More Employment The most satisfactory point arising from the unemploy-
ment figures for September is that the reduction of the total by 54,591 occurs in a season which normally shows a falling off in employment. We are justified in concluding that the improvement in trade is real when it is strong enough to counteract seasonal variations. It is true that most of the addition to the ranks of the employed might appear to be accounted for by the re-employment of 48,648 miners in the one big industry which always improves in the autumn. But the greater part of this figure is balanced by the seasonal falling off in the distributive trades, hotel services, building and public works. The upshot is that a majority of industries, including iron and steel, pottery and cotton, were in a position to take on more hands, thus showing that progress in the right direction has not vet exhausted itself, in spite of the continuing slackness in foreign trade.
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