Second Shetland Truck System Report Part 60

1673. Do you sell your shawls to any person in particular?-Yes; to Mr Robert Sinclair.

1674. Are you paid for them in goods?-Yes, and a little in money. I always get some money from him to buy the worsted with.

1675. Would you be content with a lower price for your shawls if you were paid in money?-Yes.

1676. Have you ever asked to get it all in money, and offered to take less?-No.

1677. Do you ever sell shawls to ladies or to any person not in the trade?-No; Mr. Robert Sinclair has bought them all from me.

1678. Have you ever asked for more money from any of the merchants than they would give you?-No.

1679. Have you ever got lines?-Yes, I got lines from Mr.

Sinclair.

1680. When?-When I gave in my articles.

1681. And when you did not happen to want goods?-Yes.

1682. Have you got any of these lines?-No.

1683. What did you do with them?-I gave them back when I got the goods.

1684. Was that long ago?-No, not long ago; it was when I sold my last shawl to him.

1685. Would that be a month or two?-Yes.

1686. Was a line given to you for the whole price of the shawl that you were selling, or was it only for the balance?-27s., was the price of the shawl.

1687. How much of that did you take in goods?-I took about one half of it, and I got a line for the rest.

1688. Did you take the line out in goods afterwards-Yes.

1689. You did not think of asking money for the line?-No; I never asked money at that time.

1690. Did you ever know of people selling their lines to their neighbours?-No.

1691. Or dealing with them in any way, or letting their neighbours get goods for them?-No.

1692. How much of the 27s., the price of your last shawl, did you get in money?-7s.

1693. When was that?-I think about two months ago, I do not recollect exactly.

1694. Was the 7s. all that you asked for?-Yes; I asked for the 7s.

and he said he would give it to me.

1695. Did you take 4s. or 5s, worth of goods at the same time?- Yes; or perhaps more.

1696. And the rest in a line?-Yes.

Lerwick, January 3, 1872, JEMIMA SANDISON, examined.

1697. Are you a knitter in Lerwick?-Yes.

1698. Do you knit with your own wool?-No.

1699. Do you knit for merchants in the town?-Yes; for Mr.

Robert Sinclair.

1700. Have you a pa.s.s-book?-Yes. [Produces it.]

1701. Do you deal with Mr Sinclair in the way which has been described already by the Witnesses you have heard?-No.

1702. Do you deal in a different way?-Yes.

1703. How is that? You get wool from him to knit into shawls or veils?-Yes; chiefly veils.

1704. The goods you get are entered in the pa.s.sbook you have produced, and the goods given in are entered at the end of it?- Yes.

1705. Are the goods supplied to you always goods which you are requiring for your own use?-Yes.

1706. You do not sell any of them, or get them for your neighbours?-No; unless such goods as my own family require.

1707. Do you live with your own family?-Yes; with my mother.

1708. Do you get part of the payment for your shawls and veils in money?-Yes; whenever I ask money I get it. I never asked a s.h.i.+lling from Mr. Sinclair himself but that I always got it.

1709. When you got money for a shawl, how was it entered in the book?-I cannot say anything about that.

1710. If you were to take two veils to Mr. Sinclair and ask the money for them, do you think you would get it?-I cannot say, because I never asked it; but whenever I asked for a small quant.i.ty of money, such as 2s. or the like of that, I got it.

1711. What quant.i.ty of goods did you generally take at a time?-I cannot say that either. I don't think I ever had money to get out of his book. I was always due him something, and in that way I could not ask him for money.

1712. Then your account was larger than the value of the articles which you took to him?-Yes.

1713. If that was so, did you ever ask him for money at all?-Yes; sometimes, when I was in a strait for money I asked him for a little, and I got it.

1714. Then that was an advance, which he made when there was nothing due to you?-Yes; I have asked him for money when I was due him.

1715. But you don't know how that was entered in the pa.s.s-book, or whether it was entered there at all?-No; I don't think it was entered.

1716. I see there are entries in your pa.s.s-book: April 28, 1871, cash 1s.; April 26, cash 6d.: is that the way the money was entered?-Yes.

1717. There is an entry of worsted, 5d. was that worsted given to you for the purpose of knitting shawls to Mr. Sinclair?-I asked for worsted to buy, and I got it to knit for myself, and to sell again.

1718. Then it is entered in the pa.s.s-book just as goods?-Yes.

1719. Is there any difficulty made about giving you worsted in that way and entering it in the pa.s.s-book?-No; whenever I ask for worsted, I get it the same as any other thing out of the shop.