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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 75467 ***
+
+
+
+
+
+                            SWEATED INDUSTRY
+                                AND THE
+                              MINIMUM WAGE
+
+
+  “The whole spectacle of poverty indeed is incredible. As soon as you
+  cease to have it before your eyes—even when you have it before your
+  eyes—you can hardly believe it, and that is perhaps why so many people
+  deny that it exists, or is much more than a superstition of the
+  sentimentalist.”
+
+                                                          W. D. HOWELLS.
+
+  “The system which produces the happiest moral effects will be found
+  most beneficial to the interest of the individual and the common weal;
+  upon this basis the science of political economy will rest at last,
+  when the ponderous volumes with which it has been overlaid shall have
+  sunk by their own weight into the dead sea of oblivion.”
+
+                                                             R. SOUTHEY.
+
+
+
+
+                            SWEATED INDUSTRY
+                                AND THE
+                              MINIMUM WAGE
+
+
+                                    BY
+
+                             CLEMENTINA BLACK
+
+                         WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY
+
+                              A. G. GARDINER
+
+ CHAIRMAN OF THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE OF THE NATIONAL ANTI-SWEATING LEAGUE
+
+[Illustration: [Logo]]
+
+                                 LONDON
+                            DUCKWORTH & CO.
+                3 HENRIETTA STREET, COVENT GARDEN, W.C.
+                                  1907
+
+
+
+
+                         _All rights reserved._
+
+
+
+
+So many persons have kindly helped me with material for this volume that
+it is impossible to name all of them; but I cannot forbear to express my
+thanks to Mr W. Pember Reeves, to Mr Tom Garnett of Clitheroe, to my old
+friends Mrs Bogue Luffmann and Mr H. H. Champion, who have collected
+information for me in Australia, and last, but not least, to Mr Gardiner
+for his valuable introduction.
+
+                                                                   C. B.
+
+
+  _March 1907_
+
+
+
+
+                                CONTENTS
+
+
+                                                    PAGE
+                INTRODUCTION                          ix
+
+                                 PART I
+                            SWEATED INDUSTRY
+
+                               CHAPTER I
+                THE POOREST OF ALL                     1
+
+                               CHAPTER II
+                WORKERS IN FACTORIES AND WORKSHOPS    23
+
+                              CHAPTER III
+                SHOP ASSISTANTS, CLERKS, WAITRESSES   48
+
+                               CHAPTER IV
+                TRAFFIC WORKERS                       75
+
+                               CHAPTER V
+                WAGE-EARNING CHILDREN                104
+
+                               CHAPTER VI
+                SUMMARY                              132
+
+                              CHAPTER VII
+                HOW UNDERPAYMENT COMES               144
+
+                              CHAPTER VIII
+                LABOUR AS A COMMODITY                161
+
+                                PART II
+                            THE MINIMUM WAGE
+
+                               CHAPTER I
+                EXISTING CHECKS                      175
+
+                               CHAPTER II
+                SUPPOSED REMEDIES                    195
+
+                              CHAPTER III
+                THE LESSONS OF THE COTTON TRADE      212
+
+                               CHAPTER IV
+                THE MINIMUM WAGE IN PRACTICE         230
+
+                               CHAPTER V
+                FOREIGN COMPETITION                  260
+
+                               CHAPTER VI
+                GAIN TO THE NATION                   272
+
+                INDEX                                277
+
+
+
+
+                              INTRODUCTION
+
+
+The sweating evil has long engaged the attention of social and
+industrial workers in many fields. Some have approached it from the
+philanthropic point of view, and have sought a remedy in voluntary means
+such as consumers’ leagues; others have approached it from the point of
+view of industrial organisation, and have sought to deal with it by the
+extension of trade unionism and legislative action. So far all efforts
+alike have been futile. The evil is too wide-spread and too remote in
+its operations to be touched by charity. It involves a class too
+forlorn, too isolated, and too impoverished to be reached by trade
+unionism. The cry of the victims has hitherto been too feeble and
+hopeless to command the attention of Parliament.
+
+This has happily been changed by the object lesson presented by the
+Sweating Exhibition organised by _The Daily News_ last May and opened by
+the Princess Henry of Battenberg. That exhibition, held right in the
+heart of West London, visited by thirty thousand people, and commanding
+the attention of all serious students of our social system, brought the
+question instantly into the sphere of practical politics. Sweating was
+no longer a vague term concerning some more or less apocryphal wrongs.
+It was made real and actual. It was seen to be not an excrescence on the
+body politic, having no bearing upon its general health, but an organic
+disease. It was seen to be an evil not simply affecting some obscure
+lives in the mean streets of our cities, but an evil that wasted the
+whole industrial physique—a running sore that affected the entire fabric
+of society, a morass exhaling a miasma that poisoned the healthy
+elements of industry. Its spectre haunted not only the fever dens of the
+slums, but was present in the most costly garments of the most
+fashionable West-End shops, in the rich embroideries of the wealthy as
+well as in the household matchbox. Well dressed people who came with the
+comfortable belief that sweated goods were necessarily cheap goods
+realised with a shock that cheapness and sweating had no intrinsic
+relationship. They saw with more or less clearness that sweating reduced
+to its true meaning was not the oppression of the poor in the interests
+of the poor; but the effort of an uneconomic system to extract from the
+misery of the unorganised, ill-equipped worker the equivalent of
+organised, well paid and well equipped industry. It was the competition
+of flesh and blood with machinery. Sweating, it was seen, did not make
+goods cheap: it only made human life cheap. It did not benefit the
+consumer: it only benefited the man who set the slum to compete with the
+workshop, the man or more often the woman and the child to compete with
+the machine. It was seen that the evil lowered the whole vitality of
+industry. It preyed upon the defenceless and used them to depress the
+general industrial standard. It had no chance in a highly organised
+community, and found its victims in the hopeless and the broken, among
+the poor widows of the courts and alleys and all those who had lost
+heart in the battle and were sunk into the lowest depths of the social
+abyss.
+
+Not the least disquieting revelation that emerged from the Exhibition
+and the lectures which accompanied it was the bearing of the evil upon
+our collective life. The sweated reacted upon the community. It was seen
+that they not only lowered the industrial standard: they were a menace
+to the communal good, a drain upon the resources of society in the
+interests of the people who exploited them. They provided a reserve of
+incredibly cheap labour which the community had to subsidise from the
+rates. Having no power of combination or resistance they were beaten
+down by the employer far below the barest means of subsistence, and the
+task of keeping them alive was left to the public. This was the case
+even when they were employed; but in many instances the work was
+seasonal and subject to long periods of unemployment. Then their whole
+existence depended upon a mingling of pauperism and charity until a
+fresh demand for their labour sprang up, and the public purse was
+relieved of some portion of the task of keeping them alive. It was seen,
+in short, that sweating meant the maintenance out of the rates of a vast
+mass of low class labour which enabled the sweater to compete
+successfully with high class labour. Many of the complaints of high
+rates in the East End for example came from the very firms whose high
+dividends were actually being paid out of the rates in the form of poor
+relief to the underpaid worker.
+
+The bearing of the evil upon child life was made equally clear. It was
+not merely that the children of the sweated were ill-nourished and
+ill-clad. They were made to take their share in the incessant struggle
+for food. They too became competitors with healthy industry, and by
+increasing the family output actually served to still further lower the
+starvation wages. For in this social morass there is no minimum. The
+excess of labour is so great and the demand for food so urgent that the
+tendency is constantly downward. It is a fight for bread in which the
+sweater plays off the dire misery of these against the deeper misery of
+those. And in this struggle the child life of the slums is used as a
+counter in the game and a new generation of the physically unfit and
+socially dead springs up like rank weeds to choke the hope and effort of
+the future.
+
+Finally, it was made clear that sweating is the enemy of the development
+of industry. It makes it possible to extract from the necessities of the
+poor what ought to be extracted from highly developed processes. It
+checks the natural evolution of commercial effort by an uneconomic
+substitute. Mr Sidney Webb states this point with much force in his
+“Industrial Democracy” when he says:
+
+“We arrive, therefore, at the unexpected result that the enforcement of
+definite minimum conditions of employment positively stimulates the
+invention and adoption of new processes of manufacture. This has been
+repeatedly remarked by the opponents of Trade Unionism. Thus Babbage, in
+1832, described in detail how the invention and adoption of new methods
+of forging and welding gun-barrels was directly caused by the combined
+insistence on better conditions of employment by all the workmen engaged
+in the old process. ‘In this difficulty,’ he says, ‘the contractors
+resorted to a mode of welding the gun-barrel according to a plan for
+which a patent had been taken out by them some years before the event.
+It had not then succeeded so well as to come into general use, _in
+consequence of the cheapness of the usual mode of welding by hand
+labour_, combined with some other difficulties with which the patentee
+had had to contend. But _the stimulus produced by the combination of the
+workmen for this advance of wages_ induced him to make a few trials, and
+he was enabled to introduce such a facility in welding gun-barrels by
+roller, and such perfection in the work itself, that in all probability
+very few will in future be welded by hand-labour.’”
+
+The profound impression made by the Exhibition found expression in a
+universal desire for action. The question one heard again and again was
+“What can we do? What can we do?” It was the question which the Princess
+of Wales asked as she passed round the stalls where the workers were
+engaged at their various forms of slavery. It was the question which
+continued like a hopeless refrain throughout the six weeks of the
+Exhibition. Most people came with vague ideas of the evil and went away
+with vaguer ideas of the remedy. Many of them were doubtless glad to
+forget this contact with that other forlorn world which seemed such a
+disquieting challenge to the splendour and luxury of the world of
+society. It was a painful interlude between a visit to the shops in the
+morning and a visit to the theatre in the evening.
+
+The general feeling however was not one of idle curiosity, but of grave
+concern, and when the Exhibition closed it was felt that the public
+conscience once awakened must not be allowed to go to sleep again. The
+Exhibition had been an appeal to the individual; but all experience
+showed that voluntary action on the part of the individual, while worthy
+and desirable, would not touch the evil. Consumers’ leagues had been at
+work in this country and still more in America; but they had done little
+to reduce the vast sum of misery. If the Exhibition was to bear fruit it
+must be in the direction of legislative action.
+
+The immediate outcome was the formation of the Anti-Sweating League to
+secure a minimum wage, and later in the year a three days’ conference,
+opened by the Lord Mayor and representing two millions organised
+workers, was held at the Guildhall. This conference, which was addressed
+on various aspects of the evil and its remedy by authorities like Sir
+Chas. Dilke, Lord Dunraven, Mr Pember Reeves, Mr Sidney Webb, Mr J. A.
+Hobson, Mr Bernard Wise, Miss Clementina Black and others, unanimously
+endorsed the programme of the League which was embodied in the Bill now
+before Parliament. That Bill is purely experimental. It is based upon
+the lines of the Victorian Wages Board system and is applied only to a
+certain group of trades which furnish the best field for an experiment
+which has become firmly established and generally operative in the
+Australian colony. Many authorities prefer the Arbitration system of New
+South Wales and New Zealand; but the difficulty in the way of the
+adoption of that system in this country is the opposition of the trade
+unions. All are agreed on the principle of the minimum wage, and the
+Wages Board has been accepted as the only possible legislative
+expression of that principle in this country. So far as can be seen,
+then, the Bill offers the one available remedy for an evil which all are
+agreed must be dealt with.
+
+It is not necessary here to argue at length the case for the principle
+of the minimum wage. Those interested in the subject will find it stated
+in the addresses given at the Guildhall Conference and published in
+pamphlet form by the National Anti-Sweating League, Salisbury Square,
+E.C. It is forty-seven years since Ruskin shocked the economists of his
+time by declaring for the regulation of wages irrespective of the demand
+for labour.
+
+“Perhaps one of the most curious facts in the history of human error,”
+he said, “is the denial by the common political economist of the
+possibility of thus regulating wages; while for all the important and
+much of the unimportant labour on the earth, wages are already so
+regulated.
+
+“We do not sell our Prime-Ministership by Dutch auction; nor on the
+decease of a bishop, whatever may be the general advantages of simony,
+do we (yet) offer his diocese to the clergyman who will take the
+episcopacy at the lowest contract. We (we exquisite sagacity of
+political economy) do indeed sell commissions; but not openly,
+generalships; sick, we do not inquire for a physician who takes less
+than a guinea; litigious, we never think of reducing six-and-eightpence
+to four-and-sixpence; caught in a shower, we do not canvass the cabmen,
+to find one who values his driving at less than sixpence a mile.”
+
+Ruskin was duly punished. The publishers closed their magazines against
+such revolutionary teaching, and Carlyle’s “ten thousand sparrows”
+chirped in one furious chorus the current equivalent for “Socialism” and
+“Wastrel.”
+
+To-day the minimum wage, like so much else of Ruskin’s teaching, is a
+commonplace of the industrial system. No Government or municipality
+to-day issues a contract which does not contain a fair wages clause
+which is drawn up irrespective of the demand for labour, and every
+healthy organised industry has a fixed scale which is dependent on
+prices, it is true, but which is wholly independent of the demand and
+supply of labour. The whole teaching of modern industry is that cheap
+labour is dear labour, and that it is as important for successful
+competition to have a well equipped human instrument as to have well
+equipped machinery.
+
+To take the example of the cotton trade. Sixty years ago the condition
+of the Lancashire trade was deplorable. It was based largely on sweated
+labour, including the labour of wretched little slaves drafted in groups
+from the workhouses, and kept alive on porridge, their compound a shed
+or barn on the premises. To-day there is no industry more highly
+organised, and no class of worker—certainly no class of female
+worker—more adequately paid. Trade unionism with its fixed wage has made
+the Lancashire cotton trade the most wonderful industrial organism in
+the world. Four thousand miles from its raw material, ten thousand miles
+from its greatest market, it yet dominates the cotton industry as
+completely as our shipping trade, with all its relative advantages in
+regard to raw material and geographical situation, dominates the
+shipping industry of the world. Not least important is the peace which
+this high state of organisation has produced in the trade. It is many
+years since there was a serious conflict in Lancashire.
+
+The cotton trade in a word has had this enormous success not because
+labour is cheap, but because labour is dear—and good; because the human
+machine being kept at the highest point of perfection is the most
+productive instrument of its kind in the world. It has succeeded, above
+all, because the standard wage has removed the competition of low class,
+sweated labour, which is not only iniquitous in itself, but which has
+the effect of depreciating the whole currency of industry.
+
+And in depreciating the currency of industry it lowers the general
+standard of the community. Where wages are low, there the poor rate is
+necessarily high, and the general trader shares in the universal
+impoverishment. For it must be remembered that the working classes are
+the bedrock of commerce. Their condition reacts immediately upon
+society. The money they receive comes back instantly in a fertilising
+stream to the grocer, the bootmaker, and the clothier. These get nothing
+but bad debts and insolvency from the operations of the sweater, whose
+poor instruments, moreover, in falling upon the public purse, still
+further depress the shopkeeper.
+
+What has happened in the cotton trade may be paralleled by the
+experience of other trades. Wherever sweating has been eliminated by the
+regulation of wages, the health of the trade is established. Wherever
+the trade is only partly organised, as in the umbrella, the boot or the
+tailoring trade, the wholesome part suffers by the competition of those
+whose stock in trade is the misery of the unorganised poor. As an
+illustration of this competition I may quote the following comparison
+given by Miss Gertrude Tuckwell at the Guildhall Conference.
+
+             AMALGAMATED SOCIETY OF TAILORS AND TAILORESSES.
+                  │
+    STATEMENT OF PRICES AS AGREED TO BETWEEN THIS BODY AND THE LONDON
+   MASTER TAILORS’ ASSOCIATION, AND OF THE “SWEATED” RATES FOR SIMILAR
+                                  WORK.
+                  │
+                  │       TRADE UNION.                NON-UNION.
+                  │
+ Making Dress Coat│£1. 5s. 6d. to £1. 7s. 6d.        10s. to 16s.
+                  │  (6d. to 7d. per hour).    (These are prices where
+                  │                             middleman is employed
+                  │                             —16s. rarely reached.)
+ Gentleman’s Frock│           Do.                        Do.
+   Coat           │
+ Dress Vest       │      8s. to 9s. 3d.                2s. 6d.
+ Dress Trousers   │    7s. 3d. to 8s. 5d.             2s. to 4s.
+ Ladies’ Costume— │
+ Pressing         │     With very little                 2½d.
+ Machining        │       extras) 30s.                   9d.
+ Baisting         │                                      7d.
+ Felling          │                                      1¼d.
+                  │                                           ——1s. 7¾d.
+ Ladies’ Jackets— │
+ Pressing         │                                      1¼d.
+ Baisting         │           23s.                       3½d.
+ Machining        │                                      4½d.
+ Felling          │                                      ½d.
+                  │                                               ——9¾d.
+
+Ninepence three farthings against twenty three shillings! How is it
+possible for honest industry to compete against this exploitation of
+flesh and blood subsidised by the ratepayer? It was staggering facts of
+this sort that induced the Guildhall Conference to go beyond the scope
+of its reference by passing an amendment calling for the abolition of
+the outworker in all trades and the provision of workshop accommodation.
+
+Trade unionism has succeeded in regulating wages in the great industries
+whose operations can only be carried on on a great collective scale; but
+trade unionism alone is clearly unable to destroy sweating in the many
+industries in which the fabrication of the parts is let and sub-let
+until the origin of the whole is found in the dim, one-roomed tenement
+of the slum where the victim of the sweater carries on her tragic
+struggle with famine.
+
+“Isn’t the remedy Protection?” was a question frequently heard at the
+lectures given at the Exhibition. Most of us would agree with Mr Bernard
+Shaw who, in answering such a question, said he would be ready to
+protect our industry against sweated competition. But the general
+operation of Protection would be wholly in the interest of the sweater.
+It would put a new premium upon his vocation. And the fact remains that
+sweating is more rampant in protected countries even than in our own. It
+was the Berlin Exhibition which suggested the _Daily News_ Exhibition,
+and since that event there has been an exhibition in Philadelphia which
+has shown that the horrors of sweating in Protectionist America go
+deeper even than those in Free Trade England. And it is three of our
+Protectionist colonies which, realising the social menace of this trade
+in misery, have indicated the true path of reform. They have realised
+that the community must protect not only the individual but itself
+against a traffic which is slavery in the thinnest disguise, and which
+is not only cruel to the individual but destructive of honest industry
+and ruinous to social health. The policy which Australia has applied
+holds the field as the one effective remedy discovered for dealing with
+this appalling social evil. The victims cannot protect themselves. They
+are beyond the reach of organisation. In their isolation and poverty
+they have no defence against the raids of the conscienceless
+sub-contractor who is as literal a slave-driver as any who ever wielded
+a whip in the cotton fields, a slave-driver none the less because his
+whip is hunger instead of thongs.
+
+        Poor naked wretches, wheresoe’er you are,
+        How shall your loop’d and window’d raggedness defend you
+        From seasons such as these? Oh, I have ta’en
+        Too little care of this.
+
+It is the State alone which can take care of them, protect them against
+the rapacity of the oppressor and, in protecting them, protect itself
+also. For this is primarily not a problem for pity; but a duty to the
+commonwealth. No Society can be sound in health which has at its base
+this undrained morass of wretchedness—a morass which charity and the
+cold mercy of the Poor Law only develop and which social justice can
+alone drain dry.
+
+
+
+
+                                 PART I
+                            SWEATED INDUSTRY
+
+
+
+
+                               CHAPTER I
+                           THE POOREST OF ALL
+
+  “Sweating”—General interpretation of the term—Work in the worker’s
+      home—Some special investigations—Characteristics of home
+      work—Match box making—The process—The payment—History of the
+      Jarvis family—Shirt making—Some individual cases—Paper-bag
+      making—Some cases—Some men home workers—Racquet balls—The
+      process—The payment—Health of home workers—The married woman and
+      the single woman as home workers—Brushmaking—Mrs Hogg’s
+      description—Tooth brushes—Other trades and rates of pay—Home work,
+      underpayment, and high priced goods.
+
+
+The term “sweating,” to which at one time the notion of sub-contract was
+attached, has gradually come to be applied to almost any method of work
+under which workers are extremely ill paid or extremely overworked; and
+the “sweater” means nowadays “the employer who cuts down wages below the
+level of decent subsistence, works his operatives for excessive hours,
+or compels them to toil under insanitary conditions.” It is in this wide
+general sense that the word will be employed in these pages; and the
+first part of this volume will be devoted to showing how wide-spread is
+the prevalence of sweating throughout the whole field of British
+industry.
+
+Probably the most completely wretched workers in our country may be
+found among those who ply their toil in their own poor homes. It is by
+no means the case that all home work is sweated; but it is the fact that
+a good deal of home work, in this country and in others, exists solely
+because the home worker can be ground down to the lowest stage of
+misery. As an acute French observer writes:—
+
+“Home work, or at least an important fraction of that industry, is in
+the odd condition of only surviving on account of its evils. Low pay and
+long hours of work are among the chief conditions of its existence.”[1]
+Into the conditions of women workers in this branch of industry—which,
+however, is by no means confined to women—the Women’s Industrial Council
+made an investigation, published in 1897.[2] Two inquiries were also
+made by Miss Irwin, in Scotland, on behalf of the Scottish Council for
+Women’s Trades; and particulars as to the home work of women in
+Birmingham appear in _Women’s Work and Wages_.[3] All these records
+exhibit much the same features: unremitting toil, a high degree of
+mechanical speed and accuracy, and at the same time the lowest standard
+of workmanship that will pass muster; above all, a cruelly heavy burden
+resting on the shoulders of the woman who tries to be at the same time
+mother, housekeeper, and bread-winner, and who in return for her endless
+exertion seldom receives enough even to keep her properly fed, and never
+enough to satisfy her own very modest standard of comfort.
+
+The investigators of the Women’s Industrial Council visited personally
+nearly four hundred workers. Perhaps the very poorest trade investigated
+was matchbox-making, which, for the last fifteen years at least, has
+occupied some hundreds of workers in East London alone. The women fetch
+out from the factory or the middlewoman’s, strips of notched wood,
+packets of coloured paper and sandpaper, and printed wrappers; they
+carry back large but light bundles of boxes, tied up in packets of two
+dozen. Inside their rooms the boxes, made and unmade and half-made,
+cover the floor and fill up the lack of furniture. I have seen a room
+containing only an old bedstead in the very last stage of dirt and
+dilapidation, a table, and two deal boxes for seats. The floor and the
+window-sill were rosy with magenta matchboxes, while everything else,
+including the boards of the floor, the woodwork of the room and the
+coverings of the bed, was of the dark grey of ingrained dust and dirt.
+At first sight it is a pretty enough spectacle to see a matchbox made;
+one motion of the hands bends into shape the notched frame of the case,
+another surrounds it with the ready-pasted strip of printed wrapper,
+which, by long practice, is fitted instantly without a wrinkle, then the
+sandpaper or the phosphorus-paper, pasted ready beforehand, is applied
+and pressed on so that it sticks fast. A pretty high average of neatness
+and finish is demanded by most employers, and readers who will pass
+their matchboxes in review will seldom find a wrinkle or a loose corner
+of paper. The finished case is thrown upon the floor; the long narrow
+strip which is to form the frame of the drawer is laid upon the bright
+strip of ready-pasted paper, then bent together and joined by an
+overlapping bit of the paper; the edges of paper below are bent flat,
+the ready-cut bottom is dropped in and pressed down, and before the
+fingers are withdrawn they fold over the upper edges of the paper inside
+the top. Now the drawer, too, is cast on the floor to dry. All this,
+besides the preliminary pasting of wrapper, coloured paper and
+sandpaper, had to be done 144 times for 2¼d.; and even this is not all,
+for every drawer and case have to be fitted together and the packets
+tied up with hemp. Nor is the work done then, for paste has to be made
+before it can be used, and boxes, when they are ready, have to be
+carried to the factory. Let any reader, however deft, however
+nimble-fingered, consider how many hundred times a day he or she could
+manage to perform all these minute operations. But practice gives speed,
+especially when stimulated by the risk of starvation.
+
+The conditions of life secured in return for this continuous and
+monotonous toil are such as might well make death appear preferable. The
+poor dwelling—already probably overcrowded—is yet further crowded with
+matchboxes, a couple of gross of which, in separated pieces, occupy a
+considerable space. If the weather be at all damp, as English weather
+often is, even in summer, there must be a fire kept up, or the paste
+will not dry; and fire, paste, and hemp must all be paid for out of the
+worker’s pocket. From her working time, too, or from that of her child
+messenger, must be deducted the time lost in fetching and carrying back
+work, and, too often, in being kept waiting for it before it is given
+out. The history of one matchbox-making family visited by a
+representative of the Women’s Industrial Council may be given in detail,
+since no single member survives.
+
+The Jarvis household consisted of a father, mother, and nine children.
+They lived in an alley some fifty yards long and very narrow, entered
+through a row of posts from a street that runs northward from
+Whitechapel Road. Mr Booth’s “Poverty” map shows it coloured with the
+dark blue that signifies “Very poor, casual. Chronic want.” The houses
+in it, of which there were not many, were and are four-roomed cottages
+of two floors, and the Jarvis family occupied the upper floor of No. 9.
+Below them lived a young man with his wife and their baby, his mother,
+and three sisters; sixteen persons thus inhabiting the four rooms. All
+these people seem to have been industrious and respectable. Mr Jarvis,
+who had poor health, worked in the last summer of his life at
+matchbox-stamping, and earned “sometimes” 16s. a week. His wife worked
+constantly at matchbox-making, two of the girls nearly all day, and two
+of the boys out of school hours. The journey to and from the factory
+took from an hour to an hour and a half. In the beginning of the winter
+of 1897 the father fell ill, and had to go into the infirmary. The
+mother and the children remained at home, and the combined earnings of
+Mrs Jarvis and her four young helpers produced from 10d. to 1s. a day.
+It was at this time that the investigator of the Women’s Industrial
+Council paid her visit, and she notes in the brief space for “Remarks”:
+“This house was very poor and bare.... Family is often nearly starving.”
+
+At about half past six on the morning after Christmas Day—a Sunday
+morning, when it was freezing hard and when there was a thick fog, the
+young man who lived on the ground floor awoke and got up to make tea for
+his wife. He found smoke in the room, and when he opened the door of the
+room in which his mother and sisters were sleeping, a burst of smoke met
+him. He succeeded in getting out his own family—in their
+nightdresses—sent a neighbour to call the fire engine, and tried in
+vain, as did a next door neighbour, to arouse the Jarvises. The firemen
+arrived within a very few minutes—three minutes, indeed, from the time
+of their summons—but the house was already in a blaze, the windows gone
+and the roof fallen in. The engine could not get through the posts at
+the entry of the court, but while it was being taken round to the back,
+a ladder was carried in, and a fireman bravely attempted to enter the
+burning house. But it was too late; all ten were already dead. All had,
+it was believed, been suffocated before the first call of their
+neighbour from below. The children had probably passed out of life
+without warning, but the mother was found lying on the floor, with her
+baby of seven months old in her arms, its body so protected by hers as
+to be scarcely burned at all. The father died next day in the infirmary,
+without having learned what fate had overtaken his wife and children;
+and their poor neighbours—for whom the weeks after Christmas are the
+leanest of the year—raised a subscription to defray the funeral expenses
+of the eleven, who were buried together.
+
+In all but its tragically sudden close the history of the Jarvis family
+is the history of scores of East End households. In some there is a
+husband in intermittent work; in some the mother is widowed; in all the
+children, if children there are, help; in all the human beings are
+slaves of the matchbox. The nine years since that December morning have
+brought no change, unless it be that, impossible though it would have
+appeared, pay has rather decreased than advanced, and that a recent
+investigation, not yet completed, seems to reveal a higher proportion of
+workers in receipt of out-relief.
+
+Such matchbox makers, if they worked at the same rates in the factory
+during the far shorter hours permitted by the Factory Acts, would earn
+no less than they do now, for they would no longer waste time in putting
+together box and drawer—whereby at present some other worker also wastes
+time in separating them again before they can be filled—and the employer
+would pay for paste and drying. That, indeed, is really the reason why
+they are working at home.
+
+But although matchbox-making is among the poorest of trades, there are
+others but a shade better. The wages of shirtmaking, for instance, are
+often extremely low, and are yet further reduced by the fact that the
+home worker provides cotton for sewing. I remember seeing, seventeen
+years ago, a young deserted wife who was trying to support herself and
+two young children by making shirts. These were flannel shirts of a fair
+quality, and were handed to her cut out. She did not sew on buttons nor
+make button holes; but except for these items made the shirt throughout,
+by machine, and put in a square of lining at the back of the neck. She
+was paid 1s. 2d. a dozen, and bought the cotton herself. She could make
+in a week “five dozen all but one”; for which the payment would be five
+shillings, eightpence and a fraction of a penny, less the cost of
+cotton, machine needles, oil, and perhaps hire of machine.
+
+At the _Daily News_ Exhibition of Sweated Industries was to be seen an
+elderly Scotchwoman cutting and making shirts from the first stitch to
+the last, who was a singularly intelligent, skilful, and industrious
+worker. For varying styles of shirts she received from 9½d. to 1s. 9½d.
+per dozen. “For the shirts paid at 1s. 9½d. per dozen the following work
+is required:—Make and line yoke and bottom bands, put in four gussets,
+hem skirts, run and fell side seams, make sleeves and put them in....
+The shirts paid at 9d. per dozen require her to hem necks, button-stitch
+two stud holes, sew on six buttons and clip threads from all seams. The
+shirts at 1s. per dozen have two rows of feather stitching, six button
+holes, eight buttons, four seams bridged and eight fastenings made.”[4]
+
+The better sorts of these shirts were such as are worn, not by poor, but
+by well-to-do purchasers.
+
+“Paper-bag making,” says the Factory Inspectors’ Report for 1905, “is an
+industry largely carried on in homes in Glasgow, and no trade is more
+disturbing to the home. The paste seems to find its way everywhere, and
+many more things than the bags are found firmly pasted together. I
+visited two women, who, working usually in workshops, were, during the
+enforced period of absence owing to the birth of a child, given
+employment as outworkers. Nothing could exceed the misery and squalor
+amongst which the work was done. In both cases the workroom was also the
+living room and bedroom, and the whole of the available furniture,
+including the bed, was covered with damp bags, some hundreds of which
+had to be removed in one home before I could be shown the baby. The
+surroundings were unpleasant ones for making bags destined to hold
+pastry.” (p. 322.) Of another woman it is reported that “she personally
+took out work until the day before her child’s birth, and found the load
+of bags which had to be carried downstairs and upstairs very heavy and
+tiring. This work is poorly paid. Bags, by no means of the smallest
+size, are made for 3d. to 5d. a thousand, so that it is indeed a heavy
+weight which has to be carried for the daily shilling.” (p. 320.)
+
+Although the cases quoted hitherto are those of women, and although the
+very worst instances of underpayment invariably occur among women, it
+must not be supposed that all home workers are women. In the nail and
+chain making districts many men as well as women work at forges in their
+own backyards; and even in London there is quite a small population of
+home working tailors, shoemakers, and cabinetmakers, to say nothing of
+men who make toys and trifles of various sorts for hawking in the
+streets.
+
+In one afternoon last summer I was taken to visit some men working in
+their own homes, all within a very short distance. Two were toy makers,
+two manufactured pipes, and another cages for parrots; one was a
+shoemaker, and the last was the most skilled handweaver in London. One
+toy maker was engaged upon wooden hoops with handles and beaded spokes,
+for South Africa. He also made wooden engines, finding all the
+materials, iron wheels included, and for these he was paid 22s. a gross.
+The selling price is sixpence each. In his workshop, too, were to be
+seen attractive little waggons with sacks in them; and horses of that
+archaic type which has a barrel body, straight legs, and harness of red
+and blue paper. The other toy maker was making little go-carts adapted
+to the use of good-sized dolls. All the material was found by the maker,
+and the price received by him varied from 3s. 3d. to 6s. 6d. a dozen,
+according to size. Here again iron wheels had to be provided. In both
+these cases the wife and some other member of the family helped. The
+pipes were roughly shaped by hand, then pressed in a mould, the seam
+scraped smooth, and the pipes stacked in great clay pans and fired in an
+oven. They are not made to order, but sold by the maker to private
+customers—generally publicans—at 2s. 6d. or 3s. a gross. The cage maker,
+a consumptive man, transforms bands of tin and thick wires into domed
+cages, with a speed and dexterity amazing to the beholder. I have
+mislaid my note of the prices paid for this skilful work, but I know
+that they were horribly low. The elderly shoemaker and his
+wife—interesting, intelligent people—were full of family cares and of
+curious industrial reminiscences. They are now on a dry bank, as it
+were, a foot or two above the deep waters of hopeless struggle, in which
+the Jarvises, their neighbours, were immersed. The weaver was a survivor
+from another period, and a child of another race. Face and name alike
+proclaim him a descendant of the Huguenots; and not only is he a weaver
+of silk, but also one of the very, very few hand weavers of velvet still
+left in our country. The coronation robe of King Edward—perhaps the
+finest velvet ever woven, was his handiwork.
+
+Moreover, a little remnant is still left of the old silk-weaving trade
+that came to Spitalfields and Bethnal Green when Louis XIV. was so ill
+advised as to revoke the Edict of Nantes. Instances of man and wife
+working at home together appear in the Report of the Factory Inspectors.
+“Husband and wife, with two children, occupy one room only. The wife
+weaves, while her husband is occupied in ‘finishing’ canvas boots in the
+same room.” “Husband, wife, and six children occupy the workroom (which
+contains two looms) and an attic.” “In the weaving room are three low
+beds _under_ the looms, in which three adults sleep. They cannot sit
+upright in bed, as they knock against and injure the warp.” (p. 322.)
+
+Racquet balls are articles bought mainly by persons in prosperous
+circumstances, few of whom would desire that women engaged in making
+their tools of play should receive less than a living wage. Yet the
+rates of pay are such that probably no coverer of racquet balls ever
+subsisted without aid from other sources. The cores or centres of these
+balls are made of shreds of rag, much compressed, and covered with
+strands of wool. These are prepared in the factory, but the covering is
+done by women working at home. The coverer receives a gross of cores,
+together with a gross of squares of white leather and a skein or skeins
+of a special thread. The squares of leather must be damped between wet
+cloths. Laying one of these damp squares on her left palm, the worker
+places upon it the core, “pulls the skin tightly over it, pares off with
+a pair of sharp scissors any superfluous leather, and sews together with
+neat regular stitches the edges at their meeting-places. While still
+damp the ball must be rolled, so as to smooth down any projection of the
+seam. This rolling is best effected between two slabs of marble, the
+upper one of which need be only a little larger than the ball.
+Considerable pressure is necessary, but in the hands of a practised
+worker the process is a quick one. These slabs of marble are not
+provided by the employer, and many women roll their balls between two
+plates; to do this takes rather longer, because the plate will not bear
+so much pressure as the slab. The scissors also have to be provided and
+kept sharp by the worker.” For covering a gross of the smallest sized
+balls (sold retail at 2d. or 3d.), the usual payment is 2s. per gross;
+but there is one prosperous employer who still pays only 1s. 10d.
+Working steadily for eleven to twelve hours a day, a superior young
+woman known to me who covered balls before her marriage used to earn
+about 5s. a week. She was quick and skilful, but obviously
+ill-nourished, and an accidental sprain, from which a girl in good
+health would quickly have recovered, developed in her case into an
+ulcer, in consequence, said the doctor who saw her, of her anæmic
+condition.
+
+Ill-health, indeed, is the chronic state of the woman home worker. She
+misses that regular daily journey to and from her work-place which
+ensures to the factory worker at least a daily modicum of air and
+exercise; and she misses also that element of changed scene and varied
+human intercourse which makes for health and happiness. If she depends
+upon her own exertions she will inevitably be ill fed and ill clothed;
+and this is probably one reason for the fact, noted both by the
+investigators of the Women’s Industrial Council and by Miss Irwin, that
+the woman who is self-supported often earns less, even at the same rates
+of pay, than the woman who is comfortably married. The half-starved and
+apathetic human creature cannot maintain a high output of work; and even
+the out-relief which is so frequent a factor in the income of the
+widowed or single home worker, seldom suffices to keep her in more than
+a half-starved condition. Her work grows, like herself, poorer and
+poorer; and the employer thereupon declares that it is worth no more
+than its poor price. From a national point of view it would pay better
+to save the human machine from falling into that state of disrepair
+wherein it ceases to be profitable.
