THE RURAL INDUSTRIES OF • ENGLAND AND WALES.—III. DECORATIVE CRAFTS
AND RURAL POTTERIES. By Helen E. • FitzRandolph and M. Doriel Hay. (Clarendon Press. 5s.)—Two ladies, working on behalf of the Agricultural-Economics Research Institute at Oxford, have collected much curious and interesting informa- tion about the village industries of England. They describe elearly what is being done, give details of wages, explain the difficulties of marketing the wares, and discuss the prospects. Too often the subject is merely treated from a sentimental standpoint. The authors rightly try to get down to hard facts, though they realize that the primary object of the Women's Institutes and other organizations is to teach country women and girls some pleasant handicraft for their leisure hours. They rule out lace-making as wholly unprofit- able - it yields at best a few pence an hour to a skilled worker. •There are better prospects for hand-weaving, glove- . "Making, leather-working, basket-Making and other attractive crafts, provided always that a regular market can be found. The five Women's Institutes in Warwickshire, who 'have combined to open a. shop at Dunchurch, have done well, and the example might be widely followed. The shop is on a main road, and passing motorists are good customers. The jet and serpentine workers are not forgotten, and there is an appendix on the Brandon flint knappers, of whom in 1923 there were only four, with an old man to dig the flints out of a deep shaft.
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