as a rule, on a great scale; but already in the iron foundries we find a great number of establishments belonging to the middle-sized and small industry. Thus at Sheffield I saw myself several foundries employing only from five to six workmen, For the making of huge machinery there is, of course, a number of very large works, such as those of Armstrong, Whitworth, or those of the State at Woolwich. But it is very instructive to see how very small works prosper by the side of big ones; they are numerous enough to reduce the average to seventy workers per establishment for the 5,318 works of this category.
Shipbuilding and the manufacture of metallic tubes evidently belong to the great industry (averages, 243 and 156 persons per establisment); and the same applies to the two great metallurgical works of the State, which employ between them 23,455 workmen.
Going over to the chemical works, we find again a great industry in the fabrication of alkalies and of matches (only twenty-five works); but, on the contrary, the fabrication of soap and candles, as well as manures and all other sorts of chemical produce, which represents nearly 2,000 factories, belongs almost entirely to the domain of the small industry. The average is only twenty-nine workpeople per factory. There are, of course, half a dozen of very large soap works — one knows them only too well by their advertisements on the cliffs and in the fields; but the low average of twenty-nine workmen proves how many small factories must exist by the side of the soap kings. The 2,500 works engaged in the fabrication of furniture, both in wood and in iron, belong again chiefly to the small industry. The small and very small factories swarm by the side of a few great ones, to say nothing of the thousands of the still smaller workshops. The great storehouses of our cities are for the most part mere exhibitions of furniture made in very small factories and workshops.
In the fabrication of food produce we find several great sugar, chocolate, and