DEGRADATION

"Out of each class of artificers he shall select one to be at their head, and appoint another their broker for buying and selling, and regulate the business of the class by their reports; and they shall regularly furnish him with journals attested by their respective seals. . . . He shall see that the market prices are moderate, and not suffer anyone to go out of the city to purchase grain; neither shall he allow the rich to buy more than is necessary for their own consumption."*

To this day the citizens of Srinagar lament the prosperous days of old, when the trade was not free, as it is now is.

They have a common saying to the effect that when the taxation went the prosperity of the city went also, and they explain this by the fact that the removal of taxation led to the breaking up of what were practically guilds sanctioned and protected by the State. When the taxation was removed outsiders rushed in, and competition at once reduced prices of art wares. Copper-work, which sold at seven rupees per seer in the days of taxation, now sells at three rupees, and this is the case with many other art wares."

In the days of taxation also:

"The State exercised a vigorous supervision over the quality of the raw material and the manufacAyeen Akbery, F. Gladwin, 1800.

OF STANDARD.

tured article. In the good days of the shawl-trade no spurious wool was brought in from Amritsar to be mixed with the real shawl-wool of Central Asia, and woe betide the weaver who did bad work or the silversmith who was too liberal with his alloy. There is no such supervision nowadays. Competition has lowered prices, and the real masters of weaving, silver, papier-maché and copper-work have to bend to the times and supply their customers with cheap, inferior work. Ask an old artist in papier-maché to show the work which formerly went to Kabul, and he will show something very different from the miserable trash which is now sold. But the Pathans of Kabul paid the price of good work; the visitors to the valley want cheap work, and they get it."* And so the story goes on. Let us take another case. Says Sir George Birdwood:

"Formerly, a great industry in gold embroidered shoes flourished at Lucknow. They were in demand all over India, for the native kings of Oudh would not allow the shoemakers to use any but pure gold wire on them. But when we annexed the kingdom, all such restrictions were removed, and the bazaars of Oudh were at once flooded with the pinchbeck embroidered shoes of Delhi, and the

* Sir W. Lawrence, "The Valley of Kashmir," P. 373. The italics are not in the original.

FREE TRADE AND

Lucknow shoemakers were swept away for ever by the besom of free trade."+

And thus we see at work the degradation of standard, which is undermining alike the crafts of the East and of the West. "Under British rule," says Sir George Birdwood, "the authority of the trade guilds in India has necessarily been relaxed, to the marked detriment of those handicrafts the perfection of which depends on hereditary processes and skill." Modern individualism, in fact, whether we call it "Laissez Faire" in Manchester, or the introduction of "Free Western Institutions" into India, hesitates to interfere with a man's sacred individual liberty to make things as badly as he likes, and to undermine the trade of his fellows on that basis-a basis of competition in cheapness, not in excellence; and the result we know. Surely a strange product of civilization this!

Perhaps it is necessary to explain that in thus contrasting "Free Trade " with the status of

66

protected" industries, I do not intend at all to advocate "Protection" as commonly understood. The "Protection" which is here advocated is the protection of standard; this must be carried out in most cases not by the taxation of imports, but by the absolute prohibition of the importation of any goods whose quality falls below the standard established. The

† “Industrial Arts of India," II., p. 64.

PROTECTION.

hall-marking of gold and silver is almost the only survival of this power formerly exercised by the trade guilds in England, and here it is only quality of material that is considered, not of design. In recent times, the principle has been put in practice in the prohibition of aniline dyes by Kashmir. The principle, however, requires great extension, if standard is to be maintained; and it is best done by restoring to the guilds that power of control which they formerly possessed. For the State to merely tax, and profit by, the importation of the inferior goods-"Protection " as ordinarily understood-would be quite futile from the present point of view. Equally foolish would be the taxation of goods which for one reason or another can better be made in another country than one's own. Each country should excel in its own special productions, and protect their standard ruthlessly.

CHAPTER V.

RELIGIOUS IDEAS IN CRAFTSMANSHIP.

THERE is another kind of provision in Eastern society tending to secure the maintenance of standard in the crafts. I allude to the caste system, some aspects of which we must consider. Without here speaking of the origin and general significance of caste, it will suffice to say from our point of view, that it represents a legal recognition of the natural division of society into functional groups. Theoretically, there are four castes only, the Brahman, or learned caste; the Kshattriya, or warriors and statesmen; the Vaisya, or traders, cultivators and craftsmen; and the Sudra, craftsmen and servants. Much subdivision and multiplication of castes has taken place, so that there are large numbers of widely distributed, but self-contained communities in India, whose members do not inter-marry or eat together. Caste is hereditary, that is to say, every man is, and must remain, of the caste into which he is born, and this is true even if he should leave the special occupation which is the traditional work of his caste. There is a certain connection between