Page:On the economy of machinery and manufactures - Babbage - 1846.djvu/250

216 slowly, and gradually acquired greater velocity than it was safe to give it at once; and the speed was thus increased from 100 to about 120 strokes per minute.

(267.) Pursuing the same principles, the manufactory becomes gradually so enlarged, that the expense of lighting during the night amounts to a considerable sum; and as there are already attached to the establishment persons who are up all night, and can therefore constantly attend to it, and also engineers to make and keep in repair any machinery, the addition of an apparatus for making gas to light the factory leads to a new extension, at the same time that it contributes, by diminishing the expense of lighting, and the risk of accidents from fire, to reduce the cost of manufacturing.

(268.) Long before a factory has reached this extent, it will have been found necessary to establish an accountant's department, with clerks to pay the workmen, and to see that they arrive at their stated times; and this department must be in communication with the agents who purchase the raw produce, and with those who sell the manufactured article.

(269.) We have seen that the application of the Division of Labour tends to produce cheaper articles; that it thus increases the demand; and gradually, by the effect of competition, or by the hope of increased gain, that it causes large capitals to be embarked in extensive factories. Let us now examine the influence of this accumulation of capital directed to one object. In the first place, it enables the most important principle on which the advantages of the division of labour depends to be carried almost to its extreme limits: not