sense of the word are, that it rarely occupies the whole time of the worker,
but is rather carried on as a subsidiary employment, usually side by side
with agriculture, and also that, in general, it is based on inherited designs
and models characteristic of the district in which it is carried on.
It is clear that, in our own days, domestic industry no longer forms an
essential proportion of the productions of the land as a whole. The rise of
the towns and of handicrafts, and, above all, the improved communications
of later times, modern industrialism, together with the taste for change
and alterations in domestic utensils, clothing, etc., which the former phenomena,
in their turn, called forth among the agricultural population, too,
and which is not so easily satisfied by home industries, are factors that,
in most places in Europe, have more or less completely exterminated domestic
industries, unless they have degenerated into house-industries
or “ sweating”, with an unscrupulous exploitation on the part of capitalist
middle-men.
Among the few countries where domestic industries have succeeded in
retaining their position to any great extent, Sweden is, beyond possibility
of contradiction, one of the principal. The reason of this is partly the fact
that from ancient times the Swedish nation, with its love of work and sense
of beauty, has been able to produce designs and models of rare beauty and
originality, especially as regards textiles and carpentry-sloyd, and that
it has since, with unswerving conservatism and devotion, held fast to the
work and methods of work handed down from ancestral times. But the
chief reason why domestic industries have survived in Sweden is, we think,
to be found in the position and natural features of the country. In thinly
populated districts, where the communications are but little developed, it
is greatly to the economic advantage of the rural population, even to-day,
to supply their own needs, as far as certain branches of production
are concerned, and in tracts where the soil is not very fertile, or where the
climate is less suitable for agriculture, domestic industries carried on for
profit form a by no means contemptible minor source of income. When,
during four to seven months of the year, cold and the short daylight prevent
aDy very great amount of agricultural work being done, during the
afternoons at least, domestic industries, especially if there be no forest-
work or other suitable winter occupations to be had, give a welcome addition
to the limited income derived from work, and prevent many a one
from idling his time away. The great economic and ethical importance
for Sweden of domestic industries has, too, of late years, although as yet
still insufficiently, in an ever-increasing degree awakened the attention of
the authorities and private individuals, this attention finding expression
in the adoption of various measures for the encouragement and promotion
of home-sloyd.
Domestic industry for domestic supply. It is in the very nature of
things that it is within the domestic industries that are carried on to supply
domestic needs, rather than in similar industries carried on for the sake of profit,
that the so-called peasant-art is to be met with. In the case of domestic industries
for domestic supply the workman, of course, feels the greatest imaginable
interest for the article he makes, an interest which lasts for a far longer time
than that needed for the production of the article in question, and which does
not cease before the object thus produced is altogether worn out. A successful
piece of work the producer honours with its daily use while, for an unsuccessful
article, he would every day be put to shame in the presence of relatives,
companions, and friends. The workman, therefore, not only exercises all his
technical ability, but he also embodies in the work of his hands his artistic
skill and his sense of beauty and harmony.
Productions of this interest, of this artistic sense, are seen, amongst other
things, in the rich Dalecarlian domestic industry, with its original lace-designs,
many-coloured textiles, quaintly painted wall-hangings and cupboards, its well-
designed chairs with other articles of domestic use, and implements. We trace
the same interest, the same artistic spirit, in the large chests of the rich Skane
peasant, filled, as they are, with gaily-coloured woven treasures with their
quaint untranslatable names — ’’rodlakan, krabbasnar, dukagang, munkabalte,
opphamta, rosengang”, with the rest of all these many kinds of artistic textile
productions, which, as a matter of fact, were once in general use almost everywhere
in the country but, above all — besides Skane — in Vastergotland, Bohus-
lan, Blekinge, Smaland, Dalarne, Halsingland, and Angermanland. Bobbin-lace-
work, too, in the districts around the towns of Motala, Vadstena, and Skanninge,
and in many places in Dalarne and Skane, show us traces of this peasant-art;
so does the art-knitting of Halland and the various forms of Laplanders’ sloyd
in leather, bone, wood, and horn. It has been asserted that this artistic peasant
industry hardly exists in our own times, but the incorrectness of this assertion
is plainly shown by the investigation now being carried out by the Domestic
Industries Committee, appointed by the Government during 1912. It is true
that this art-sloyd has fallen off tremendously, but the fact is that, even at the
present day, it is carried on especially in Skane, Dalarne, and Norrland, and
that in many places, in consequence of the encouragement it has received from
Agricultural Societies and Societies for the Promotion of Domestic Industries,
it has increased somewhat during the last few years and, in not a few instances,
has become a fairly lucrative market-sloyd.
The same investigation shows that domestic industries to supply domestic
needs for practical use alone still play a fairly essential part in the life of the
Swedish peasant. Agricultural Societies and Societies for the Promotion of
Domestic Industries in most of the Ians report that spinning for domestic needs
is carried on in a number of farmers’ families, and that weaving is practised
in still more. This is especially the case in the more remote districts of the
country, which are less affected by modem ’’culture“, such as those in the Lans
of Norrbotten and Vasterbotten, where, even at the present day, homespun and
other articles of attire required by the family, such as linen and stockings, are made
at home. The same state of things exists in districts where, as in the parishes
round lake Siljan in Dalame, the ancient' peasant dresses are still worn. In more
centrally situated tracts, on the other hand, especially in the neighbourhood of
the larger towns, the peasants prefer factory-goods to home-made articles.
The total gross value of sloyd-articles made for home needs — ordinary needlework,
repairing- and buildingwork not included — is for 1912 estimated at about
13- million kronor. Of this amount the Lans of Kopparberg, Vasternorrland,
vasterbotten, and Norrbotten claim ltj^ lV s million kronor each. It is quite
natural that such figures do not by any means claim to be exact, and they
are rather to be considered as fairly rough estimations, which in every case are
certainly much too low.