+
+Tooth brushes, again, are articles purchased by the wealthy even more
+frequently than by the poor, and so are household brushes of all kinds.
+Of brushmaking an account was written in 1897 by the late Mrs Hogg,[5]
+and being still applicable, was printed in the Handbook of the Sweated
+Industries Exhibition. “The brushes are given out in dozens, ready
+bored, and the worker supplied with fibre or bristles, as the case may
+be. Their work consists in selecting the little bundles of bristles from
+the heap, fastening them securely in the centre with wire, and then,
+with a sharp pull against the edge of the table, drawing them through
+the hole. They are kept in position by a wire at the back of the brush,
+and each row of bristles is trimmed with a large pair of shears fastened
+to a table-vice. The fingers, though protected by a leather shield, are
+often badly cut with the slipping of the wire, and the constant jerk of
+the drawing causes a strain to the chest. All the women complain of
+this. More serious accidents occasionally happen from the shears, which
+are hard to manipulate, and often beyond the strength of these
+exhausted, underfed workers. Materials, with the exception of lamp-black
+for painting the backs of the brushes, are provided by the shop. As
+lamp-black costs something, and soot can be had for nothing, a
+concoction of soot and water boiled is often used as a substitute for
+the more expensive pigment. But the shears are a serious outlay, costing
+from 18s. to £1, and needing constant sharpening. Many of the drawers,
+never having been in possession of the capital to buy them, or being
+forced by hunger to ‘put them away,’ are obliged to get their trimming
+done at the shop, at the cost of terrible waste of time and of
+iniquitous and capricious deductions from the price given for the work.
+Deductions are also made for short returns of fibre or bristle
+sweepings, where these have to be returned to the shop. The material is
+weighed out and weighed in. It is calculated that if the material
+weighed so much, the clippings or sweepings ought to weigh so much; but
+the worker is never told _how_ much, and has no means of checking the
+calculation; yet if the amount is short, she either ‘gets the sack’ or
+has to pay for the deficiency. The rate of payment varies with the
+number of holes and the quality of brush, bristles always commanding a
+higher rate than fibre. Coarse fibre scrubbing brushes fetch anything
+from 3½d. to 1s. a dozen. One woman will make brushes with 145 holes for
+10d., while another will get 9d. for brushes with only 100. There is no
+uniformity of payment; it all depends, they tell you, on the shop you
+work for.... The fibre drawers rarely make more than 7s. to 8s. for a
+week of seventy-two hours. Taking into consideration the various lets
+and hindrances to which they are subject, and the time wasted at the
+shop, 6s. would fairly represent the average during the season when it
+suits the masters to keep them regularly employed.... It is only by
+seeing the homes of the brush drawers that it is possible to realise all
+that is implied in the carrying on of a trade and of the travesty of
+family life in one single room, or the misery of these lives of endless
+toil, where the tragedy which endures on is so much more pitiful than
+the tragedy to which death brings rest from labour.”
+
+Tooth brushes, of which it is estimated that a worker can make four in
+an hour, are paid at the rate of 4d. a dozen, and best hair brushes at
+2d. each, or ¾d. for 100 holes.
+
+These examples might be multiplied a hundredfold. Blouse makers
+(receiving from 1s. 6d. a dozen), underclothing makers, trouser
+finishers (from 2½d. a pair), sack makers (at 8d. or 9d. for a “turn” of
+12, 15, or 18), makers of boot boxes (at 1s. 4d. a gross), of soap boxes
+and tack boxes, makers of baby clothes and of children’s shoes,
+finishers of woollen gloves, tassel makers, umbrella coverers,
+artificial flower makers, forgers of chains and strikers of nails,
+carders of buttons (at 3s. per 100 gross), and of hooks and eyes (at 8d.
+and 9d. per 24 gross), cappers of safety pins (at 1s. 6d. per 100
+gross)—all of these are busy among us hour after hour, and day after
+day, for seven days a week, and are receiving in return a remuneration
+ranging from ¾d. to 2d. per hour. Their work, in some shape or form,
+comes into every house in this country. Our potatoes and our flour are
+carried in sacks, although not perhaps to our doors; our eggs are sold
+to us in cardboard boxes; our garments are fastened with buttons or with
+hooks—or perchance with safety pins; the gentleman’s collar and tie and
+the lady’s waist belt may probably be the handiwork of some half-starved
+home worker whose life is being shortened by her poverty. Only ignorance
+can flatter itself—as indeed ignorance is fond of doing—with the idea
+that none but cheap goods or cheap shops are tainted with sweating. Any
+person inclining to that opinion is advised to hang about the back doors
+of leading shops soon after they open in the morning, or just before
+they close at night, and to observe the furtive figures that pass in and
+out with bundles. The taint is everywhere; there is no dweller in this
+country, however well-intentioned, who can declare with certainty that
+he has no share in this oppression of the poorest and most helpless
+among his compatriots.
+
+
+
+
+                               CHAPTER II
+                   WORKERS IN FACTORIES AND WORKSHOPS
+
+  Wherein factory workers are better off than home workers—Life on five
+      to ten shillings a week—Health—Ancillary processes—Paper
+      bags—Packers—Case of a cocoa filler—Of a cartridge filler—Jam
+      fillers—Pay sheets of confectionery workers—Observations of an
+      uninstructed observer—Slack times—Long hours—Some
+      cases—“Emergency” processes—Discomforts—Some cases—Danger of
+      fire—Lead poisoning—Instances—Washing appliances—Extremes of
+      temperature—Fines and deductions—Divergent views of two employers
+      upon fines—“Earned too much”—Summary.
+
+
+The poorer class of workers in factories and workshops are financially
+little better off—if, indeed, better off at all—than the poorer sort of
+home workers; but they have some other advantages. Their hours and
+conditions are in some degree regulated, and at least some degree of
+change and variety enters into their lives. But for them too existence
+is a hard battle. Upon a wage of from five to ten shillings a week life
+cannot but be narrow and stinted. Food, clothing, and lodging must all
+be of the poorest; an omnibus fare, a halfpenny newspaper, a penny stamp
+are luxuries in which only the thriftless indulge; and good health, as
+the middle class man or woman knows it, is a treasure seldom enjoyed.
+There is, indeed, no fact more painfully forced upon the middle class
+observer who becomes intimately acquainted with ill paid workers than
+the frequency with which they succumb to ailments that would be regarded
+in the observer’s own circle as trifling. Many girls injure themselves
+permanently by going to work when they are actually seriously ill. To
+stay away means loss of pay and possibly loss of employment, so they
+hold out to the last gasp.
+
+Many of the worst paid workers are engaged in various processes that
+facilitate buying and selling, rather than in actual manufacture. The
+paper-bags into which a civil shop assistant so obligingly pops our
+small purchases are given nominally without charge to us, and are bought
+in very large quantities at a very low rate by the shopkeeper, their
+real cost being paid in flesh and blood by the women who make them. Some
+of these women, as appears in the previous chapter, work at home; some,
+possibly, in well-appointed workshops, but many, as the women factory
+inspectors truly observe, “in the poorest kind of workshop, badly
+lighted, ventilated, and heated. To these conditions, no doubt, the
+weak, inflamed eyes so often seen among the workers are due, at least
+partly. The workers themselves attribute it to the strain involved in
+counting over the bags.”[6] This remark shows us that the simple and
+time-saving plan of weighing instead of counting (which is employed for
+wares so valuable as those of the Royal Mint) is not in use in paper-bag
+manufactories. Packing of various kinds occupies vast numbers of women
+and girls, most of whom are paid at low rates, by the dozen or the
+gross, and some of whom attain a celerity almost incredible. No foreman
+in the world can drive so hard as her own low wage drives the piece
+worker who has to support herself and, often enough, to help to support
+relatives. The most worn-out girl whom I remember ever to have seen was
+engaged upon no harder task than the packing of cocoa. My attention was
+called to her, in a room full of girls, by her ghastly appearance. She
+may have been eighteen or nineteen; she was absolutely colourless, and
+although there was no sign about her of any specific illness, seemed
+exhausted literally almost to death. She sat day after day pouring
+powdered cocoa into ready made square paper packets, of which she then
+folded down the tops and pasted on the wrappers. She received a
+halfpenny for every gross. In the week previous to that in which I saw
+her she had earned 7s. Each shilling represented 24 gross of packets;
+she had therefore filled, folded and pasted, in the week, 188 gross, or
+21,792 packets. Her mother, who was present, said that the drive was
+killing her and that she must leave. The cocoa was of a brand well known
+in its day and sold in good shops, but the firm has now, I believe,
+disappeared. Would that its methods had disappeared with it.[7]
+
+Tea packers and jam fillers often receive wages barely higher. Girls
+whom I have known personally have been paid at the following rates for
+filling pots with boiling jam or marmalade: 11 lb. pots (in four trays
+of thirty-six pots), 2d. per gross; 2 lb. jars (in six trays of
+twenty-four jars) or 3 lb. jars (in nine trays of sixteen jars), 2½d.
+per gross. Two girls worked together, and my informant reckoned that the
+pair could fill a gross of the largest size in about half an hour. This
+would bring the wages of each to the comparatively magnificent figure of
+2½d. an hour, or over 11s. a week. In some factories these heavy trays
+have to be lifted and stacked by the girls, the weight of the jars being
+added to that of the contents.
+
+I was fortunate enough, some years ago, to obtain possession of a number
+of “pay sheets” showing the wages received in two consecutive weeks by
+girls employed in a large London confectionery factory. For the first
+week I had 107 sheets; for the second 98. Five sheets in the first week
+and ten in the second were left out of my reckoning as probably not
+representing a full week’s work; in each of these the total was below
+4s. The highest net payment (there was a deduction for a compulsory sick
+club) was, in the first week, 15s. 9½d.; in the second, 16s. 1½d. The
+girls who received these wages (both well known to me) were superior
+young women of from 22 to 25 years old; both helped to support widowed
+mothers with younger children. There were, in the first week, 20 girls,
+and in the second 24, who received from 10s. to 16s., and most of them
+came much nearer to the lower than to the higher figure. In the first
+week 78, and in the second 64, received from 5s. to 10s. (57 out of the
+78, and 49 out of the 64 earning less than 8s.); while in the first week
+9, and in the second week 10, received from 4s. to 5s. Two-thirds,
+therefore, of the whole 190 sheets (excluding 15, which showed less than
+4s. received) testified to a net weekly wage of less than 10s.—the
+average being a fraction over 7s. 6d. a week. Yet so easy is it for the
+inexperienced enquirer to be misled that a lady actually published an
+account of this very factory, in which she assured the public of wages
+“rising steadily to 18s. a week,” and declared that a girl, “if she
+ultimately becomes a piece worker, may make as much as 24s. to 25s. a
+week.” This lady was evidently not aware that piece work is not a state
+“ultimately attained,” but the usual system throughout the
+establishment. Nearly all—probably, indeed, every one—of those 190 pay
+sheets represented piece work wages. Upon the basis of this illusory
+wage of 24s. and upwards the writer proceeded to compare the payment of
+confectionery “hands” with that of High School mistresses, forgetting,
+however, to compare the hours of a school with those of a factory, or to
+deduct those slack seasons to which the confectionery trade is so sadly
+liable. A High School mistress, moreover, works forty weeks in the year
+and is paid by the year; a confectionery worker often works for less
+than forty weeks in the year, and since she is paid by the week her
+blank weeks are blank to her exchequer, so that even if she did earn £1
+a week (which she does not) she would not earn £52 a year.
+Seasonality—the word is so useful that it must be admitted—though it
+falls one degree less heavily upon the factory worker than upon the
+worker at home, is to her too a terrible evil. The long “slack times” of
+the West-End tailor or tailoress reduce a wage that looks handsome in a
+pay sheet of May or June to a very meagre annual income; and many a West
+End dressmaker who has worked overtime—as often as not without extra
+pay—through the long hot evenings of the London season finds herself, in
+January or February, shivering, without work or pay, beside her own
+empty grate.
+
+Long hours, which are in effect one form of low wages, have been checked
+by the Factory Acts, but not yet ended. The inspector for West London
+writes: “The Jew tailor of West London has an idea that seven days a
+week is not too long to work his hands.”[8]
+
+From Birmingham a case is reported of a Christmas card maker, who had
+already been cautioned for keeping “female young persons,” _i.e._ girls
+under eighteen, at work till 9 of an evening. He was found to be keeping
+two women and a girl at work till 6.15 on Saturday, a day on which work
+should, by law, end early, and was said to be keeping his hands at work
+on Sundays also—a privilege which the law allows only to the laundry
+proprietor. “On the succeeding Sunday,” writes the inspector, “the place
+was inspected, but with difficulty. It was only after considerable delay
+that admittance was obtained, and then, although the place had every
+appearance that work had been going on, no females were found. The upper
+parts of the premises were in use as residence, and I had reason to
+think that women had been sent up there upon my arrival, but the
+occupier would not allow me to go up. It has subsequently been admitted
+that eight women and two female young persons were at work and hidden as
+suspected.”[9]
+
+That such cases would be not the exception, but the rule, if there were
+no legal prohibition and no fear of fines, may be judged by the state of
+things actually existing in laundries, where, although the law allows
+the monstrous stretch of 14 consecutive hours of work, the permitted
+hours are frequently exceeded. The report of the lady inspectors
+contains a significant paragraph on this subject. “The hours worked in
+London laundries by women and girls,” says Miss Vines, “seem to be
+increasing in length, and to be more excessive than ever.... The firm I
+prosecuted in February had employed several young women, one of them
+only 17 years of age, for 28 consecutive hours, from 8 A.M. on Friday
+till 12, midday, on Saturday; while their hours, including meals on the
+previous days of the week, had numbered 14 on Thursday, 12 on Wednesday
+and Tuesday, and 11 on Monday. The 28 hours’ period included 2½ hours’
+interval during the night, when the girls were permitted to lie on the
+floor of the calendar-room with their coats for pillows ‘for a rest!’ I
+prosecuted the other firm twice in June, and on the second occasion it
+was proved at the hearing of the case that an ironer had been employed
+for 37 consecutive hours, including meal times and short breaks, and
+another, an ironer and calendar worker, 32½ hours ... 14 days previously
+I had taken proceedings against the same firm.... It was then proved
+that, in one week, a young packer had been employed by them, exclusive
+of meal hours and absence of work, for 73½ hours; and two girls, aged
+respectively 16 and 17, for 68½ hours.”[10]
+
+Very similar results ensue in the jam-making industry, where, on the
+pretext of emergency, the law permits the working of prolonged hours.
+“In more than one case,” writes the inspector, “I have found emergency
+created by the simple expedient of allowing fruit to lie untouched at
+the factory till the close of the normal working day, when workers from
+all departments were turned on to it.”[11]
+
+It must be remembered that, in the case of workers paid by the day, as
+is usual in dressmaking establishments, and in some departments of
+laundry work, there is frequently no extra payment made for overtime. I
+have indeed heard a West-End working woman declare that overtime would
+cease if the law made payment for it compulsory; and although that
+assertion was much too sweeping, the experience of strong trade unions
+shows that when employers are compelled to pay at a higher rate for
+overtime, that necessity for overtime of which so much is heard whenever
+the Factory Acts are under discussion, does diminish in a very
+remarkable manner. Meanwhile, the law does its best to make undue hours
+of work costly by prosecuting persistent offenders. In 1905 the fines
+inflicted in the North-Western district of England alone, for illegal
+overtime, amounted to no less than £728, 4s. 0d., and the accompanying
+costs to £627, 16s. 0d.; and this in spite of the fact that magistrates
+in certain localities are decidedly hostile, and inflict derisory
+penalties. When we further reflect that the North-Western district
+contains both a large number of highly-organised workers, ready to
+complain of any breach of law, and also a large number of exceedingly
+enlightened employers who believe long hours to be inimical to their own
+true interests, we may fairly infer that there are other districts in
+which things are considerably worse, and in which the inspectors,
+zealous though they are, fail to discover all or nearly all the
+offenders.
+
+Sanitary conditions are still sometimes far from satisfactory, although
+greatly bettered of late years. There is perhaps no point upon which the
+influence of women inspectors has been more beneficial. A case is
+reported to me, by a most trustworthy witness, of a box factory, where
+“women and men worked together in a room in which was the lavatory, with
+seldom a flush of water.” The same witness reports another case, in a
+rope factory employing both men and women, the details of which are so
+repulsive, that it is impossible I should print them.
+
+Nor are long hours and underpayment the only ills from which factory
+workers suffer. In spite of laws and of inspectors, dangers and
+discomforts are still prevalent in many workplaces—especially in those
+where workers are ill paid. Many instances may be gathered from a single
+year’s Report of the factory inspectors; and of course the inspectors
+neither discover all the instances nor print all that they discover.
+Looking into the Report for 1905, we find, on p. 13, an account from
+Southampton of the tea-room “provided by a high class dressmaker
+employing about 60 females.” This apartment was “underground with
+concrete floor and walls and the ceiling only 6 feet high, with no
+ventilation and no natural light.” Not a few women employed by West-End
+firms may be found at the present day, not only eating, but also
+working, by artificial light, in basement-rooms that are little better
+than cellars, or in cramped upper rooms, from which there would be
+little hope of escape in case of fire. The law, in its wisdom, does not
+require a special fire escape except in places where as many as 40
+persons are at work; and certain frugal employers are careful,
+therefore, to employ but 39. “In one such workshop,” writes Miss Squire,
+“the condition of the 39 women working there seemed one of grave danger;
+it is a large new rag sorting warehouse, so filled with bales that only
+narrow passages down which one person can pass are left. On the second
+floor the women rag sorters work, their tables ranged along a sort of
+gallery ... the centre of the building being open for the hoisting of
+bales; the only means of exit is a narrow wooden staircase with open
+treads, at one end of the spacious floor. Were a fire to break out
+below, all exit would be cut off very quickly. In this case the local
+authority reply they have no bye-laws and can do nothing, as less than
+40 persons are employed.”[12]
+
+Another case is reported on the same page, in which a building
+originally meant for offices only has been turned into a factory and
+warehouses. “There is no second staircase and no exit on to the roof,
+which is higher than the adjoining houses.... The third floor is
+occupied ... by a blouse manufacturer employing between 50 and 60 women.
+On the top floor there is a lace warehouse where 15 women are employed
+finishing laces and veilings; a large amount of light inflammable
+material is stored on both these floors; there are no fire buckets or
+any means kept for extinguishing fire.” Miss Squire sent a notice to the
+Corporation about this building; and the Corporation replied that it
+“did not see its way to making any recommendations owing to the
+impossibility of providing an outside staircase.” Miss Squire and the
+City Surveyor in vain pointed out how an exit could be provided; six
+months later nothing had been done, and, on again approaching the
+Corporation, she found that authority “of opinion that no additional
+means of escape can be provided at a reasonable expense.” “The chief
+officer of the Fire Brigade told me he has himself reported this
+building as unsafe to the Corporation years ago in vain.” From Bristol,
+Mr Pendock reports a case of a clothing factory “employing about 50
+females.” “The work is carried on, on the third and fourth floors, and
+these are reached by means of an internal wooden, winding, narrow
+staircase, always imperfectly lighted on account of its position.” The
+local authority demanded an additional staircase. The owner, on the
+strength of a decision in a previous appeal case, did nothing.
+Immediately afterwards the premises were considerably damaged by fire
+which, fortunately, took place in the meal time when all the workers had
+left the factory. Since then work has been resumed under unimproved
+conditions.[13]
+
+None of these are cases of ignorance, or even of carelessness; they are
+instances of the deliberate disregard, for money’s sake, of danger to
+the lives of fellow creatures.
+
+Scarcely less blameworthy is the criminal negligence shown by some
+employers in carrying out those precautions prescribed by the law,
+where, as in the potteries, there is a risk of lead poisoning. Thus,
+Miss Vines remarks “how frequently one finds the necessary supply of
+soap, nail brushes, and towels missing. Yet, when giving instructions as
+to such irregularities, one is almost invariably met with an attitude of
+_non possumus_. Over and over again managers defend themselves by the
+assertion that these things, although provided by them, have been and
+are constantly stolen by the workers.” She goes on to quote the
+observation of a predecessor: “It is impossible not to believe that if
+expensive and highly-finished ware disappeared from the factory with the
+same speed and to the same degree that soap, nail brushes, and towels
+disappear, steps would be taken to discover the offenders.”[14]
+
+In one instance a girl of nineteen, after no more than six weeks’
+employment at pottery dipping, suffered “acute pains, with weakness and
+subsequent unconsciousness for several hours.” On the premises where she
+had worked, the inspector found 17 persons engaged in dangerous
+processes. “Notwithstanding, in the lavatory for their use, which was
+extremely dirty, there was neither towel nor nail brush, and not more
+than one tiny piece of soap. Eventually one small and very dirty towel
+was discovered; this, it was stated, had been taken away by the foreman
+to dry.... There was not a single clean towel in stock or in reserve on
+the premises, and when I questioned the workers it appeared that this
+condition of affairs was normal.”[15]
+
+Even where no risk of poison occurs, the provision of decent washing
+appliances would, to most of us, appear an essential part of a civilised
+factory. Many employers, however, hold a different opinion. The authors
+of “Women’s Work and Wages” write that “regulations against washing are
+still found in many factories where excellence of work does not depend
+upon cleanliness of handling. Painters and japanners are generally
+provided with turpentine, etc., but the rank and file are fortunate if
+they can get a bucket at the sink, and there do exist places where there
+is a fine of 6d. for washing.”
+
+I remember seeing girls, to the number of 50 or more, packing tea in a
+large room where an old and grubby sink with one wash bowl and one towel
+formed the sole provision for washing. Access to this room was gained by
+one wooden ladder-stair. Yet the manager who exhibited this place to a
+group of visitors was not only satisfied, but actually boastful. The
+personal attention of the head of the firm was called to these defects,
+and I am happy to say both of them have now been remedied.
+
+The discomfort formerly undergone in many work-rooms during winter was
+extreme. Until the law required the maintenance of “a reasonable
+temperature” (generally interpreted by inspectors as 60 degrees
+Fahrenheit), a very large proportion of women who worked for West End
+dressmakers did so in rooms absolutely unwarmed, or warmed only by the
+gas jets meant for lighting the room. I knew of a shirt factory in East
+London, which was a wooden edifice erected in a back yard and entirely
+unprovided with any means of warming, and have known women who worked
+there during the bitterest days of a particularly cold winter.
+
+On the other hand, some processes of manufacture are generally carried
+on in overheated workplaces. “The temperature in starch drying stoves,”
+says one inspector, “is the most consistently excessive I have found....
+The manager of one starch works is of opinion that women stand the heat
+better than men do, but says those whom he employs are all hard
+drinkers; no temperate woman will stay.[16]
+
+Some processes also of lacemaking and of cotton spinning are facilitated
+by damp heat, and it can hardly be doubted that, but for the constant
+vigilance, both of the organised workers and of the inspectors, there
+would be still, as there were before the law intervened, many working
+places in which such processes would be carried on without proper
+ventilation or proper precautions for the health of the workers. Many
+people now living have seen women and girls come out of a weaving shed
+that has been kept full of steam, their clothes wet through and
+presently frozen stiff upon them as they walked home through the cold
+air.
+
+The plan of reducing wages by fines and deductions is one dear to the
+low type of employer; and as long as workers remain ill paid and
+desperately afraid of being out of work, the evil will probably persist
+to some extent, in spite of increasingly stringent Truck Acts. There are
+many factories and work-rooms in which silence is more or less rigidly
+enforced, and fines are inflicted for talking or laughing. In many,
+again, some part of the material used is charged to the worker. I had in
+my hands, some years ago, 14 or 15 wage books belonging to skilled
+machinists employed in a provincial stay factory and paid by the piece.
+The following are the figures of 3 books for 3 successive weeks. _A_
+represents the highest, and _C_ the lowest sums received.
+
+                   _A._ Nominal wage  9/8½ 8/–  10/2½
+                        Deductions    1/4  9½   1/6
+                        Wage received 8/4½ 7/2½ 8/8½
+
+                   _B._ Nominal wage  9/2½ 8/6  8/4
+                        Deductions    2/2  1/7  1/11
+                        Wage received 7/8½ 6/11 6/5
+
+                   _C._ Nominal wage  5/3½ 5/3  5/5
+                        Deductions    1/4  1/9  1/9
+                        Wage received 3/11 1/5  3/8
+
+These deductions represent mainly material—cotton, and tools—machine
+needles. Some employers oblige their workers to pay hire for the sewing
+machines used in the factory, and where these machines are worked by
+steam, gas, or electricity, a charge varying from a halfpenny to
+sixpence “for power” is not unusual. I have known instances in which the
+rent of a factory has been partly—perhaps wholly—defrayed by a charge
+upon the workers, who had to pay so much a week for their places in it.
+“Cleaning, as well as rent, is sometimes met in the same way by a weekly
+charge of 2d. or 3d. for cleaning the workroom. I am assured that one
+ingenious employer pays a man 15s. a week for performing this duty in
+addition to others, while the payments made by the women amount to 30s.
+In a certain provincial town in a factory which I visited, there was no
+apparent method of lighting. I was informed that in the winter the women
+brought their own candles. A local competitor, more acute, provides gas,
+and charges each girl 3d. a week throughout the dark seasons, at which
+rate, according to his fellow townsmen, he must make a profit on his gas
+bill.”[17]
+
+In a large box factory deductions were made for glue, for gas to heat
+the glue, for string to tie the boxes together, and for work
+books—amounting in all to 1s. 6d. per week.
+
+A charge for hot water to make tea is not unusual, and is sometimes
+enforced on all workers, the resulting sum, where many are employed,
+being ridiculously in excess of the cost of the boiling water. One young
+woman known to me paid this tax (in her case 2d. a week) for six weeks,
+and never once used the hot water.
+
+Deductions for spoiled work or alleged damage are those which seem the
+most to arouse heartburnings and that general feeling of grudge which it
+is so greatly the interest of an employer to avoid arousing. Where, for
+instance, glass or earthenware jars are filled with boiling preserve,
+one or two jars in every few hundreds are sure to crack. “The breakage
+will probably come to light under the hands of the girl who washes the
+jar and sticks on the label, and in some factories she is made to pay.”
+I have known a girl charged the full selling price for a seven-pound jar
+from which the bits of glass were afterwards picked out and the preserve
+reboiled and sold. Many instances of a similar kind from other trades
+might be quoted if space allowed.
+
+Other deductions are in the nature of punishment; and of these it may
+safely be said that the master or foreman who cannot keep order without
+the use of them does not know his business. One of the best employers
+and kindest men whom I ever knew said, indignantly, when I asked him
+whether there were fines in his factory: “If I could not run a factory
+without fines I should be ashamed to run one at all.” My real reason for
+the question was that an employer of a very different stamp had within
+the same week defended himself against an accusation of excessive fining
+by a public declaration that unless he inflicted fines his factory would
+be a “bear-garden.” The contrast between these two men—carrying on
+industries not at all dissimilar—between the two factories, and, above
+all, between the manners, morals, and appearance of the young women
+working for the one and of those working for the other, formed one of
+the most instructive object lessons which it has ever been my lot to
+receive.
+
+Deductions for lateness are sometimes made a source of profit to the
+employer. Men who pay a penny for an hour’s work will sometimes deduct
+threepence for an hour’s absence; and piece workers—who, of course, lose
+pay for the time of absence, are sometimes made to pay in addition. I
+have seen the wage-book of an umbrella-coverer, which showed that in the
+course of two years she had paid in fines (to the same employer) nearly
+£6, chiefly for coming late in the morning. The case was particularly
+flagrant, because she was a piece worker, and was not using a power
+machine, and because work in this workshop was so irregular that when
+she did come early she was often kept sitting unoccupied, while, if
+orders happened to come in of an afternoon, the women were kept late to
+fulfil them. Thus, although there might be no work for them, they were
+fined if they came late; being piece workers, they were paid nothing for
+the time spent in waiting for work, and they were paid at no extra rate
+for work done late.
+
+Worst of all, there are factories—though I hope but very few—in which
+piece workers, when they have succeeded in making up a total slightly
+better than usual, are liable to have the surplus deducted. I have in my
+mind a factory where the foreman frequently deducted 1s. or 2s. from a
+week’s payment, on the ground that the girl who should have received it
+had “earned too much.”
+
+To sum up then: workers in factories and workshops, although they are,
+on the whole, better off in respect of hours, and although their lives
+cannot at the worst, be so horribly monotonous as can that of the home
+worker, are frequently exceedingly ill paid, even in trades demanding
+considerable skill: not a few of them are employed in places that are
+uncomfortable, unwholesome, or even actually dangerous; their poor wages
+are apt to be docked by irritating fines and deductions; they have no
+choice as to the companions with whom they spend their days, and they
+share with the home worker the constant dread of being left without
+employment and without means to pay for lodging or food. These are the
+conditions in which hundreds and hundreds of young women in this country
+are earning what it is customary to call “their living,” although all of
+us are aware that no young woman can really live, in a large town, the
+life of a civilised human being upon ten shillings a week or less.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER III
+                  SHOP ASSISTANTS, CLERKS, WAITRESSES
+
+  The daily life of the shop assistant—Her bedroom—“No pictures, photos,
+      etc.”—“Anything so left”—The dining-room—Meals—Impossibility of
+      ever being alone—Long hours—Fines and rules—Examples—Some notes on
+      health—Baths—Payment—“Premiums” and “intro” goods—“Taking the
+      book”—Diminished salary with commission on sales—Case of a
+      milliner’s assistant—The dictum of a draper—Why not domestic
+      service?—The social grade—Assistants who do not “live in”—Some
+      Scotch cases—Trade expenses of waitresses—Breakages—Clerks and
+      bookkeepers—Salaries offered to a competent young woman—Some shops
+      in fiction—The question of morals.
+
+
+How many of us, as we sit at ease on the customer’s side of the counter,
+reflect upon the life led by the spruce, black-coated young man or the
+trim, deft young woman who stands upon the other? For myself, the
+elaborate hairdressing of the shop-girl—all those curls and waves and
+puffs that represent so much care and time—always sets me thinking of
+the same girl before her looking-glass (taking her turn, probably, with
+others). The dormitory in which she occupies a place is bare and
+unhomelike, all the beds, chairs, and chests of drawers of the same
+pattern; the walls unadorned, for the decoration of them is forbidden.
+As the rule of one large establishment says, with equal harshness and
+bad grammar: “No pictures, photos, etc., allowed to disfigure the walls.
+Any one so doing will be charged with the repairs.” The room is chill in
+winter and stuffy at all seasons, and her companions are chosen by
+chance. Amid such surroundings she combs and rolls and twists with the
+skill of a practised lady’s maid, in preparation, not for an evening’s
+gaiety, but for a day’s toil. Hastily she crams into the small chest of
+drawers which is her sole receptacle all her little apparatus of brush
+and comb and curlers and wavers. For what says the rule? “Brushes,
+bottles, etc., must not be left about in the room, but put away in the
+drawers. Anything so left will be considered done for.” Carefully
+dressed as to the head, but very inadequately washed—for baths are too
+often lacking and hot water seldom provided in the mornings—the young
+lady hurries down to breakfast in a dining-room which has the same
+impersonal, depressing character as the dormitory. Too often it is a
+basement room, and sometimes infested by black beetles. Here, among a
+crowd of companions, she takes her meal, consisting in the great
+majority of cases, of bread and butter and weak tea.
+
+Twenty or twenty-five minutes later the assistant must be in the shop,
+where, again among a crowd of fellow workers, she remains till the
+midday dinner time. In many, indeed in most, shops the space behind the
+counter is too narrow, and the assistant is jostled every time another
+passes her. To a tired woman with aching back and feet the repetition of
+this discomfort grows, towards the end of the day, almost intolerable.
+The work itself is sometimes by no means light; in some departments the
+boxes that have to be lifted down from high “fixtures” are of
+considerable weight; the exhibiting of such things as mantles or coats
+and skirts involves much carrying to and fro of heavy garments; so that
+a young woman may well be physically exhausted by closing time.
+Nervously exhausted she will surely be if the day has been busy, for the
+whole of her occupation is a strain upon the nerves. She has to confront
+strangers all day long; to touch without damaging numbers of articles,
+often of a delicate kind; to fill up a number of forms, the omission of
+any one of which will bring upon her reproof and probably a fine. She is
+never alone. She eats her dinner to an accompaniment of clatter and
+chatter in the same dull dining-room where she breakfasted. In many
+shops that meal is neither good nor sufficient; and even if good the
+food is monotonous. Each day of the week has generally its appointed
+bill of fare. “In many houses the assistants know what the dinner will
+be to-morrow, to-morrow week, to-morrow month, to-morrow year. I have an
+Islington shop in my mind where the menu for years past has been this:—
+
+              Sunday: Pork.
+              Monday: Beef, hot.
+              Tuesday: Beef, cold.
+              Wednesday: Mutton, hot.
+              Thursday: Mutton, cold.
+              Friday: Beef, hot.
+              Saturday: Beef, cold, and resurrection pie.
+
+On Thursday there is a roly-poly pudding, or stewed fruit densely
+thickened with sago.
+
+At a large Clapham house the week is mapped out thus:—
+
+                        Monday: Mutton, hot.
+                        Tuesday: Beef, hot.
+                        Wednesday: Mutton, hot.
+                        Thursday: Beef, cold.
+                        Friday: Fish.
+                        Saturday: Beef.[18]
+
+These meals are often supplemented by private purchases; in some houses
+the cook is allowed to supply extras at a price; in others the
+assistants may bring in food; in yet others there is a refreshment bar
+at which they may and do purchase food. In some establishments they are
+actually fined for leaving any food on the plate.
+
+From dinner the shop assistant returns, generally after a bare half
+hour, to the counter. An extra interval of even ten minutes to be passed
+in rest and solitude would be precious, and even the institution-like
+dormitory would be a welcome refuge. But, no; rare indeed is the “house
+of business” in which the assistant is allowed to enter his or her own
+bedroom during the day, except by special permission from the
+shopwalker.
+
+For tea, which affords a welcome break at about five o’clock, a quarter
+of an hour or twenty minutes will, as a rule, be allotted, and the meal
+will in most cases consist of tea and ready-cut bread and butter. After
+tea work will go on again till closing time. That happy hour varies
+enormously according to the locality and nature of the shop. In the West
+End of London most shops are closed by seven, and on Saturdays by two;
+but in poorer districts shops will habitually be kept open until 9.30,
+and on Saturdays until much later.
+
+When the shop has been cleared of customers the business of tidying up
+and covering in for the night begins. After that comes supper, rather a
+Spartan meal as a rule; and then—then, the assistant is free till 11
+P.M., or on Saturdays till 12. Fifteen minutes after that hour the gas
+of the firm is turned out, and no private light must be kept burning.
+“Any one having a light after that time will be discharged.” The “young
+lady” may now sleep, if she can, in her narrow bed, with her companions
+around her, until the morning’s bell calls her to rise, wash and
+dress—still not alone—and begin another day like the last.
+
+In lower-class shops the assistant does not always have even her bed to
+herself, and has, of course, no choice as to the companion who shares
+it. In such shops, where the hours are long, many young women never,
+except on Sundays or holidays, go out of doors in the daylight. What
+wonder that they grow anæmic, that they suffer continually from
+headaches and indigestion and from all the long train of woes that lie
+in wait for the overworked, underfed, and shut-in women.
