems to me, what are the remedies to be applied to this state of
things? An attempt to regulate the price of labour, to legislate for supply and
demand, would be to disturb an hornets' nest. Still the general impression of
the working classes is, that if a properly constituted Labour Board was
established by the Legislature, empowering employers and men to agree to a fair
remunerating price of labour in their respective trades, great good would arise.
The working classes, it is true, are not themselves free from blame, for they
have yet a great power to ensure many advantages, if they would but unite for
the best purposes."
In my next Letter I shall give an account of the better-paid
fancy cabinetmakers, the carvers, the buhl-cutters, the marqueterie-workers,
&c., and I shall then pass on to describe the slop-trade in connection with
these different branches of art.