Among the inventions, which, by lessening labour, render a great number of workmen unnecessary, and consequently deprive many of bread, and which, with whatever ingenuity they may be contrived, have been considered as hurtful, and were for a long time suppressed by governments, may be reckoned the ribbon-loom. In its general construction, this machine approaches very near to that of the common weaving loom; but the workman, instead of weaving one piece, or one ribbon, as is the case when the latter is used, can, on the former when it has all the necessary apparatus, weave sixteen or twenty pieces at the same time, and even of different patterns. Such a loom is so made, that the workman can move the batten as in the common loom, towards him and from him, and also to the right and left, with all the shuttles it contains; or, it is furnished with certain machinery below, which can be moved by a boy unacquainted with the art of weaving, and which keeps the whole loom with all its shuttles in motion. Looms of the former kind are certainly much simpler than those of the latter, and in all probability are older. To the first kind belongs the loom at Erfurt, and that which was lately brought thence to GÖttingen. Of the other kind there are two at Berlin; and some of them may be seen in many other places. The art has been discovered also of causing such looms to be driven by water; and an instance of this may be found, as I have been told, in the neighbourhood of Iserlohe1293. The proprietors however in most places keep the construction of their looms a secret, and, as far as appears, no complete description or figure of them has ever been published. There is reason to believe that this invention is as yet little used in France; no mention at least is made of it in the Encyclopedie, where, however, the common loom of the ribbon-weavers and lace-weavers is fully represented with all its parts in ten copper-plates.

Attempts were made in Europe to suppress this invention, as was the case with printing in Turkey. But without here inquiring whether inventions may not save too much labour, and be therefore hurtful, as Montesquieu affirms, or whether it would be possible to suppress them throughout all Europe, I shall restrict myself to the history of the ribbon-loom as far as information is to be collected on the subject.

We are told by M. Jacobson, that it is believed the Swiss invented such looms above a hundred years ago; but I do not know any grounds upon which this conjecture can be supported. To me it appears much more probable that this invention had its rise in the Netherlands or Germany, either about the end of the sixteenth or beginning of the seventeenth century. The oldest account with which I am acquainted seems to be in favour of Germany and the sixteenth century. Lancellotti, in a work1294 published at Venice in 1636, says “Anthony Moller of Dantzic relates, that he saw in that city about fifty years before a very ingenious machine, on which, from four to six pieces could be wove at the same time; but as the council were afraid that by this invention a great many workmen might be reduced to beggary, they suppressed it and caused the inventor to be privately strangled or drowned.” Who this Anthony Moller was I do not know; but that he saw a ribbon-loom at Dantzic is beyond all doubt. If the date of the printing of the book be taken as the time in which Lancellotti wrote, there is reason to believe that there was a ribbon-loom at Dantzic about the year 1586; but it appears to me that the book was written in 1629, which would bring us to the year 1579.

The next oldest information with which I am acquainted, is that given by Boxhorn, who says, “About twenty years ago some persons in this city (Leyden) invented a weaving-machine on which one workman could with ease make more cloth than several others in the same space of time. This gave rise to rioting among the weavers, and to such loud complaints, that the use of this machine was at length prohibited by the magistrates.” According to this account, Leyden was the place of the invention; but, in order to determine the time, it will be necessary to attend to the following circumstances. Boxhorn’s Institutiones PoliticÆ have been often printed, as for example, at Amsterdam 1663, in 12mo. Boxhorn read lectures on the Institutiones PoliticÆ, and gave verbal illustrations of them to his scholars, one of whom, in the year 1641, carried a fairly written copy of the latter to Germany, and gave them to Professor C.F. Franckenstein, who caused them to be printed for the first time at Leipsic in 1658, and again in 1665, 12mo. The passage above-quoted is to be found in the illustrations which are appended. Hence there is reason to conclude that the ribbon-loom was known in Holland about the year 1621.

It is some confirmation of Boxhorn’s account, that the States-General, as early as the 11th of August 1623, if they did not totally prohibit the use of the ribbon-loom, as commonly asserted, at any rate greatly circumscribed it. The proclamation for that purpose may be found in the Groot Placaet-Boeck1295, a valuable collection published at the Hague in seven large folio volumes, between the years 1658 and 1746. Nothing further however is found there respecting the history of ribbon-looms, which are called Lint-molens, than that they had been in use for several years to the great injury and even total ruin of many thousands of workmen, who were accustomed to weave ribbons on the common loom. This prohibition was renewed on the 14th of March 1639, and again on the 17th of September 1648, as appears by the same work1296. On the 5th of December 1661, the use of them was extended a little longer, and defined with more precision1297; but as far as I have been able to find, no other regulations were made respecting these machines in the Netherlands.

The council of Nuremberg, it is said, prohibited the use of them in 1664, as is mentioned in the Hanau work, which I shall soon have occasion to quote.

On the 24th of December, the same year, ribbon-looms were prohibited in the Spanish Netherlands. In the proclamation for that purpose, it is stated that a great number of articles manufactured on these looms were privately imported from Viane and Culenburg.

In the year 1665, there was to be seen at Frankfort-on-the-Maine, a loom which of itself wove all kinds of lace, tape, &c., provided the silk or yarn was properly arranged in the usual manner; but if a thread happened to break, it was necessary that some one should again join it by means of a knot1298. The year following, some person in that city applied not only to the council, but even to the emperor, for permission to establish such a loom, but was not able to obtain it.

