Woollen and Linen Industries

On the other hand, the situation is quite different in the case of the other branches of the textile industry. Of these, the cloth manufacture had quite as deep roots in the history of France as the silk industry; and it had, like that, and in fact like the whole of French industrial life, suffered greatly from the storms of the revolution, both through the general insecurity of life and limb and through the hopeless state of the currency in consequence of the assignat system. It now raised itself out of its decay and had a brilliant period, which,—for instance, in Rheims—surpassed the last years of the ancien régime, which was now justly remembered as having marked the summit level of old French material culture. Undoubtedly, the development of the woollen industry was promoted by Napoleon's policy, especially by careful work in the way of production of wool and the procurement of wool from Spain, and also with regard to the coarser clothing in consequence of the military requirements, which always and everywhere in our climes make special demands on this branch of the textile trade. Remarkably enough, so far as one can judge, the greatest progress was made in one of the incorporated territories, namely, the Roer department, meaning that particular part of the present Rhine province which is situated on the left bank of the Rhine (Nieder-Rhein). In the now world-famous textile centres, Aix-la-Chapelle, Cologne, &c., there were almost the only industrial centres which the old French manufacturers recognized as equal rivals in the finer branches of the clothing trade. It is true that the blockade against Great Britain also played its part here, and still more, perhaps, the blockade against the continental rivals of France. But we cannot speak here of any at all decisive effect of the Continental System itself, as the woollen industry was long established in France and was not brought to any distinctly higher state of prosperity than it had attained before the Revolution, despite the fact that various new specialities were taken up and also various technical advances were made, of which more anon. Thus it was principally for the regions which had previously been outside France, or had been treated by the customs authorities as foreign countries, that the policy became important, inasmuch as it gave them a share of the sales on what was at least intended to be the hermeticallysealed French market. According to Chaptal's calculation, exports had indeed absolutely declined, if one takes into consideration only the old French territory, although internal sales and the total production had increased since 1789. The situation was less favourable as regards the linen industry, where even in the incorporated territories it was only the Belgian district of Ghent that showed any marked development.