+
+In the matter of hours, of food, and of restrictions, young men are no
+better off than young women. They also are subject to fines for every
+petty error, and to a code of rules covering every detail of life and
+work. I have inspected several such codes, and very curious reading I
+have found them. I do not remember any instance in which the number of
+rules was less than 50. Mr Whiteley’s, at the time when I saw them, were
+159; those of another shop in the same district ran up to 198. Here are
+a few sample rules, taken almost at random: “Young men coming to
+business with dirty boots, soiled shirts or collars, etc., and young
+ladies with soiled collars or cuffs, or otherwise appearing in business
+in an untidy manner, fine 3d.” Of course the washing of these immaculate
+collars, cuffs, and shirts is paid for by the wearer. “Gossiping,
+standing in groups, or lounging about in an unbusinesslike manner, fine
+3d.” “Assistants must introduce at least two articles to each customer,
+fine 2d.” “Unnecessary talking and noise in bedrooms is strictly
+prohibited, fine 6d.” “For losing copy of rules, 2d.” “For
+unbusinesslike conduct, 6d.”[19]
+
+It is needless to dwell upon the nagging, ungenerous tone that marks
+such rules as these. That their harassing character helps towards that
+collapse of health and nerves which is so frequent among women shop
+assistants, I feel persuaded; and it is more than probable the abolition
+of “living-in” with all its accompanying petty annoyances would lead to
+a marked improvement in the health of the whole class.[20]
+
+Here are a few notes upon the question of health made by a trustworthy
+observer at close quarters.[21]
+
+_A._ “During the fifteen weeks I spent at ——’s, three girls in my
+department had to leave on account of illness. The department was
+entered through others, and had no street door. In summer it was so
+oppressively hot that even customers often complained. Out of the
+sixteen assistants I worked with, one was anæmic, one had varicose
+veins, one had a chronic cough, one chronic indigestion; all suffered
+from lassitude and headache, and four frequently lost their voices
+through weakness. One of those who left broke down from extreme
+weakness, and had to give up altogether. Another was the case of
+varicose veins. A vein burst, and the girl was taken to the hospital,
+where she was told she must not stand much. She could not give up
+business, however, and now wears elastic stockings above and below the
+knee on both legs. Anæmia was common. At my table at dinner there were
+six persons with the same colourless lips, leaden skins, and hollow
+eyes. This house compares favourably with most business houses in
+London.”
+
+_B._ “I very clearly remember some very hot days ... behind the fancy
+counter of a West-End house. The atmosphere was filled with fluff and
+dust, the very board floors seemed to scorch one’s feet, and the effort
+to drag a heavy lace box out of the fixtures made one faint and giddy.
+One day my companion at the counter gave a little gasp and collapsed on
+a heap of collar-boxes. The shopwalker carried her out of the shop to
+the housekeeper’s room, and in about half an hour she regained
+consciousness. In another half hour she was at the counter again. It was
+only the heat and the standing! That night when we went to bed she
+showed me her blistered feet and told me they had been very painful
+during the day. She had been unable to bathe them for three days, for
+there had only been enough water in the bedroom for washing in the
+morning, and she hadn’t time to wash her feet then.”
+
+_C._ “Only strong girls can manage to keep a berth in this house for any
+length of time. Ailments: weakness, anæmia, and fainting attacks, with
+frequent headaches and other symptoms of a low state of health.
+Underground dining-room lit with gas; a damp unpleasant room. In summer
+it is very close and infested with black beetles. The shops are warmed
+with gas in winter.”
+
+_D._ “The shops of this firm are bitterly cold in winter, as there is no
+artificial heat. The assistants get thoroughly chilled and are not
+allowed a fire in the sitting-room unless the weather is exceptionally
+cold. Sanitary accommodation objectionable.”
+
+The hours of work are in some localities very long. I have known of
+shops in poor districts that remained open on Saturdays till 11, 11.30
+or 12; and cases are cited by credible witnesses of 12.30 as the
+Saturday closing time. Tobacconists’ and sweet shops are often open on
+Sundays, and assistants employed in them are liable to a seven days’
+week. On the other hand, in shops that are never open on a Sunday there
+is often a tendency to discourage the presence of the assistants on the
+premises during Sundays. It used to be not an uncommon practice actually
+to turn the assistants out, from closing time on Saturday till Sunday
+night or Monday morning; but it is a good many years now since I have
+met with any instance of this. The cruelty and meanness of this form of
+economy are sufficiently obvious; yet I have known it practised by a
+draper who was a churchwarden and who was greatly surprised at receiving
+from his vicar earnest remonstrances upon the subject.
+
+Sad to say, a bath or bathroom is by no means regarded by employers as a
+necessity. There are still houses of good repute in which the
+assistants, male and female, have nothing but a basin in which to wash.
+On the very day that I write these words a letter is published in the
+_Daily News_ from a shop assistant who cites the case of “a large house
+in the West-End where hundreds of young men and women ‘live in,’ and not
+a single bath is provided for them.... When the poor assistant feels
+inclined to take a bath he has to take it before the public baths close
+at eight o’clock; and as there is no fire in the sitting-room he is
+obliged to go straight to bed to avoid catching cold on a cold winter’s
+night after taking his bath.”[22]
+
+The salaries both of men and women are poor. The shopwalker and the
+buyer may, in some instances, receive handsome salaries; but for the
+ordinary saleswoman, £35 a year is high pay; indeed, there are many
+young men receiving no more than £20 or £25. Out of this income the
+assistant has to keep up the required standard of appearance, providing
+black coats or gowns, as the case may be, and spotless starched linen.
+Often the collar and cuffs of the young lady are of a regulation pattern
+that may perhaps not suit her again if she goes into another house.
+Towels are not generally included in the furnishing of the bedrooms; the
+purchase and washing of these come out of the assistant’s pocket.
+
+These wages are supposed to be supplemented by “premiums,” and the
+subject of premiums is not without interest for the customer. Certain
+goods, which for some reason it is particularly desired to sell, are
+“premiumed,” _i.e._ a small commission is given to the assistant who
+effects a sale of them. The premium, which is in proportion to the
+selling price, is generally but a small sum. Half a crown is about the
+highest figure, and would represent a purchase running to some pounds.
+On small things the premium may be as low as a halfpenny. The existence
+of premiums explains in great measure the annoyance to which all of us
+have been subjected by the endeavours of an assistant to force upon us
+goods for which we have not asked—goods known behind the counter as
+“intro” (or introduced) goods. A rule quoted above shows that there are
+shops in which an assistant is bound to press two “intro” articles, at
+least, upon every customer. To dispose largely of “intro” goods is
+obviously to the assistant’s interest, not only because the premiums
+make a welcome addition to his small income, but also because the
+disposal of these articles is viewed with favour by his superior
+officers. To the customer who knows what she wants and is anxious to
+spend no more than the needful time and money in getting it, “intro”
+goods are an irritation and a burden—especially if she is sufficiently
+behind the scenes to know their significance to the girl or youth who
+compulsorily obtrudes them upon her. Such customers are apt to forget
+the great commercial truth that shops exist not to supply the needs of
+the public but to fill the pockets of the shopkeeper.
+
+Nor is the premium the only instrument of pressure applied to the shop
+assistant. There is, in most establishments, an unwritten law that each
+assistant must, each week, sell goods to a certain amount. That total
+goes by the name of the “book”; and each young man and young woman is
+aware that repeated failure to “take” his or her “book” will be followed
+by dismissal. One very capable employer has a different method. He
+engages the assistant at a fixed salary; and when she has been at work
+for a couple of months, she is informed that for the future her salary
+will be diminished by a substantial deduction, and that she will receive
+a commission of 1¼ per cent. upon her sales. The assistants are said not
+to keep a reckoning of their commission, but to be of opinion that they
+rather gain than lose. In the “wools” department, where sales would not
+generally run to high figures, £10 was deducted from the £30 a year of
+one assistant, and £8 from the £28 of another. From a salary of £35 in
+the underclothing showroom, no less than £23 was taken off.
+
+There are houses in which a list of weekly “takings” is posted up; and
+some in which the names that stand low in the list are marked by the
+employer with signs of disapprobation. To be a good salesman or
+saleswoman is to be an adept in the art of inducing fellow creatures to
+make purchases that they did not intend to make. Indeed, there are shops
+where failure to effect a sale, if it occurs three times running, means
+dismissal. I knew an instance (a good many years ago) in which a girl
+was dismissed at a moment’s notice from a London millinery shop, because
+she had failed to cajole a customer into buying any bonnet. She was
+“living-in”; her home was not in London; the dismissal took place
+between 5 and 6 o’clock, and she did not know of any lodging to which
+she could go. Fortunately a policeman whom she consulted was able to
+direct her to one of London’s many safe havens for young women. But what
+of the employer, who, suddenly, and late in the day, turned a young girl
+out of his house into the unknown world of London, her only fault being
+that another woman had found in his shop no bonnet to suit her—and had
+been resolute enough to resist buying one that did not?
+
+It is related of a certain provincial draper that seeing a customer
+depart having made no purchase, he called up the assistant who had
+waited upon her. “Why did not that lady buy anything?” “We hadn’t what
+she wanted, sir.” “Anybody can sell people what they want. Remember that
+I keep you to sell people what they don’t want.” That in a nutshell is
+the present condition of retail shopkeeping—especially, perhaps, in the
+department of drapery; and that condition is one reason why some
+customers find it preferable to deal at co-operative stores. The
+business of the assistant in a private shop is to sell, reluctantly
+perhaps, but under stern compulsion, articles that the shopkeeper
+desires sold to a customer who does not really desire to buy them. Can
+any employment be imagined more straining to the nerves, or more trying
+to the temper of a refined and delicate minded person? And there are
+many shop assistants of refinement and of delicate feeling; some of them
+daughters of clergymen and of other professional men who have died
+leaving their girls unprovided for.
+
+At this point some reader will certainly be found to demand why these
+young ladies do not, in a body, abandon the shop and enter domestic
+service. The answer is a simple one enough. These girls, like the vast
+majority of their compatriots, will endure much hardship rather than
+lose caste; and, whatever may be the opinion of the wage-payers, there
+can be no doubt that among wage-earners domestic service ranks as a
+low-caste occupation. The middle class mother who will not send her
+little girl to a public elementary school, the middle class father who
+would rather see his son making a small income as a professional man
+than a large income as a tradesman, ought rather to applaud than to
+condemn the “young lady in business” who refuses to exchange her black
+uniform and her title of “Miss” for the cap and apron and the name
+without a handle of the domestic servant.
+
+The question of class distinction has, as Mr Charles Booth has pointed
+out, a marked influence upon the choice of employment; and this
+influence, the authors of _Women’s Work and Wages_ truly observe has led
+to curious economic anomalies, which are generally beneficial to the
+employers.[23]
+
+An observation somewhat to the same effect may be found on pp. 67, 68 of
+_Women in the Printing Trades_.[24]
+
+In Scotland “living-in” is not customary, but the advantages of freedom
+have been, in the past, sometimes counterbalanced by serious drawbacks.
+Here are some instances from one of Miss Irwin’s reports:—
+
+“In some of these shops the girls are kept on duty continuously; this is
+more especially the case where only one girl is employed.... In scarcely
+any of the shops in this district is lavatory accommodation provided.
+Witness said she knew of drapery shops where the hours are from 8 A.M.
+to 9 P.M., and in some cases to 10 P.M.; while they are kept open till
+11 P.M. and 12 midnight on Saturdays. In these shops the girls are
+allowed half an hour off for breakfast and one hour for dinner. Total
+hours worked per week 82 and 89 (not including meal hours). No seats are
+provided and there is no sanitary accommodation. Witness stated that
+there are frequent cases of girls completely breaking down in health in
+these shops.”
+
+“Witness 504 is about 24 years of age. She is saleswoman and manager in
+a confectioner’s shop and is paid 7s. per week. The shop she keeps is an
+East end branch belonging to a leading firm in this trade. The shops of
+this firm in better localities are closed at 8 P.M. In the other the
+following are the hours: open 9.30 A.M., close at 10 P.M. Saturdays,
+open at 8.30 A.M., close at 11 P.M. As witness has sole charge of the
+shop she cannot leave it to take her meals, or for any other purpose.
+Her dinner is brought to her and she takes it as she can; tea is taken
+in the same way. Witness has in all nine holidays in the year.”
+
+“Witness 418 had been engaged as an assistant in a tea shop and gave the
+following evidence: Her hours were from 9 A.M. to 9 P.M., five days in
+the week; and from 9 A.M. to 11.30 P.M. on Saturdays. Witness had sole
+charge of the shop and was not allowed to go out for meals, except on
+such days as her employer, a commercial traveller, and seldom at home,
+came to relieve her; frequently she was obliged to fast all day, and
+finally she was obliged to leave on account of her health breaking down.
+Total hours worked per day, 12; Saturdays, 14½; per week 74½ hours.”[25]
+
+In restaurants, both in London and elsewhere, the hours are sometimes
+excessive. I have known instances of girls who were employed at the
+refreshment rooms of stations who were not allowed to leave until after
+the last train had gone at night—which meant that they had to walk home
+every night after midnight.
+
+Miss Irwin, in her evidence before the Committee of the House of Lords
+upon the early closing of shops, quotes a very similar instance: “In
+another baker’s shop where six girls were employed, the hours were from
+6.45 A.M. to 8 P.M., and to 11.30 on Saturdays. The girls had to provide
+their own food, and all meals, including breakfast, were made and
+partaken of on the premises, the girls having the use of the kitchen for
+this. No regular time was allowed for meals, and they were kept running
+backwards and forwards to the shop all the time. Very often they were
+kept beyond the nominal closing hour of 11.15 P.M. and lost the last car
+home. This was a great hardship to the girls who lived at a distance. My
+informant said: ‘When I get home, I just sit down and cry with fatigue.’
+The firm have a number of branch shops. There are in all twenty-eight
+girls employed in them.”[26]
+
+The nominal maximum hours in restaurants visited by her are given by
+Miss Irwin as follows:—
+
+ “In 3 cases 16         hours on one or more days in the week    96 hours.
+   „ 1   „   15½               „         „          „               93   „
+   „ 1   „   12 to 17          „         „          „               93   „
+   „ 1   „   15                „         „          „               90   „
+   „ 2   „   16                „         „          „               87   „
+   „ 1   „   14½               „         „          „               87   „
+   „ 2   „   13 to 14          „         „          „               79   „
+   „ 4   „   12½ to 15½        „         „          „               78   „
+   „ 1   „   17                „         „          „               77   „
+   „ 3   „   12 to 12½         „         „          „         72 to 75   „
+   „ 1   „   13                „         „          „               70   „
+
+“These,” adds Miss Irwin, “are the _nominal_ hours, but ... in several
+cases the information was taken from the women assistants at a later
+hour than the nominal closing time.”[27]
+
+The expenses of a waitress are often considerable; she almost always has
+to pay for the washing of the aprons, collars and cuffs that are a part
+of her uniform, and in most cases to provide them. As nearly every
+company has its different pattern the articles are apt to become useless
+when employment is changed. Moreover in some restaurants and
+refreshment-rooms, all breakages, whether made by them or by customers,
+are paid for by the assistants. I have known girls subject to this
+deduction who complained that they received no statement as to how the
+amount deducted was made up. That the sum is in some cases not trifling
+is shown by a newspaper correspondence that occurred in the year 1890. A
+representative of Messrs Spiers & Pond, Ltd., wrote to a newspaper
+complaining that the amounts habitually deducted at Waterloo Station had
+been overstated, and assigned 1s. 9½d. as the weekly average for each
+assistant. This being the firm’s own estimate, there can be no injustice
+in quoting it. When we remember that the wages of waitresses average,
+roughly, from 7s. to 14s. a week, less 8d. or 9d. for washing, we shall
+probably regard an average deduction of 1s. 9½d. a week as by no means
+inconsiderable. A certain proportion of breakages is manifestly
+incidental to the refreshment trade and the renewal of crockery is as
+much one of its natural expenses as the renewal of fuel. Either of these
+items might just as fairly be laid upon the waitresses. It is often made
+a reproach to schemes of industrial partnership that the employees share
+the profits without sharing the losses. This particular form of
+partnership, in which employees bear losses but take no share in gains
+seems to have escaped the economists.
+
+In the matters of poor pay, uncertainty of employment and compulsorily
+“respectable” clothing, clerks and bookkeepers occupy much the same
+position as shop assistants; and when their employment happens to be in
+shops, their hours are equally long. A young woman known to me, a highly
+competent clerk and book-keeper, showed me letters from employers with
+whom she was in treaty. In one case she was to be cashier and
+book-keeper in a very well known and flourishing shop; she was to be at
+her post until 11 P.M. on Saturdays and until 8 (or it may have been
+8.30) on other evenings. Her pay was to be 8s. a week, living out. I may
+add that shortly afterwards I myself saw this shop open one evening, not
+Saturday, at nearly 9 o’clock. The other post, again that of cashier and
+book-keeper, was in the office of an extremely wealthy wholesale City
+firm, where thousands of pounds would have passed through her hands
+weekly and where the book-keeping would have been very complex. The
+salary offered was 14s. a week.
+
+Reviewing this chapter, I see that I have dealt almost exclusively with
+large establishments. In smaller ones and especially in poor districts
+the food and housing may be worse, and the payment will almost certainly
+be lower. On the other hand the regulations will in all likelihood be
+less rigid and sometimes the relations between employer and employed
+will be quite human and even homelike.
+
+Of the general conditions in a thoroughly low class shop, Mr Maxwell’s
+_Vivien_ presents a picture faithful probably in most particulars. A
+more typical case, illuminated by a spark of real genius, is portrayed
+in Mr Wells’s _Kipps_; and there is an admirable vignette in Gissing’s
+_The Odd Women_.
+
+It is only just to add that neither the somewhat exhaustive
+investigations made under the auspices of the Women’s Industrial Council
+nor such information as, during a considerable course of years, I have
+been able to collect personally, confirm those accusations of prevalent
+immorality which might be suggested by such novels as Zola’s _Au Bonheur
+des Dames_, and which are freely made in some quarters. No doubt
+instances must from time to time occur in which a shopwalker or an
+employer makes use of his position as a weapon of seduction; but such
+instances are certainly the exception. There may also possibly have
+existed, somewhere, at some time, a basis of fact for that persistent
+legend of the employer who offers to young women the free use of a latch
+key by way of compensation for low payment.
+
+For the large majority of shop girls, however, the temptations of shop
+life take the form not of illicit lovemaking within the shop but rather
+of continued dulness, driving and discomfort, constantly pressing them
+towards any offered means of escape. The passion that really prevails in
+the modern shop is the passion for money, which, no less than more lurid
+passions preferred by the romance writer, devours the youth and lives of
+girls. It does not, however, consciously fall under the classification
+of the decalogue, and the destroyers of these victims often honestly
+believe themselves to be men of singular righteousness and virtue, the
+pillars and bulwarks of an industrious, commercial nation. The feudal
+baron, not improbably regarded himself in no very different light.
+
+
+  _Note._ The daily papers of the week in which this chapter was written
+  contained two cases that corroborate the statements made in it; and
+  that show the evils described to be by no means matters of the past. I
+  give them verbatim, except that in the second case I have concealed
+  the name of the accused lad.
+
+  George A. Evans, coffee-shop keeper, of Goldsmith’s Row, Hackney Road,
+  was summoned at Old Street for breaches of the Shop Hours Act by
+  employing two young persons as waitresses for more than 74 hours in
+  any one week.
+
+  Mr D. Carter, for the London County Council, explained that girls
+  under the age of 18 were denominated “young persons,” and while they
+  might be worked 12 hours for the first five days of the week, and 14
+  hours on a Saturday, all meal times were to be counted in as part of
+  the employment.
+
+  The defendant was found employing a girl aged 17 years and 7 months,
+  and another 16 years and 2 months, and both had in the week ending May
+  26th worked 85 hours each. Further, the defendant had no notice of the
+  hours of labour, as allowed by the Act, exhibited in his shop. He was
+  also summoned for that offence.
+
+  Defendant pleaded guilty, and Mr Dickinson imposed fines and costs
+  amounting to £4, 18s.—_Daily News_, 23rd August 1906.
+
+  A well dressed clerk, named Y. Z., aged 16, was charged at Marylebone
+  with having embezzled £2, 2s. belonging to his employers Ryland & Co.,
+  auctioneers of Edgeware Road. His duty was to collect rents, and it
+  was alleged that his defalcations amounted in all to £7, 10s. In
+  extenuation of the offence he pointed out that his wages only came to
+  12s. a week, out of which he had to pay 4s. rent and 2s. travelling
+  expenses, leaving him but 6s. a week with which to clothe and feed
+  himself. He took the £2, 2s. intending to pay it back, but he was
+  found out before he could do so. His hours were from 9 to 6. Mr Paul
+  Taylor said he was at a loss to know how Z. could have sustained life
+  on the small salary he was receiving. He remanded him to give the
+  missionary an opportunity of seeing what could be done for
+  him.—_Tribune_, 24th August 1906.
+
+
+
+
+                               CHAPTER IV
+                            TRAFFIC WORKERS
+
+  The traffic worker and the public safety—“Privileged
+      cabs”—Railway workers—The hours of signalmen—The seven day
+      week—“Blacklisting”—London’s omnibus men—Paying the police
+      for leave to work—“The rest of the evening”—What is required
+      of a driver—What is required of a conductor—Wages stopped
+      for fogs, fires and processions—Curiosities of an “Accident
+      Club”—How a motor man is “passed” for a licence—The “journey
+      system”—What it means to the passenger—What it means to the
+      men—Breakdowns—Wages in the garage—3d. a day for
+      uniform—“The bar up”—The best employer in London—Tram men
+      under the London County Council.
+
+
+In these days of much journeying, there is scarcely one of us whose life
+and safety do not depend, again and again, upon the skill, the
+steadiness, the nerve and the judgment of the men who steer our public
+conveyances. Not only in their own interests, therefore, but in the
+interest of public security, it is essential that the men upon whom
+rests so vast a responsibility should not be overworked, underpaid nor
+harassed. The sad fact is, however, that the vast majority of them are
+both overworked and harassed; and that, if not the majority, at least a
+very appreciable minority are decidedly underpaid.
+
+Of cabmen I do not propose to speak; the subject of their hours,
+conditions and rates of pay being so intricate that anything like a
+general view is difficult to present. I will content myself with
+indicating, by means of a paragraph from a Parliamentary Report, the
+kind of exactions to which cabmen are exposed. “Privileged cabs” are
+those admitted, upon payment of a fixed charge, to ply in railway
+stations. It appears that the lowest charge made by any company
+maintaining the privileged cab system is 1s. per week. The smallest
+number of cabs is “15, at Clapham Junction, and the largest number of
+cabs, 290, at Paddington, which at 3s. per week provide the Great
+Western Railway with the substantial sum of £2262 per annum.”[28]
+
+The railway workers of Great Britain are, as a class, men of excellent
+character, intelligent, careful, attentive and worthy of the trust
+reposed in them. They have a strong trade union, and their secretary now
+sits in Parliament. Yet this body of grown men, most of them voters, was
+so unable to secure from its employers a reasonably short working day
+that the legislature, unwilling though it has always shown itself to any
+direct regulation of the working hours of men, felt compelled in the
+interests of public safety, to intervene; and a special order of the
+Board of Trade has, for many years past, limited the hours of railway
+men. Yet, even now, there are porters, generally at small stations, who
+are on duty for 16 hours a day; and 8 hours, which should be the longest
+day of any signalman, are extended, except in the busiest boxes, to 10
+and, in some cases, to 12. Many a porter works seven days a week for
+16s., perhaps at some small station where “tips” are infrequent. In this
+connection it is worthy of note that such companies as pay additionally
+for Sunday labour find it possible to do with much fewer workers on
+Sundays. Of how much improvement the railway man’s lot is still
+susceptible may be judged from the programme of the union, drawn up at
+the close of 1906, and about to be submitted to the various companies.
+Its demands are as follows:—
+
+ An eight-hour day for trainmen, shunters and signalmen.
+
+ No railway employee to work more than ten hours a day.
+
+
+ An increase of 2s. per week in the wages of all grades receiving less
+    than 30s. per week.
+
+ Sunday labour to be paid for at the rate of time and a half; and
+    overtime at the rate of time and a quarter.[29]
+
+The worst form of oppression, however, to which the railway man is
+exposed is one very difficult to prove and very easy to deny:
+“blacklisting.” A railway servant, on leaving the employ of one company,
+(whether at the company’s instance or at his own) receives no written
+character, nor can he refer any intending employer to the report of his
+immediate superior. Enquiry must be made at headquarters; and it seldom
+happens that a man who, for whatever cause, has left the service of one
+company, succeeds in getting taken on by another. The men are convinced
+that a deliberate understanding exists, and this conviction leads many
+of them, unwillingly subservient, to endure the ills they have, rather
+than face loss of employment and of pay. Any trade that is in the
+hands—as the railway industry of course is—of comparatively few and very
+powerful employers is especially liable to develop the tyranny of
+“blacklisting.” The existence of the practice is almost invariably
+denied, and can, in the nature of things, very seldom be substantiated;
+but it is possible to remark that, as a matter of experience, one
+company does not engage the man who has previously worked for another.
+The men know, experimentally, that to leave their present employers
+means, in the great majority of cases, leaving the industry altogether.
+How much such knowledge must sap a man’s independence, how much it must
+try his nerves and his temper, it is, surely, unnecessary to insist.
+
+The railway workers have, in the course of years, conquered the immense
+difficulties that beset the organising of men whose hours are long and
+varying, and whose work brings them rather apart than together. Other
+workers, whose employment is closely akin to theirs, are still involved
+in those early struggles which seem to the men engaged in them almost
+hopeless. Comparing their position with that of the railway men, we
+shall see, once again, how great are the benefits which organisation can
+bestow, and how powerless are even skilled and licensed workmen unless
+backed by a strong union.
+
+The omnibus men of London form a group of workers familiar to all
+London’s citizens. The most tedious of “blocks” has been enlivened for
+us by their “chaff”; the blackest of fogs and the most scorching of
+dog-days have failed to destroy their patience and their good temper.
+With the advent of the motor omnibus, however, a change has become
+apparent which fills observant Londoners with foreboding. The motor man
+is, to put it plainly, snappish; he hustles his passengers in and out;
+he not infrequently turns a blind eye to the breathless pursuer; and he
+is apt to be caustic in remarks upon the slowness of the aged or the
+unwieldy traveller. To this impatience the jarring motion and irritating
+jangle of the car may perhaps contribute; but the main reason of it may,
+I believe, be found in the conditions under which the drivers and
+conductors of motor omnibuses mostly work.
+
+It may be of some interest to compare the conditions of three different
+groups of men, all of whom are busied in the work of carrying London’s
+inhabitants to and fro; especially since their cases exemplify a
+transition which is in course of progress around us.
+
+All drivers and conductors are compelled to pay for leave to exercise
+their calling. It is considered that the security of the passenger
+requires to be safeguarded, and that no person should be allowed to
+officiate upon a public conveyance unless he has been licensed to do so.
+In London the ultimate licensing authority is the Home Secretary, to
+whom Section 8 of the Stage and Hackney Carriages (Metropolis) Act of
+1869 has allowed a power little less than autocratic. These are the
+terms of it: “A licence to the driver or conductor of a hackney or stage
+carriage may be granted at such price, on such conditions, be in such
+form, be subject to revocation or suspension in such events and
+generally be dealt with in such manner as the said Secretary of State
+may by order prescribe, subject to this provision, that any licence
+shall, if not revoked or suspended, be in force for a year, and there
+shall be paid in respect thereof to the Receiver of the Metropolitan
+Police Fund such sum not exceeding 5s. as the said Secretary of State
+may prescribe.” Successive Home Secretaries have seen fit to fix the
+maximum charge of 5s. for each year’s licence; and between the 1st of
+April, 1905 and the 31st of March, 1906, the Commissioners of Police
+received as many sums of 5s. as sufficed to make up a total of £7928,
+10s.[30]
+
+Of the manner in which the police authorities exercise their power
+something will appear later on; but, apart from any question of
+administration, there is surely some injustice in taxing the men for a
+licence demanded not at all in their interest, but solely in that of
+their passengers. That the owners of public conveyances, who derive a
+profit from running them on the public roads, and who in doing so assist
+to wear out those roads, should pay for a licence may be not
+inequitable; but that the paid servants of such owners should be taxed,
+as a condition of entering that service, can hardly, when judicially
+considered, be pronounced defensible, and it is not surprising that the
+Select Committee should advise alteration. “The theory of the Home
+Office,” says the Report, “seems to be that, in view of the special
+benefits derived by the cab and omnibus trade from its connection with
+the police, it is only fair that the trade should be specially taxed for
+the maintenance of the police.... There seem, however, to be few other
+classes of the community who are charged in this way for their own
+police inspection, and in our opinion, the system requires
+modification.”[31]
+
+The drivers and conductors of horse omnibuses (though there have been
+changes in their conditions) are still employed upon the system which
+was once the only one in vogue, and are, at least nominally, paid by the
+day. The length of day varies somewhat on different routes, but the
+average is about fifteen hours—or very nearly twice the length of the
+working day in the best managed industries. Moreover, the omnibus man
+works as a rule thirteen days in a fortnight. His share of leisure is
+pretty well described by the reply of an elderly driver who, in the
+hearing of my informant, was asked by a passenger, at something after 11
+P.M., whether this was the last journey. “Yes, sir,” the man answered
+mildly, “this is our last journey—and the rest of the evening we have to
+ourselves.”
+
+Out of his nominal daily wage of 7s. or 8s., the driver has to provide
+rugs, capes and whips. Custom requires of him “tips” to horse-keepers,
+pullers-up, &c., the total of which is estimated at not far short of a
+shilling a day. In only a few cases are the men near enough to their
+homes at dinner time to be met by a small son or daughter carefully
+conveying “Father’s dinner” in a covered dish or basin—an economy
+possible to very many cabmen. Their meal, on this account, inevitably
+costs them rather more than if it could be prepared at home; and the
+same increase of cost attends their tea. Less than two meals in 15
+hours, a man who works in the open air can scarcely do with.
+
+Superhuman punctuality is expected of the omnibus. Should it arrive two
+or three minutes late—or two or three minutes early—at one of its
+“points,” its driver may be suspended from work for from two to seven
+days. The conductor, whose nominal wage is 6s. a day, is liable to be
+suspended or discharged if his takings fall below the average. When a
+journey is stopped by fog, fire or the occurrence of a procession, the
+proportion of pay for that journey is deducted from the wage of driver
+and conductor alike, even although they may not succeed in bringing the
+omnibus into the yard until after the usual hour, or even if, as happens
+occasionally, they may have to stay out all night with it. As one of the
+fraternity sardonically remarked to me: “It’s a new experience for them,
+that’s all.”
+
+At the present moment, the drivers and conductors of horse omnibuses are
+face to face with the prospect of a lowered wage. On one line, there has
+been a reduction of one journey _per diem_ (the working day having
+previously been one of 16 hours) and a reduction in the day’s pay of 1s.
+6d. for the driver (from 8s. to 6s. 6d.) and of 1s. for the conductor.
+It is fully expected that men on other lines will, before long,
+experience the same change.
+
+It will, I am sure, surprise many readers to learn that the drivers and
+conductors of omnibuses are expected to defray the expenses of
+accidents. The men employed by one large company subscribe to a fund for
+the purpose of meeting such expenses. I cannot learn that any direct
+rule obliges them to belong to this so-called “Drivers’ and Conductors’
+Accident Club,” but they are of opinion that any man who declined to
+belong would not find himself, for long, in the employ of the company. I
+have been fortunate enough to inspect the rules of this club, and have
+carefully preserved a copy. It is a document equally remarkable for its
+oppressiveness and for its grammar. The preamble runs thus: “This
+Club ... is for the purpose of creating a fund by which the expenses so
+frequently arising from accidental causes may be met without allowing
+these expenses to fall unjustly upon the company, or subjecting the
+individuals who may be the immediate cause of such expenses to perilous
+and embarrassing circumstances, and, be it further understood, that each
+Driver and Conductor are responsible for all damages to property or
+person to the amount of Ten Pounds, and any Driver or Conductor not
+conforming with the Club Rules will not be allowed any assistance from
+the Funds thereof for any accident they may meet with.” Rule 1 requires
+“Each Driver to pay 2s. entrance fee as soon as he is passed eligible to
+drive an Omnibus belonging to the Club. Each Conductor to pay 1s.
+entrance fee. Each Service Driver to pay 1s. per week contribution. Each
+Service Conductor to pay 6d. per week contribution.” Rules 3 and 5 are
+worth quoting. “Whatever accident may occur by any Driver and Conductor,
+whether regular or spare men, he shall pay towards such accident not
+less than one quarter of the amount the accident may cost the Club to
+settle. If not able to pay the whole of such fourth in one payment it
+must be paid by instalments of not less than 2s. 6d. per week. Should it
+be further proved that such accident was brought about by intoxication
+or any kind of neglect, the Committee shall, at their next meeting, have
+power to levy any further sum they agree upon, and, whatever sum fixed,
+may be paid by weekly instalments by such sums as may be agreed upon by
+the Committee.” “Should any Member of the Club leave or be discharged
+from the Company’s service within three months of his becoming a Member,
+such Member shall forfeit all claims upon the Club funds.” Rule 7, after
+providing for quarterly meetings, proceeds: “The fourth meeting to take
+place on the most convenient date in December, when after putting away
+as reserve fund, not less than £40, any surplus remaining to be equally
+divided among the Members in accordance with what they may be entitled
+to.” Rule 9 is, perhaps, the most remarkable piece of grammatical
+construction that ever presented itself under the guise of English. “Any
+Member having left the Club and is indebted thereto shall not be
+entitled to share, unless all arrears be paid up. Any Member having left
+the Club and is entitled to share must apply for same within the first
+calendar month of the ensuing year, if not his share will be lost and
+will be placed to the credit of the Club for the ensuing year.”
+
+Thus the nominal wage of every driver in this company’s service is
+really reduced by 1s. weekly, and that of every conductor by 6d.; while
+a fund of “not less than £40,” saved up out of these men’s earnings, is
+held in hand to indemnify the company for possible accidents, whether
+such accidents are caused by the fault of the men or not. The conductor,
+indeed, can seldom be even remotely responsible for an accident; yet the
+conductor, no less than the driver, is made to pay this tax. It would be
+interesting to know whether the law would uphold a man who should refuse
+to pay anything at all towards the cost of an accident not caused by
+neglect or misconduct. He would, of course, lose all chance of further
+employment in the trade; but he might conceivably put an end, once and
+for all, to these exactions.
+
+It will hardly appear, from all that has been said, that the life of the
+omnibus man is extraordinarily enviable; yet his situation is decidedly
+preferable to that of the man who exchanges the society of a pair of
+horses for that of a snorting and self-willed motor. Like the horse
+driver, the motor driver must secure a licence, for which, when he gets
+it, he must pay 5s. yearly to the Police Commissioners; and if
+possessing a horse licence he desires to retain it he must pay an
+additional 5s. per annum. Moreover, when he enters his application, he
+has also to pay a fee of 5s. to the London County Council for
+registration. The Commissioners have been known to refuse motor licences
+to men who have been driving for years, but whose licence shows an
+endorsement, sometimes of distant date and sometimes for an offence of
+trivial character. To the lay mind it appears that a man, whose
+misdemeanours were not too great to make him unfit for driving a horse
+omnibus, is likely to be a safer driver for a motor than a man from some
+other calling, quite inexperienced in the art of threading the maze of
+London traffic. In any case it is clearly an injustice that such a man
+should not be able to learn, before spending time and money upon special
+training, that a licence will not be granted to him. The test of
+competence applied is curious but probably effective. A certain
+inspector, whose name I refrain from giving, collects a number of
+candidates and places himself with one of them on the driving stand of a
+motor omnibus, the remainder of the candidates occupying seats as
+passengers. The driver, under orders from the inspector, steers the car
+hither and thither until such time as his instructor dismisses him to
+inaction, and selects another. Not until the party has returned home,
+does any man learn his fate. Then the inspector remarks to each as the
+case may be: “You have passed,” or “You must come up again.” The fiat of
+this gentleman being unchecked, it is well that it appears to be
+dictated by justice. Beloved, indeed, of his licencees he is not; but I
+found myself hardly able to sympathise with complaints of his unsmiling
+disposition. How should a man smile, whose calling in life it is to
+imperil his existence at the hands of an endless succession of
+unpractised motor drivers? A certain proportion of these candidates are
+men who have never driven in the London streets—some of them never on
+any road whatever. There is a legend of one, said to have been
+originally a shop assistant, who entered upon his career unaware that he
+was expected to drive to the left rather than to the right. I have
+myself travelled in a motor omnibus the driver of which took the wrong
+side of three refuges between Maida Vale and Tottenham Court Road.