In 1676 the ribbon-loom was prohibited at Cologne, and the same year some disturbance took place in consequence of its being introduced into England1299. It is probable that Anderson1300 alludes to this loom when he says, speaking of the above year, “As was also brought from Holland to London, the weavers’ loom-engine, then called the Dutch loom-engine.” He however praises the machine without describing it; nor does he mention that it occasioned any commotion.

The lace-weavers in Germany, but in particular the councils of Augsburg and Cologne, applied to Frederick Casimir, count of Hanau, who had great influence in the empire, and requested that he would endeavour to procure a general prohibition of ribbon-looms throughout all Germany; and the count accordingly presented a representation on this subject to the electors and states.

On the 8th of January 1681, it was declared by Imperial authority that a prohibition of ribbon-looms was both useful and necessary. This was followed by an imperial decree, dated January the 5th, 1685, and on the first of September following it was strengthened by a conclusum in senatu of the council of Frankfort.

The council of Hamburg, it is said, ordered a loom to be publicly burnt; and the emperor Charles VI. caused the prohibition of 1685 to be renewed on the 19th of February 1719; though some mercantile people made considerable opposition to this measure. A general prohibition was likewise issued in the electorate of Saxony, on the 29th of July 1720. All these coercive means however were ineffectual; and the ribbon-loom, being found useful, has now become common.

In the year 1718, the first loom of this kind was brought from Holland to Charlottenburg on the Spree; but Nicolai, in his Description of Berlin, says that this circumstance took place in the year 1728. The workmen were then engaged from foreign countries; and the loom was supported at the king’s expense. The electorate of Saxony also, in the year 1765, revoked its prohibition, and permitted such looms to be publicly used. In the rescript dated March the 20th, it is said, that as things were much changed, and as other German states had annulled the prohibitions against ribbon-looms, it was induced to grant full liberty to the lace-weavers to employ freely and publicly in future, ribbon and lace-looms, and to manufacture all kinds of ribbons and other articles of the like kind that could be wove on them. It stated further, that the lace-weavers should give notice whether any of them wished to establish ribbon-looms, and how soon they could get them ready for work; that such of them as did not choose to be at the expense, should for every loom constructed receive a certain sum, besides being admitted a member of the company; and that three months after the publication of this order, fifty rix-dollars would be given, by way of premium, for every loom on which from twelve to fifteen pieces of silk-ribbon could be wove; and thirty rix-dollars for every loom employed to weave ferret and articles of woollen1301. [The profitable application of steam-power to silk weaving was long considered to be almost impossible; so much time being consumed in the handling and trimming of the silk, in proportion to the time that the loom is in motion, there was consequently a waste of power. A small factory was built in 1831, for the purpose of making the experiment on ribbons. It was, however, burnt during a disturbance relating to prices; and though the act was disclaimed by weavers in general, the feeling amongst them was so strong against the employment of inanimate labour whilst their own was superabundant, that the scheme was given up. Within a few years there were numerous steam-factories at work at Congleton, Leek, Derby and other places, which made large quantities of plain ribbons, chiefly black sarsenets. The Coventry manufacturers, alarmed for the interests of their trade, formed in 1836 a steam-company, and erected a large factory, but difficulties arose as to the apportionment of the power among the different parties, and it has never yet been fitted up for its original purpose. Another large factory was soon after built, and applied to the making of figured ribbons, but owing to the failure of the parties, the experiment was not in this instance fairly tested. One experiment on a smaller scale had some success. The factories of the North and of Derby have proved the advantage of steam-power as applied to plain ribbons. At Congleton there were in 1838, 254 power-looms engaged in the manufacture of plain silk, a few black satin and some plain coloured ribbons; at Leek there were 100 employed in the same way, and at Derby 233. In these, each loom is tended by one pair of hands, which pick up and keep the machinery in order: the gain consists, not in a more rapid motion of the shuttles, the delicacy of the materials not allowing of this; but in the shooting down being seldom interrupted during the picking up, as in hand-loom weaving; in the greater regularity of the fabric, and also in the addition of from one-fifth to one-third more shuttles, for which one workman suffices, the loom being so constructed as to enable him to reach from the front over the batten to the warps behind. But when two pairs of hands are required for one loom, as is the case with the Jacquard loom, one before to tend the work and one behind to pick up, the advantage is much lessened. Steam-loom weaving is undoubtedly making great progress notwithstanding all disadvantages: in 1840, the steam-factory at Coventry, which formerly failed, was again at work under fresh parties, who were making both plain and fancy ribbons with a strong probability of ultimate success. The fine factory belonging to the Steam Company, which is now occupied by broad silk steam-looms, has one ribbon-loom at work; and in one other instance, in Coventry, Jacquard steam-looms are employed in making light figured ribbons with great beauty and precision, and in this case it is found that one man is able to tend the front and another the back of two looms. There can be little doubt that the time is approaching when steam will be the chief motive-power of the ribbon as of other manufacturing districts, and that the strength of English machinery will be called for to enter into competition with French taste.

Coventry is the great city for the manufacture of ribbons in England; in 1838, the number of persons employed there was 6000 or 7000, and in the rural parishes, 10,000 or 11,0001302.]