Second Shetland Truck System Report Part 61

1720. Were you ever told that worsted was a money article?-No; I never was told that, so far as I can remember.

1721. Have you dealt in any other shop than Mr. Sinclair's in this way?-No; I have knitted for two and a half years for Mr, Sinclair.

1722. And always in the same way?-Yes.

1723. Are you a North Unst woman?-Yes.

1724. Do you live in Lerwick by yourself?-I live with my mother and my two sisters in a room.

1725. Does your mother knit?-No; she spins.

1726. Does she spin your wool?-No; she gets wool from other people to spin, and gets money for her work. She only spins for those who employ her.

1727. Does she spin for the shops?-No; she spins generally for ladies in the town, who employ her to make worsted for them.

1728. Ask her employers altogether ladies, not merchants?-They are just merchants' wives, and ladies in the town-chiefly Dr.

Cowie's lady.

Lerwick, January 3, 1872, MRS ANN ARCUS, examined.

1729. You are a dresser in Lerwick?-Yes.

1730. How do you carry on that business? What is the nature of it?-I sometimes make shawls myself, and sell them. There [producing it] is a line of mine, which I got from Mr. Sinclair.

1731. Do you dress shawls or make them?-I dress shawls, and sometimes I make them or get them made.

1732. What is the dressing business?-Washing the shawls, and stretching them on the gra.s.s, and mending [Page 34] them and making them ready for the market. The st.i.tches sometimes give way when they are stretched and then I mend them.

1733. Do you also bleach the shawls?-We whiten them with brimstone.

1734. You do that before stretching them on the gra.s.s?-Yes.

1735. That is part of the washing process?-Yes.

1736. Does every shawl, after being knitted require to be so dressed before it is sold?-Yes.

1737. The merchants don't buy shawls until after they are dressed?-No.

1738. Are your transactions in dressing shawls always with the knitters, or are they sometimes with the merchants?-Sometimes they are with the merchants, and sometimes with the knitters.

1739. Then the merchants do buy shawls undressed?-No; they do not buy them undressed, but they send some shawls out to be worked for themselves; and it is these shawls I dress for them

1740 In that way a knitter who works for a merchant has nothing to do with you?-No.

1741. When she has knitted a shawl with wool supplied by the merchant, she takes it to the merchant, and he sends it to you to be dressed?-Yes.

1742. It is only the knitters who work with their own wool who come to you?-Yes.

1743. Do you also buy shawls from knitters yourself?-No; but I get shawls made in the same way as the merchants do, and then I sell them.

1744. To whom do you sell them?-To the merchants.

1745. Do you send any shawls south?-No.

1746. Do you sometimes sell knitted articles to the merchants on behalf of the knitters?-Yes.

1747. When a knitter brings you a shawl to dress, I suppose she pays you in money?-Yes.

1748. What is the usual for that?-There are different charges, according to the size of the shawl; but for the general run of them it is 6d.

1749. And that is always paid by the knitter to you in money?- Yes.

1750. In what way is it that you are sometimes asked to sell articles for the knitters?-Because I cannot always have them dressed and ready for them to sell after the time they come in with the goods and before they go away again. These women come from the country, and I cannot have their things ready before they want to go home again; and therefore I sell them for them before they come back.

1751. You sell them as their agent?-Yes.

1752. And then you account to them for the price?-Yes. I get the price from some of the merchants, but others mark it in their books, and don't give lines. These merchants mark down the price of the shawl, and the name of the woman who owns it.

1753. And she, when she comes to the merchant again, arranges with him as to the price?-Yes.

1754. Is it within your knowledge that these shawls are always paid for in goods?-The country girls don't want money, and don't ask it. It is always clothing they need, and they get it.

1755. Then they just knit for the purpose of supplying themselves with clothing?-Yes.

1756. How is it that they don't want money?-They have some other way of doing at home, and I suppose they only want their clothing from the shops in Lerwick.

1757. Then the knitting with them is an extra sort of employment?-Yes; it is not exactly a livelihood for them.

1758. Is that the case with the town girls too?-No; they generally depend on their knitting for a living.

1759. Do they regard it as a hardship not to get money?-I can only speak for myself, not for them. When I have a shawl of my own, and ask some money on it, I get it.

1760. Do the town girls come to you to sell their articles for them?-No; they sell their own work themselves. I dress the shawls for them, and they get the price themselves-sometimes in money I suppose, to pay me with.

1761. You think they get sufficient money for their shawls from the merchants, to pay your charge?-They get money somewhere to pay me with: whether it is their own money or not I don't know.

I don't take anything but money.

1762. You give them credit sometimes until their shawl is sold?- Yes.

1763. And then they come back you with the charge for dressing?-Yes.

1764. You shown me a line: where did you get it?-I got it in Mr.

Robert Sinclair's shop-I think from his clerk.

1765. When?-When I sold my shawl-a shawl of my own, which I knitted myself.

1766. You did not want anything particular at the time, and therefore you took the line: was that so?-No. I asked him for a little money on the shawl, and I got it; and then I got the line, so that I could buy what I required afterwards as I needed it.