Still less serviceable are those schemes of rescuing “the unemployed,” which, in the very work of rescue, engender an economic force whose operation causes as much unemployment as it cures.  A signal example of this futile system of social drainage has been afforded by certain experiments of the Salvation Army in their City Works and Farm Colony.  The original draft of the scheme contained in the volume, In Darkest England, clearly recognized the advisability of keeping the bounty-fed products of the Salvation Colonies from competition in the market with the products of outside labour.  The design was to withdraw from the competitive labour market certain members of “the unemployed,” to train and educate them in efficient labour, and to apply this labour to capital provided out of charitable funds:  the produce of this labour was to be consumed by the colonists themselves, who would thus become as far as possible self-supporting; in no case was it to be thrown upon the open market.  As a matter of fact these sound, economic conditions of social experiment have been utterly ignored.  Matches, firewood, furniture, etc. produced in the City factories have been thrown upon the open market.  The Hadleigh Farm Colony, originally designed to give a thorough training in the arts of agriculture so as to educate its members for the Over Sea Colony, has devoted more and more attention to shoemaking, carpentering, and other special mechanical crafts, and less and less to the efficient cultivation of the soil; the boots, chairs, etc. being thrown in large quantities upon the open market.  Moreover, the fruit and vegetables raised upon the Farm have been systematically placed upon the outside market.  The result of such a line of conduct is evident.  Suppose A is a carpenter thrown out of work because there are more carpenters than are required to turn out the current supply of chairs and tables at a profitable price; the Salvation Army takes A in hand, and provides him with capital upon which no interest need be paid.  A’s chairs, now thrown on the market, can undersell the chairs provided by B, C, D, his former trade competitors.  Unless we suppose an increased demand for chairs, the result is that A’s chairs displace those of B in the market, and B is thrown out of employment.  Thus A, assisted by the Salvation Army, has simply taken B’s work.  If the Salvation Army now takes B in hand, it can engage him in useful work on condition that he takes away the work of C. If match-makers are thrown out of work by trade conditions, and the Salvation Army places them in a factory, and sells in the open market the matches which they make, the public which buys these matches abstains from buying the matches made by other firms, and these firms are thus prevented from employing as much labour as they would otherwise have done.  No net increase of employment is caused by this action of the Salvation Army, and therefore they have done nothing towards