Thames side tender was £6,700: a better one from the North of England was £5,500, but from Rotterdam a Dutch tender was received for £1,800." Naturally the ship went to Rotterdam to be repaired; but she herself had knocked a hole in the much battered bottom of the Safeguarding of Industry Act, designed to protect our industry against competition encouraged by depreciated currency. For this tender, offering to do a job for less than a third of the best British bid, came from a country with an appreciated currency. Sir Fortescue accounted for the puzzle by saying that Dutch labour is almost as highly paid as labour in the North of England, but the Dutchmen worked longer hours and were free from many of the restrictions that cramp the British workman's elbow, and employers were content with a smaller profit. It is true that Holland got steel from Germany at half the price of ours, but that could not account for the enormous difference between the two tenders. Better work, fewer restrictions, and organizers of industry who were not too greedy were the causes on this occasion of the foreigners' success and probably were in many of those that were ascribed to currency depreciation.
My own personal experience in the matter was also strange. I happened at about the
