As no more new jewellery would be wanted, and as the resetting and division of the now existing articles into smaller shape would soon be accomplished, the almost entire extinction of the trade of goldsmiths and jewellers, now numbering 15,000 workers, may be expected, and a remnant of 1000, left for executing the most necessary repairs, will be all that will remain of their present number.

The trade of Toy-makers, which now employs 2,000 persons, will become extinct, because children will in the future social state be taught how to make their own toys from materials provided for the purpose.

The author expects, however, that the early training in industrial and domestic labour will, in the future, interest children even more than any toys and play things they could be provided with.

He is consequently altogether opposed to the present custom of giving to children ready made, highly finished, and ingenious toys. These mechanical playthings excite for a moment the wonder and curiosity of the children, but they soon pull them to pieces, or destroy them in wanton frolic. Toys of this kind rob the children also of the exercise of their own ingenuity in making playthings for themselves. This ill-advised kind of luxury seems, however, to flourish in great splendour, for in Thuringia 32,000 persons are employed in toy-making. Of brass and steel wire 30,000,000 feet are consumed annually in the toy manufacture of that part of Germany. Of dolls only, 2,000,000 dozen are exported. The toy manufacture in Paris alone employs 1,800 men, who daily earn six francs individually. The business done by the principals in the trade amounts to a value of about 10,000,000 francs. The costliness of some of the toys shows that they are intended for the children of the rich, who thus are early incited to that extravagant love of costly dresses and other finery which, in later years, often causes the ruin of whole families and entire households. Mr. Cremer, a toy merchant in Regent Street, London, issued, lately, a publication concerning the trade of toy-making, and in it is to be found the almost incredible fact that one dress in the trousseaux of a French doll cost 500 francs. The statement of this outrageous incitement to extravagancy and luxury most deservedly merits to be accompanied by the

observation that if anyone purchases this doll and her costly dresses for his children, he commits sinful luxury, or unpardonable folly.

It is related of the great socialist writer Prouhdon, that when a friend one day brought a doll as a present to his two little girls, he absolutely refused to let them have it, declaring that dolls taught children laziness and coquetry, gave them a taste for luxury and languor, adding, "If you wish to make my daughters a present, give them something useful, a thimble, a pair of scissors, or a packet of needles, that they may be always reminded that they are the children of misery and philosophy, and must unceasingly devote their lives to work."

Of 5000 Locksmiths, 4000 will be dismissed, because private property being abolished, and money suppressed, and everyone being lodged, fed, and clothed by the state, there will be no necessity and not even any possibility for thieves to take property, money or jewellery, away; for it would be utterly impossible for them to dispose of stolen articles, or even to hide them. Under these circumstances lock and key may be removed from all doors, drawers, and boxes. The only exceptions from this general absence of lock and key will be, first, in the closing of dwelling apartments, where they may serve to prevent visitors entering at a time when the occupants wish to be left alone; and, second, in the closing of the national storehouses, repositories, and workshops for the mere reason of regulating the admission of the public to these establish

ments.

The Butchers, now numbering 68,000, will, most probably, be reduced to 30,000; for the meat will be sent in large joints or in quarters of carcasses to the Associated Homes, without undergoing the minute chopping and trimming process of the present retail butchers.

The greatest reduction will, perhaps, take place in the Building Trades; although they may at the advent of the new social order be rather fully employed or even need an increase;

"The people of Icaria have no need to lock their doors, for there are neither thieves nor drunkards amongst them.”—M. CABET.

At Mettray, the celebrated penitentiary establishment, founded by M. de Metz, bars and bolts are renounced.

for they will have to construct the new Associated Homes and erect national workshops and storehouses. But when these are finished, one-tenth part of the number of persons now employed in these trades will suffice for the repairing and renovating of all buildings:

or in round numbers 500,000 persons, of whom 450,000 will become superfluous, if 50,000 only are required.

Adding finally together the whole of the partial reductions and total suppressions of trades arrived at in skilled labour, viz. :

is obtained, representing 420,000,000 working-days, which deducted from the total of all skilled labour, amounting to 1,200,000,000 working-days, leaves a sum of 780,000,000, which if shared by 12,000,000 people would not be more than 65 days annually per individual; and if to these 10 more days are added for domestic labour, and 18 more for factory work, and 4 more for mining and general labour, it will be found that the whole amount of labour required of 12,000,000 persons, qualified for work, is really not more than 97 working-days per individual, or in round numbers 3 months each year.*

This period of work, if slightly increased to 100 days, represents exactly one-third of the 300 working-days the hardworking artizan or labourer has now to accomplish in the space of each year, and which he so persistently endeavours to reduce to a smaller number.

An objection might here be raised concerning the great increase of locomotion by rail and otherwise which the frequent transfer of all adult and able-bodied citizens to their respective centres of industry will annually necessitate. The following calculation will, however, suffice to allay these fears.

Out of a population of 30,000,000 people there will be 20,000,000 adults employed in agriculture, manufactures, mining, navigation, handicrafts, etc. If 10 journeys are allowed annually to each person, 200,000,000 journeys will be required. This will still favourably contrast with the present mode of

* Nearly a hundred years ago a similar computation was made; for Benjamin Franklin, in his letter to Benjamin Vaughan, dated at Passy, July 26th, 1784, says :-" It has been computed by some political arithmetician, that, if every man and woman would work for four hours each day on something useful, that labour would produce sufficient to procure all the necessaries and comforts of life, want and misery would be banished out of the world, and the rest of the twenty-four hours might be leisure and pleasure."

wasteful locomotion by rail; for it is stated that in the year 1874 the number of passengers who travelled on the railways of the United Kingdom amounted to not less than 480,000,000, and that a large part of the population took at least two journeys a day, or 700 in the year.

THIS

CHAPTER XXXV.-DISTRIBUTIVE LABOUR.

HIS kind of labour comprises all those occupations and employments which now carry out the distribution of produce by means of wholesale and retail traders, the former of which are also the regular agents for the importation and exportation of all articles of merchandise.

Of all the various classes of labour, the distribution of produce is the easiest to be learned, and is also, with very few exceptions, the least dangerous. Distributive labour is therefore eminently suited for equal distribution, and in allotting it to the population, especial care will be taken that the easiest shares fall upon the aged workmen, who have already discharged their duty of national labour during the period of their athletic age. Allotments of an easy nature may be found amongst the supervision of the national storerooms and magazines, and also amongst all those occupations in which the retail dealers are now usually engaged.

Some kind of labour required in the distribution of produce is, however, of a very heavy and dangerous nature, although not difficult to learn. Work of this kind, for instance, is the occupation of porters, packers, carmen, dock labourers, railway servants and of all those engaged in the service of the mercantile marine on seas and canals. But as all heavy and dangerous work has, by its very nature, the first claim on equal distribution, all these employments will be subjected to the universal law of distribution by casting the lot; for the inducement of gain being withdrawn by the abolition of money, and the earning of any wages, high or low, having thereby become an impossibility, nothing but a profound feeling of solemn duty will, in the future, incite men to do the work of the sailor, the