78 THE INDUSTRIAL WAGE EARNERS [CH

Ill]

THE INDUSTRIAL WAGE EARNERS

₇₉

the south,

by

the curious ancientorganisationsof thecompagnon- nages

among

the elite of the journeymen; organisations from

which many

unions _ultimately sprang. Ccmpagnonnages

had

always existed in defiance of government, since their history first

comes

clearly intolightinthesixteenthcentury.

They

were too old

and

too strongforthe laws of the Constituent

Assembly

or thepoliceofNapoleon. In the longruntherailwaysdid

more

tokill

them

thanever thelawhad done^.

The compagnmnage

sprang

up

and was always strongest in the building trades. Its

members

were single journeymen,

skilled

and

tested. Marriageor recognitionasamaster involved retirement;

and

incompetence was,at leastnominally, a barto entry. Building labour

had

always been migratory. Outside the building trades too there was an old, but not universal, custom

by which

theskilled

man moved from town

to town,to find

work and

perfect himselfin his craft.

He made

the Tour de France,

became

a

Compagnon

du Tour de France.

As

he

moved

about, his compagnonnage provided help for

him

in

many ways —

^{the inn or} boarding house, kept

by

a "father"

ora "mother,"

where

he lodged;foodandshelter untilhehad found

work

;assistance to find it through^a recognised

member

of the society called the rouleur,

who

assigned

men

jobs in rotation,

and was

well

known

to employers; help in sickness;

help inhis quarrels; help to leave a master

who

offended

him

orwas

on

the rouleur'sblacklist;help toget

away from

a

town where

he could not earn

enough

^; help perhaps inastrike;and always

good

fellowship

when

thewine was tappedor thefuneral bell

was

tolling.

Compagnons

werenot organised primarily accordingto trades, thoughtradedistinctions

made

themselvesfelt.

The

whole

body was

split into sections called devoirs, bearing ancient fantastic

names,

whose

legendary explanation bears witness totheorigin of the system

among

building

workmen. The

Children of Solomon, or Devoir de ^liberie, reckoned themselves the

most

ancient group; and

among them

the

masons

were the senior division.

The

other original divisions were joiners and lock-

1 SeeMartin-SaintL^on,Lecompagnonnage,andLevasseur,I,511^sqq.

8o

THE INDUSTRIAL WAGE ^EARNERS

^[ch.

smiths.

The

cooperswereadmittedin1839 andthe bootmakers in 1844. Solomon's children

made

no special religious pro- fessionand were largely recruited

among

^southern Protestants.

The

great rival group, the Children ofMaster ^James, an im- aginary builder of Solomon's temple, were ^{also originally}

composed

ofthe

same

threebuildingcrafts,plus the^carpenters

;

buttheywere strictCatholics.

They

hadadmitted

many

^other

trades into their

company

before 1789.

The

^{list is long but}

historically significant. It runs thus

—

^{tanners, dyers, rope-}

makers, basket-makers,hatters,whitelawyers,founders,pinners, smiths, cloth shearers, turners,glaziers,saddlers, stove-builders, gilders, cutlers, tinsmiths, harness-makers^wheelwrights, tilers

and

plasterers. Recently recognised were the canvas-makers

and

the farriers; and in a

more

doubtful position came the bootmakers, bakers and makers ofsabots.

Note

the absenceof miners, of

most

kinds of weavers, of all kinds of spinners

—

spinnerswere

women

inthe eighteenthcentury

—

ofallkinds of transport workers, and ofthefew classes ofeighteenth century craftsmen

who

had any knowledge of machines, clockmakers, instrument-makers, millwrights. Note, in short,

how

those groupswhich weretodominatetheEuropeanlabour

movement

ofthelaternineteenthcenturywerenotyeteven counted worth recognition

by

thedliteoftheskilledjourneymen,eitherbecause they were so few, like the machine workers, or because ^they wereso lowly,liketheminersandthe carters

There was

an oldworld flavour about the compagnons, with their legends and their rites ofinitiation, their passwords and elaborate greetings

when

they

met

on thehighway,their canes and ribbons fiill of symbolism, the speed vwth which theyfell

to brawling for the honour of

Solomon

or Master James, or forthe right to wear ribbons and to wear

them

in a particular

way.

They

hadtheapparatusandthe quicktemperof

members

of secret societies all the world over; for in their long career they had never been favoured

by

the governing powers.

Repressedfor atime during the Revolution, they recoveredunder the

Empire

and the Restoration, to the dismayof the powers.

"At

the funeral of a mason," the police of Bordeaux reported in 1818,

"a numerous

cortege of masons has been observed

Ill]

THE INDUSTRIAL WAGE EARNERS

8i adorned with all the

emblems

of the ancient compagnonnage."

The

illegal cortege

was

dissolved and two

men

were arrested

"still wearing their hats adorned with ribbons.

These

in- dividuals, being natives of Bordeaiix, were ^sent

home,

but the ribbons were seized

and

the affair was reported to the public prosecutorto frightenthose

who

mightimitatetheirexample'^."

The same

sort of thing

had happened

before. It did not dis- courage the compagnons. Theirs was the most permanent and importantworkingclassorganisationofthe Restoration period;

and

itonly graduallylostground after 1830.

They

hadthe true oldworldintolerance,

which

led to rebellions

among

theyounger

men, who

resented the patronage and bullyingoftheirseniors.

Their queer old rites were

becoming

ridiculous to the critical

mind

of the nineteenth century

workman.

Industries with

which some

of

them

were connected begantobe transformed,

A

type of organisationstrictlyaccordingtotrades

became more

and

more

attractivetothe average

wage

earner.

A

^labour

^move-

ment was

takingshape

among workmen who

hadneverbelonged to the compagnonnages, and were not likely to imitate them.

Last

came

therailway, tochangethelifeofthemigratorywork-

man

and destroy the companionships of the open road. But the building trades in

which

the compagnonnages had begun, being as yet untouched

by

machinery, remained a stronghold for

them

in 1848; and it

was

only in the second half of the century thatthey sankfinallyinto obscurity.

^ Bourgin,op.cit.p. 133.

CHAPTER IV