+Whether ignorance guided his course or a desire to achieve a full
+complement of journeys _per diem_ I cannot, of course, tell.
+
+Having secured his licence and an engagement, the motor driver is put
+upon a certain route, to perform a shift, not of so many hours, but of
+so many journeys. The “journey system,” which is responsible for nearly
+all the ill temper and not a few of the accidents that attend the course
+of the motor omnibus, is as follows. A certain number of journeys each
+day is allotted to each car. Driver and conductor are paid by the
+journey, and the required number of journeys is such that only under the
+most favourable possible conditions can it be completed. At least one
+car in every three will fail in the task. Let us consider, for instance,
+the case of certain cars which, at one period, were timed to do four
+journeys, but have recently been required to make six in the day. Two
+shifts are worked, each set of men being supposed to make three
+journeys. Since the very barest measure of time is allowed, the men are
+constantly on the strain; they are tempted to take risks, and are
+unwilling to pause long enough for the picking up and setting down of
+passengers. At the close of the period allowed for the first shift, the
+third journey will in all probability not be finished, but it may have
+been begun, and will be concluded before the car is brought in. It thus
+becomes more impossible than ever for the second set of journeys to be
+compressed into the shortened hours left for the second shift, the
+rather that the car will very probably have suffered from the strain put
+upon it in the endeavour to get out of it the utmost amount of work. Two
+journeys may be achieved, in which case the driver may receive from 4s.
+to 5s., and the conductor from 3s. to 4s.; or only one may be completed,
+in which case the payment of each will be but half as much. Is it
+wonderful that the tempers of men working under such conditions display
+some uncertainty, nor that accidents are frequent especially in the
+latter half of the day? The wonder is that so many cautious City
+gentlemen, who obviously regard their own lives as precious, should
+continue to entrust their persons to vehicles so precarious.
+
+On some lines, the men work early and late shifts in alternate weeks; on
+others, they change twice a week. A driver, working on these terms,
+explained to me how, on a certain evening in the week, he came off duty
+about midnight, after which time he had to get home, to get himself
+clean—no rapid process, as many an amateur motorist well knows—and to
+get his supper. Soon after six, next morning, he was due at the garage
+to take on his early shift, and was obliged, therefore, to leave home by
+about half past five. His next leisure for a meal not arriving until
+seven hours later, it behoves him to get his breakfast before he sets
+out. How many hours’ rest fall to his share on such occasions, and how
+fit he is, in the morning, to assume the responsibility of a motor
+omnibus and its complement of passengers, readers may judge for
+themselves.
+
+Among other evils arising from this system we may note the way in which
+every man’s hand is turned against his comrade. It becomes the interest
+of the first shift to snatch time enough for their own journeys, to the
+loss of the second shift; while the second shift would be more than
+human if they did not resent the time thus lost. The employing company
+alone profits by setting up an impossible, or almost impossible, task as
+the measure of the day’s payment. By pretending that three journeys
+instead of two form the task of one shift of workers, the payment for
+each journey can be fixed at one-third instead of at one-half of what
+may be reckoned as the wage of a man’s working day.
+
+From the moment when the car breaks down—and how frequently it does so
+our own eyes assure us—the payment of its driver and conductor cease.
+They must remain by the disabled vehicle until a trolley comes to drag
+it away; their period of waiting may stretch into several hours—it may
+even extend through the night, but for that part of their time in which
+they were not actually conveying passengers they will not receive a
+penny. Some companies have indeed a rule upon their code that payment
+will be made if the road engineer employed by the firm certifies that
+the driver is not responsible for the accident. One can understand that
+certificates, the granting of which means money out of pocket to the
+company, are not likely to be very lavishly issued by an engineer in the
+company’s employ; and there are men who declare that this rule is a dead
+letter and that broken journeys are never paid for. Industrially
+speaking, the history of the motor omnibus industry in London has been
+unfortunate. One, at least, of the firms that appeared early in the
+field followed the tactics rendered familiar by the example of American
+trusts. It began, as the trust does, by underselling competitors, and
+offered the passenger a longer journey for a penny. A hope was probably
+entertained that these low fares would deter the older companies from
+setting up motor conveyances. The older companies were not deterred; but
+they found themselves compelled to compete on their rival’s terms; so
+that, for a time, the curious alternative was offered to the Londoner,
+of travelling from the Marble Arch to Victoria, either in a slow horse
+omnibus, for 2d., or in a quick motor omnibus for 1d. To travel for 1d.
+instead of for 2d. is the desire of every passenger; but the
+gratification may be bought too dear, and danger is a high price to pay.
+How much danger the passenger incurs, who travels in the motor omnibuses
+of certain companies may be guessed by persons who have heard—as I
+have—the drivers of these vehicles talking among themselves of the
+accidents and of the hairbreadth escapes that have formed part of their
+own experience. The running into the river of the Barnes omnibus was
+foretold, less than a week before its occurrence, as a thing that must,
+sooner or later, come to pass. The trained men who face them are fully
+aware what risks they are running; and to some of them, no doubt, the
+very risk is an attraction. No motor man need complain that modern life
+lacks incident and adventure. The passenger, on the other hand, who,
+when he sits behind a horse, can see for himself its weakness or its
+restiveness, cannot possibly judge the strength or the weakness of
+machinery that is not even open to his view. Some omnibuses, no doubt,
+are in excellent condition; but it is equally certain that there are
+others, the essential parts of which are perilously near to being worn
+out. Accumulated experience has convinced even so technically unskilled
+an observer as myself that there is at least one company whose vehicles
+are not, in themselves, dangerous, and at least one other with whose
+habitual passengers a prudent life insurance company should have nothing
+to do. In the hands of an unskilled driver, or of a driver rendered
+temporarily unskilled by fatigue, by too long a fast, or by too little
+sleep, every motor omnibus is dangerous; and every hardship of the men
+thus becomes a source of public danger.
+
+The frequency of breakdowns has undoubtedly been increased by the
+shortsighted policy of some owners who, for economy’s sake, have
+employed in the repairing shop, not qualified engineers, but merely
+“fitters,” or even those humbler persons known as “fitters’ mates.” The
+lesson of experience, however, seems to be teaching wisdom in this
+respect; and the motor companies are learning, as other employers have
+learned before them, that to entrust costly property to unskilled hands
+comes expensive, however low the wages paid. Meanwhile, we are informed
+by the Report of the Select Committee upon the Cabs and Omnibuses
+(Metropolitan) Bill, that during the period covered by that Report, 25%
+of the cars were on an average always out of use. This means, of course,
+that a certain ratio of the men employed upon such cars were always out
+of a job. Most of these would be set to various kinds of work in the
+garage, their payment while so employed being but 3s. 6d. a day, a rate
+representing, for ten hours, less than fourpence an hour. These are
+truths which should be recollected when persons familiar only with the
+nominal figure of a wage that can hardly ever be earned, talk of the
+good pay of motor drivers. Moreover, instances are quoted in which men
+have not received even this pittance for the time spent in the garage,
+but have been paid only for one day instead of for two or three. By one
+company a notice has been posted up that, from the day upon which these
+words are written, no work done in the garage will be paid for, unless a
+certificate has been obtained from the superintendent of the garage.
+
+It may be remarked that this principle of proportional deduction which
+is so dear to the hearts of the companies is not applied in the matter
+of the uniform, for which although it never becomes the wearer’s
+property a charge of threepence a day is demanded, even though the day
+may have been broken and the uniform worn only during an hour or two. A
+tale is told of a conductor to whom, the car having come to grief early
+in the shift, fourpence was handed as the fraction of wage to which he
+was entitled, out of which sum he was requested to hand back threepence
+in payment for his uniform. He had not presence of mind enough to reduce
+this charge in proportion to the reduction of his own wages, and to
+proffer a farthing as the nearest equivalent to one-fifteenth of
+threepence, but weakly yielded to the demand and went away with a penny.
+At threepence a day and 339 days in a year (_i.e._, deducting 26
+Sundays) each man would pay £4, 4s. 3d. for his coat, cap, &c. It would
+be interesting to know what price is paid for the articles by the
+company.
+
+Employment in the omnibus trade, whether behind a horse or behind a
+motor, is thus full of discomforts and of weariness. Yet, such as it is,
+the men would be thankful for any certainty of retaining it. They are
+liable to discharge upon any complaint from an inspector (or possibly
+from an outside person) and no opportunity is allowed of exculpating
+themselves. Furthermore they are firmly convinced that a number of
+spies—“spots” is their own slang term—travel to and fro in the character
+of ordinary passengers and constantly present complaints, ill or well
+founded as the case may be, to the companies. “There’s plenty of
+people,” said one man, “who never pay their omnibus fares. They send in
+their tickets to the company and get back their money.” “Of course,”
+said another, “they must make plenty of complaints or the companies
+wouldn’t think it worth while to keep them on.” Whether this belief is
+right or wrong, its existence is, at least, highly significant of the
+light in which the men regard their employers, and is, I venture to say,
+a symptom of very unsatisfactory relations.
+
+The men are also persuaded that there exists among the Federation of
+masters a tacit compact in accordance with which a man who has quitted
+the service of any one of them will not, for a certain length of time,
+be admitted into that of any other. In their own language “the bar is
+up” against such a man. How far this opinion is well founded it is
+difficult to judge; but it is unquestionably the fact that instance
+after instance can be adduced of drivers, holding unendorsed licences,
+who, on leaving the employment of one company, have been refused week
+after week, by the others, and have been obliged at last to find some
+other calling. One finds himself happier and wealthier as a street
+sweeper. In at least one such case the responsible post eventually
+secured is a guarantee of good character and steadiness.
+
+It is always instructive to compare the conditions offered by the best
+and the worst employers, respectively, in the same trade. In the matter
+of traffic, the best employer in London is the London County Council. To
+begin with, the men who work upon its trams pay nothing for their
+uniforms. Their working day is of ten hours. Time lost by such
+hindrances as fog, fire and processions is paid extra (at the rate known
+to the trade as “time and a half”). Work on a seventh day in the week
+when it occurs is paid at time-and-a-quarter rates. Moreover any horse
+driver in the Council’s service who desires to qualify as an electric
+driver can be trained, free of charge, in the municipal technical
+school; whereas the charge for training made by one of the private
+companies is £5. Not only does the London County Council issue to its
+inspectors special instructions to avoid arbitrary and domineering
+treatment of subordinates; it also affords to every man accused by an
+inspector the opportunity of meeting his accuser face to face, and of
+telling his own story. In short, the London County Council treats those
+deserving citizens who do its work, with justice and with respect; and
+they, in their turn, treat the public with a degree of kindly courtesy
+most refreshing after the asperities of the motor omnibus man. Nor can
+it be maintained by any truthful person that the comparatively
+comfortable conditions of the municipal tram men have cost the ratepayer
+too dear; since the profits of the Southern tramway lines alone in the
+year 1905 were assessed by the Exchequer for income tax purposes at
+£203,831; while, in addition to the large profits thus indicated, the
+reduction of fares on these lines must, by this time, have saved
+hundreds of pounds to the travelling public.
+
+With the exception, then, of that fortunate minority employed by the
+municipality, the workers on the public conveyances of London present no
+very cheering spectacle. In the beginning of this 20th century, and in
+the capital of a country that prides itself upon the freedom of its
+citizens and upon the representative character of its government, we
+find adult skilled male workers, performing valuable public services and
+occupying positions of great responsibility, apparently as powerless as
+any sweated home worker in her garret to secure for themselves either a
+reasonably short working day, or equitable treatment, or payment for the
+whole of the hours spent in the employer’s service. Yet one group of
+them is guaranteed by the licence of a public department as efficient;
+the services which they render are eagerly demanded by the public; their
+industry is one in which foreign competition is impossible; and the
+companies employing them are in many instances paying high dividends.
+These, surely, are facts very much worth the consideration of all those
+fellow citizens for whom, in the last resort, the railway man and the
+omnibus man are working.
+
+
+
+
+                               CHAPTER V
+                         WAGE-EARNING CHILDREN
+
+  Children and home work—Boot making—Box making—All night at match box
+      making—“Can do nearly everything”—A boy tooth brush maker—A boy
+      belt maker—Polishing “spindle legs”—Children and laundry
+      work—Errands—Street sellers—Boys in bakehouses—In brick
+      fields—Girls and heavy trays of jam—Half timers’ heavy
+      loads—Things as they were—Terrors of the early cotton mills—A five
+      year old maker of “blonde net”—Miss Edgeworth’s “Ellen”—Mrs Hogg
+      and wage-earning children—Children in American cotton mills—The
+      glass bottle works—Effects of juvenile work on health—On
+      education—On morals—On industrial efficiency.
+
+
+The very worst feature of underpaid labour is that it tends to make wage
+earners of children and, in so doing, deteriorates the coming generation
+of adult wage earners. Where work is carried on in the home, the
+temptation to press children into the service is very great. The tedious
+process of fetching and carrying work from and to the factory or
+workshop generally falls to their lot; indeed, workers who have no
+children of their own not infrequently hire a child, for a few pence, to
+perform that duty. The time of a child is considered to be of little
+value—of less value than the three halfpence or twopence earned by the
+home worker in the hour or more that is often spent in waiting. Not a
+few children are habitually late for school, in consequence of being
+thus employed. Here is an instance.
+
+“Jane B. Standard 6. Age 13. Father a potman at 25s. a week. Mother
+machines uppers of boots; common goods, 10d. a dozen; better, 1s. 3d. a
+dozen. Jane sews on buttons, cuts apart work, inks round button holes. A
+little brother, aged nine, does buttons” (_i.e._, I suppose, sews them
+on). “Mother, who does sometimes three dozen in a day, sometimes only
+three pairs, begins work at 7 A.M. Jane begins at 7.45. She goes to the
+shop for work, in the morning, and carries it in—a heavy load of three
+dozen pairs sometimes—when she comes home from school. She gets late for
+school, and is only in time in the afternoons.”
+
+At the same school, a girl of eleven, Alice J., pastes in the soles of
+babies’ shoes and sews together the pairs. A sister “sews and beats.”
+These are white buck shoes, and are paid at the rate of 1s. 1d. to 1s.
+3d. a dozen. Two dozen can be done in a day. The father is a cabinet
+maker in regular work; the mother a cleaner (apparently at an office or
+warehouse). The sister, of 18 or 19, makes 10s. a week. The little Alice
+works from 12 to 1, and again from 5.30 to 6.30, doing in that time a
+dozen or fifteen pairs; she reckons that it takes her five minutes to
+finish a pair, or perhaps twenty minutes for six pairs.
+
+Esther S., aged ten, and a sister aged six, help their mother at the
+midday break, and also in the evening, in lining and covering boxes. 5d.
+a gross is paid for the smaller sort; 1s. 9d. for the larger sort. The
+work of the children is said to be absolutely necessary. “Dreadful home;
+nice woman,” is the observation of the visitor whose notes I have been
+permitted to use.
+
+A schoolfellow of Esther’s, Sarah W., is thirteen years old and in
+Standard 4. Her father was in prison. Her mother drinks. These parents
+hid their children for eight months, and the educational authorities had
+great difficulty in finding them. This child, “a very bright girl,” used
+to stay up all night making match boxes, so as to get them taken in by
+11 the next morning. She now works, between school times, at capping
+sticks.
+
+Another little girl sews and opens Japanese fish and poultry baskets,
+and sews the handles upon string bags; she also sometimes makes the
+bags. She does not like the work, because it makes her hands sore and is
+hard work. “I can do nearly everything,” this person of thirteen is
+reported as saying.
+
+Employment out of school hours is not of course confined to girls.
+Stanley G., aged eleven, works from 5 to 7, wiring tooth brushes, and
+can do seven in an hour; 3½d. a dozen is paid for them. The visitor
+notes that he had a sore face.
+
+Alfred D., age 13, Standard 7, helps in making white kid belts, receives
+1d. in the dozen, and can do fifteen or sixteen dozen in the week.
+
+George W., who is thirteen years old, and only in Standard 3, does wood
+chopping and dislikes it, because it hurts his hands. His mother “does
+frame work,” and his father, looking glasses.
+
+Thomas P., who is thirteen, and in Standard 5, polishes spindle legs for
+a cabinet maker, from 5 to 8 every evening, and from 9 to 2 on
+Saturdays. He receives 2s. 6d. a week; and announces that he is going to
+be a tobacconist—a calling for which the polishing of furniture legs
+hardly seems a valuable preparation.
+
+Cases like these might be multiplied almost indefinitely.
+
+“At a recent enquiry during the spring of this year, it was found that
+in a Hackney school one-fourth of the girls were engaged in match box
+making, steel covering, baby shoe making and fish basket sewing. This
+latter work is of a specially disagreeable character, and little girls
+often complain that the manipulation of the reeds is a most painful
+process. Children working with their parents at home are frequently kept
+at their sewing or pasting until ten or eleven o’clock at night. They
+are sent to “shop” before coming to school in the morning, and many of
+them are never marked for regular attendance. Particularly severe is the
+lot of the children of small laundresses, who are often employed, both
+in housework and in ironing in a steam laden atmosphere, two or three
+nights weekly till ten o’clock, and all day Saturday.”[32]
+
+Other children are employed by shopkeepers; milk and newspapers are
+delivered before and after school, boys are employed by grocers,
+greengrocers, &c., to carry out goods, and—sometimes for incredibly long
+hours—by barbers. Girls run errands and match stuffs and trimmings. In
+the Parliamentary Return obtained from school teachers by Sir John Gorst
+in 1899, out of 144,026 children, about 12% were described as engaged in
+street trading, exposed inevitably to every inclemency of weather and to
+all the hazards of promiscuous companionship, while acquiring habits
+that unfit them for regular work later in life. Moreover, the street
+seller, juvenile no less than adult, is apt to seek for customers in the
+public house. Very few, comparatively, of employed children are engaged
+in work that is likely to be of use to them industrially in their
+maturer life; and even of those few, some are working under bad
+conditions. The Factory Inspectors’ Reports are seldom free from
+instances of the overwork of children. In last year’s, for example,
+mention is made of boys under thirteen years of age, and even under
+twelve, being found, on several occasions, at work in bakehouses. One
+boy of twelve, who was found by the inspector clearing ashes from the
+oven, before 6 in the morning, had for two or three years been employed,
+before school, in delivering rolls, and at the midday break, as well as
+after school, in running errands.[33]
+
+Several children under 13 years of age were found working full time in
+brick fields.[34]
+
+A bad case is noted on p. 99: “A lad of 15, employed in a large tin
+works in West Wales, had started work at 6.30 A.M. on a certain Monday
+morning and continued working till 6 A.M. on the following Tuesday.
+During this period he only left the works for one hour, viz., 5 till 6
+P.M. on Monday, when he went home and took a short rest. He had
+therefore worked during the whole twenty-four hours with only about one
+hour’s rest.”
+
+The chief lady Inspector says, on pp. 302–3, “Carrying of jam and of
+jam-pots, empty or full, is still done largely by women and girls, and I
+have cautioned several occupiers about the weights I have found little
+girls lifting. A 40-pound tray is a heavy load for a girl of fourteen,
+and the repeated carrying of such trays all day long must have a bad
+effect.”
+
+Nor are jam makers the only employers who offend in this way. Cases have
+occurred in “textile factories, the places where one most expects to
+find labour-saving methods, but undoubtedly whenever there is a fairly
+abundant supply of young, cheap labour, there is less anxiety to
+introduce these, and carrying, pushing or pulling heavy weights is one
+of the duties of the apprentice in almost every trade. In a cotton
+weaving factory in Lancashire I found children and young persons[35]
+carrying cloth from the shed to the warehouse in an upper floor. One
+bundle was proved to weigh 44 lbs. and another 40 lbs. In a similar
+factory, also in Lancashire, I was not able to have weighed any of the
+tins of weft which children were found carrying to the looms, but from
+the evident effort it was to raise the tin to the shoulder, it was clear
+that the weight was too great. In both cases the entire weight was on
+one shoulder, and it was pitiful to see the twisted little figures of
+the children doing their best to accomplish more than they were
+physically fit for.”[36]
+
+On the same page Miss Martindale speaks of a boy whom she saw in 1903
+carrying a piece of clay “weighing 69 lbs., his own weight being 77 lbs.
+During the two years which has elapsed he has hardly grown, and he
+informed me that he weighs at the present time 81 lbs., showing an
+increase of only four lbs.”
+
+While it is reported that in Scotland “the half time system has almost
+ceased to exist,” there has recently been in some districts of England,
+a marked increase in the number of half timers, owing to the unexampled
+prosperity of the cotton trade, and the difficulty of satisfying the
+demand for labour in that industry. In a good many districts, a half
+timer may be as young as twelve years old.
+
+What the conditions of children’s employment would be, if there were no
+Factory Acts, may be guessed by the nature of the first Act of
+Parliament passed in their interests. In 1784 certain Manchester
+physicians investigated an outbreak of fever. They failed to discover
+its primary cause, but reported that “we are decided in our opinion that
+the disorder has been supported, diffused and aggravated by the ready
+communication of contagion ... and by the injury done to young persons
+through confinement and too long continued labour, to which several
+evils the cotton mills have given occasion.” They went on to say that
+they regarded a longer recess at noon and a shorter working day as
+“essential to the present health and future capacity for labour of those
+who are under the age of fourteen; for the active recreations of
+childhood and youth are necessary to the right growth and conformation
+of the human body.” The Manchester magistrates, who had asked for this
+report, resolved not to allow in future “indentures of Parish
+Apprentices whereby they shall be bound to owners of cotton mills and
+other works in which children are obliged to work in the night or more
+than ten hours in the day.”
+
+The condition of these unfortunate pauper children was wretched in the
+extreme. They were “sent down from the workhouses of London and other
+great towns to any manufacturer who would take them, a small premium
+being usually paid as an inducement. There was no system of control or
+inspection from outside; the factories were frequently set up in some
+remote glen or lonely valley where a waterfall or stream provided cheap
+power for the machinery and where the restraint of public opinion and
+observation was almost entirely absent. There can be no reasonable doubt
+that these unhappy children were often worked almost or entirely to
+death by their masters or by their overseers whose interest it was to
+work the apprentices to the utmost, their pay being in proportion to the
+labour they could extract. Sir Samuel Romilly says in his diary that he
+had known cases where the apprentices had been actually murdered by
+their masters in order to get fresh premiums with new apprentices.”[37]
+
+The Act of 1802, the first on this subject, dealt only with apprentices
+and only with the textile trades. It limited the hours of work to twelve
+a day, forbade night work, and required a modicum of elementary
+instruction; moreover it provided for inspection.
+
+By and by, it became apparent that the evils at which this measure had
+been aimed were not confined to any one group of child workers. As late
+as 1844, Sir Robert Peel told the House of Commons that in the
+potteries, “children worked in a temperature of from 100 to 130,
+carrying pieces weighing 3 lbs, and each child carrying two pieces at a
+time. The calculation is that the child will carry per day some
+thousands of pounds weight. In manufactures other than cotton, work
+might sometimes be continued thirteen, fifteen, even seventeen or
+eighteen hours consecutively.”[38]
+
+Nor was there any limit as to the earliness of the age at which a child
+might be set to work. About five or six seems to have been a common age
+for beginning. I have, myself, been acquainted with a woman of about
+eighty years old who told me that as a child of five, when she was too
+little to reach the work table and had to stand upon a stool, she was
+employed all day long in “running blonde net.” Evidence was brought
+forward—exactly as similar evidence is brought forward to-day in
+America—to show that it was not really injurious to children of nine
+years old and under to be kept working for 14 or 15 hours daily; and, no
+doubt, there were persons not in the least inhumane who really thought
+so. The best of us are liable to social blindness, and able to see but a
+small part of contemporary evils that become plainly visible and
+unendurable to succeeding generations. An instance of such blindness, in
+the case of the disinterested and open minded Maria Edgeworth, may be
+found in the pages of her _Rosamond_—that delightful children’s book too
+little known to the modern child. In reading the passage it should be
+remembered that the whole Edgeworth family were persons of unusual
+enlightenment and benevolence, and that the view presented probably
+typifies the bettermost stratum of contemporary sentiment.
+
+Rosamond, with her parents, goes to visit a cotton mill conducted by “a
+very sensible, humane man, who did not think only of how he could get so
+much work done for himself, but also how he could preserve the health of
+those who worked for him; and how he could make them as comfortable and
+happy as possible.” This good employer was in all probability drawn from
+some member of the Strutt family. By and by, while the visitors are
+resting and eating “cherries, ripe cherries, strawberries and cream,”
+provided by “this hospitable gentleman,” Godfrey calls to his parents to
+“‘look out of this window.... All the people are going from work. Look
+what numbers of children are passing through this great yard!’
+
+“The children passed close by the window at which Godfrey and Rosamond
+had stationed themselves. Among the little children came some tall girls
+and among these there was one, a girl about twelve years old, whose
+countenance particularly pleased them. Several of the younger ones were
+crowding round her.
+
+“‘Laura, Laura, look at this girl! What a good countenance she has,’
+said Rosamond, ‘and how fond the little children seem of her!’
+
+“‘That is Ellen. She is an excellent girl,’ said the master of the
+manufactory, ‘and those little children have good reason to be fond of
+her.’”
+
+He then relates how a good clergyman, who had taught the children and
+won their grateful affection, had been appointed to a post elsewhere.
+
+“‘All the children in the manufactory were sorry that he was going away,
+and they wished to do something that should prove to him their respect
+and gratitude.
+
+“‘They considered and consulted among themselves. They had no money,
+nothing of their own to give, but their labour; and they agreed that
+they would work a certain number of hours beyond their usual time, to
+earn money to buy a silver cup, which they might present to him the day
+before that appointed for his departure. They were obliged to sit up a
+great part of the night to work to earn their shares. Several of the
+little children were not able to bear the fatigue and the want of sleep.
+For this they were very sorry, and when Ellen saw how sorry they were,
+she pitied them, and she did more than pity them. After she had earned
+her own share of the money to be subscribed for buying the silver cup,
+she sat up every night a certain time to work, to earn the shares of all
+these little children.
+
+“‘Ellen never said anything of her intentions, but went on working
+steadily, till she had accomplished her purpose. I used to see her night
+after night, and used to fear she would hurt her health, and often
+begged her not to labour so hard, but she said, “It does me good,
+sir.”’”
+
+The modern reader will sigh to think of what the admirable Ellen’s
+health and strength would probably be at thirty, and will find it
+difficult to forgive the complacency of the employer in whose mill she
+was permitted so to squander her physical resources.
+
+In our own country the general development of factory legislation has
+gone far towards stopping the overwork of children in mills and
+factories; though it is only of late years, and thanks to the exertions
+of Mrs Hogg, that the law has begun to attempt the regulation of
+children’s labour out of school hours either in their own homes or for
+outside employers.[39]
+
+In the United States, however, where each State is free to make its own
+regulations, there is, at this present day, one State (Georgia) in which
+the work of children is absolutely unrestricted, and several in which
+the practical limitation is extremely small. Children of any age may be,
+and actually are, kept at work in the cotton mills of the Southern
+States, precisely as they used to be in the mills of Lancashire and
+Yorkshire. “Only last year, in North Carolina, the testimony of two
+doctors was introduced to show that there was no need from a hygienic
+point of view, for a law forbidding girls under fourteen to stand at
+their work for twelve hours a day, or for boys or girls under fourteen
+to work a twelve-hour night.”[40]
+
+Boys of twelve may still legally work in the coal mines of Kansas and in
+all mines in Iowa, Missouri and North Carolina; and do so work. “No
+colliery has been visited in which children have not been found employed
+at ages prohibited by the law of the State.”[41]
+
+In some American glass bottle works, quite small boys are kept running
+to and fro with loads of hot glass all through the day or the night as
+the case may be. Mrs Kelley, reporting personal visits of inspection,
+says that she found it impossible to get from any boy “a consecutive
+statement as to his name, address or parentage. A boy would say, ‘My
+name is Jimmie’; and then trot to the cooling oven with his load of
+bottles; and returning would say, in answer to a fresh question, ‘I live
+in a shanty boat,’ then trot to the moulder for another load of bottles;
+and returning say, ‘I’m going to be eight next summer,’ and so on. Among
+twenty-four lads questioned during one night inspection, not one
+ventured to pause long enough to put together two of the foregoing
+statements.”[42]
+
+“There was no restriction upon night work and pitifully little children
+were found at work at two o’clock in the morning.”[43]
+
+Some of these children are directly imported—as the little serfs in
+English cotton mills often were—from other districts; and in these
+States of America, as in England once, not only ruthless employers but
+worthless adults of their own class, parents and others, make profits
+out of the toil of half grown children.
+
+“A worn out and dissolute glass blower, who had a pension of $8 a month
+and five children under the age of fourteen years had recently married a
+widow with six children under fifteen years. Father, mother and the
+eleven children were living in a tent between the river and the works
+where several of the children were employed, some by night and some by
+day, so that the beds in the tent were used by different children, one
+set rising to go to work when the others returned to sleep.”[44]
+
+Upon the future of these poor children the effect of this early toil is
+most injurious. Physically, mentally and morally, the children—the
+citizens of the next generation—are damaged.
+
+Significant is the remark of a mother quoted in one of the articles in
+_Child Labor_: “‘When Charley works on the night shift, he hasn’t any
+appetite.’” (p. 303.)
+
+Doubtless the half timers in a good English mill are examples of
+children working under the best of existing conditions; and
+manufacturers are fond of assuring us how good these conditions are. Yet
+I shall never forget the painful impression made upon myself by the
+peculiar mixture of pallor and eagerness on the faces of the little half
+timers, the first time that I went over a weaving mill. The working
+place was light and airy, and the situation, just outside a healthy
+Northern town, was admirable; the work was not physically hard, and the
+management, as I was assured by a trustworthy witness, who was himself
+at work there, considerate. He, for his part, seemed unaware that the
+children looked ill. Incidentally, however, he mentioned that a large
+proportion of his fellow workers drank; and I felt that it would be
+interesting to know how many of them had been half timers, and whether
+early exhaustion might not lie at the root of their intemperance. As to
+the children, I am quite sure that any London doctor, or any woman
+accustomed to the care of children, would have thought their appearance
+unhealthy and their expression of face abnormal.
+
+Evidence more valuable than any untrained observer’s impression is on
+record in regard to London school children. Dr Thomas, assistant Medical
+Officer of Health to the London County Council, in investigating the
+physical condition of 2000 school children, in 14 different schools,
+gave special attention to 384 wage earners among the boys. “Of this
+number 233 showed signs of fatigue, 140 were proved to be anæmic, 131
+had severe nerve signs, 64 were suffering from deformities resulting
+from the carrying of heavy weights, and 51 had severe heart signs.
+Barbers’ boys were found to suffer most in physique, 72 per cent being
+anæmic, 63 per cent showing severe nerve strain, and 27 per cent severe
+heart affection.”[45]
+
+Before the Inter-Departmental Committee on the employment of school
+children, appointed in 1901, evidence was given by Alderman Watts, of
+Manchester, of the abnormal death-rate among children in industrial
+schools, many of whom had drifted thither from the streets; and in 1904
+Sir Lambert Ormsby, President of the Royal College of Surgeons, of
+Dublin, gave to the Inter-Departmental Committee on Physical
+Deterioration, particulars of the miserable physique of the little
+street sellers and of the many cases of pneumonia among them which had
+been brought to his notice in the children’s hospitals.[46]
+
+In July 1905, when an inquiry was held by the Home Office into the
+Bye-laws for the Employment of Children proposed by the London County
+Council, Mr Marshall Jackman, of the Michael Faraday School, Walworth,
+gave evidence that, out of 227 boys in that school, 27 were at work of
+whom 13 were employed more than eight hours a day, and 13 after nine
+o’clock at night. All except six were in poor health. One had broken
+down altogether; one had a weak circulation; one had fainted in school
+during the previous week; yet another had a defective circulation. In
+one single week, nine boys who worked out of school hours were taken ill
+in school, were obliged to leave the class and suspend lessons for the
+rest of the afternoon.[47]
+
+Very similar evidence may be found in the pages of Mrs Kelley’s volume,
+in those of _Child Labor_, and in the Report of the American Consumers’
+League. On p. 297 of _Child Labor_ appears the following paragraph which
+should make every British reader thankful for the comparative stringency
+of our own Factory Acts: “A recent study of the reports of factory
+inspectors in several of our industrial States shows a remarkable
+uniformity in the percentage of accidents. We find in the textile mills,
+foundries and iron mills, glass houses and machine shops employing
+children that, in proportion to the number of children employed,
+accidents to children under sixteen years of age are from 250 to 300%
+more frequent than to adults.”
+
+Educationally, the results of early industrial labour are naturally
+disastrous. “In none of the great Southern States,” writes Mrs Kelley,
+“in which young children are employed in manufacture are 80% of the
+children between 10 and 14 years of age able to read and write.”[48]
+
+At the Home Office enquiry, Mr Marshall Jackman stated that although the
+boys who worked out of school hours were of more than average mental
+capacity, they were more than twelve months behind the average of the
+whole school in educational standing, and moreover were low down even in
+their lower classes. Of the 27 boys in his school who were employed,
+eleven were one standard below the average, two, two standards below;
+four, three standards below; and one, four standards below the general
+average.
+
+A report prepared in 1901 for the Scottish Council for Women’s Trades
+gives the opinions of 14 head masters, who are practically unanimous as
+to the detrimental effect upon the children’s progress of long hours of
+work out of school. No. 3 says: “I consider this exploiting of children
+is one of the greatest crimes against the children themselves, and the
+greatest possible hindrance to their education.” No. 6 thinks “there can
+be no doubt that children who have such long spells of employment are
+heavily handicapped”; and No. 7 says: “There is no doubt whatever that
+these long hours stand very much in the way of educational progress.”
+“Message running,” says No. 14, “certainly tends to sharpen intelligence
+of a superficial kind but weakens the power of sustained attention and
+vigorous mental work in school.”[49]
+
+When we remember that the Inter-Departmental Committee on the employment
+of school children—a cautious official body—estimated the _minimum_
+number of school children employed in the United Kingdom at 200,000, and
+that there is no reason to suppose that number materially lessened, we
+perceive that the deterioration of national education from this cause
+alone must be by no means trifling.
+
+Of moral injury, especially from street selling, there is abundant
+evidence, both in our own country and in the United States. The
+committee of 1901 received a statement from the Town Clerk of Newcastle
+on Tyne that children had been found in the streets afraid to go home,
+lest they should be punished for not bringing in enough money. The
+children often, in consequence, slept out, gambled or stole, the girls
+sinking lower yet in order to procure sufficient money to take home. The
+number of such children he reported to have increased greatly of late
+years, and many of them were, he feared, on the threshold of a life of
+vice and crime. The Chief Constable of Manchester presented a list of 16
+women known as degraded characters, who had formerly been street
+sellers. The Chief Constable of Birmingham produced tables showing that
+of 713 children engaged in street trading during July 1901, 458 had been
+prosecuted for various offences during the previous six months. 163 of
+the number were girls.[50]
+
+Boys in American glass works are almost proverbially ill conducted. One
+manufacturer, in Ohio, said, in answer to an appeal for the education of
+the boys: “You can’t do anything for them. The little devils are vicious
+from their birth.” Statements of the same kind used to be made about the
+poor little victims in the English mills but it is not observed that the
+modern half timer, whose hours and health are protected by law, is any
+more vicious than other children. The principal of a Pennsylvanian
+school sets the corruption of the boys at a much later date than
+infancy. He says: “‘My observation is that when a boy leaves school and
+goes into the factory at twelve or thirteen, by the time he is fifteen
+or sixteen he is too foul-mouthed to associate with decent people.’”[51]
+
+Street occupations on the farther as on the hither side of the Atlantic
+are shown to form an easy avenue to worse things. “Although the street
+trades in Washington engage only one-fourth of the total number of
+children engaged in all occupations, yet of the number of children under
+15 who have gone to the reform school, or who have been turned over by
+the courts to the care of the probation officers, over two-thirds have
+come from the ranks of the children engaged in the street trades.”[52]
+
+“A judge told the writer that one-third of all the delinquent boys
+brought before him had at one time or another served the public as
+messenger boys.”[53]
+
+Nor are those children of school age who go to work often found to be
+acquiring any sort of technical training or industrial skill. On the
+contrary, indeed; their employment is almost always of a kind that
+rather unfits them than prepares them to become industrially efficient.
