ly, half the
spindles and half the looms in the Southern States would be included
within a circle around Charlotte of a radius of about 100 m. Of the
remainder a large proportion is scattered over a wide area.

Much interest has been excited by this newly created Lancashire of a new
type, and much speculation as to the causes that account for it has been
elicited. An informal commission of Lancashire spinners and
manufacturers crossed the Atlantic to make inquiries in 1902 and
investigations have been undertaken by other persons[56], and much has
been written on the subject. A general explanation can now be framed
without much difficulty, as in all probability most of the relevant
facts have been brought to light. First and foremost the general
development of the cotton industry in the United States must be
emphasized. The industry was unquestionably foredoomed to expansion at
this time, and the only question was where the expansion should take
place. It was plain that the growth might be so great as to present the
appearance of a new industry created with new labour rather than an
extension of an old industry. It was not altogether surprising,
therefore, that the exploitation of a new field of labour was thought
of. The labour market of the North was comparatively exhausted; in less
developed parts of the country larger supplies of intrinsically good
labour might be looked for at lower wages. Skill was not a matter of
much moment, because in the North it would have been necessary to
incorporate much labour without previous experience in the industry, the
work was intended to be of the rough kind upon which manual skill is
least important, and it was intended to repose reliance for economy upon
machinery in the main. The choice of new fields meant at the outset the
sacrifice of some of the economies of localization, but so large an
expansion was looked for that projectors did not despair of creating
fresh industrial localization of sufficient magnitude to produce such
economies as are derived from it, which, it must be observed, are
inconsiderable in America, and have declined relatively with falling
cost of transport and the adoption, as regards machinery, of the
principle of interchangeable parts. And at any rate a new local industry
would have a slight advantage in supplying markets in proximity to it.

These were the main general considerations, and the scale was turned in
favour of the new locality (a) by the adva