tents me, body and mind. I have even had to
give up my old hobby of botanizing, or, rather, I have voluntarily
given it up, in order to devote more time to the study of humanity. In
the general division of labor, every one should take what best suits
his capacities. That is a lesson my country-people will not learn, and
our native industry suffers in consequence."

"May I ask you to explain yourself more particularly?"

"The thing is very simple. Our clock-making, like all our home
pursuits, is the natural result of the unproductiveness of our soil,
and the indivisibility of our large, entailed estates. Younger sons,
and all whose whole capital consists in their industry, must make the
most of that, if they would earn a living. Hence that natural aptitude
for work, that strict, unresting carefulness, that are common among us.
Our forests supply the best wood for machinery and cases, and as long
as our wooden clocks found a good market, a manufacturer, with the help
of his wife and children to paint the dial-plate, could make an entire
clock in his own house. But now that metal clocks have been introduced,
and have, in a measure, supplanted the wooden ones, a division of labor
has become necessary. There is a strong competition in France, in
America, and especially in Saxony. We must give up pendulums, and take
to springs. These changes cannot be effected without the help of some
general and binding association among the workmen. The stone-cutters,
in old times, used to form themselves into a guild, presided over by a
chosen head, and that is what is wanted here. The workmen, scattered
about on the mountains, must enter into a league with one another, and
work into each other's hands. The difficulty is to bring about such a
league among our people. In Switzerland a watch passes through a
hundred and twenty hands before it is finished. But the very
perseverance of the good people here, which is undoubtedly a virtue,
makes them unwilling to adopt new ways. Only by unexampled frugality
and application could our home manufactures have been carried on as
long as they have. You would hardly believe what a morbid sensitiveness
our people have contracted by their constant and close confinement at
their work. They have to be handled as tenderly as their own clocks,
which an awkward touch will break."

"It seems to me," answered the young man, "that the first thing wanted
now is a better case for your clocks, that they may becom