+Sadly true are the words written by Mrs Kelley out of prolonged and wide
+experience. “The State which accepts the plea of poverty and permits the
+children of the poorest citizens to labour prematurely, accepts the
+heritage of new poverty flowing from two sources; namely, on the one
+hand, the relaxed efforts of fathers of families to provide for them,
+and on the other hand the corruption of weak children by inappropriate
+occupations which involve temptations beyond the child’s power of
+resistance and the exhaustion of strong children by overwork. It is
+exactly the most conscientious and promising children who are worked
+into the grave or into nervous prostration, or into that saddest state
+of all, the moral fatigue which enables a man to sit idly about for
+years while his wife or his sister or his children support him.”[54]
+
+Thus the employment of the young which is generally regarded as a result
+of poverty is really one of the causes of poverty, and that for several
+reasons. It tends to lower the wages of the adult worker and tends to
+make the family, instead of the father, the industrial unit; it
+diminishes the adult working power of the child itself,[55] and it also
+retards the progress of every trade in which it occurs, for as Mr
+Schoenhof says: “The cheapness of human labour where it prevails is the
+greatest incentive for the perpetuation of obsolete methods.”[56]
+
+Thus, in every respect, the industrial employment of children is an
+injury to the community; and it is more than possible (I am not
+recommending the course as a practicable one) that, in the long run, the
+nation would save money by undertaking the whole support and education
+up to the age of sixteen of every child who now works for wages. Short
+of this extreme measure, however, there is little doubt that, except for
+the fear lest hardships might be intensified, public opinion is ready
+for far more stringent limitation of child labour. If it were known that
+the wages of parents were, even approximately, adequate (as they would
+be under a Minimum Wage Law) most of the objections now made to the
+restriction of child labour would die away. That fact alone is no
+inconsiderable argument in favour of a Minimum Wage Law.
+
+
+
+
+                               CHAPTER VI
+                                SUMMARY
+
+  Home work—Factory work—The working girl—Her manners, virtues and
+      code of honour—The woman into whom she developes—Shop
+      assistants—Traffic workers—Children—“Sweated” workers often
+      producing high priced goods—Not drunken—Not idle—Not
+      unskilful—Men as helpless, economically, as women—Sweating an
+      invariable accompaniment of unregulated labour.
+
+
+The preceding chapters do not profess to give anything like a general
+survey of the whole field of British labour. It has seemed wise for many
+reasons to confine myself to aspects with which I am, in a greater or
+less degree, personally familiar; and therefore the work of women, and
+of London women especially, looms rather large. But I hope that I have
+shown, by a sufficient range of instances, certain general truths. In
+trade after trade, men, women and children are exhibited working in the
+conditions which are indicated, comprehensively but vaguely, by the term
+“sweating.” We have seen the dwelling of the home worker robbed of every
+feature that makes a home, its narrow space littered with match boxes,
+or with shirts or trousers or paper-bags—in any case transformed into
+one of the most comfortless of workshops. In some homes the rattle of
+the sewing machine forms a ceaseless accompaniment to the whole course
+of family life; in others, meals, such as they are, are eaten in the
+immediate neighbourhood of the glue pot or the paste pot; the smell of
+new cloth, the dust and fluff of flannelette pervade the room of the
+“finisher”; damp paper-bags or damp cardboard boxes lie piled on beds;
+home, parents and children are all subservient to unintermittent and
+most unremunerative labour.
+
+One step, but only one step, higher comes the factory “hand.” We have
+seen girls filling pots with boiling jam, carrying to and fro heavy
+trays and stacking these trays in piles, two together raising, sometimes
+to above the height of their own heads, trays some of which weigh well
+over half a hundredweight. We have seen them, even when their work was
+not in itself heavy, worn out by the rapidity with which they repeat
+endlessly, day after day, and week after week, operations of mechanical
+monotony. Some glimpse has been given of those horrible intervals in
+which the semistarvation of “full work” gives place to the acute
+privation of “slack time.” The dangers, discomforts, hardships and
+exactions that must be borne if an employer chooses to inflict them,
+have been indicated, though but very inadequately; and the example of
+laundries and jam factories has served to suggest how far worse yet
+would be the conditions of factory operatives if the law did not
+intervene for their protection.
+
+One thing I have not succeeded in picturing—and it is the thing which
+seems to me perhaps the most terrible of all: the change of the working
+girl into the working woman. I have not drawn the factory girl as I have
+known her and delighted in her, gay to “cheekiness,” staunchly loyal,
+wonderfully uncomplaining, wonderfully ready to make allowances for “the
+governor” as long as he speaks her fair and shows consideration in
+trifles, but equally resolute to “pay him out,” when once she is
+convinced of his meanness or spitefulness. Her language is devoid, to a
+degree remarkable even in our undemonstrative race, of any tenderness or
+emotion. She accepts an invitation with the ungracious formula: “I don’t
+mind if I do.” Upon the “mate” of her own sex, to whom she is so much
+more warmly devoted than to her “chap,” she never bestows a word of
+endearment. “Hi, ‘Liza, d’y’ think I’m going to wait all night for you?”
+is the tone of her address to the friend with whom she will share her
+last penny or for whom she will pawn her last item of pawnable property.
+She speaks roughly to her relatives and aggressively to the world at
+large; she is no respecter of persons, and her eye for affectation or
+insincerity is unerring. Condescend to her and she will “chaff” you off
+the field. But meet her on equal terms, help her without attempting to
+“boss” her, and within a month or two you will have won her unalterable
+allegiance; her face will light up at your coming; she will bear the
+plainest speech from you, and on occasion of emergency will obey
+implicitly your every command. Nor is she lacking in the fundamental
+parts of politeness. Here is an instance. Years ago, in the days when
+some of us still believed in the possibility of organising unskilled
+women, a member of the Dockers’ Union sent me word that I should find it
+possible to walk at dinner time straight into the dining-room of a
+certain factory and talk to the workers undisturbed, since at that hour
+both the foreman and the porter went home to their own meals. I went,
+accordingly, though I confess that I felt myself very much of a
+trespasser. As I mounted the extremely grimy stair to the dining-room, I
+heard the loud voices of the girls. Their language was singularly vile.
+It did not, no doubt, mean very much to them; they used horrible words
+as the young of another class use slang. I went in and said my little
+say. After the first few words, most of them listened; several asked
+questions; a certain amount of conversation continued to go on. But
+while I was in the room—and, remember, I was a complete stranger to all
+of them—not one word was spoken which I could justly have felt to be
+offensive. I distributed my handbills, told them I hoped they would come
+to the meeting, and departed. As I went downstairs, I heard them
+relapsing into their hideous vernacular. But I could not help reflecting
+that they had shown the essence of good manners; and also that, if the
+literature of the eighteenth century is to be trusted, the same form of
+good manners was far from being universal among those swearing country
+gentlemen who were the great grandfathers of our smooth spoken
+generation.[57]
+
+The factory girl’s code of honour is curiously like that of the school
+boy. In no circumstances will she denounce a companion. To the governor
+or to the forewoman she will lie freely if occasion demands. To those
+whom she recognises as allies, she is truth itself. I do not recall one
+single instance, in disputes between workers and employers, in which the
+tale told by working girls has not been proved true in every detail.
+With employers, I am sorry to say, this has often been by no means the
+case. Two qualities, in particular, mark the factory girl of from
+sixteen to twenty: her exuberant spirits and energy, and the invariable
+improvement in manner and language that follows upon any sort of
+amelioration in her position. To watch the rapid development of
+refinement and gentleness consequent upon joining a good club is to feel
+how sound is the national character and how lamentable the yearly waste
+of admirable human material.
+
+A few years pass, a very few, and these bright girls become apathetic,
+listless women of whom at 35 it is impossible to guess whether their age
+is 40 or 50. They are tired out; they toil on, but they have ceased to
+look forward or to entertain any hopes. The contrast between the factory
+girl and her mother is perhaps the very saddest spectacle that the
+labour world presents. To be the wife of a casual labourer, the mother
+of many children, living always in too small a space and always in a
+noise, is an existence that makes of too many women, in what ought to be
+the prime of their lives, mere machines of toil, going on from day to
+day, with as little hope and as little happiness as the sewing machine
+that furnishes one item in their permanent weariness.
+
+We ascend another step and come to the shop assistants, the clerks and
+the waitresses in restaurants. We find that these dapper young men and
+trim young women whose hands and faces are so much cleaner and whose
+speech and manners are so much smoother than those of the factory
+worker, are scarcely better off in the matter of pay, and often
+absolutely worse off in the matter of working conditions. The factory
+worker is at least free after the factory closes, and, except in
+laundries, the law generally succeeds in bringing down the hours of work
+to something near a reasonable limit.
+
+But the shop assistant is subject to rule during practically the whole
+of his or her working life; food, companions, dress, sleeping
+arrangements, hours of going to bed and of getting up, nay, the very
+medical man to be consulted in case of illness are thrust upon him
+without any choice of his own. The privilege, so dear to the natural
+man, of wearing an old coat and old slippers in the hours of relaxation,
+is not for the shop assistant; nor the modern diversion of experimenting
+with new and strange foods, nor the right of voting at elections, either
+municipal or parliamentary. The position combines, in short, the
+disagreeables of boarding school with those of domestic service, while
+failing to offer the pleasant features of either. It is indeed a moot
+point in my own mind whether it is not worse to be a shop assistant than
+a home worker, supposing the home worker to be a single woman.
+Personally, I would rather make cardboard boxes in silence and solitude,
+and buy for myself my own inferior bread and cheap tea.
+
+Chapter IV. brings us to the case of workers who are all men, who are
+engaged in a most necessary public service and employed for the most
+part by rich companies paying high dividends. Here the inexperienced
+would expect to find high wages and good conditions prevailing. In fact,
+however, we find, in the case of railway servants, that the hours of
+work imposed were so excessive as to constitute a public danger and to
+demand the intervention of the law. The drivers and conductors of trams
+and omnibuses have been shown to be in a large measure enslaved by the
+companies for which they work, their hours often cruelly long, their pay
+often reduced from a decent nominal to a quite inadequate actual wage,
+their conditions of work, in many cases, singularly oppressive and their
+liberty of passing into fresh employment, although not so completely
+barred as the railway servant’s, yet very seriously hampered and
+restricted. In short we behold a body of grown men, skilled and of good
+character, almost as unable as the isolated home worker to defend
+themselves against a strong and tyrannical employer.
+
+Last of all, we come to the children. In these days we are continually
+talking in tones of alarm about a declining birth rate and are at last
+seriously considering how to check the appalling infant mortality that
+makes an annual massacre of the innocents; but most of us are still very
+little awake to the sacrifice of childhood that is daily being made in
+our midst. We pass a pale child in the street, carrying a long bundle in
+a black wrapper, and the sight makes no impression. But, to those of us
+who have seen the under side of London, that little figure is a type of
+unremunerative toil, of stunted growth, of weakened vitality and of
+wasted school teaching: an example of that most cruel form of
+improvidence described by the French proverb as “eating our wheat as
+grass.” Labour in childhood inevitably means, in nine cases out of ten,
+decadence in early manhood or womanhood; and the prevalence of it among
+ourselves is perhaps the most serious of national dangers. There is
+probably no branch of home work in which child labour is not involved,
+and but very few branches of retail trade. Our milk, our newspapers, our
+greengrocery are brought to us by small boys; young boys are out at all
+hours and in all weathers with parcel-delivering vans; and many and many
+a perambulator is pushed by a small girl whose chin is on a level with
+the handle. If, in 1901, there were, as the Interdepartmental Committee
+declared, _at least_ 200,000 school children working for wages, and if,
+as seems practically certain, the number is larger now, can we wonder
+that so many grown up workers have remained inefficient, incompetent and
+listless? We cannot have grain, if we choose to eat the wheat in the
+blade.
+
+We see, then, that large bodies of British workpeople are, in these
+early years of the twentieth century, extremely overworked and
+underpaid. These evils are not, as is so often declared, a result of
+cheap selling. One of the worst examples of underpayment in the Sweated
+Industries Exhibition was a lady’s combination garment, of nainsook, the
+selling price of which was 22s.; and much of the work produced by the
+underpaid is sold at a good price to the well-to-do. On the other hand,
+under a well organised factory system, goods that are sold at a very low
+price are sometimes produced by workers receiving comparatively high
+wages. Nor is it true that any large proportion of these ill paid
+workers are either drunken or idle, or yet incompetent. Incompetent,
+indeed, they eventually become, if they are starved, physically and
+mentally, for a long enough period; but many of them remain competent
+for a surprising number of years. Very many of them are pathetically
+industrious, and by no means all are unskilled. Neither my reader nor I,
+for instance, could cover a racquet ball so that it would pass muster
+when inspected by the paymaster; it is improbable that either of us
+could cover an umbrella, and pretty certain that neither could make a
+passable artificial rose of even the poorest description. The driver of
+a motor omnibus is—in theory at least, and often in practice—a highly
+skilled mechanic; but his skill does not enable him (his trade union
+being still comparatively young and weak) to retain his freedom of
+action nor to resist the most exhausting and harassing conditions of
+labour.
+
+The evil is thus not confined to women, nor to home workers, nor to any
+class or trade. Nor is it confined to any one country. Nearly every
+instance quoted could be matched from Germany and from America.
+“Sweating,” in short, invariably tends to appear wherever and whenever
+industry is not either highly organised or else stringently regulated by
+law.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER VII
+                         HOW UNDERPAYMENT COMES
+
+  A shirtmaker’s story—The “higgling of the market” as seen at the
+      factory gate—Mr Booth’s percentage of poverty—Mr Rowntree’s—The
+      living wage in America—How wages are determined—By relative
+      needs—Not by efficiency—Mr Bosanquet’s fundamental
+      fallacy—Ambiguity of word “earn”—Effect upon the poor of the
+      pressure of the poorer—Efficiency only of pecuniary value while
+      rare—Not inefficiency but poverty the real disease.
+
+
+More than seventeen years ago I sat in the neat but poverty stricken
+room of a most respectable family and listened to the pathetic,
+uncomplaining words of an admirable woman who, together with her sister,
+had, for years, helped to support an early widowed sister-in-law and her
+three children. All three women worked at home at shirtmaking, and this
+one of the aunts had certainly gone short of food. It was not she who
+told me of her good deeds. She was showing me, at my request, the shirts
+that they were at that time making for a payment of 1s. 2d. a dozen. I
+continue in the words of my own report, written immediately afterwards.
+
+“These shirts are of fair average quality and are striped in gay
+colours. They have to be fetched ready cut out but not folded; all the
+sewing has to be done to them, including a square of lining at the back
+of the neck but not the button holes.... ‘Has the price gone down much?’
+I asked. ‘Oh, yes’ said Miss Y.; ‘my sister and I used to get sixpence
+apiece. But that was for rather better shirts than these. We worked for
+B.’s then. One day my sister was there, waiting for the work, and a
+gentleman came in and said to Mr B., “I’ll take the whole lot at 4s. 6d.
+a dozen”; and Mr B. said to my sister: “Miss Y., will you take the work
+at that, or must I give it all to this gentleman?” And my sister
+thought, if we stood out for the price, they would come round to us, and
+she said, “No,” she would not take it, and so he gave it to the
+gentleman and we were thrown out; and instead of coming round to
+sixpence again, that work has gone down to 2s. 6d. a dozen, and even
+lower than that. I know of people who do the very cheapest cotton shirts
+at 9d. or even 7d. a dozen.’”
+
+Miss Y.’s little story is the story of work in hundreds—nay in
+thousands—of work places. Sometimes it is at the factory gate that the
+cheapening process goes on. Towards the end of those bitter weeks, “the
+slack time,” there will be scores of factory girls, pale and pinched
+under their shabby feathered hats, going from firm to firm and asking
+whether hands are wanted. At last word will go round that X.’s are
+“taking on” on Monday morning. Before the opening hour on Monday
+morning, the entrance to Mr X.’s factory will look like the pit door of
+a popular theatre. Often have I heard girls describe the dialogue that
+follows.
+
+“The foreman says to a young girl in front of me: ‘What wages do you
+want?’ And she says: ‘Eight shillings.’ And he told her: ‘No, she could
+go.’ So when he come to me, I knew it was no good to say, ‘Eight’; so I
+said: ‘Seven and six.’”
+
+At seven and sixpence, perhaps, she gets taken on; and when, presently,
+the slack time comes again, the girls weeded out, to be first
+discharged, are those who have been receiving eight shillings weekly
+ever since their engagement in the previous season. Seven shillings and
+sixpence a week (translated or not, according to the custom of the
+factory, into terms of piece work) now becomes the usual wage; and next
+season this descends by another sixpence or another shilling.
+
+Below six shillings or five shillings, an employer or foreman seldom
+tries to drive the time wage, even of girls, unless, indeed, he can
+salve his conscience by regarding them as learners. Yet I have known a
+wealthy employer admit without any signs of compunction, both that
+certain girls in his employ were paid four shillings a week, and that
+they could not live on that sum.
+
+The home worker, when he thus suffers diminution of an already
+insufficient wage, tries to increase output by setting his children to
+work.
+
+“The same pressure that leads to the employment of the children
+presently leads, in a slack time, to the acceptance of yet lower pay for
+the sake of securing work. The poorer the worker the less possible is
+any resistance to any reduction in pay. Thus, by and by, mother and
+children, working together, come to receive no more than did the mother
+working alone. The employer—and eventually in all probability the
+public—has in fact obtained the labour of the children without extra
+payment. To such an extent has this process been carried that in the
+worst paid branches of home work, subsistence becomes almost impossible
+unless the work of children is called in.”[58]
+
+It is thus true that, economically, a man’s enemies are those of his own
+household; and that, wherever workers are not protected by organisation
+or by special laws, the wage, first of the individual and then of the
+family, tends to be brought down to the lowest possible level of
+subsistence, and even, possibly if a poor-law subsidy can be obtained,
+below it. It is not by chance, nor because their work is of little
+value, nor because they are contented to take little pay, that all these
+many households of workers are living lives so cruelly straitened by
+poverty. Nor is it a mere effect of chance that in other countries as
+well as in our own, national wealth is beheld increasing side by side
+with extreme poverty on the part of those citizens who toil most
+incessantly.
+
+In our own country, the investigations of Mr Charles Booth and of Mr
+Seebohm Rowntree, carried out independently and on slightly differing
+methods, the one in London, the other in York, have resulted in figures
+strikingly similar. Mr Booth puts the proportion living in poverty, of
+the whole population of London, at 30·7%; Mr Rowntree, that of the whole
+population of York, at 27·84%.[59]
+
+In America the same problem has received the attention of various
+careful enquirers, the most recent of whom, perhaps, is Father Ryan,
+Professor of ethics and economics in the St Paul Seminary,
+Minnesota.[60]
+
+In this volume may be found a careful estimate of the figure that may be
+taken as affording a “living wage” in different parts of the United
+States. Professor Albion Small, head of the Department of Sociology at
+the University of Chicago, is quoted as having said “a few years ago”
+that “No man can live, bring up a family, and enjoy the ordinary human
+happiness on a wage of less than one thousand dollars a year”
+(£200).[61]
+
+Mr John Mitchell, President of the United Mine Workers, says, in a
+passage quoted by Professor Ryan: “In cities of from five thousand to
+one hundred thousand inhabitants, the American standard of living should
+mean, to the ordinary unskilled workman with an average family, a
+comfortable house of at least six rooms. It should mean a bathroom, good
+sanitary plumbing, a parlour, dining-room, kitchen and sufficient
+sleeping room that decency may be preserved and a reasonable degree of
+comfort maintained. The American standard of living should mean, to the
+unskilled workman, carpets, pictures, books and furniture with which to
+make his home bright, comfortable and attractive for himself and his
+family, an ample supply of clothing suitable for winter and summer and
+above all a sufficient quantity of good, wholesome, nourishing food at
+all times of the year. The American standard, moreover, should mean to
+the unskilled workman that his children should be kept at school until
+they have attained the age of sixteen at least, and that he is enabled
+to lay by sufficient to maintain himself and his family in times of
+illness or at the close of his industrial life, when age and weakness
+render further work impossible, and to make provision for his family
+against premature death from accident or otherwise.”[62]
+
+The minimum wage upon which a family could be supported, in towns of the
+size named, was estimated by Mr Mitchell in 1903 at $600 a year (£120).
+In larger cities the cost would, he considered, be higher. Professor
+Ryan is, no doubt, right in saying that “the irreducible minimum of
+necessaries and comforts” could not “now” (he was writing in October
+1905) be obtained in any city of the United States for less than $600,
+and that though that sum might be “_possibly_ a Living Wage in the
+moderately sized cities of the West, North and East ... in some of the
+largest cities of the last-named regions, it is certainly _not_ a Living
+Wage.”[63]
+
+Having established this figure for annual income Professor Ryan goes out
+to enquire into its actual prevalence and from various official reports
+and statistics draws the conclusion that, “the number of male adults
+receiving less than $12.50 (£2, 10s.) per week, in 34 manufacturing
+industries was, in 1890, 66%, and, in 1900, 64%.[64]
+
+And it must be remembered that in America as in England there are few
+manufacturing industries in which wage earners are in full work
+throughout the year.
+
+Thus it appears that, in the two great English speaking empires, a
+considerable proportion, even of the upper working classes, do not
+receive remuneration that allows to them and to their families that
+minimum of space, food, clothing and recreation which at the present day
+are esteemed essential to civilised life.
+
+The reason of this state of things is a fairly simple one. Wages, in a
+state of free competition, are determined not by the intrinsic cost of
+the work performed but by the relative needs of the worker to sell and
+of the paymaster to buy. Where there are many workers able to offer the
+same service and comparatively few buyers, the work will be paid for at
+a low rate, however excellent; where would-be buyers’ workers are few
+and would-be buyers many, the work will be highly paid, however ill
+done. Among ourselves the numbers competing for manual work are very
+large, and the need of each particular workman for employment far
+greater and more pressing than the need of any employer for any
+particular man. Consequently, the wages of the manual worker are low in
+proportion to the cost of livelihood; and the individual worker is
+absolutely powerless by himself to increase them.
+
+These facts are so familiar, and, when definitely stated, so universally
+admitted, that it almost seems necessary to apologise for reiterating
+them. Yet they are continually ignored by ordinary middle class people
+in conversing upon labour questions, and not infrequently even by
+writers of some standing. Categorically, they are not—and doubtless
+would not be—denied; but whole volumes are founded upon the basis of
+their falsity. The entire constructive argument, for instance, of Mrs
+Bosanquet’s “The Strength of the People,” a book which, having gone into
+a second edition, may be supposed to have influenced a good many
+readers, rests upon a tacit assumption that payment is determined by
+quality of work: an assumption masked by the ambiguous character of the
+word “earn,” which at one moment is used in the sense of “deserve” and
+at another in the sense of “receive.” Mrs Bosanquet—except indeed when
+dealing with the old Poor Law—cheerfully ignores the painful law that
+wages are determined by the conflict of needs, and writes, throughout,
+as though the manual worker who does good work were sure of being well
+paid. From this assumption she goes on, very logically, to suppose that
+the cure for a man’s poverty is to make him do good work. Many persons
+who are not themselves exposed to the pinch of competition may be found
+expressing the same view, which obtains apparent support from the fact
+that the very ill paid are observed not to be producing good work. For,
+although it is unfortunately not true that good work always “earns” good
+wages, it is true that bad pay, sooner or later, but quite inevitably
+leads to bad work. Without a certain modicum of food, comfort, good
+clothing, leisure and ease of mind, no human being long remains capable
+of producing good work. The father of a family who receives 18s. a week
+and pays 7s. for lodging cannot, if he also feeds his wife and children,
+either remain or become a very good workman. Before he can do better
+work he must be better paid.
+
+Mrs Bosanquet thinks otherwise. Efficiency and consequently prosperity
+might, she appears to believe, be enforced upon the poor by the
+withdrawal of such help as is now accorded them. The prospect of that
+beloved refuge, the workhouse, prevents them from providing for their
+old age; but the prospect of literal starvation would probably be more
+effective. The hunger and hardship of their daily lives do not furnish
+an adequate spur; but perhaps despair might do so. We seem to hear Mrs
+Chick exhorting the dying Mrs Dombey to “make an effort.”
+
+Again, that terrible pressure of the poorer upon the poor which Mr Booth
+regards as so serious an evil appears to Mrs Bosanquet an element of
+hope and strength. Morally, the charity of the poor to one another is
+undoubtedly a beautiful thing; economically, it is assuredly one of the
+causes that increase and aggravate poverty; and such diminution of
+pauperism as is produced by the maintenance out of the workhouse of an
+aged or sick relative may, in the long run, lead to the destitution of a
+whole family. The last result of such maintenance may, if wide-spread,
+be far more nationally expensive than if all the sick and aged were
+supported out of the public purse.
+
+Let us see, in an example of the commonest kind, how this mutual help
+works out. Smith and Brown, manual labourers, are working side by side
+at a wage of £1 a week or thereabouts. Both are married men with
+children. Both are contributing to a provident society which, if they
+survive the age of sixty, will furnish a small pittance to their
+declining years. Slack times come; Smith is discharged; Brown is
+retained. Within a fortnight, Smith, with his wife and children, begins
+to suffer hardship; the household property goes, piecemeal, to the
+pawnshop; the “club money” is no longer forthcoming, and Smith’s
+provision for his old age lapses. Brown, whose pound a week affords, as
+may be supposed, no great superfluity for him and his, finds himself
+unable to see his “mate” and his mate’s children in want of bread;
+Brown’s club money and a good deal more which can ill be spared goes to
+their assistance, and Brown’s provision for old age lapses.
+
+The Smith family, it is true, has been kept from the workhouse—at the
+cost, not improbably, of some weakly little Smith’s life—but has not
+this result been bought too dear? Do not justice and good sense alike
+suggest the unfitness of leaving the burden of maintaining the Smith
+family to rest upon precisely that class of the community which is least
+able to support it? The maintenance of those who cannot maintain
+themselves by those who can barely maintain themselves keeps both groups
+upon a dead level of destitution. If our aim is really the strengthening
+of the people we must not begin by increasing the burdens of the
+weakest—burdens borne often at so cruel a sacrifice of health and life,
+and with so amazing an absence of complaint. The Smith family and the
+Brown family alike are suffering because their income is barely adequate
+to their elementary current needs; and their troubles will only be cured
+by the possession of a larger real income. This, indeed, Mrs Bosanquet
+sees plainly enough. “How can we bring it about,” she asks, “that they”
+(_i.e._ “those whom we may call the very poor”) “shall have a
+permanently greater command over the necessaries and luxuries of life?”
+Gifts she perceives to be no true remedy, though she fails to assign the
+economic reason, which is that the possession of outside resources
+enables the recipient to “go one lower” than his unendowed competitor in
+the battle for employment. The same objection does not apply to the
+workhouse, which withdraws the pauper from the battle altogether, but it
+does apply to outdoor relief, and is the one valid economic argument
+against it. The best charity—as Dr Johnson long ago pointed out—indeed,
+the only effectual charity, is to set a man to work at good wages. This
+is not, however, Mrs Bosanquet’s plan. “The less obvious, but more
+effective remedy is to approach the problem by striking at its roots in
+the minds of the people themselves; to stimulate their energies, to
+insist upon their responsibilities, to train their faculties. In short,
+to make them efficient.”[65]
+
+Unfortunately the ill-nourished, ill clothed and ill taught cannot be
+made efficient. Moreover if we could make every one of them efficient,
+they would be no better off, financially in their efficient state than
+they are now, in their incompetence.[66] While rare, efficiency, like a
+tenor voice, commands a monopoly price; if universal, its money worth
+would be no higher than that of the ability to read, which in the Middle
+Ages was a commercial asset of value. Furthermore, since extreme poverty
+destroys efficiency, these ill paid efficient persons would presently
+become, like our poorer manual labourers of to-day, weak of brain and of
+body, dull, languid, inert and therefore bad workers.
+
+Thus efficiency, however desirable upon other grounds, is no economic
+remedy for underpayment. Not inefficiency but poverty is the real
+disease, and since poverty is an inevitable result of unlimited
+competition in labour, the disease can only be cured by some
+interference with the free course of competition. How to apply such
+interference effectually is the real problem which organised society has
+to solve. Towards its solution Mrs Bosanquet, able though she is, offers
+no assistance, because she never acknowledges the character of the
+problem. For her there are only inefficient people to be taught better,
+not underpaid people to be paid better. In this respect she represents a
+considerable school of thought and therefore it has seemed worth while
+to examine her thesis at some length; especially since any writer is
+pretty sure of welcome who preaches a doctrine so soothing to the
+general conscience. Much sympathetic distress would be spared to all of
+us, and much racking of anxious brains to a few, if it were but possible
+to believe with Mrs Bosanquet that the poor are themselves the
+architects of their own poverty and that they must themselves be its
+physicians. Unfortunately this is not the case. The process of
+cheapening described above is, in a state of unlimited competition,
+absolutely inevitable; and neither talent nor industry can exempt from
+it any isolated worker whose qualifications do not create for him some
+sort of monopoly.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER VIII
+                         LABOUR AS A COMMODITY
+
+  What is a “fair wage”—Two meanings of “worth”—What work costs to the
+      worker—Work done below cost price—How the worker may lose upon his
+      work—The effect upon commodities in general of free
+      competition—The effect upon labour—The robber employer—Eventual
+      powerlessness of the single employer—Cost to the nation of the
+      underpaid worker—Difference in essence between labour and other
+      commodities—Ambiguity of word “law”—Recognition of the true cost
+      of labour the basis of reform.
+
+
+There are few phrases more current than those which include the
+expression “a fair wage.” All workers conceive that they have a right to
+it; and I never met an employer who did not maintain that he paid
+it—although I have met more than one who admitted that his “fair wage”
+was one upon which the worker who received it could not live. To any
+enquirer venturing to point out this peculiarity, the reply is given:
+“But the work is not worth more,” and the reply generally silences the
+enquirer for the moment—whereby the employer comes to believe it
+unanswerable.
+
+In the enquirer’s mind two questions eventually arise: “Can a wage be
+fair upon which the worker cannot live?” and: “Has labour a worth
+measurable otherwise than by the market price?”
+
+We begin presently to perceive that there are two faces to that word
+“worth”; that it represents sometimes the price to the buyer and
+sometimes the cost to the worker. The price to the buyer—the “worth” of
+the work in the answer quoted above—is neither more nor less than its
+market price, or, in other words, the price brought about by the balance
+of competition between those who want to buy labour and those who want
+to sell it. This price is regulated solely by the numbers competing on
+either hand and by their greater or less degree of combined action. But
+the cost of work to the worker is the expenditure of energy which he has
+made upon it. Every hour’s work of a man or woman takes out of that man
+or that woman a certain fixed amount of strength, of energy,—in short, a
+certain amount of life. When we work, we spend, literally, something of
+our substance. To make up that expenditure, we must have both a certain
+amount of nourishment and a certain amount of rest. If our work is not
+paid at such a rate as to give us that, we lose something in every hour
+we work. We spend a little more life than is restored to us. Even if we
+are paid at a rate that enables us just to make up what we have spent,
+we have earned nothing—we have only had our outlay repaid to us. The
+purchaser who pays a worker just enough to make him as fit for work
+afterwards as before, has only paid the worker’s expenses; he has not
+yet begun to pay him for his work. The worker in such a case is
+precisely in the position of a capitalist who has lent money, and got it
+back, but has made no profit on its use.
+
+The wage of much labour in this and in other countries is on that scale.
+So accustomed, indeed, are we to this state of things that many of us
+think a worker quite well paid if he receives enough to keep him in good
+bodily condition. Yet the same people who hold this opinion in regard to
+that labour which is the sole capital of the worker, consider themselves
+to have made a very bad bargain if they so invest their pecuniary
+capital as to receive no interest upon it. It would be well if we should
+bear in mind that the worker who receives no more than enough to make up
+the strength expended, is in exactly that financial position.
+
+But there is a financial stage lower than this: the stage of the worker
+who not only gets no interest upon his capital, but does not get even
+back the whole of his capital. That labour is so often yielded for less
+than its cost is one reason why a working man’s expectation of life is
+considerably less than that of a professional man; or, to put it in
+other words, why the dock labourer and the omnibus conductor die younger
+than the lawyer and the clergyman.
+
+There are two ways in either (or both) of which any worker may lose upon
+his work, and the names of them are Long Hours and Low Wages. For
+instance, a railway company or an omnibus company that keeps a man at
+work for sixteen hours out of the twenty-four uses up more of that man’s
+vitality than the other eight hours can restore. Though he were to be
+paid, like Miss Edna May, at a salary of £200 a week he would still lose
+on the bargain. At no price can his employers repay him. They have
+consumed some of his capital, and capital of that sort when once spent
+is spent for ever.
+
+Or the worker may receive for each hour’s work, even though the stretch
+of hours be not unduly long, too little money to pay for those
+necessaries by which alone his outlay can be made up. On each
+transaction he pays out a little more than is returned to him. He
+becomes, at each step, a little poorer in bodily resources; he is never
+quite sufficiently fed, never quite sufficiently clothed nor healthily
+housed, and he never has that reasonable certainty of to-morrow’s
+provision which goes so far towards giving peace of mind and health of
+body. Finally, like other persons who spend more than they receive, he
+becomes bankrupt; that is to say, he either dies several years earlier
+than the average of men who are better paid, or he sinks into the
+invalid condition of the pauper. “Labour,” says Mr Schoenhof, “is an
+expenditure of vital force. Unless this is replaced by wholesome
+nutrition (air, light, sanitation and even cheerful surroundings are
+part of wholesome nutrition) the frame will work itself out and the
+labour will become economically of smaller and smaller value.”[67]
+
+The cost, then, of labour as a commodity is the cost of the worker’s
+existence, a cost paid by the worker not in money, but in exhaustion, in
+hunger, in actual flesh and blood. This is the point in which labour
+differs from every other commodity, and the reason for which it should
+not be treated in the same way as other commodities.
+
+In regard to all commodities, the tendency of free competition is, as we
+all know, to bring down the selling price to a figure very little above
+the cost of production; and in regard to all commodities other than
+labour, it is easy enough to see that this result is advantageous to the
+buyer. It is less easy to see, but is probably no less true that, in the
+long run, it is advantageous also to the seller, and that every
+hindrance to free competition in goods tends to diminish the volume of
+production and consequently that of human enjoyment.
+
+But when we come to consider that exceptional commodity, labour, we find
+a different result ensuing from free competition; we find the inevitable
+consequences to be impoverishment of the seller, deterioration of the
+product and increase of human misery. The underpaid worker is not only
+inevitably wretched and inevitably unhealthy; he is also a danger and a
+burden to the country in which he lives. Since he—or more often
+she—receives less than a living wage for his work, and since he
+continues to live, it is obvious that some one else is in part
+supporting him.
+
+I can never forget the impression made upon me in the first factory
+which I ever visited by a little scene of which I was a silent witness.
