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Isles 14; making up for the United Kingdom a total of 1250. Of the aggregate circulation of these journals, it is impossible to arrive at any accurate estimate. At the beginning of the century, the annual circulation of newspapers in England and Wales was 15 millions. In 1853, as was shown by the Stamp Office returns, the annual circulation of England and Wales was 72 millions, and of Scotland and Ireland each 8 millions. Even the circulation in 1853 was an astounding fact, and we then wrote, Visit, if you can, the interior of that marvellous human machine the General Post Office on a Friday evening from half-past five to six o'clock. Look with awe upon the tons of newspapers that are crowding in to be distributed through the habitable globe. Think silently how potent a power is this for good or for evil. You turn to one of the boxes of the letter-sorters, and your guide will tell you, 'This work occupies not half the time it formerly did, for everybody writes better."" Some of the elder country newspapers and some that have started into life since the repeal of the Stamp, have a circulation that is to be numbered by thousands. But if we only assign a sale of 1000 each to the 679 country papers in England, we have a total annual circulation of 235 millions. The Scotch and Irish journals will probably swell the aggregate annual circulation of the United Kingdom to 250 millions. Taking the entire population at 30 millions, this estimate would give 8 newspapers in the course of the year to every person: and assuming that every newspaper has six readers, there is no present want in these kingdoms of the literary means of keeping the people informed upon every current event and topic.

The printing machines, which have been in full operation for little more than twenty years, have called into action an amount of employment which was almost wholly unknown when knowledge was for the few. Paper-makers, typefounders, wood-engravers, bookbinders, booksellers, have been raised up by this extension of the art of printing in numbers which far exceed those of any former period.

But the printing machine would have worked feebly and imperfectly without the paper machine. That most complete invention has not only cheapened paper itself, but it has cheapened the subsequent operations of printing in a remarkable degree. It has enabled one revolution of the cylinder of the printing machine to produce four sheets instead of one, or a surface of print equal to four sheets. When paper was altogether made by hand, the usual paper for books was called demy; and a sheet of demy produced sixteen octavo pages of a book. The paper could not have been economically made larger by hand. A sheet of paper equal to four sheets of demy is now worked at the newspaper machine; and sixty-four pages of an octavo book might be so worked, if it were needful for cheapening production. Thus one economical arrangement of science produces another contrivance; and machines in one direction combine with machines having a different object, to produce legitimate cheapness, injurious to no one, but beneficial to all.

In consequence of the cheaper production of the press, and the consequent extension of the demand for books, bookbinding has become a large manufacture, carried on with many scientific applications. We have rolling machines, to make the book solid; cutting machines, to supersede the hand-labour of the little instrument called a plough; embossing machines, to produce elaborate raised patterns on leather or cloth; embossing presses, to give the gilt ornament and lettering. These contrivances, and other smaller inventions, have not only cheapened books, but have enabled the publisher to give them a permanent instead of a temporary cover, ornamental as well as useful. The number of bookbinders employed has been quadrupled by these inventions. In 1830, the journeymen bookbinders of London opposed the introduction of the rolling machine. Books were formerly beat with large hammers upon a stone to give them solidity. The workmen were relieved from the drudgery of the beating-hammer by the easy operation of the rolling machine. They soon discovered the weak foundation of their objection to an in

strument which, in truth, had a tendency, above all other things, to elevate their trade, and to make that an art which in one division of it was a mere labour. If the painter was compelled to grind his own colours and make his own frames, he would no longer follow an art, but a trade; and he would receive the wages of a labourer instead of the wages of an artist, not only so far as related to the grinding and frame-making, but as affecting all his occupations by the drudgery attending a portion of them.

The commerce of literature has been doubled in thirty years. But it would be scarcely too much to assert that the influence of the press, in forming public opinion, and causing it to operate upon legislation, has doubled almost every other employment. To that public opinion, chiefly so formed, we owe the successive removals of restrictions upon trade. To that public opinion we owe the abolition of prohibitive duties upon foreign produce, which has given us a far wider range of beneficial consumption. To that public opinion we owe the repeal of the oppressive excise duties upon salt, leather, candles, glass, bricks, and lastly

upon paper.

QUESTIONS UPON CHAPTER XXI.

1. What invention preceded that of separate letters for printing? What was the effect on labour of the invention of the printing-press? What change has this invention made in the condition of the people?

2. Give some instances of the changes in the method of publishing news. By what means have these changes been produced?

3. What method of conveying intelligence was superseded by the Electric Telegraph? Give some instances of the effect of the Electric Telegraph on the transmission of news.

4. Give some account of the collection and arrangement of intelligence in a London newspaper office.

5. What measures have produced the great increase in the circulation of newspapers during the last ten years?

6. What invention has completed the work of the printing machine? What effect has the printing press had on bookbinding?

7. What are the indirect benefits of the printing press?

APPENDIX TO PART II.

OCCUPATIONS OF THE PEOPLE.

IN the Companion to the Almanac' for 1864, the author of 'Knowledge is Power' wrote a paper, in which he presented an abstract of the second volume of the Census of 1861, which contains the fullest information on the important subject of the occupations of the people. In an introductory note to this volume of tables relating to England and Wales, the Registrar-General says: "The nomenclature of many occupations is in an unsettled state. But in 1851 an attempt was made to frame a classification under which all the varieties of occupation could be placed; and that classification was to a certain extent successful. After further experience, its groups have been simplified and its ramifications extended, so as to exhibit in one view the whole population of England and Wales marshalled in six groups, according to their various occupations.

The Summary Tables of Occupations exhibit the whole community inhabiting our industrial hive, and working "in divers functions," under classes, orders, and sub-orders. We propose, instead of giving all the tables in one view, to separate the classes, showing the orders and suborders of each, and adding in each division such observations as appear to us essential, or at least interesting.

The information presented in this Appendix is referred to in the preceding chapters of this volume, instead of being given in a more condeused shape.

The first striking fact which appears on the face of this table is, that out of 20 millions of people, only 150 thousand do not appear in the enumeration of those

of specified occupations and conditions. The Census is founded upon the returns made by each family or individual as to their status. The vague" Rentier" of the old French passport has no place here. Men and women for the most part shrunk not from naming their employments; and though there may be a little of that colour which pretences to gentility occasionally put on, we may conclude that the record, upon the whole, is honest and true. The Domestic Class, II.— as we shall see when we come to the orders and suborders which it comprises -represents those engaged in domestic offices the wives, mothers, children, relatives, and servants of a household. The Classes I., III., V., VI., form an aggregate of 6,478,160. The Agricultural Class, IV., comprises 2,010,454 persons. Thus we see that the possessors or workers of the land form only about onefourth of the whole working community. If we compare

the males enumerated under various occupations, we shall find that those belonging to the four non-agricultural classes amount to 4,619,246, whilst those comprised in the agricultural class amount to 1,631,652. This computation gives the same result as to the proportions of agriculturists to other workers.