n down-
trodden Jew. Most men will contentedly receive less as master than as
servant, but especially the Jew. We saw that the immigrant Jew, by his
capacities and inclinations, was induced to make special efforts to
substitute work of management for manual labour, and to become a profit-
maker instead of a wage-earner. The Jew craves the position of a
sweating-master, because that is the lowest step in a ladder which may
lead to a life of magnificence, supported out of usury. The Jewish Board
of Guardians in London, though its philanthropic action is on the whole
more enlightened than that of most wealthy public bodies, has been
responsible in no small measure for this artificial multiplication of
small masters. A very large proportion of the funds which they dispensed
was given or lent in small sums in order to enable poor Jews "to set up
for themselves." The effect of this was twofold. It first assisted to
draw to London numbers of continental Jews, who struggled as "greeners"
under sweaters for six months, until they were qualified for assistance
from the Jewish Board of Guardians. It then enabled them to set up as
small masters, and sweat other "greeners" as they themselves were
sweated. It was quite true that the object of such charity was the most
useful which any society could undertake; namely, that of assisting the
industrially weak to stand on their own legs. But it was unfortunately
true that this early stage of independence was built upon the miserable
dependence of other workers.

6. But while, as we see, there are many special conditions which, in
London especially, favour the small workshop, the most important will be
found to consist in the large supply of cheap unskilled labour. This is
the real material out of which the small workshop system is built. In
dealing with the other conditions, we shall find that they all
presuppose this abundant supply of labour. If labour were more scarce,
and wages therefore higher, the small workshop would be impossible, for
the absolute economy of labour, effected by the factory organization
with its larger use of machinery, would far outweigh the number of small
economies which, as we have seen, at present in certain trades, favour
and make possible the small workshop. Every limitation in the supply of
this low-skilled labour, every expansion of the alternatives offered by
emigration, access to free land, &c., will be effectual in crushing a
number of the sweating wor