confers a definite advantage on the manufactory, not enjoyed by other
trades which operate in the large way. The result is mediocrity of
wealth, and little ruinous speculation. At the same time, the sanguine
expectations of manufacturers often lead them to overstock themselves,
and as the demand has been, so they expect it always to be.

"Sheffield employs about 15,000 persons in its various branches, and of
these full one-third are engaged on knives and forks, pocket-knives,
razors, and scissors. The rest are engaged in the plated trades, in
saws, files, and some fancy trades. The following is an exact
enumeration of the hands employed in the various departments two or
three years since:--

"On table-knives 2,240
On spring-knives 2,190
On razors 478
On scissors 806
On files 1,284
On saws 400
On edge-tools 541
On forks 480
In the country 130
In the plated trade nearly 2,000
______
"About 10,549

"Besides those who are employed in Britannia-metal ware, smelting,
optical instruments, grinding, polishing, &c. &c., making full 5,000
more.

"There are full 1,700 forges engaged in the various branches of the
trades, and of course as many fires, fixing oxygen to make their heat,
and evolving the undecomposed carbon in active volumes of steam and
smoke.

"The place is usually described as smoky, but I thought it less so than
the central parts of London. The manufactures, for the most part, are
carried on in an unostentatious way, in small scattered shops, and no
where make the noise and bustle of a single great iron works. Compared
with them Sheffield is a seat of elegant arts, nevertheless compared
with the cotton and silk trades, it must be regarded as dirty and smoky.

"The steel and plated manufactures require much taste, and in some cases
make a great display. Hence there were exhibitions of elegant products,
not exceeded in the Palais Royal, or any other place abroad, and
superior to any of the cutlers' shops in London. All that the lustre of
steel ware and silver plate can produce, is, in Sheffield, exhibited in
splendid arrangement, in the warerooms of some of the principal
manufacturers. In particular Messrs. J. Rodgers and Sons, cutlers to his