+The head of the firm had shown us over various departments, and
+incidentally had talked of how some of his children had just gone to the
+other side of the world in a yacht. He was himself a man beginning to be
+elderly, well grown, well groomed, fresh coloured, speaking with an
+educated accent and presenting that air of prosperous content which is
+common with elderly business men who are making money. He presently took
+us into a department where very young and very poor-looking little girls
+were employed; and one of our party shyly asked what were their wages.
+“Four shillings a week,” was the answer. The first speaker, himself an
+employer who pays high wages by choice, said deprecatingly:
+“But—surely—they can’t live on that!” “Oh, no!” returned their employer,
+cheerfully. “They live at home with their parents.” And I, new, then, to
+the facts of commercial life, stood staring, silent, at this well fed
+gentleman, with sons and daughters of his own, who frankly confessed
+that poor men’s daughters had to be supported by their parents in order
+that he might have their work for less than it cost. He seemed to me to
+be owning himself a thief. And that, indeed, was exactly what he
+was—although, strangely enough, he failed to perceive the fact. He was
+committing a daily robbery upon persons too weak to withstand his
+demands. His being, however, a variety of robbery not recognised by the
+laws, he pursued his course not only unremorseful and unpunished, but
+with great profit, and died, leaving behind him a large fortune which
+only a small minority of his fellow countrymen consider to have been
+disgracefully acquired. Yet his course was attended with much more
+suffering to other people than that of any highwayman. It was akin
+rather to that of the mediæval baron who by force of arms extracted a
+reluctant toll from all his poorer neighbours. The girls submitted to
+the extortion because it is even worse to starve than to be robbed, and
+because they lacked the combination that might have enabled them to
+resist both robbery and starvation.
+
+The individual worker whose skill is but the dexterity born of constant
+practice—the worker, that is to say, who has no sort of monopoly—is no
+more able to regulate the payment of his services than an apple or a
+sack is able to regulate its market price. Nor, at a certain stage of
+the downward course, is any individual employer able to regulate it. It
+is, for instance, probable enough that at the present moment not the
+Brothers Cheeryble themselves could sell safety pins at a profit if they
+paid a living wage to the women who “cap” them.[68]
+
+For, in the long run, the process of competition generally succeeds in
+filching from the employer that unfair profit which he had originally
+filched from the worker. It is now the public at large which, by paying
+for safety pins a fraction less than they really cost, pockets the
+balance of the worker’s living wage. For the manufacturer who desires to
+pay his workers better there are now two courses open; he must either,
+if he can, find out some improved method, which, by diminishing his
+other expenses, will allow him to pay higher for labour, or must combine
+with his fellow manufacturers to raise the selling price. In practice,
+he generally does neither of these things, but continues to take
+advantage of his workers and to say—not without some show of
+justification—that he cannot help it, and that they would be worse off
+if he gave up business. The public at large, meanwhile, though it
+automatically pockets the unfair profits, does not, in the long run,
+gain by the transaction. For the underpaid worker who fails to be wholly
+supported by the proceeds of his own labour is inevitably supported in
+part out of the pocket of some other person or persons. Moreover, both
+the health and the work of the underpaid worker presently deteriorates.
+He contributes less than he might and ought to the general wealth, and,
+by and by, when his health fails sufficiently, he becomes a charge upon
+the public. Finally, he dies before his natural time, so that his
+country fails to receive the full natural return for those costly and
+unproductive years of childhood during which he was supported.
+Furthermore, his working life is one of continued hardship, fatigue and
+suffering. His existence is not an addition to, but a deduction from,
+the total general happiness, the rather that underpayment is a burden
+not only to its victim but also to the onlooker. No person of ordinary
+sensibilities can fail to be depressed by the knowledge that large
+numbers of his fellow citizens are struggling, to their physical, moral
+and mental detriment, in hopeless poverty. Yet this state of things
+arises inevitably if labour is left, like any other commodity, at the
+mercy of unrestricted competition.
+
+This difference in kind, between labour and other commodities, is the
+justification of trade unionism, and the explanation of how it is that a
+man can logically be at the same time a free trader and a trade
+unionist. Except the trade unionists and the professed socialists,
+however, no great body of persons seems to have perceived this
+peculiarity of labour; and while underpayment is very generally
+deplored, the various efforts of the benevolent are mostly directed
+either towards supplementing inadequate wages or towards transferring
+the underpaid to other branches of work, rather than towards securing
+better payment for the work at present done. In the eyes of the average
+Briton, the settling of wages by free competition appears, for some
+unexplained reason, as a sacred and permanent principle. Perhaps, if
+this attitude could be exhaustively analysed, we should find at its root
+a vague respect for “the laws of political economy,” which respect is,
+in the last resort, but the result of a confusion of mind about two
+aspects of the word “law.” Laws in the moral world are, of course,
+different from laws in the scientific world. The moral (or social) law
+is a command; the scientific law merely a statement of effects. This we
+see, plainly enough, when the effects are material and immediate. We do
+not dream of regarding the law that fire burns as a command to put our
+fingers in the flame. But when we come to consider the results of
+wide-spread human action, we seem to ourselves to be in the region
+rather of morals than of science, and without clearly realising our
+attitude, we begin, many of us, to regard the laws that govern these
+matters rather as precepts to be obeyed than as sequences to be avoided.
+The law that free competition in labour leads to starvation wages is a
+law of the same kind as the law that a dose of prussic acid leads to
+death; and the conclusion to be drawn in each case is that if we wish to
+avoid the result we must avoid the cause. Persons who are not desirous
+of committing suicide must abstain from prussic acid; persons who desire
+to see underpayment vanish must resist free competition in labour.
+
+If the nature of labour were as generally apprehended as is the nature
+of prussic acid, the laws of our country (which are laws of the other
+kind—laws of command) would gradually be so altered as to prevent and
+punish that kind of robbery which was practised, for years, by that
+prosperous gentleman who, year after year, paid girls for their work at
+a trifle under a penny an hour, and died thereafter wealthy and highly
+respected. It is more than conceivable that persons now living may
+survive to a day in which wealth so accumulated will be held as
+discreditable as wealth accumulated by slave trading, and when the
+stealing of labour will be held no less criminal than the stealing of
+cash. The foundation upon which any such reform must rest will be the
+recognition that labour is a commodity differing in its nature from
+every other commodity; and that while there is, intrinsically, no such
+thing as a fair price, there is, intrinsically, and in every case, such
+a thing as a fair wage.
+
+
+
+
+                                PART II
+                            THE MINIMUM WAGE
+
+
+
+
+                               CHAPTER I
+                            EXISTING CHECKS
+
+  How it is that some workers are not “sweated”—Non-competitive
+      systems—Co-operation—Public services—Trade unions—Who is to blame
+      for strikes?—How trade unions promote trade—Limits of their
+      success—Factory Acts—How restriction raises wages—An example—How
+      restriction drives the employer into better ways—Limit of legal
+      restrictions in Great Britain.
+
+
+If it be true that unlimited competition tends to reduce the wage earner
+to the lowest possible rate of subsistence, how does it happen, some
+reader may enquire, that under our present competitive system all wage
+earners are not, in fact, at that low level, but that, on the contrary,
+there are occupations in which wages tend steadily to rise.
+
+The answer is that the course of competition among ourselves is not
+unchecked, and that, wherever concerted human action has interposed a
+check, the downward course of wages has been stayed. Nor, indeed, is the
+competitive system, though the most widely prevalent, the only system in
+existence among us.
+
+A very considerable proportion of the trade of these islands is carried
+on not upon a competitive but upon a co-operative basis. The actual
+sales of goods made by industrial co-operative societies in the year
+1904 amounted to £90,681,406,[69] and this total was “exclusive of the
+sums (amounting to £11,874,643 in 1904) representing the value of the
+goods produced by the productive departments of the wholesale and retail
+societies and transferred to their distributive departments.” The
+membership of the various societies included in 1904 no less than
+2,103,113 persons, an appreciable fraction of the population.
+
+The great movement known as Industrial Co-operation has two forms: (_a_)
+Associations of Consumers; (_b_) Labour Copartnerships.
+
+The theory of Associations of Consumers is simple in the extreme. It
+consists in the elimination and reduction of intermediate profits, and
+the purchase by the retail customer of goods as nearly as possible at
+prime cost. The method employed is to sell at the usual market price and
+to return the surplus in the form of a percentage upon the total of
+purchases—which percentage is usually called a dividend. The fund from
+which such payments are paid is “the fund commonly known as profit,” and
+commonly retained under that name by the individual employer. Some
+writers have pointed out that this fund is in truth not profit but only
+savings. “‘Wealth is not created, it is only economised by
+distribution’; but in co-operative distribution it is economised to such
+effect that, for the workers at any rate, it has appeared to create
+wealth where none existed nor could exist for them under the old system
+of competitive trading.”[70] The “fund commonly called profit” is in
+fact “the margin between the prime cost of an article and the price paid
+for it over the counter by the individual customer.” The appropriation
+of this margin, or of a considerable part of it, to the customer is a
+feature not only of stores belonging to working class members but also
+of such undertakings as the Civil Service or the Army and Navy Stores.
+In these instances, however, the method adopted is to diminish the
+selling price; and this slight difference of procedure has led to a wide
+difference of results. The ordinary customer of the middle class stores
+feels himself, for the most part, but a purchaser at an exceptionally
+good and cheap shop; the customer at a store that follows the plan of
+the original Rochdale Pioneers feels himself the member of a community
+and the inheritor of a tradition. The fund, being collected in the hands
+of the society at large, is recognised more clearly as the property of
+all members alike; its destination is regulated by the governing body
+whom those members elect; and it forms a continual object lesson in
+political economy.
+
+In these cases, it is clear to all persons who understand the processes,
+that competition has been checked. The margin no longer goes into an
+employer’s pocket but returns to the customer; and since the working
+classes are the largest customers, most of it returns to them. In nearly
+all instances, however, a part of the fund is retained for public uses;
+few, indeed, are the societies that contribute nothing towards
+educational or federal purposes.
+
+The other group of co-operators views its members not as consumers but
+as producers, and by this very fact narrows its range, since every human
+being is a consumer, but not all of us are, or can be, in the strict
+sense, producers. There must be clerks, distributors of all kinds,
+policemen, organisers. The work of such persons is necessary and useful,
+but it does not produce, like that of the weaver or the engineer, an
+immediate and apparent increase in the wealth of the world. In theory,
+the early associations of producers were workers who combined themselves
+into self governed workshops and divided the profits of their labours.
+But this ideal is applicable only to industries demanding but a small
+outlay of capital, and such industries are always growing fewer. “The
+ideal ... was modified; individual sympathisers outside the workshop
+were admitted as members ... so too were societies of consumers. Thus,
+in place of the old self governing workshop, the modern copartnership
+workshop developed.” Associations of this type have been rapidly growing
+in the last ten or twelve years, and during the last two or three have
+spread amazingly in Ireland. All sorts of industries are represented:
+baking, weaving (of cotton, wool and silk), spinning, building,
+printing, quarrying, dairying, sick nursing, typewriting, cab-driving
+and bookbinding among them; there are societies that make wearing
+apparel of various sorts, pianos, harness, nails, mineral waters,
+photographs, brushes, watches, cutlery, padlocks and bricks.
+“Desborough, with its two important productive societies and its
+flourishing store which owns much of the land and has built most of the
+houses, is almost a co-operative community.”
+
+Of the great English and Scotch Wholesale Societies made up of
+federations of societies, of the annual conferences, the annual
+festivals, the Women’s Co-operative Guild—that greatest and most
+interesting of working women’s associations—it is not my business here
+to speak in detail. Readers who desire to become acquainted with
+co-operation as it exists to-day should procure _Industrial
+Co-operation_.[71]
+
+It must be enough to say that in the ocean of commercial competition,
+co-operation lies like a fertile island inhabited by workers who are
+putting into their own pockets the profits of their buying and selling,
+and very often also of their labour.
+
+Nor is industrial co-operation the only part of the nation’s business
+carried on, in part at least, upon non-competitive principles. The whole
+civil service of any country, the army, navy, hospitals, museums,
+prisons, endowed schools and municipal undertakings of all kinds are
+examples of enterprises established on a non-competitive basis, although
+often influenced as regards internal management by competitive methods.
+In many of these cases, the payment of workers is fixed otherwise than
+by competition. Military and naval officers are not asked what is the
+lowest figure at which they will consent to serve their country; nor do
+we find in advertisements for town clerks or borough surveyors that
+preference will be given to candidates willing to accept a reduction of
+salary.
+
+Even in the wider labour market, competition has not entirely a free
+course. It is checked by trade organisations, by Factory Acts and by
+Sanitary Acts. It is even checked in some slight degree by an uneasy
+feeling that it is not decent to let people work for us in return for
+obviously inadequate payment.
+
+The avowed aim of trade unions is to check freedom of competition, with
+the object of obtaining or maintaining for the workers a high level of
+pay and of comfort. Their attempted method has been, almost invariably,
+the establishment not of a fixed wage but of a minimum wage. A
+misconception upon this point is so deeply engrained in the mind of the
+ordinary middle class Briton that I entirely despair of being believed
+when I make this statement. If I should live to celebrate a hundredth
+birthday, I should expect still to hear in the last year of my life the
+words: “What I really can’t bear about trade unions is that they insist
+upon all men being paid alike.” Let it be repeated, once again, however
+vainly, that trade unions do not so insist. I have never known, nor
+heard of, any trade union that objected to any of its members getting
+paid as much above the minimum rate as they possibly could. What the
+union does forbid is the taking of wages below the minimum; and the
+reason of this prohibition will be clear to any person who has read the
+chapter: “How Underpayment Comes.”
+
+The means employed by trade unions for securing a minimum wage is the
+combined refusal of all members to work at any lower rate. In trades of
+skill, as distinguished from trades of mere practice—trades that is to
+say which possess in some degree a natural monopoly—unions have often
+attained considerable success; and wherever they have done so, poverty
+has been in a measure checked. Not only have the members of the union
+themselves been comparatively well paid, but the fact of their being so
+has helped to raise the level around them. Thus, since national poverty
+is the greatest enemy of trade, the unions have almost invariably, and
+indeed inevitably, been promoters of trade and prosperity.
+
+At this point the question “How about strikes?” becomes almost
+physically audible. Certainly, a strike, during its continuance, hinders
+trade and prosperity in exactly the same way as warfare does. It is in
+fact warfare on a lesser scale and—in our country—with restrictions upon
+the weapons that may be employed; and war is always an evil, though
+sometimes the lesser of two evils. In a strike, as in greater wars,
+responsibility rests upon both parties, but seldom in equal degrees. The
+apportionment of blame must largely depend upon the cause in which each
+is fighting. The employer, in nine cases out of ten, is fighting for
+cheap labour; the union primarily for access to amenities of life which
+the employer enjoys already. In nine cases out of ten, therefore, the
+union is really fighting the battle of the whole nation, while the
+employer is fighting against it. Mr Schoenhof, a grave State official,
+sent by his own government to examine economic questions in Europe,
+declares of the acts of British trade unions that: “economically these
+acts speak of a high degree of wisdom. On the other hand the attempts of
+the employing classes to depress the rate of wages show frequently an
+entire misapprehension of the principles under which production is
+conducted. Most of the strife would disappear if it were more fully
+recognised that a high rate of wages has all the time been the powerful
+lever to reaching the low cost of production which practically rules
+to-day in the industries of the United States.”[72]
+
+If therefore that combatant is to be held most responsible who is
+fighting in the worse cause, it is not the trade unionist but the
+employer, who, on the whole, is chiefly to be blamed for the occurrence
+of strikes.
+
+There may, indeed, have been cases—I believe there has, in our own day
+and country, been at least one—in which a union has followed a mistaken
+course, has restricted output, and so lessened the volume of trade, and
+to that degree injured the country. In so far as unions have
+occasionally done this, they have been blind to the larger issues; but
+not so blind, even thus, as those employers who thought to cheapen
+production by lowering wages. Poverty, always and everywhere, hinders
+production; the wise employer desires to see more money in the pockets
+of working class purchasers, and the wise statesman more money in the
+pockets of working class taxpayers. Some day, when the history of Great
+Britain comes to be seen in the truer perspective of retrospect, it will
+be the leaders of trade unionism and the promoters of Factory Acts who
+will stand out among the real makers of this nation’s wealth.
+
+But trade unions have seldom been really successful among unskilled
+workers—precisely those who, having no natural monopoly, are most liable
+to the pressure of economic competition and most likely to be underpaid.
+Women workers, too, have always been difficult to organise; not
+primarily, as is sometimes supposed, because they are women; but partly
+because women, in our present social state, expect to leave the labour
+market upon marriage, and therefore are comparatively indifferent about
+earning high wages; and partly because women have, as a rule, less of
+companionship with one another and of common social life out of working
+hours than men, and therefore less opportunity of that “talking over” of
+affairs out of which concerted action grows. Home workers are, of
+course, especially isolated; and the successful organisation of a union
+among unskilled female home workers would be an industrial miracle not
+looked for by the most sanguine toiler in the industrial field.
+
+Co-operation and trade unionism have both been, in the main, working
+class movements, and both are examples of that curious inarticulate
+instinct for right collective action which seems to be inherent in the
+English democracy. From an assembly of average English artisans—I say,
+English, not British—you will not get logically reasoned statements; you
+will very seldom get a clear exposition of principles; but you will,
+very generally, get that main line of conduct which true principles and
+sound logic would dictate.
+
+Not all the checks, however, in the course of free competition have come
+from the workers. The direct interposition of the law was invoked and
+secured by men whose personal concern in the question was only that of
+fellow citizens. These men were actuated by a horror of the sufferings
+undergone by the poorest workers; they felt that moral order was
+outraged and the nation disgraced by the existing industrial conditions.
+Restriction of hours was the first check imposed by British law, which
+has shrunk hitherto from directly fixing a rate of wages.[73]
+
+But since prolonged hours of labour are in fact but a form of diminished
+wages, the law has, as it were despite itself, led to a real, and often
+also to a nominal, rise of wages. The way in which this comes about was
+exemplified with singular completeness in a case that occurred some
+years ago in London. The managers of a girl’s club, enquiring into the
+non-attendance of a certain member of the club, learned that her
+employer was giving every day to her and to her fellow workers a
+considerable number of articles to be made at home after the closing of
+the work room and to be brought in next morning. In order to complete
+this task, she was often, she declared, obliged to work till two in the
+morning. The articles were accessories of dress, and were paid for, by
+the dozen, at such a rate that the girls (there were seven of them)
+earned each about seven shillings a week, or about 1s. 2d. a day for a
+working day of from 14 to 16 hours. The ladies of the club reported the
+case to the Women’s Industrial Council, the members of which knew—as the
+girls did not—that the Factory Act forbade such employment at home after
+a working day on the employer’s premises. Now this, it will be seen, was
+just the kind of case in which, to people who have but little industrial
+experience, the interference of the law seems harsh, and its strict
+enforcement disastrous. If, working 14 to 16 hours a day, these poor
+girls earned but 1s. 2d., how cruel to let them work but 10 hours, and
+so earn but ninepence or tenpence! The Women’s Industrial Council,
+however, ruthlessly reported the facts to the Factory inspectors; and
+one evening, shortly afterwards, a lady inspector appeared at the
+workshop door just as the girls were leaving. Each girl carried a
+parcel. The inspector enquired the contents, and on learning them,
+turned the girls back and made each leave behind her the work which
+should have occupied her until after midnight. She herself interviewed
+the employer and no doubt expounded to him the provisions of the Act.
+Next morning—or possibly a day or two later—this ingenious gentleman
+presented to his employees a statement for their signature which
+declared that they carried home work to be done, not by themselves but
+by their relatives. They all signed; girls who work part of the night as
+well as all day and who receive but seven shillings a week are not
+persons likely to have spirit for much resistance. But they told the
+club leaders, and the club leaders told the Women’s Industrial Council,
+and the Industrial Council hastened to tell the Factory inspectors.
+Again the lady inspector appeared and met the girls coming out with
+parcels. Again she bade them return the work, and again she went in and
+saw their employer. What she said to him can only be surmised; for
+neither Factory inspectors nor employers report these things to the
+outer world. Whatever it may have been, it was effectual. No more work
+was given out to be carried home and the girls were thenceforward able
+to spend their evenings, if they chose, at the club and their nights in
+sleep. But, at the week’s end, every girl had done much less work, and
+being paid at the usual piece work rate, received considerably less than
+her weekly average. Thereupon, they represented to their employer their
+hard case. The inspector had forbidden them to work at night, and they
+could not live upon the proceeds of their work by day. Would he
+therefore be pleased to raise their pay; otherwise, they would be
+obliged to seek work elsewhere. The employer did raise their wages,
+paying them at a rate per dozen which, while still but a very few pence,
+was yet somewhere between 40 and 45 per cent. higher than he had paid
+before. Nor was this all. Finding that seven girls were now unable to
+accomplish all his work, he enlarged his workshop and took on six more.
+There were now therefore thirteen girls at work instead of seven, and
+all thirteen were receiving wages a shade higher for ten hours’ work
+than the seven had received for about fifteen hours. Nor did the retail
+selling price of the goods advance by so much as the fraction of a
+penny. In such ways as this do legal checks tend to impede the course of
+free competition and to prevent the extremity of underpayment.
+
+It is not, however, only by preventing undue hours of labour but also by
+insisting upon reasonable sanitary conditions that the law promotes
+better wages and improved trade. An employer who can no longer either
+overwork or overcrowd his “hands” is driven to seek other channels of
+saving. He demands some method of getting more work done in an hour, and
+finds it worth his while to pay for the best possible machinery. All
+sorts of improved processes are introduced, some of which may demand
+increased skill and attention from the workers. The workers as soon as
+they have leisure enough to think, and health enough to develop
+initiative, begin to insist upon better payment, and because they are
+better paid are able to respond to demands for better work. The improved
+methods of production, where introduced, lead to an increase of
+production which renders possible a lowering of selling price, while the
+rise in wages at the same time increases the buying power of the
+workers. Trade expands and finds a ready outlet.[74]
+
+The profits of the manufacturer, in these circumstances, are greatly
+increased, no longer at the cost of increased hardship to the workers
+but with advantage to the whole community. Thus the law has already, in
+various ways, interfered with the free course of competition, and its
+interference has been beneficial all round. The grounds of its
+intervention have always been moral; legislators and constituents alike
+have felt that certain evils must be suppressed at whatever loss of
+profits or of trade. But the results have been, not only morally but
+also economically, of immense national benefit. Slowly the great truth
+is emerging into recognition that the enforcement of good conditions and
+good payment for the workers of a nation is not only the humane but also
+the profitable policy. Slowly, step by step, in that piecemeal, groping
+and wasteful manner which seems to be a part of the English nature, and
+which, while so maddening to some of us who happen to possess an
+infusion of more logical but hotter blood, yet, on the whole, works out
+so well in practice, the British law goes forward, setting check after
+check in the path of unlimited competition. Almost every step has been
+taken amid outcries of opposition and prophecies of ruin. At every
+advance, the “practical man” has assured the government of the day,
+beforehand, that his particular trade would be destroyed, and,
+afterwards, that he had lost nothing.
+
+In spite of all these steps and all these consequences, the vast
+majority of English people still believe themselves to be living under a
+_régime_ of pure competition and are ready to declare such a _régime_
+not only beneficial but inevitable. In fact, however, modern life, even
+in our own small islands, comprises not one _régime_ only but many.
+Every stage, from a modified feudalism up to an almost undiluted
+socialism, is represented by existing conditions in Great Britain. Some
+stages are dwindling; some are growing; and it is well within the power
+of concerted human action to determine which shall grow and which shall
+dwindle.
+
+As far as we have gone, our law has directly stopped many gross forms of
+overwork and oppression. The home worker it has helped, if at all, only
+in so far as it has enforced certain provisions as to housing and
+sanitation. Indirectly, the Factory Acts have served to raise wages by
+forming a basis of minimum comfort upon which trade union organisation
+could be built. In Great Britain, the law has never yet intervened,
+directly and of set purpose, to raise wages. In parts indeed of Greater
+Britain the law has directly so intervened; but the history of that
+intervention belongs to another chapter.
+
+
+
+
+                               CHAPTER II
+                           SUPPOSED REMEDIES
+
+  Emigration—Valuable to the individual—Useless for the
+      community—Assumed improvidence of early marriage—Drunkenness cause
+      of individual poverty, not of general poverty—The amazing thrift
+      of working people—Dangers of thrift—Observations of a sagacious
+      Scotchman—Consumers’ Leagues—Why impracticable as remedy for
+      underpayment—Fields in which a Consumers’ League may be of use.
+
+
+The evils described in the first part of this volume are no new ones;
+they have been familiar for many years to many persons; a variety of
+remedies have been suggested and in many cases attempted. Of these
+remedies, only those are in any degree effectual which act as checks
+upon competition. One group of proposed remedies is founded upon the
+assumption that the country is overpopulated. This assumption, is,
+however, disproved by the fact (which is unquestioned) that
+notwithstanding the presence among us of a large class of rich
+non-producers, the national income has increased at a greater rate than
+the population of the country. Still, there are persons who believe that
+England has too many people and who, therefore, very logically, desire
+to reduce the number.
+
+Some reformers of this way of thinking desire to see fewer births;
+others desire the removal, to parts of the world where population is
+still sparse, of those persons who, in this country, are seen to be
+vainly struggling for remunerative employment. Emigration has, no doubt,
+in many individual cases, meant a change from indigence to prosperity;
+but, as a remedy for general indigence, it has the fatal flaw that every
+worker removed is also a consumer removed, and that every consumer
+removed means the loss of a customer and, therefore, to that extent, a
+diminution of trade. The supply of labour is, indeed, lessened, but the
+demand for labour’s product, and thus for labour itself, is lessened
+too. It would be better for British trade if the emigrant could be made
+prosperous at home instead of being sent to seek prosperity in exile. It
+is, however, true that most emigrants go to British colonies, and that
+these colonies need them. For these reasons, emigration is, no doubt,
+useful, but as a remedy for general poverty at home it must always
+remain delusive. Moreover, so long as the immigration of foreigners is
+permitted, the emigration of British subjects is in effect little more
+than a game of “General Post.”
+
+Another school of reformers holds the poor themselves responsible for
+their own poverty. “Why do they marry so young?” “Why do they drink?”
+“Why don’t they save?” These questions are heard at every turn; and
+persons who do not know the life of the poor regard them as
+unanswerable.
+
+To take first the question of early marriages, a point upon which the
+better off are apt to judge with singular unfairness of their poorer
+brethren. The market value of the middle class man is probably highest
+after 40, certainly after 30. The market value of the average workman,
+on the other hand, decreases after 40, if not earlier, and, in a vast
+number of cases, is as high at 22 as it will ever be. Therefore, while
+the middle class man is in a financial sense, prudent in deferring
+marriage till 30 or thereabouts, the workman would be foolish indeed to
+delay the birth of his eldest children until within ten years or so of
+his own decline in market value. The workman who desires, like the
+middle class man, that the infancy and schooltime of his children shall
+coincide with his own period of greatest prosperity should marry—as in
+fact he does—between the ages of 20 and 24. Then, by the time that the
+father begins to experience increasing difficulty in getting well paid
+employment—or perhaps employment at all—the elder children will at least
+be of an age to earn for themselves. It should be remembered, too, that
+workpeople as a class die younger than people who are better off, so
+that a bricklayer, married at 20, and a barrister, married at 30, have
+about even chances of seeing the manhood of their elder sons—another
+reason why the former is wise to marry early, if at all. Early
+marriages, then, whether improvident or no in the case of middle class
+brides and bridegrooms, are not improvident in the case of working
+people—unless indeed it be contended that it is improvident for working
+people to marry at all—a contention fraught with rather alarming
+possibilities to the future of the race.
+
+To the question: “Why do they drink?” the answer is not quite so simple.
+One may begin by remarking that there are a great many total abstainers
+among wage earners; one may also remark that, if drinking were as
+universal among wage earners as, let us say, the wearing of boots, even
+the lowest rate of wages would stand at a figure allowing for the
+purchase of drink. Economically, it is because the majority of wage
+earners do not drink to excess that the excessive drinker finds himself
+at a disadvantage. Of course, he is at a disadvantage also in various
+other respects, but these do not enter into the economic argument. That
+intemperate drinking may conduce to poverty is undeniable; but that
+poverty also often conduces to intemperance is no less true. Of the two
+kinds of drunkenness that exist among wage earners one is largely in the
+nature of an escape from fatigue and from despair. Of the other—the
+outbreak at intervals of the able, energetic and often comparatively
+prosperous man, I do not pretend to have fathomed the mystery; but it
+seems likely that the monotony of modern working life and the lack of
+abundant personal interests may be among the contributory causes. It may
+also be noted that to carouse at intervals was a deeply rooted habit
+among our Northern ancestors, who admired a man potent in drinking as
+they admired a man powerful in fight. It is at least conceivable that
+the energetic, capable man who “breaks out” every month or two is a
+survival of the old type; and it certainly seems to be the case that his
+type does not occur among purely Latin races. Be this as it may,
+experience shows convincingly that, on the whole, in this country, any
+and every class of workers grows by degrees more sober as its hours of
+work are shortened and its wages raised. Individuals of the class may
+still drink heavily, but the average of sobriety steadily rises with
+improved conditions. Moreover, in spite of the temptations presented by
+poverty, a steady rise in the sobriety of this country is shown by the
+excise returns. If poverty spreads and deepens—as I fear it does—the
+cause cannot be found in an increase of drunkenness; for the consumption
+of drink per head grows yearly less and less. Temperance is doubtless
+advantageous in many ways to those who practise it; but, like
+efficiency, it possesses a money value only while it fails to be
+universal. If every man were temperate, no employer would make a point
+of retaining his temperate “hands” when reducing his establishment.
+
+To the question: “Why do not working people save?” truth requires the
+paradoxical reply that they do save, and that they cannot afford to do
+so. As a class, working people save a larger proportion of their income
+than any other class of the community. The shares in Industrial
+Co-operative Societies amounted in 1904 to £27,739,123; the Reserve and
+Insurance funds of the same societies to £2,677,420. The great Friendly
+and Provident Societies are supported almost wholly by working class
+contributors; and, in addition to these, the majority of Trade Unions
+are also provident Societies.[75]
+
+Of the thirty families whose household expenditure has been tabulated in
+Vol. I. of Mr Booth’s _Life and Labour_ (East London), only five spent
+nothing upon insurance or club money; and in one household this item ran
+up to 11½ per cent. of the whole expenditure. Considering that the
+weekly income, as estimated, ranged from about 10s. 3½d. to about 33s.
+7d. and that the households consisted seldom of less than four, and in
+one case of eight persons, these contributions are by no means trifling.
+Yet it is probable that not two families out of the thirty were able to
+make anything like an adequate provision for old age. It hardly, indeed,
+requires demonstration that a person earning just enough to support life
+can only make an adequate provision for his old age by laying by 100 per
+cent. of his income. Upon 10s. a week, or less, the saving of money
+becomes something very near to a slow form of suicide. Moreover, at the
+risk of horrifying every middle class reader, I must frankly declare
+that, in my opinion, a worker does more wisely to abstain from all forms
+of thrift beyond participation in his trade union and his co-operative
+society. His union will help to keep up his wages; his co-operative
+society will increase their purchasing power; the return upon both these
+investments is immediate and certain: but anything more is apt to cost
+too dear. It is now a good many years since an old Scotchman of great
+intelligence and judgment, the secretary of his trade union, a member of
+the municipal council, and justly respected by his fellow townsmen of
+various ranks, gave me his opinion on this subject. He related to me
+how, as a young man, he had accompanied a benevolent gentleman to a
+lecture upon thrift, and how, as they afterwards walked away, the
+gentleman waxed eloquent upon the duty of every man to lay by. But my
+old friend, canny even at five-and-twenty or so, replied that he was a
+married man with two children, that his earnings were two pounds a week,
+that, if he spent less, either his children must go short of what was
+necessary to make them strong, healthy and well trained, or he himself
+must go short of what was necessary to maintain his efficiency; and
+that, in his belief, the best form of thrift for a man in his position
+was to maintain the highest standard of living which his small total
+income would secure. In his case the plan had fully succeeded. He was, I
+suppose, well over sixty, as hale, as active and as much interested in
+the progress of the world as any man of thirty, and a most valuable
+citizen. His children had both grown up healthy, capable and
+industrious; both were skilled workers, regularly employed and in
+receipt of good wages. But supposing—and his trade was one reputed
+unhealthy—that the father had died, leaving a widow and young children
+unprovided for? We may note that his risk of doing so was lessened by
+his being better fed and better clothed than his more sparing neighbour.
+Still, death is liable to seize even the best nourished and the most
+fitly clothed; he might have died long before his children had completed
+their excellent education or become capable of self support. Even in
+that case, however, would these orphans, in whom a foundation had been
+laid of good health and good teaching, have been really worse off than
+if, with a poorer endowment of personal advantages, they had inherited
+the money pittance—so sadly inadequate at best—that their father might
+have scraped together in his few years of life? For how miserably small
+is the provision that _can_, even with the utmost exercise of parsimony,
+be made out of a family income of two pounds a week! In their inevitably
+inadequate efforts to make such provision, workers too often deny
+themselves the absolute essentials of healthy living. To abstain from
+buying new shoes in order to save the price for one’s old age, and then
+to die of pneumonia, induced by want of sound shoes, is but a doubtful
+form of thrift, both for oneself and one’s nation. The interests of the
+nation, especially, are certainly better served by the maintenance among
+working class families of the highest attainable standard of life than
+by the accumulation of very small individual provision for possible
+orphans or possible old age. Even two pounds a week will not suffice
+(except in remote country districts—where no man earns so much) to
+provide really very good food, clothing and housing for four persons;
+and the working class family does not often consist of no more than
+four. The present cost of thrift, as thrift is generally understood, is
+too heavy and the future return too light; and the wise man is not he
+who saves his money, but he who spends it to the best advantage.
+
+The supposed remedies hitherto touched upon have been measures demanding
+the agency of the wage earner himself; but there is another scheme,
+particularly attractive to the inexperienced reformer, in which the
+consumer is to be the active person. When men and women who are not
+themselves underpaid come face to face with the evil of underpayment, it
+is natural enough for them to resolve that henceforth the articles
+purchased by themselves shall be articles the makers of which have been
+adequately paid. From this individual resolve it is but one step to an
+association of persons all thus resolved, and banded together for the
+purposes of investigation and exclusive dealing. Such an association is
+a “Consumers’ League,” the aim of which is “to check unlimited
+competition not at the point of manufacture but at the point of sale.”
+Such associations, the first of which was formed, I believe, in
+consequence of a suggestion made by myself, many years ago, in
+_Longman’s Magazine_, are likely to reappear at a time like the present
+when many consciences are disturbed by recognition of the fact that a
+considerable proportion of British workers are scandalously underpaid.
+It seems desirable, therefore, to point out how and why a Consumers’
+League must inevitably fail in its aims.
+
+The complexities of modern commerce are such that it is absolutely
+impossible for any group of purchasers, however large and however
+earnest, to attain that accurate knowledge of myriads of facts which
+would be necessary; or, even, supposing such knowledge to have been once
+obtained, to keep abreast of the unceasing changes. Let us take the
+comparatively elementary problem of the large retail drapery shops. It
+appears to be the general practice in such establishments for each
+separate department to be under separate management, and for the head of
+each department to have a free hand, subject to the one condition of
+producing a certain percentage of profit. The ability to manage
+successfully and develop a large branch of trade is not, as may well be
+believed, very common, and one part of the payment that it demands is
+freedom to do its work in its own way. Thus it is not uncommon for one
+department of a large business to be conducted in a spirit of justice
+and consideration, while another is marked by the total lack of such a
+spirit. For instance, there was at one time, in a certain firm, a
+manager of the mourning department who was among the best employers in
+the London trade; but at the same time, the man in charge of the
+workshop in which certain garments were made up or altered, was a
+cutter-down of wages, rude and bullying in his behaviour to the workers
+and entirely inconsiderate of their comfort. What reply, in a case like
+this, can be given to a lady who asks: “Can I safely go to X’s shop?”
