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There are perhaps no manufactures, in which the division of

labour can be carried further, or in which the machinery employed

admits of a greater variety of improvements, than those of which

the materials are the coarser metals.

In the clothing manufacture there has, during the same period,

been no such sensible reduction of price. The price of superfine

cloth, I have been assured, on the contrary, has, within these

five-and-twenty or thirty years, risen somewhat in proportion to

its quality, owing, it was said, to a considerable rise in the

price of the material, which consists altogether of Spanish wool.

That of the Yorkshire cloth, which is made altogether of English

wool, is said, indeed, during the course of the present century,

to have fallen a good deal in proportion to its quality. Quality,

however, is so very disputable a matter, that I look upon all

information of this kind as somewhat uncertain. In the clothing

manufacture, the division of labour is nearly the same now as it

was a century ago, and the machinery employed is not very

different. There may, however, have been some small improvements

in both, which may have occasioned some reduction of price.