The labour of slaves is therefore less valuable than that of brutes, inasmuch as their strength is inferior; and less valuable than that of free labourers, inasmuch as their Reason and Will are feeble and alienated.
Free and slave labour are equally owned by the capitalist.
Where the labourer is not held as capital, the capitalist pays for labour only.
Where the labourer is held as capital, the capitalist not only pays a much higher price for an equal quantity of labour, but also for waste, negligence, and theft, on the part of the labourer.
Capital is thus sunk, which ought to be reproduced.
As the supply of slave-labour does not rise and fall with the wants of the capitalist, like that of free labour, he employs his occasional surplus on works which could be better done by brute labour or machinery.
By rejecting brute labour, he refuses facilities for convertible husbandry, and for improving the labour of his slaves by giving them animal food.
By rejecting machinery, he declines the most direct and complete method of saving labour.
Thus, again, capital is sunk which ought to be reproduced.