+How, if she is furnished with the information just given, can she
+discriminate, or how, even if she did, can she or her informant be sure
+of the continuance of these conditions? Six months later, the one
+manager may have taken a better post, and the other have been dismissed.
+The new man at the workshop may be an enlightened organiser, who
+introduces improved machinery and methods, knows the value of contented
+and well fed workers, and raises wages; while the new man at the
+mourning department may have been trained in the ways of “a driving
+trade,” and may believe good management to consist in harrying his
+employees, in nibbling at their wages and in “cribbing” their leisure.
+If we multiply these facts by the number of shops or departments touched
+by the weekly purchases of any well-to-do customer, we shall begin to
+have some conception of the scale upon which a Consumers’ League would
+have to conduct its investigations.
+
+Moreover, all this is only on the uppermost plane. Few of these
+retailers manufacture the goods sold. In regard to every single article
+it becomes necessary to trace every step of production and transmission.
+A pair of shoes cannot be satisfactorily guaranteed until we have
+discovered the wages and conditions of employment not only of every
+person who has worked upon the actual shoe, but also of the tanner, the
+thread weaver and winder, the maker of eyelets, the spinner and weaver
+of the shoe-lace and the various operatives engaged upon the little
+metal tag at the shoe-lace’s end. Nor is the matter finished even then.
+At every stage of its evolution, a shoe requires the services of clerks,
+bookkeepers, office-boys, warehousemen, packers, boxmakers, carmen,
+railway servants &c., and each new service introduces other material and
+other service—paper, ink, ledgers, harness, stable fittings, cardboard,
+string, glue, iron, coal—the series is endless. Yet compared with a
+woman’s completed gown, or a man’s suit of clothes, how simple a product
+is a pair of shoes. The fact is that even the most apparently simple of
+commercial acts is but one link in a network that spreads over the whole
+field of life and labour; and the fabric of that network is not woven
+once and for ever, but is in continual process of change.
+
+At the present stage, then, of our commercial development it appears
+absolutely impossible for a Consumers’ League to fulfil its aims. If
+labour were thoroughly organised in every branch, so that a strong trade
+union existed in every trade, capable of giving information upon every
+point, then indeed a Consumers’ League might become truly efficient, but
+it would become proportionately superfluous.[76]
+
+The cure of underpayment needs to be applied at the point of payment;
+and the establishment of a legal minimum wage is the most direct method
+of application.
+
+But although a Consumers’ League can never hope to counteract the
+results of unlimited competition, it may, as the National Consumers’
+League of America shows, exert a valuable influence upon public opinion,
+and may succeed in remedying certain industrial scandals. The Report of
+that body for the year 1905–6 (up to March 6, 1906) is a most
+interesting pamphlet, full of details that show how useful may be the
+work, as industrial detectives and agitators, of a group of citizens,
+banded together for the purpose of exposing and abolishing oppressive
+and insanitary conditions of labour. In a country where public feeling
+is not yet nearly ready for the enactment of a minimum wage, the
+formation of a Consumers’ League may possibly be the best step forward.
+An effectual remedy it cannot be; but it undoubtedly affords means of
+education, both for its members and for the community at large. In our
+own country, however, where the evils are already more or less generally
+recognised, and where an increasing number of persons are already
+beginning to hope for a minimum wage, the Consumers’ League marks a
+stage that has been left behind.
+
+We see, then, that emigration, though it may help the individual, can
+but affect the trade of the country injuriously; that temperance, while
+eminently desirable on other grounds, is only of any economic value
+because it is still not universal; that effectual thrift is absolutely
+impossible for the underpaid, and that the exercise of even an illusory
+thrift can only be achieved by a sacrifice of things essential to good
+health. We see, furthermore, that a Consumers’ League may be a valuable
+social agency, but can never hope to be an economic remedy for
+underpayment. Having looked up all these turnings and found all of them
+blind alleys, we now proceed to examine a road along which younger
+sisters of ours have travelled already, and at the end of which a ray of
+hope seems to be shining. But before entering upon this examination we
+will pause to consider the lesson of facts as presented in the history
+of our own cotton trade.
+
+
+
+
+                              CHAPTER III
+                    THE LESSONS OF THE COTTON TRADE
+
+  The pessimist view—False assumption on which it rests—Cotton trade not
+      natural to Britain—Climate—Temperature—Fallacy of inherited
+      skill—Cotton workers as they were—Advancing legal
+      restrictions—Rise of wages—Amazing development and prosperity of
+      the British trade—Change in the mills—Change in the workers—Change
+      in the employers—The case of Bristol—The verdict of Mr Schoenhof.
+
+
+Many people who would gladly see working people better paid, honestly
+believe that a general rise in wages is not commercially possible. Any
+attempt at giving a fair wage all round would, they declare, so diminish
+trade as to throw out of work an additional number of persons whose
+added competition would inevitably reduce the average wage to below its
+original level: or who, if their competition were effectually barred by
+the existence of a legal minimum wage, would be left without employment,
+in a state more wretched than before. It may be remarked that this view
+involves an admission that we live under commercial conditions which
+render dishonesty not only the best, but actually the only possible,
+policy. Such a belief would appear to furnish an unanswerable argument
+in favour of the destruction of such commercial conditions, and it is
+difficult to understand how any human being can hold it and not become a
+convinced revolutionist. Yet, strange to say, it is from the mouth of
+upholders of things as existing, that this doctrine is most frequently
+heard. In some quarters, indeed, there would seem to be actual hostility
+to the idea of bettering the workman’s lot, an inclination to grudge him
+any greater share than he now possesses of the comforts and conveniences
+of modern life. This attitude—to some extent, it must be supposed, a
+feudal survival—indicates a very ugly spirit of class selfishness which
+may possibly be dangerous, and is certainly ignorant. Dull, indeed, must
+be the man or woman upon whom modern conditions of life do not impress
+the closeness of human interdependence. Never, since the beginnings of
+history, has the daily life of every man been so wonderfully interwoven
+with that of all his fellows: never was there a time when the deeds of
+each were so much a part of his neighbour’s pains or pleasures. Consider
+for a single moment how changed would be one’s own life, if there were
+no longer in Great Britain any person very poor, very dirty or very ill
+mannered, if, in short, no one fell below the standard of that skilled
+artisan class which is not only the most solidly virtuous, but also, in
+essentials, the most truly courteous section of our society. Is there
+one of us, however selfish, however callous, from whose daily existence
+a burden would not be lifted?
+
+Yes, the pessimist will say, the change would be delightful, but it is
+not possible. That very interdependence of which you speak makes the
+whole world but one market, and renders it impossible for any one
+country to raise wages while other countries keep theirs low. This
+alleged impossibility rests, it will be observed, upon the assumption
+that higher wages conduce to higher selling prices, an assumption which
+experience shows to be fallacious. And since it is always more
+convincing, especially, perhaps, to the British mind, to narrate what
+has happened than to declare what must happen, the purposes of my
+argument will be best served by a brief account of the English cotton
+trade.
+
+Before entering upon this, let me point out how very remarkable a
+phenomenon it is that there should exist an English cotton trade at all.
+We cannot grow the required material: every ounce of raw cotton has to
+be imported at a price, imported too from a great distance, and owing to
+its bulky nature, at comparatively a high heavy cost. Originally the
+possession of coal, iron and a seaboard gave advantages to England: the
+factory system developed early with us, and we manufactured cotton, as
+we manufactured other goods, because our energies were turned towards
+manufacture in general. But the same influences which caused mechanical
+production to begin here have caused it to arise elsewhere, and the
+natural development of industry must, one would suppose, eventually
+carry the manufacture of cotton to regions where cotton can be grown,
+especially if they happen also to possess the means of motive power. The
+Southern States of America, where cotton grows, where coal and water
+power are plentiful, and where population is no longer sparse, would
+seem to be marked out by nature as the home of the cotton industry. And
+in fact mills are rapidly rising in that region. Not only so, but the
+workers in them are employed for much longer hours and paid at a far
+lower rate per hour than English cotton workers. Readers of the chapter
+upon child labour, in Part I. of this volume, will be aware that
+children are working, both by day and by night, in these mills, whereas
+no child may work full time in any English mill, nor any child or woman
+at night. Yet these Southern mills, with every advantage of position,
+with cheap labour, and comparatively cheap land, have not succeeded, and
+are not succeeding, in winning from the English their immense
+preponderance in the markets of the world. This undeniable fact is
+explained in some quarters as being due to our much abused English
+climate, which is said to provide exactly the degree of temperature and
+humidity most favourable to the manipulation of cotton yarn. That a very
+dry atmosphere will not suit some processes of the trade seems to be
+generally acknowledged, and if England were the only damp country in the
+world, or even the dampest, we might perhaps regard ourselves as
+possessing a sort of monopoly advantage. If, however, there be any one
+state of the atmosphere more favourable than any other for the
+manufacture of cotton, then it is quite impossible that our notoriously
+variable climate can always present it. Moreover, it seems to be the
+case that for some processes at least, a combination of dampness with
+great heat is desirable: and this combination, natural to some
+countries, is actually forbidden by the English law. Countries
+possessing a climate at once hot and damp must, it would seem, have a
+natural advantage over us, and here again, the Southern States are
+favoured by nature.
+
+Another explanation sometimes put forward is that the English workers,
+among whom the manufacture was first established, possess a hereditary
+skill of manipulation. The physiological possibility of such inheritance
+seems to be questionable: and, considering the great changes undergone
+by the machinery employed, the existence of it would be, at least, very
+surprising. Moreover, this supposed hereditary dexterity would require
+to have grown up in strangely few generations, since, in 1830 or so, the
+cotton workers of England are described as being deplorably poor
+workers, degenerate, physically and morally. Their condition, at that
+time and for a good many years afterwards, was appalling. A more
+horrible picture than that presented in Mr P. Gaskell’s “Manufacturing
+Population of England,” published in 1833, can hardly be conceived.
+These cotton operatives were, in short, as unpromising in physique, in
+character and in industrial efficiency as any group of casual,
+irregularly employed labourers that could be selected to-day from the
+ranks of unorganised industry: as ill paid, as wretched and as much
+oppressed as any sweated home worker in a slum garret.
+
+By slow degrees, from that first Act which, in 1802, made some faint
+attempt at shortening the hours of the unhappy parish apprentices, the
+law has gone on, steadily diminishing hours of work. From 1854 onward,
+the working week for women in textile trades became one of 60 hours.
+Within a few years later, these hours were reduced to 56½; and now, the
+legal week in the textile trades is one of 55½ hours. At all these
+stages, the regulations, though nominally affecting only women, have, in
+practice, decided the hours of men also. Thus, the British textile
+worker is employed for fewer hours than any foreign competitor. Wages,
+though not high for the individual, are, owing to the fact that nearly
+all its members work in the trade, high for the family. Rates of pay
+have steadily risen; the average nominal wage of 24s. 9d. for men in
+1881—itself an immense advance upon the starvation rates of the
+thirties—had risen, in 1902, to 27s. 3d. For later years I cannot cite
+figures, but the amazing prosperity of the trade during the last year or
+two can hardly have failed to affect wages favourably.[77]
+
+Moreover, these rises have coincided with a fall in the price of food so
+marked that the increase in average real wages, between 1881 and 1902,
+is reckoned to be more than 36%.
+
+The number of persons employed has also steadily grown, and the returns
+of the Chief Inspector of Factories show that in 1901 the industry gave
+occupation to 513,000 persons. The increase in the number of spindles
+and of looms, however, has been far greater than the increase in the
+number of hands. Machinery has made vast strides and becomes daily
+swifter and more economical of labour; so that the total growth of the
+trade, since the days of employers who vowed that a ten-hour day would
+ruin them, almost passes calculation. Moreover, the development of the
+industry tends more and more towards those branches which demand most
+skill. Our exports increase more largely in fabrics than in yarn, and
+most of all in coloured fabrics, the prices of which are rising. We are
+in short “specialising in the more expensive and difficult work.” We are
+producing those really exquisite coloured cotton stuffs which under
+various fancy names have, during the last few years, made summer dresses
+so attractive, and which are well worth the comparatively high price at
+which they are bought.
+
+On p. 61 of the pamphlet written by Professor S. J. Chapman for the Free
+Trade League[78] may be found a most interesting table of the
+comparative increase, all over the world, in the number of spindles,
+between the years 1870 and 1903. We find that “about a fifth of the
+total increase in the world’s spindles in a third of a century has
+fallen to the United Kingdom. The whole of Europe, taken together in a
+period of industrial awakening, cannot boast a growth of cotton spindles
+more than twice as great as that which has taken place in this country
+alone, though in 1870 Europe was almost at the beginning of her cotton
+spinning, and has since then been fostering it.... In 1870 the American
+nation had a fifth as many spindles as the United Kingdom, and to-day
+she does not possess half as many as the United Kingdom.” And this in
+spite of the fact that the population of the United States is so much
+larger than ours.
+
+Another table (on p. 66) deals with exports of manufactured cotton
+goods, and compares the average annual exports, from 1891 to 1902, of
+Germany, Holland, Belgium, France, Switzerland, the United States, and
+the United Kingdom. The absolute increase of British exports in the year
+1901–2 was £8,170,000; that of Germany, £4,100,000; and that of the
+United States, £325,000. All the remaining countries together totalled
+an increase of only £13,450,000, as against Britain’s £8,170,000. The
+increase in German exports, which comes nearest to our own, is but
+slightly more than half of it. “Of the total trade (exporting) done by
+the chief Western trading nations, Great Britain accounts for 62·5%;
+Germany stands next with 12%.” Moreover, these figures, reaching only to
+1902, take no account of the vast prosperity of the cotton trade in
+Great Britain since: a prosperity of which some indication is given in
+the Report of the Chief Inspector of Factories for 1905. From Oldham, Mr
+Crabtree reports that “About 20 new mills have been erected or are in
+course of erection for the cotton spinning trade alone. These will
+contain about 2,000,000 spindles.” (p. 147.) Mr Verney reports that “in
+the Rochdale district alone three new mills containing 220,000 spindles
+started in 1905, and at the end of the year there were nine more in
+course of construction to be equipped with 770,000 spindles. The total
+number of new mills which have commenced to run in 1905 and which are in
+course of erection throughout Lancashire is no less than 57, with
+5,000,000 spindles. The signification of these figures may be better
+appreciated when it is remembered that in the whole of France there are
+but 6,000,000 spindles, and in Germany less than 9,000,000.” (p. 147.)
+On the same page the following declaration, by Mr W. Tattersall, is
+quoted from “The Cotton Trade Circular”: “The year’s trading has been
+the most prosperous in the history of Lancashire.”
+
+On the whole, the story of the British cotton trade—a trade, be it
+remembered, the very existence of which is surprising—is the story of
+one of the most amazing developments in industrial history. Raw material
+that can only be grown in distant countries is brought, naturally
+enough, at first, to a land of coal and iron, the cradle of the factory
+system. By and by, other countries, including some in which the raw
+material can be produced, begin, in their turn, to adopt the factory
+system and to manufacture cotton. What would naturally follow? Surely,
+the absorption of the English trade by the foreign competitor whom
+nature favours. Moreover, Britain, already handicapped by nature, had
+further handicapped herself by restricting hours of work and by imposing
+high and expensive standards of sanitation and safety. Yet what is seen
+to occur? England’s trade goes on steadily expanding, year by year;
+wages rise, both nominally and, to a greater degree, really; and in the
+course of last year (1905) not only was all the available adult labour
+employed, but it was not possible to get enough of it, so that there was
+actually some increase in half time labour, which previously had
+steadily declined.
+
+Nor is the contrast less if we consider the mills themselves or the men
+and women connected with them. In the first third of the last century,
+the mills were, in general, dirty, ill ventilated, ill provided with
+sanitary accommodation, frequently overcrowded, the machinery unguarded
+and the temperature unregulated, so that the operatives suffered from
+extremes both of heat and of cold. At the present day, there must be a
+certain cubic space for every worker, there must be proper sanitary
+accommodation, moderate temperature and—most important of all, perhaps,
+in this industry—there must be proper ventilation for carrying off the
+dust and fluff by which the lungs of so many cotton operatives have been
+injured. The old mills were full of overworked, underpaid children,
+stunted, wizened, and, if their contemporaries are to be credited,
+precociously vicious; children who dropped asleep at their looms, and
+had to be dragged, crying with sleepiness, from their beds to begin work
+again in the morning, while another relay of little serfs were actually
+waiting to enter the beds left vacant. The mills ran till late at night,
+sometimes all night long. Diseases of many kinds, especially phthisis
+and spinal deformities were rife; while drunkenness and immorality seem
+to have been rampant. The masters, many of whom were self made men, of
+little education, vowed that their profits were not large, and that any
+restriction of the hours of labour would inevitably land them in the
+Bankruptcy Court. The operatives, however, persisted in clamouring for
+relief; parliament granted it; and strange to say, instead of being
+ruined, the trade grew better and better. The workers, seizing their
+chance, developed strong trade unions that included both men and women,
+and thus secured themselves against the disastrous results of free
+competition. Their union helped them to gain better wages; the law
+helped them to health and to leisure. In less than three generations,
+the cotton workers of North Western England have become intelligent,
+independent citizens. They are no longer oppressed, no longer illiterate
+and no longer vicious. Free libraries and co-operative stores grow and
+flourish, and the old English passion for music, still dormant in the
+South, is well awake in the large cotton towns of the North. In
+industrial efficiency the English spinners and weavers of cotton have no
+rivals. As the Tariff Commission reported, “Nearly every mill started
+abroad with English machinery requires a certain amount of British
+workpeople and overlookers to start it and to train up native labour.”
+(Sec. 205.) This increase of skill, dependent very largely upon an
+improved standard of life, has rendered possible a vast improvement in
+methods of production, with the usual consequence of a greatly enlarged
+output. The masters, from whom the increasing stringency of the law has
+demanded an ever rising standard of capacity, are men of a better class
+than their predecessors, and among the most enlightened of British
+employers.
+
+Meanwhile, in other countries, many of the evils which Lancashire has
+left behind, still prevail. Children toil to-day in certain American
+mills, as they toiled once in ours; in many European countries, hours
+are still injuriously long and wages inadequate to the demands of a
+civilised life. Yet employers of this cheap labour cannot produce so
+profitably as Lancashire can. “On the general efficiency of British
+labour as compared with that of any foreign country witnesses are
+practically unanimous,” says the Report of the Tariff Commission. (Sec.
+89.) In short, the English cotton manufacturer produces more cheaply and
+more profitably, upon the whole, than any competitor, and in the highest
+branches of the trade, can hardly be approached. The reasons of this
+pre-eminence are that the good conditions enforced by law and the
+comparatively high wage enforced by the trade unions combine to create
+for him the most efficient body of cotton workers in the world. Once
+more, the facts of industrial history proclaim the truth that efficiency
+is not the cause but the product of fair wages, healthy surroundings and
+reasonable leisure.
+
+Do not let us be deceived into supposing that, apart from these factors,
+there is any peculiarity in the cotton trade to account for these
+developments. If there were, we should behold the ill paid and
+overworked cotton workers of the Southern States, many of whom are of
+the same race as ourselves, producing fabrics as good as ours, at the
+same speed, and equal profit. Indeed, we need not go so far as America
+for our object lesson. The South West of our own country may provide it.
+Bristol, no less than the more northerly parts of the island, had its
+cotton mills. The same advantages were presented: the port open to the
+Atlantic, the moist westerly climate, the plentiful supply of labour.
+The same factory law applies, the same hours and conditions are
+enforced; the employers, of late years at any rate, have been men of
+capital and of intelligence. One factor only has been absent: the
+powerful organisation of workers. Because of its absence, wages have
+fallen to the level of unskilled trades in the district. Men do not work
+in the cotton trade in Bristol, nor adult women. The employees are
+girls, earning the low wage of a Bristol factory girl. Of profits there
+have, for years, been practically none. No employer can afford to make
+improvements in methods of production; and at the present moment it is,
+I believe, an open secret that the one remaining mill is only kept open
+because its owner is unwilling to turn away the hands.[79] But for the
+strong trade unions of the northern operatives, the whole of England’s
+cotton trade at the present day might be in the position of Bristol’s
+cotton trade, and the Lancashire worker might be toiling for as many
+hours and as small a wage as his German competitor. To the organisation
+of the workers, English labour owes that comparatively fortunate
+position which is, as Mr Schoenhof, years ago, perceived, “the only
+vantage ground which England possesses and which secures to her the safe
+and indisputable rulership of the commerce of the world.”[80]
+
+In this particular industry of cotton, other nations, as he points out,
+whose labour is ill paid and whose hours of work are long, are trying to
+defend themselves by a high protective tariff “against the results of
+England’s high pay and short hours.”... “Yet it is all machine work
+driven by steam power and conducted in factories under the best
+intellectual management which the countries afford. But how world wide
+the difference in the results!”[81]
+
+World wide indeed—not as to national trade only, but as to national
+happiness.
+
+
+
+
+                               CHAPTER IV
+                      THE MINIMUM WAGE IN PRACTICE
+
+  Sweating not unknown in the colonies—Instances published by _Otago
+      Daily Times_—Underpaid workers in 1895—Epidemic of strikes—State
+      arbitration proposed in New Zealand—Conciliation Boards and Court
+      of Arbitration—Details of New Zealand law—Objections raised by
+      critics in England—Difference in position of British and of New
+      Zealand trade unions—New Zealand freed from strikes—The question
+      of the poorest workers—Wellington match makers—Tailoresses under
+      an agreement and tailoresses under an award—The under rate
+      worker—Victoria and Wage Boards—Campaign of the _Age_—Factory Act
+      of 1896—Details of Wage Board scheme—The first six Boards—Boards
+      in 1905—Several instances of the “determinations” of Wage
+      Boards—Effect on home work—The case of New South Wales—Summing up.
+
+
+The evils of underpayment, being the invariable result of unlimited
+competition, inevitably show themselves in any country where trade has
+come into existence. The oversea colonies of Britain are not
+overcrowded, are naturally rich, and ought to be free from evils
+accumulated during an old civilisation. Yet, thirty years ago, instances
+of underpayment, exactly on all fours with those exhibited in the
+Queen’s Hall in the summer of 1906, were to be found in New Zealand, in
+South Australia and in Victoria.
+
+There, as here, newspapers called attention to the facts, and aroused
+the public conscience. In January 1889, the _Otago Daily Times_, “a
+journal distinguished amongst its fellows for caution and restraint of
+language,” published a series of articles about underpaid labour in
+Dunedin. “One woman deposed that she might make 3s. 6d. on a good day
+but it would be by stitching from half past eight in the morning until
+eleven at night.”[82]
+
+“Yet she counted her lot at that time almost happy, for she had lately
+escaped from a factory where, do what she would, she could not earn more
+than eighteenpence daily by working until all hours of the night.”
+Another woman reported that she “finished cotton shirts at 1s. 6d. a
+dozen”[83] and that she could “get through a dozen and a half in the
+factory between nine o’clock and six in the evening; then she carried a
+dozen more home and sat up sewing by lamplight until they were
+finished.... On one of these evenings she had a stroke of good luck; she
+was allowed to take away a dozen flannels as well as her dozen shirts.
+Both bundles were done when she went to bed—at three o’clock in the
+morning—and by that night’s work she earned a whole shilling.” (p. 30.)
+
+Individual and combined action followed these revelations. A union of
+tailoresses was formed and an effective factory law passed. Wages,
+however, continued upon a downward course, and in 1895 “there were in
+the colony 591 factory girls who were getting no pay for their work, and
+175 who were paid half a crown a week or less.” (p. 34.) Such facts as
+these were enough to show to thoughtful observers that, unless special
+measures were introduced, the evils of European countries would grow
+with the growth of the colonies. Another series of events helped to
+focus attention upon labour problems. This was the epidemic of unusually
+wide-spread and bitter strikes which ran through the various colonies in
+the early nineties. Into the details of these it is unnecessary to
+enter. It is enough to say that, in at least one instance, associated
+workers demanded what they had no right to demand and that, in at least
+three instances, associated employers refused even to confer upon the
+demands of the workers. The mining companies, for example, declared in a
+public manifesto that “The mining companies claim the right to work the
+mines as they deem best and cannot refer this right to arbitration.” (p.
+95.) Acts of violence were committed; the public was greatly
+inconvenienced; much money was lost; and people began to look about for
+some legislation that would obviate similar troubles in the future.
+
+This was the opportunity of Mr Reeves, at that time Minister of Labour
+in New Zealand. He saw that the path of progress lay along the line of
+organisation; and that the field of State Arbitration is not between man
+and man, but between association and association. He recognised that
+organised society has a right to demand of its different sections that
+degree of class organisation which renders possible the application of a
+common law. Hitherto, sectional combination had been used principally as
+a basis for organised war; in Mr Reeves’s plan, it was to furnish the
+basis of an organised peace. Following out the stages by which
+industrial disputes develop into strikes, he substituted for each a more
+peaceful step. His Bill, respecting the divisions of the colony into
+districts, allowed the creation in any district of a local Conciliation
+Board, and established a supreme Court of Arbitration. The Conciliation
+Boards were to come into existence “if petitioned for,” and were to be
+“composed of equal numbers of masters and men, with an impartial
+chairman.” (p. 101.) The right of electing representatives to serve on
+these Boards was given not to individuals but solely to such bodies of
+employers or of workers (men or women) as registered themselves under
+the Act. An association of as few as seven workers may, at the present
+time, claim registration. When registered, such associations are called
+Industrial Unions, and become corporations “with power to hold land, to
+sue and be sued, and to recover dues from their members.” (p. 103.)
+
+The functions of a Conciliation Board are as follows: On receiving a
+request from any party to an industrial dispute, it calls before it the
+other parties concerned, hears, examines and awards. No strike or
+lock-out is permitted while the case is under hearing. The Board has
+full power to take evidence and to compel attendance. At first, the
+awards of the Conciliation Boards had no legal force but, in 1900, the
+amended Act made these awards “final and legally binding unless appealed
+against within a month.” (p. 127.)
+
+The higher tribunal, the Court of Arbitration, consists of “a president
+with two assessors, one selected by associations of employers the other
+by federations of trade unions.” (p. 102.) The three members of the
+Court are appointed for three years and, unless bankruptcy, crime or
+insanity intervenes, cannot be removed except by a vote of both Houses
+of Parliament. The Court is not fettered by precedent, settles its own
+procedure and may take any evidence that it chooses, “whether strictly
+legal evidence or not.” It may hear cases publicly or privately at its
+discretion. Its award is given by the majority of the three members, and
+they may decide whether the award is to have the force of law or “merely
+to be in the nature of good advice.” If it is to have legal force it
+must be filed in the Supreme Court and after that any party to it may be
+prosecuted for a breach of it. The penalty payable by a single employer
+or trade union is limited to £500; and in case of a union’s possessing
+insufficient funds to meet the penalty every member is liable up to £10.
+The award cannot be appealed against nor quashed by any other tribunal,
+nor can the proceedings be carried into any other court. On the other
+hand, awards remain in currency only for a fixed period, which need not
+be longer than three years at the outside, and at the end of which the
+matter may be reopened.
+
+Though only registered unions of masters and of workers can elect the
+officials of the Boards and of the Court, yet the jurisdiction of these
+tribunals extends to all employers and to all workers whether registered
+under the Act or not. In any district where there is a duly registered
+body of workers but none of employers the Governor in Council may
+nominate the conciliators required to make up a Board.
+
+Such were the general features of the Act that after three years of
+endeavour was passed at the end of 1894 and came into force in 1895. It
+passed amid steady opposition from employers and with extremely little
+support from public opinion. In 1900, after five years’ experience of
+its workings, when a consolidated and amended Act was introduced, only
+one voice was lifted to attack its general principle. Not from its
+neighbours, who are intimate with the workings of it, but from this side
+of the ocean have come the attacks to which it has been exposed. It has
+been contended, again and again, by English newspapers that the measure
+is unduly favourable to trade unions, a contention much strengthened in
+appearance by the fact that in various trades awards have been made
+requiring employers to give preference to unionists, so long as the
+union can supply men qualified and ready to fill vacancies. Such awards,
+however, are by no means invariable; each case is tried on its merits,
+and the Court is largely guided by the general custom of each trade. It
+must be borne in mind also that the position of a New Zealand union is
+very different from that of a British union, and that this difference
+has been largely brought about by the colonial law, in the interest not
+of the union but of public peace and convenience. As Mr Reeves justly
+remarks: “In New Zealand the community, mainly for the purpose of self
+protection, has deprived trade unionists of the right of striking—of the
+sacred right of insurrection to which all workmen rightly or wrongly
+believe that they owe most of what lifts them above serfdom. The
+Arbitration Act, moreover, deliberately encourages workmen to organise.
+When, in obedience to the law, they renounce striking and register as
+industrial unions, it does not seem amiss that they should receive some
+special consideration. Their exertions and outlay in successfully
+conducting arbitration cases benefit non-unionists as well as
+themselves, though the non-unionists have done nothing to help them. Nor
+need the preference entail any hardship to their employers. Non-unionist
+labour is usually valued either because it is cheaper or because it is
+more peaceable. But under the Arbitration law non-unionists must get the
+same pay as unionists, and unionist strikes are abolished. It is only
+the non-unionists (in a trade where there is no award in force) who can
+strike, and who—though rarely and then only in petty groups—do. They
+are, therefore, to that extent, the more dangerous servants of the two.
+Nor, be it noted, does an employer who has only non-union men in his
+factory stand clear of the Act. Nor again can he take himself out of it
+by discharging his union hands and pleading that he has none in his
+employ. If an award has been made dealing with the trade in his
+district, he is bound by it as much as his competitors who employ union
+labour.”[84]
+
+In short, New Zealand has taken out of the hands of organised labour its
+principal weapon and has placed that weapon in the hand of the state.
+The right of waging industrial war is, now, in New Zealand denied to
+unions either of workers or of employers. To have enforced this denial
+without loss to either side and at the same time to have encouraged
+organisation is a feat that any British minister may reasonably desire
+to emulate.
+
+It is quite certain that, without the Arbitration Act, New Zealand would
+not have enjoyed that immunity from labour battles which in fact it has
+enjoyed. The use of the Act happened to coincide, as its author points
+out, with a revival of trade; and a revival of trade is, as every
+experienced trade unionist knows, the period in which strikes may hope
+to be successful. “Instead, however, of striking on a rising market, as
+the traditional custom of trade unionism has been, the New Zealand
+unions were able to arbitrate upon it”—to the saving of much money, much
+suffering and much ill feeling.
+
+Other objectors complain that the Arbitration Act does nothing to help
+the unorganised—always the most helpless—workers. Those who make this
+complaint have failed to appreciate the value of that important
+provision according to which a group of as few as seven (originally as
+few as five) workers in any industry are allowed to register themselves
+as an industrial union. Even in the poorest and most scattered of
+English trades it would be an easy matter to collect seven persons who,
+_if they knew themselves protected from dismissal_, would be willing to
+appeal for improved conditions to a Conciliation Board. So far from
+shutting out the unorganised, the Industrial Arbitration law opens to
+them a door by which they may share in all the advantages of
+organisation without waiting for a preliminary improvement in their
+conditions; and, at the same time that it holds out to them a powerful
+helping hand, makes them not merely passive recipients of a benefit, but
+active agents in their own emancipation.
+
+Would that the same door were open to our poorest workers on this side
+of the ocean; that the worser paid of English factory workers could, by
+registering some seven of their number, present their case to a court
+or, with the support of the court behind them, form such an agreement as
+was made with their employers by the Wellington match-factory employees
+in November 1902, and brought into court for registration. The schedule
+of this agreement contains but five clauses and is a model of brevity
+and directness. Clause I. settles the working hours, on the basis of a
+45 hours week. Clause II. fixes (in 52 words) the piece work rates of
+pay for five different branches of work. Clause III. deals with the
+question of union and non-union labour, and requires “the company”
+(there was but the one employing company, apparently, in the district)
+“when engaging a worker or workers” to “employ a member or members of
+the union in preference to non-members, provided there are members of
+the union equally qualified with non-members to perform the particular
+work required to be done, and ready and willing to undertake it;
+provided, further, that any person now employed in this industrial
+district in this trade, and any other person desirous of entering the
+trade now residing or who may hereafter reside in this industrial
+district, may become a member of the union upon payment of an entrance
+fee not exceeding 5s., and of subsequent contributions, whether payable
+weekly or not, not exceeding 6d. per week, upon the written application
+of the persons so desiring to join the union, without ballot or other
+election.” Clause IV. requires the executive of the union to keep an
+“employment book” containing the names, addresses and employers during
+the previous six months of members wanting to be employed; the book to
+be “open to the company and its servants without fee or charge during
+all working hours on every working day.” Clause V. runs as follows:
+“When members of the union and non-members are employed together, there
+shall be no distinction between members and non-members, and both shall
+work together in harmony and shall receive equal pay for equal
+work.”[85]
+
+I have thought it worth while to quote these clauses in some detail
+because they are typical and illustrate the safeguards both to the
+employer and to the non-union worker by which a preference clause is
+generally accompanied. The whole schedule occupies only 46 lines of
+print—exactly one page of the volume in which it appears.
+
+We see, by this example, that the Arbitration Act does not exclude
+collective bargaining between workers and employers but allows the
+registration and enforcement of terms to which the representatives of
+both parties have agreed. Thus the field of legitimate activity is still
+left open to organisations both of employers and of workers: the Act
+merely provides for peaceable and equitable settlement in cases where
+the parties fail to settle matters for themselves. An instance occurs in
+the history of the tailoresses in which one district was governed by an
+agreement, and another by an award. The employers in the latter district
+complained that the employers in the former were allowed to compete with
+them on unfair terms; and the court having compared the terms of the
+agreement with those of the award, found that the agreement was actually
+in some instances the higher of the two and that, in the instances where
+it was lower, the wages actually paid were double those set down. This
+was in 1903. In 1905 the trade was once more in court asking for the
+establishment of a weekly wage. The court, acceding to what it declares
+to have been a general wish, did fix a weekly wage, but made the award
+for a year only, from Jan. 1906 to Jan. 1907. The schedule—rather a long
+one—fixes the terms of apprenticeship to each class of work, the wages
+of apprentices (5s. a week, rising at fixed intervals by 2s. 6d. at a
+time); defines, according to the length of her experience in her special
+department, a first-class and a second-class “improver,” a “journey
+woman, and an under rate worker,” and fixes minimum rates for all but
+the last named. Improvers in coat and vest work are to receive, for
+second class hands (girls just out of apprenticeship) a minimum of 17s.;
+first class hands (with another year’s experience) one of £1, 0s. 6d.;
+journey women are to be paid not less than £1, 5s. 0d.[86] An under rate
+wage, for old, infirm or incompetent persons, may be fixed by the worker
+concerned and the trade union, by the Chairman of the Conciliation Board
+or by any person appointed by the Board. Such settlements of under rate
+wages continue for only six months, and opportunity is given to the
+union and to the applicant of “calling evidence and adducing arguments”
+before the adjudicator. In the four districts to which this award
+applies a tailoress, who is a “full hand” and a competent worker, can
+now be sure that her week’s work will not be paid at a lower rate than
+25s. a week. There is no prohibition of home work; but the home worker
+must be paid at the established piece work rates, and an employer paying
+less exposes himself to fines up to the sum of £100. Thus, in district
+after district, and in trade after trade, a system has been established
+which combines the apparently contradictory virtues of uniformity and
+elasticity.
+
+The scene of a sitting of the Court of Arbitration can easily be called
+up from newspaper descriptions. The room is plain and not large. At the
+upper end, between the two arbitrators, sits the judge in wig and gown.
+Men and masters, easily distinguishable by differences of dress, manner
+and speech, face each other across a table; in the body of the room
+reporters and a sprinkling of spectators are gathered to listen. The
+matter in hand is stated; then the representative of the men’s union or
+of the associated masters sets forth the plea of his clients, no counsel
+being employed except by agreement of both parties. The cost and the
+duration of proceedings are, no doubt, both lessened by this provision;
+and it is said that the unprofessional advocates on the two parts often
+show remarkable ability in the conduct of the case.
