It was not until 1740 that the Manchester traders began to give out warps and raw cotton to the weavers, receiving them back in cloth, and paying for the carding, roving, spinning, and weaving. The weaver, if the spinning was not done by his own family, paid the spinner for the spinning, and the spinner paid the carder and the rover. The weaving of a piece of chains or thicksets, containing twelve pounds of weft, at Is. 6d. per pound, occupied a weaver about fourteen days, and he received for the weaving 18s. The spinning of the weft, at 9d. per pound, amounted to 9s. ; and the picking, carding, and roving of the article, at the same sum per pound, reached 9s. Thus, when the weaver took the piece to the master, he received 36s., out of which he paid the spinner 18s., the spinner paying 9s. for the carding and roving. A weaver required three grown persons to supply him with weft.

At this period (1760) wheat was 5s. per bushel, of 70lbs.; meal, 20s. per load; beef, 2d. per lb.; a neck of mutton, 9d.; and cheese, 21/4d. per lb. Land let for £1 10s. the Cheshire acre, and a weaver's cottage, with a two-loom shop, for £2 or £2 10s. per annum.

The average rate of wages earned by power-loom weavers at the present time (1847) is 10s. per week each, cotton spinners 17s. per week, card-room hands from 9s. to 10s., and adult piecers from 9s. to 11s. At the present period, wheat is about 10s. 6d. per bushel,

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