+
+In Victoria a different method of fixing a minimum wage has been
+adopted; the method not of the Conciliation Board and Court of
+Arbitration but of the Wage Board. The mechanism of the Wage Boards is
+much more easily described and understood than that of the New Zealand
+Boards and Court; and it is, no doubt, partly, though not wholly, upon
+this account that advocates of the minimum wage are apt to propose the
+Victorian rather than the New Zealand model for imitation. Personally,
+however, considerable study of both plans has convinced me that the New
+Zealand method is, in practice, the less cumbrous, and that it includes
+features of great value that are lacking in the Victorian system.
+
+Especially valuable seems to be the singular ease with which its
+machinery can be brought to bear upon the poorest workers. Were the law
+of New Zealand also the law of England I would myself engage to collect,
+within six months, from each of half a dozen underpaid women’s trades
+the seven workers necessary to form the required unions, and so to bring
+these half dozen trades within the purview of a Conciliation Board. Such
+Boards are established upon being asked for by a registered association
+of workers (or of employers), whereas the Victorian Wage Boards can only
+be established in any trade by a resolution of both Houses of
+Parliament; and, on this side of the ocean at least, Parliaments are apt
+to require much moving before they can be made to act.
+
+In Melbourne, as in New Zealand, the first impulse towards the legal
+fixing of a minimum wage came from a newspaper. That powerful organ, the
+_Age_, for many years continued to print articles on the subject of
+underpayment and bad conditions of work. A Royal Commission was
+appointed and made a Report as early as 1884, but no practical reforms
+were attempted. The _Age_ continued its crusade. In 1893 a Board of
+Inquiry was appointed and the evidence taken by that body showed the
+state of the workers in several trades to be deplorable. In 1895 an
+Anti-Sweating League was formed and, finally, in 1896, a new Factory and
+Shops Act was passed, of which the most remarkable clauses were those
+dealing with the establishment of Wage Boards. Provision was made for
+the appointment of special boards “to fix wages and piece work rates for
+persons employed either inside or outside factories in making clothing
+or wearing apparel or furniture, or in bread making or baking, or in the
+business of a butcher or seller of meat.”[87]
+
+Permission was also given by the Act for the appointment of similar
+boards in other trades “provided a resolution has been passed by either
+House[88] declaring it is expedient to appoint such a Board.”
+
+These Boards consist of not less than four nor more than ten members,
+half of whom are elected by employers and half by employees, or, failing
+election, are appointed by the Governor in Council.
+
+The methods by which the members of Wage Boards are elected is
+extraordinarily cumbrous and could scarcely be imitated in any large
+industrial community. The latest regulations for such elections (dated
+Feb. 19, 1906) are embodied in no less than 28 clauses. In each
+specified trade two electoral rolls must be prepared by the factory
+inspectors, the one including names and addresses of all workers, the
+other those of all employers. In order to facilitate the compilation of
+this trade census, all employers are required to send to the inspectors
+lists of the workpeople employed by them. Candidates must be nominated
+by 10 employers or by 25 employees; and voting papers are printed
+containing the names of all the candidates.
+
+“The Chief Inspector shall cause every voting paper to be posted at
+least four days prior to the date of such election to every elector
+whose name and address is on the roll of electors for the special
+board.” The elector must strike out the names of all but those
+candidates for whom he desires to vote and must return the paper by 4
+o’clock on the day of election. Imagine such a process as this in one of
+our own ill paid trades! The workers in such trades are migratory in the
+highest degree; by the time that the addresses of all qualified electors
+had been collected, one third of them, at least, would have ceased to be
+accurate. This fact alone would lead both to omissions and to
+duplications. The clerical labour and postage would be so heavy as to be
+a serious national expense; and the magnitude of the enumeration would
+render its completion a work of time. I doubt whether a Board to deal
+with any larger British trade could possibly be elected in less than a
+twelvemonth; and even such expedition as this would demand the
+employment of an extensive special staff.
+
+The members of the Board, when it has at last been formed may elect an
+outside chairman, and if they fail to do so, the Governor in Council may
+appoint one. The Boards may fix “either wage rates or piece work rates,
+or both; must also fix the hours for which the rate of wage is fixed and
+rate of pay for overtime.” They may also fix the proportions of
+apprentices and improvers to be employed; and may “determine that
+manufacturers may be allowed to fix piece work rates based on the
+minimum wage.... The Chief Inspector may, however, challenge any rate so
+paid, and the employer may have to justify it before the Board.” The
+power to grant a licence to any aged or infirm worker to work at less
+than the established minimum wage rests with the Chief Inspector.
+
+The first Boards were only six in number. Several of these had much
+difficulty in arriving at a “Determination.” The Men’s and Boys’
+Clothing Board, for instance, occupied nine months in drawing up theirs,
+and finally established both time and piece rates. With the idea of
+compensating the home worker for incidental expenses and loss of time,
+the piece work rates were fixed a shade higher than the time rate—with
+the result that employers ceased to send work out. In other instances
+where there has been no such difference, the compulsion to pay home
+workers at something near a living wage has tended in the same
+direction.
+
+Though the number of Boards was steadily enlarged, the legislation
+allowing their formation was for some years persistently held as
+experimental, and not until 1904, after eight years of experience were
+they made a permanent part of the law of Victoria.
+
+There were at the end of 1905—the latest date for which the Report of
+the Factory Inspectors is available—38 Boards the determinations of
+which were in force. The wages and conditions fixed by these Boards vary
+to a remarkable decree, and it is to be regretted that the smallest
+advances seem in general to have been granted in the worst paid trades.
+In some cases the established minimum for a competent adult worker is
+sadly low. For instance the female chocolate coverer of over 21 has a
+minimum of only 17s. weekly, while her fellow worker who is under 21 but
+over 18 may be paid as little as 14s. a week. The minimum for a youth of
+the same age is also 14s. but the adult male chocolate coverer (a person
+whom I have never found in England) must be paid not less than 30s.[89]
+Worse still is the case of the jam trade in which the minimum for
+“females of 18 years and upwards” is but 14s.[90] Such determinations as
+these point to a desire on the part of the Board rather to prevent a
+further drop of wages than to effect a rise to what may be esteemed a
+“living wage.” Still, even to arrest the downward course is a step in
+the right direction, and the example of the millinery trade, in which
+there is no Board, shows that the jam maker at 14s. is probably better
+off than she would be were there no determination at all in her trade.
+Miss Cuthbertson reports that in 1901 the average wage for milliners was
+11s. 4d. per week per individual. “In 1902 the average fell to 11s. 1d.;
+in 1903 to 10s. 4d.; in 1904 to 9s. 10d.;—and possibly this year will
+witness a further fall.”[91] Yet the trade steadily grows, the number of
+persons employed rising from 758 in 1901 to 1410 in 1904.
+
+Dressmakers, however, who work under a determination, average 12s.
+3d.[92] The determination in this trade did not come into force until
+September 1904; and in 1903 the average wage of dressmakers in Victoria
+was 11s. 11d. These averages, of course, include apprentices and
+learners. The established minimum for a competent dressmaker is now 16s.
+per week.[93]
+
+This contrast serves to suggest how valuable has been the influence of
+the Boards in checking the fall of wages. An average weekly difference
+of half a crown between the wages of dressmakers and of milliners would
+scarcely have arisen of itself, especially in a comparatively small
+industrial community. Some Boards have evidently been timid; and some
+have shown—to put the matter mildly—no strong desire to approximate the
+wages of women to those of men engaged in very similar work. The
+difference between 17s. and 30s. in the case of chocolate coverers may
+serve as an instance. On the other hand, the Bootmaking Board and the
+Brushmaking Board have courageously enacted that women employed in
+certain branches shall have “the same rate as males.” Thus a woman in
+the bootmaking trade who is engaged in “making, finishing or clicking
+(but not skiving or trimming) insides or outsides or stuff cutting by
+hand” must receive a minimum of 40s. a week; while for women in some
+other branches of the same industry the minimum is fixed at 20s.[94]
+
+The Brushmaking determination, even bolder, runs thus: “Any females
+employed in any of the above classes of work to be paid at the same
+rates as males.” These rates vary from a minimum of 21s. a week to one
+of 64s.[95]
+
+Even the lowest of these minima would be an advance of at least 25% on
+the wages of most home working brushmakers in London. In Victoria the
+average throughout the whole trade was, in 1905, £1, 9s. 2d.[96]
+
+Some Boards have been less successful than others. The mingled
+ignorance, astuteness and bland mendacity of the Chinese furniture
+makers appear to have baffled the Furniture Board, as far as the Chinese
+department of the trade is concerned; and as the figures quoted show,
+the minimum fixed in some women’s trades is far too low. But, looking at
+the Report of the Chief Inspector—a most interesting document—it seems
+impossible to doubt that the Boards have, in trade after trade, both
+arrested the fall of wages and (not always but often) effected a rise.
+No doubt the determinations are sometimes evaded; so, in our own
+country, are the Factory Acts sometimes evaded, yet the general
+influence for good of the Factory Acts is no longer a matter of doubt.
+That neither the Industrial Arbitration Act nor the Wage Boards have by
+their action checked the trade of the colonies in which they exist seems
+to be established beyond question. The Wage Boards, without any other
+prohibitory effort, seem by the mere process of forbidding underpayment
+to have imposed a check upon the most unsatisfactory sorts of home work.
+As M. Aftalion has pointed out, home work, in large part, subsists
+solely on account of its evils. Work given out only because it might be
+sweated naturally ceases to be given out when sweating is stopped. On
+the other hand, home work of a better kind, the home work that is
+harmful neither to the worker nor to the community, is not checked
+merely by a provision that it shall be properly paid. While it is very
+desirable that no person shall work at home for very poor pay or under
+very bad conditions, it is emphatically not desirable that no person
+whatever shall be allowed to work at home for money. Miss Thear, one of
+the Victorian inspectors, reports a considerable decrease in home work
+in the shirt trade, the tasks formerly performed by outdoor hands “and
+in some cases by elderly women who are now recipients of the old age
+pension” are now being performed in the factories by herring-boning,
+button-hole and button sewing machines. “In addition to getting the old
+age pension and going to work inside of factories, other means of
+employment seem to have opened up for others who were formerly out
+workers. Some have boarded-out children to care for, and some are
+registered under the Infant Life Protection Act.”[97]
+
+Miss Cuthbertson, on the same page, says: “The tendency in all trades is
+to get the work done in factories, where the supervision is closer, and
+where, with improved machinery, work can be turned out much more
+cheaply.” The minimum wage law has, in fact, hastened the course of that
+development upon which most trades, and the clothing trades, perhaps,
+especially, had already entered.
+
+Legislation of a similar character to that of the sister colonies has
+been established in New South Wales, and the kindness of friends in
+Sydney has supplied me with much matter published and unpublished; but,
+after careful consideration, I have decided not to attempt any account
+of the minimum wage law of New South Wales. The reasons for this
+abstention are twofold. In the first place the Act is but five years
+old, and its history, therefore, is far less instructive than that of
+the legislation in New Zealand and in Victoria. In the second place the
+accounts received point some one way and some another, so that it is
+difficult to draw from them any plain conclusion. I am well aware that
+by passing over the case of New South Wales I expose myself to the
+accusation of adducing only the favourable examples and of disregarding
+those that have not succeeded. To this it may fairly be replied that
+although the New South Wales law has not apparently fully succeeded,
+neither has it entirely failed. It is still in a stage of probation, and
+therefore of far less value to the student than such laws as have
+progressed beyond that stage. Moreover, even if it were true—as most
+emphatically it is not—that the Colonial experiments had all completely
+failed, it would by no means follow that to devise a successful minimum
+wage law was a task beyond the wit of man.
+
+In fact, however, both forms of minimum wage law—the Arbitration Court
+and the Wage Boards—have demonstrably helped to raise wages and to
+diminish underpayment within their jurisdiction. The Industrial
+Arbitration Act, in particular, is a very remarkable piece of
+constructive legislation, the full scope of which will probably be more
+and more perceptible with the development of the land to which it
+belongs. Its balance, its wide applicability, the simplicity and
+promptitude of its working deserve to be better comprehended. The Wage
+Board, by comparison, lacks originality, flexibility and ease.
+
+Both examples have great value for British students; yet it does not
+follow that either, in precisely its Colonial form, is altogether suited
+to the industrial needs of Britain. A prejudice against compulsory
+arbitration—a prejudice which I venture to think rests in some degree
+upon imperfect comprehension of the New Zealand law—is strong among
+British trade unionists, and the work of dispelling this would be long
+and arduous. On the other hand, the comparative slowness and
+cumbrousness of the Wage Board system and the absence of any means by
+which the workers can claim the help of the Board are features only too
+much in accord with English inertness and officialdom. It seems much to
+be desired that, if Wage Boards should come to be created in this
+country, the appointment of them should be effected in the same manner
+as the appointment of the New Zealand Conciliation Boards: i.e., on the
+request of seven or more associated workers; and it is quite imperative
+that some simpler and less costly method of choosing the representatives
+of labour and of capital, respectively, should be devised. To establish
+in this country a system which proved to be almost unworkable or of
+which the machinery moved so slowly as to be always in arrear of actual
+conditions would tend to promote rather than to abate the evil of
+sweating.
+
+
+
+
+                               CHAPTER V
+                          FOREIGN COMPETITION
+
+  High wages and high prices not necessarily connected—Effect of
+      increased wages in different groups of trades—Trades in which
+      there is a margin for increase—Varying wages in the same
+      trade—Scottish Wholesale Co-operative Society’s shirt
+      factory—Trades in which higher wages would lead to improved
+      methods—Displacement of workers—Cheapened production—Increased
+      demand and increased employment—Trades in which higher wages would
+      lead to higher prices—Foreign legislation against sweating—Effect
+      of higher wages upon home market—Valuelessness to the country of
+      very ill paid trades—The two lines along which trade may
+      develop—The line of cheap labour—Consequences to the British
+      worker—The line of good work—Summing up.
+
+
+The foregoing chapters will have been written in vain if they have not
+succeeded in showing that there is no necessary connection between high
+wages and high selling prices; but that, on the contrary, high wages, in
+the great majority of cases, actually conduce to cheap production. Were
+this invariably the case, it is obvious that a general rise of wages,
+far from encouraging foreign competition, would rather form a barrier
+against it. And this, in fact, would be—as it is in some instances
+already—the case in many trades.
+
+It may be well briefly to consider the various groups of cases that
+would arise in consequence of a general rise in the remuneration of
+labour. There exists, in the first place, a considerable group of trades
+in which, for similar work in respect of goods sold at the same price,
+different employers pay very different rates of wage. A very remarkable
+instance is furnished, in one of the worst paid trades, by the shirt
+factory of the Scottish Wholesale Co-operative Society. In that
+establishment, turning out goods for working class customers, women have
+for years received about double the wages of the average home working
+shirt maker, they not providing, as does she, the sewing cotton used. In
+October 1906 the average wage paid to workers in this factory was 18s.
+3d. per week, and their week was one of 44 hours.[98] Yet the factory
+pays and has done so for many years.[99]
+
+It is therefore clear that even in the ready made shirt trade it is
+possible to pay reasonably good wages, to compete with the “sweater,”
+and yet to make a profit. Thus the enforcement of a minimum weekly wage
+very near the level of Mr Maxwell’s 18s. 3d. would neither kill the
+trade nor stimulate the importation of foreign shirts. It would merely
+impose upon other employers that standard of management and methods
+which Mr Maxwell has chosen voluntarily to adopt. Those employers who
+lacked intelligence or flexibility to carry on a factory on these terms
+would, it is true, be driven out of business; but their customers would
+not cease to buy nor to be supplied at the old price. The only change
+would be that none of us would, any longer, be buying shirts at which
+some woman had sewn, as Hood said,
+
+                             “with a double thread
+                     At once a shirt and a shroud.”
+
+There are other groups of trades in which the history of the cotton
+trade would be repeated, that is to say, the employer who found himself
+compelled to pay higher wages would at once introduce better
+machinery—either in the narrow sense of actual appliances or in the
+wider sense of improved organisation and management. Such an employer
+would also, as the cotton masters have done, demand better work from his
+employees, and would get it. At first there might be a diminution in the
+number of hands employed; but if, as almost always happens, the improved
+methods led to a considerable reduction in the cost of production and
+consequently to a lowered selling price, demand would immediately
+increase, and more workers would again be wanted. There is no reason in
+the nature of things why a rise of wages and a powerful labour
+organisation should not do for the silk trade and the woollen trade of
+Britain what they have already done for the cotton trade.
+
+In the first group of these trades, then, no workers would be displaced,
+and the conditions of the market would remain unaltered; in the second,
+there would, at first, probably be a displacement and afterwards,
+probably, a renewed, or even an increased demand for workers.
+
+We come next to a group of trades which may exist, but of the existence
+of which I personally am somewhat sceptical. These are the trades in
+which there is neither margin of profit nor room for improvements that
+might make up for the additional outlay upon heightened wages. In these
+trades—if such there be—it is undeniable that if British wages rose
+while foreign wages remained stationary the foreigner would be extremely
+likely to capture the market.
+
+But there are various matters that must be set down upon the other side
+of the account. To begin with, our foreign competitors are themselves
+uneasy about the existence of sweating within their borders. It is
+almost certain that German legislation directed against this evil will
+precede legislation in this country; while in America, as may indeed be
+judged by the quotations from recent American books that appear in these
+pages, there are many persons much concerned with the problem of
+underpaid labour. If our foreign competitors should keep step with
+ourselves in the prohibition of extreme underpayment, the balance of
+international trade would be in no way disturbed. Nay, if only Germany
+should do so, the disturbance to the English market would not be
+serious.
+
+Moreover, the payment of high wages to working people has, in itself, a
+beneficial effect upon the home market. Some people write and speak as
+though money when it once passed into the hands of a wage earner passed
+out of existence. But in fact it almost always returns very quickly into
+active circulation and thus quickens the national turnover. As a general
+rule a workman, when his wages rise, spends his extra money upon
+additional comfort for himself and his family; buys more and better
+food, more and better clothes, more and better furniture; often he moves
+to a better dwelling and almost always he extends his recreations. The
+chances are that he will spend something in belonging to a club or a
+friendly society. He will not, however, as his enemies are fond of
+asserting, generally drink more; it is to the man who lives with his
+family in one room, not to the man who has a comfortable parlour, that
+the public-house looks so attractive. We may say without much doubt that
+these will be his modes of expenditure because we have among us plenty
+of well paid artisans, and observation teaches that these are in fact
+the ways in which they spend their money. Now, many of these channels of
+expenditure are practically not open to foreign competition. Bread for
+English eating must be baked in English bakehouses: milk is not yet
+imported: the retail shopkeeper, the bricklayer, the omnibus driver and
+the railway servant must follow their avocations on the hither side of
+the sea. The better paid worker thus, without any premeditation or
+patriotic design, tends, by the mere process of buying what he wants, to
+set his fellow countrymen working. It is quite possible that the
+increase of demand thus created would more than counterbalance the loss
+of any trade the retention of which depends upon the continuance of
+underpayment. Nor is this all. It is a question whether any trade in
+such a condition is either worth keeping or capable of being kept. An
+experienced employer who is at the head of a large and successful
+enterprise writes to me: “Broadly speaking, I am convinced that an
+occupation which does not admit of a decent living wage is an occupation
+we are better without and one which in due time will die. I mean that
+the requirements of the Factories and Workshops Act must kill it. A
+trade which can only live by means of inadequate wages and cheap squalid
+unhealthy buildings is doomed.” Such a trade while it still endures is
+not really a source of national profit. The workers whose lives it
+drains, not being supported by the price paid for their labour, must
+come eventually to be partly or wholly supported by other people. They
+are, in fact, a national burden, whether the charge is nominally borne
+by the State or by private citizens. Poverty, dirt and disease are very
+costly to the country in which they prevail; and they are inevitable
+results of underpayment.
+
+We may seek the development of our trade along either of two lines—we
+may aim either at underselling our competitors or at surpassing them. If
+we elect to take the line of cheapness, and also determine to seek that
+cheapness by paying very low wages, we must confine ourselves to goods
+that demand neither very high skill nor very elaborate machinery. But
+these are precisely the sort of goods that can best be produced by
+nations upon a lower level than ourselves, by peasants and by dwellers
+in genial climates where comparatively little food and clothing and
+practically no heating are required. With workers such as these we can
+never compete on equal terms, and we should be wiser not to try. We can
+never bring down an Englishman to the standards of the Chinaman or of
+the Hindoo. But we can, in making the attempt, create among ourselves a
+class of helots, degraded labour slaves, living on a level that shocks
+our national conscience. To do this is to keep open a sore in our midst
+and to run a constant risk of those revolts and disturbances which are
+the greatest possible danger and interruption to the regular course of
+trade—a greater danger perhaps than that of being undersold by
+foreigners. For the long-suffering of the English poor, though amazing,
+is not probably quite unlimited. No national life can be stable while
+large numbers of the people live in great misery. The best safeguard of
+national peace is a general distribution of comfort and independence.
+And the safest paths towards this state of security are good education
+and good payment for the workers. Low wages lead by a path of
+intolerable suffering to an inevitable downfall. On the ascending path
+too there may be dangers—but they are the less dangers, and they will be
+faced by citizens fitter to meet them.
+
+After all, even Great Britain cannot expect to hold all the trade of the
+world. What she may expect, what she can have if she will, is the
+commercial leadership of the world. She may show in other departments,
+as she has shown in cotton and in iron, that her race can produce the
+best workers living, and the best organisers of work; and she can
+continue the great lesson which others have learned from her history,
+but which she herself does not always remember, the lesson that, other
+things being equal, that nation becomes wealthiest which pays its
+workers best. Health, skill, intelligence: these are the true bulwarks
+of national prosperity; and the price of these is liberal payment for
+labour. Nor does the prosperity which rests upon these things injure
+those neighbouring nations amid which it develops. Rivalry upon the
+up-grade educates and improves all alike; rivalry upon the down-grade
+injures and degrades all, but not all alike. In that competition the
+nation suffers most whose standards are highest.
+
+To sum up in a few words: in many trades, wages could be raised out of
+profits without change of selling price; in some a rise of wages would
+lead to improvements of method, to cheapening of production and probably
+to a fall of selling price; in some, though probably not in many, a rise
+of wages would necessitate a rise of prices; and of these there may be
+some (it is not proved that there are) the retention of which absolutely
+depends upon the payment of excessively low wages.[100]
+
+In regard to the first two groups, which together cover the greater part
+of the industrial field, improved payment at home would certainly give
+no advantage to the foreign competitor and might in some cases rather be
+disadvantageous to him.
+
+In the other group, a rise of wages would probably, wherever the nature
+of the industry admitted of importation, lead to an increase of
+importation as against home production.
+
+But in cases where the continuance of a trade actually depends upon
+aggravated underpayment the trade is shown, by that very fact, to be
+already in a declining state, and unable to support its own cost; and no
+trade that is in a declining state and that offers no possibility of
+bettered conditions can be regarded as a valuable national asset. On the
+other hand, of every additional shilling paid in wages, at least
+sixpence is spent in employing British labour, so that if, owing to a
+general rise of wages, we were to lose entirely the third and lesser
+group of industries, we should still enjoy a greater volume of trade
+than before wages were raised.
+
+Thus, when we look it squarely in the face, we perceive that the bogie
+of foreign competition is a bogie indeed; and that British workers well
+paid would have less ground than British workers ill paid to fear that
+their trade would be taken from them.
+
+
+
+
+                               CHAPTER VI
+                           GAIN TO THE NATION
+
+  Desirability of better pay to the underpaid—Report of
+      Interdepartmental Committee on Physical Deterioration—Its hopeful
+      side—No degenerate class—Physical and mental effects of poverty on
+      the individual—The better paid artisan—Conclusion.
+
+
+If, then, without seriously diminishing the trade of the country or the
+volume of employment, it is possible gradually to raise the wage of all
+ill paid workers to a level that will allow them something like a
+civilised existence, how desirable and how urgent is legislation that
+will bring about this result. No person, indeed, disputes the
+desirability of the change; the only point in question is its
+feasibility. To prove that the change is feasible and is impossible to
+be effected except by law has been the whole purpose of this volume.
+Now, in these last pages, it may be permissible to glance at the immense
+gain to the nation that would arise from a general increase in the pay
+of such British workers as are now grossly underpaid.
+
+Physically, no person familiar with the poorer quarters of any
+industrial district can doubt that such workers are suffering seriously.
+The whole report of the Interdepartmental Committee on Physical
+Deterioration is little more than a report of the results of extreme
+poverty. Amid the accumulation of melancholy facts, however, is to be
+found evidence of a most hopeful kind. In our own country, at least, its
+seems to be true that the physical deterioration which comes of poverty
+(as distinguished from that which comes of vice) is rather personal than
+hereditary, and that the starved child will regain health and normality
+amid better conditions; so that even in a single generation any group of
+British people suffering from the effects of poverty may be restored to
+the average standard of the race if properly fed, properly clothed,
+properly housed, not overworked, and allowed plenty of air. The higher
+death rate, the inferior physique, the poorer vitality of the ill paid
+mark tendencies not inborn but acquired, all of which might and would
+disappear with the diminution of poverty and of that ignorance which is
+one outcome of poverty, and also, by reaction, one of the contributory
+causes of poverty. Degeneracy exists; but not a degenerate class; the
+class which we sometimes call degenerate is, as a class, merely starved.
+In short all that waste of human life, of human energy and of human
+happiness which is going on daily around us and is causing to the
+country a daily loss heavier than that of any campaign, is neither
+inevitable nor incurable. This misery might be sensibly diminished
+within three years, and might be ended within the lifetime of children
+already born.
+
+Nor is it the body alone that suffers the deterioration of poverty. The
+underfed brain too, remains stunted; and to be constantly hungry is to
+be constantly apathetic. Lassitude, inertia, the mental dulness that
+knows no pleasure except of the senses, no personal initiative and no
+activity save in response to external stimulus, these are the
+characteristics of the adult whose childhood has been passed in
+overcrowded rooms, whose food has been insufficient, his clothing
+inadequate, and to whom no wider horizons have ever been opened. Such an
+individual knows nothing of the real joys of life; he is a valueless
+citizen, consuming more than he produces, a poor worker, and even when
+not personally vicious, an influence rather towards degradation than
+towards progress.
+
+But taken early enough and fed, clothed and housed like the children of
+the better paid artisan, the same man might have become healthy of body
+and alert of mind; a reader of books, a player of outdoor games, a
+skilled craftsman taking delight in his good work, a citizen rendering
+intelligent public service, a parent of healthy hopeful children,
+enjoying and creating prosperity. There are hundreds of such men among
+the superior artisans of this country. It has been my lot to know many
+of them, and it is my belief that on the whole they and their families
+form the happiest, the most valuable and the best conducted portion of
+our nation. To bring up into that class those compatriots of theirs and
+ours who now, by no fault of their own, suffer not only the privations
+but also the degradations of extreme poverty is no impossible feat, and
+would be the greatest possible of national services. Happily there are
+signs of a growing public desire to remedy the appalling evils vaguely
+summarised under the word “sweating,” and of a growing inclination to
+seek the remedy along the lines of endeavour marked out by our colonial
+brethren.
+
+In the earnest hope that such an endeavour may be made, quickly, yet not
+hastily, by the law of Great Britain, and that these chapters may as
+soon as possible become out of date, I offer to my fellow countrymen the
+conclusions gradually shaped in my own mind by nearly twenty years of
+work among industrial problems.
+
+
+
+
+                                 INDEX
+
+
+ Adler: Miss Nettie, 108, 123, 124
+
+ Aftalion: A., 2, 255
+
+ Alien immigration, 197
+
+ America: Children’s work in, 115, 119–122, 128;
+   “sweating” in, 143;
+   a living wage in, 149–151;
+   low cost of production, 184;
+   cotton trade, 221;
+   child labour in cotton mills, 226;
+   southern states, 227
+
+ Anti-Sweating league: in Melbourne, 247
+
+ Apprentices, parish: Act of, 218
+
+ Arbitration Courts in New Zealand, 235, 236
+
+ Army and Navy Stores, 176, 177
+
+ Australia: wage board in Victoria, 246;
+   in Melbourne, 247;
+   minimum wage in Melbourne, 251;
+   legislation in New South Wales, 257
+
+
+ Babies’ shoe making, 105
+
+ Bake houses: boys working in, 109
+
+ Ball covering, 15
+
+ Bird cage making, 14
+
+ Boot finishing, 15
+
+ Boot making, 105
+
+ Booth: Chas., 6, 65, 148, 155, 201
+
+ Bosanquet: Mrs, 153, 154, 155, 157, 158, 159
+
+ Box making: children’s work, 106
+
+ Brickfields: children working in, 110
+
+
+ Cabmen, 76
+
+ Cabs and Omnibuses Bill: report of select committee, 82, 83, 97
+
+ Cadbury: Edward, 3
+
+ “Case for the Factory Acts: The,” 114
+
+ Chapman: Prof. S. J., 220
+
+ “Child Labour” (_No. 93, Annals_ _of American Academy_), 119 120–122,
+    125, 128–130
+
+ Children: as home workers, 104;
+   unpunctual at school through home work, 105;
+   babies’ shoe making, 105, 108;
+   dodging educational authorities, 106;
+   working all night, 106;
+   match box making, 106, 108;
+   string bag making, 107;
+   tooth brush making, 107;
+   kid belt making, 107;
+   wood chopping, 107;
+   wood polishing, 107;
+   steel covering, 108;
+   fish basket sewing, 108;
+   in small laundries, 108;
+   half timers, 112;
+   errand boys, 108;
+   Saturday and evening boys, 108;
+   barbers’ lather boys, 108;
+   matching girls, 109;
+   street trading, 109;
+   their labour of little use to them later in life, 109;
+   boys working in bake houses, 109;
+   in brick-fields, 110;
+   heavy loads, 110–111;
+   in textile trades, 110–111, 112;
+   in the potteries, 114;
+   general remarks on child labour, 140
+
+ Civil Service Stores, 177
+
+ Clerks and Bookkeepers, 71, 138
+
+ Committee on wage-earning children, 108
+
+ Competition, free: its effect upon labour, 166;
+   checks upon, 195
+
+ Confectionery, 29, 32, 110
+
+ Consumers: Associations of, 176
+
+ Consumers’ League, A: impractibility of, 205–211;
+   in America, 210;
+   influence on public opinion, 210
+
+ Co-operation: Industrial, 176, 177, 180
+
+ Co-operative Stores, 201, 202
+
+ Co-operative Union, 180
+
+ Cost of labour: recognition of its true cost, 173
+
+ Cotton mills: children’s work, 110–111, 112–113
+
+ Cotton trade: not natural to Britain, 214–217;
+   condition of workers in 1830, 217;
+   prosperity increased under higher wages, 219;
+   in Bristol, 227
+
+ “Cotton Trade Circular,” 222
+
+ Cotton workers: educational improvement of, 225
+
+ Crabtree: Mr, Inspector of Factories, 221
+
+ Cuthbertson: Miss, Inspector of Factories, Victoria, 256
+
+
+ _Daily News_, 59, 60
+
+ _Daily News_: Sweated Industries Exhibition, 10, 18, 142, 148
+
+ Danger of Fire, 35
+
+ Dockers’ Union, 135
+
+ Dressmaking, 29, 32
+
+ Drink and Poverty: some facts about, 198;
+   lessened by shorter hours, 200
+
+
+ Early marriages: reason for, among working class, 197
+
+ Economy of high wages, 165, 184, 228
+
+ Edgworth: Maria, 115
+
+ Education: effect of child labour on, 125
+
+ Efficiency: remarks on, 158
+
+ Emigration, 196, 211
+
+ Employers: responsibility for strikes, 184;
+   duty to pay a fair wage, 187;
+   in cotton trade, 225;
+   in Bristol, 227
+
+ Errand boys, 108;
+   Saturday and evening workers, 108;
+   barbers’ lather boys, 108
+
+
+ Factories: reports of chief inspector, 25, 29, 32, 37, 38, 39, 109–111,
+    221;
+   in Australia, 252–254, 256
+
+ Factory Acts: beneficial effects, 181, 188, 194, 224, 267;
+   in Australia, 247;
+   evasion of, 255
+
+ Factory girls: an appreciation of, 134;
+   manners of, 136;
+   code of honour, 137
+
+ Factory work: general remarks on, 133
+
+ Factory workers: their condition compared with home workers, 23, 46
+
+ Fair wage, a: what is a fair wage, 161;
+   pessimist view, 212–214
+
+ Fines and deductions, 39, 41, 54
+
+ Fish basket sewing, 108
+
+ Foreign Competition: effect on a minimum wage, 271
+
+ Free Libraries, 225
+
+ _Free Trade League_, 220
+
+
+ Gaskell: P, 217
+
+ Germany, 143;
+   cotton trade in, 221;
+   possibility of legislation to curtail sweating, 264, 265
+
+ Gissing: Geo., 72
+
+ Glass works in America, 120–121
+
+ _Guardian: The_, 210
+
+
+ Half timers, 112
+
+ Health: of home workers, 17;
+   of factory workers, 25;
+   of shop assistants, 55;
+   of child workers, 115, 121–125
+
+ Heavy loads, 110–111
+
+ High wages and cheap production, 260
+
+ “Historical Development of the Factory Acts,” 114
+
+ Hogg: Mrs, 18, 118
+
+ Home Industries for women: report on, 2
+
+ Home Office enquiry, 125
+
+ Home work: report on, 2;
+   in Birmingham, 3;
+   match box making, 3;
+   shirt making, 10;
+   paper-bag making, 11;
+   toy making, 13;
+   pipe making, 13;
+   bird cage making, 14;
+   weaving, 14;
+   boot finishing, 15, 105;
+   ball covering, 15;
+   tooth brush making, 18, 20;
+   miscellaneous trades, 21
+
+ Home workers: Condition of, 17;
+   general remarks on, 132;
+   impossibility of organisation, 186
+
+ Hours of work: piece work, 16;
+   long hours in factories, 29, 30, 31;
+   shop assistants, 53, 58;
+   in Scotland, 66;
+   waitresses, 69;
+   railway men, 77;
+   omnibus men, 83;
+   motor omnibus men, 92;
+   children’s hours of work at home, 108;
+   in tin works, 110;
+   work at home after closing hours, 188;
+   women in textile trades, 218
+
+ House of Lords Committee on Early Closing of Shops, 68
+
+ Hutchins: Miss B. L., 114
+
+
+ Industrial efficiency: effect of Child Labour on, 130–131;
+   caused by fair wages, 227
+
+ Industrial Unions of New Zealand, 234
+
+ Ireland: copartnership in, 179
+
+ Ironing, 108
+
+ Irwin: Miss, 3, 17, 66, 67, 68, 69
+
+
+ Jackman: Marshall, 124, 125
+
+ Jam-making. _See_ Confectionery
+
+ Jarvis family: History of, 7
+
+ Johnson: Dr, 157
+
+ “Juvenile wage earners and their work,” 108, 123
+
+
+ Kelley: Mrs Florence, 120, 125, 129
+
+ Kid belt making, 107
+
+
+ Labour and other commodities: difference in essence between, 171
+
+ Labour co-partnerships, 176;
+   in Ireland, 179
+
+ Laundries: long hours in, 31
+
+ Laundry work, 108
+
+ Lead poisoning: risk of, 37
+
+ Legislation for a minimum wage: need of, 272
+
+ Living wage: estimate of, 149
+
+ London County Council: as employer, 100;
+   contrasted with private companies, 101;
+   bye-laws relating to child labour, 119, 124;
+   Medical Officer’s report, 123
+
+ _Longman’s Magazine_, 206
+
+
+ MacDonald: J. Ramsay, 65
+
+ Manchester physicians’ report on child labour in 1784, 112
+
+ “Manufacturing population of England,” 217
+
+ Martindale: Miss, Inspector of Factories, 111
+
+ Match box making, 3, 7;
+   child workers, 106
+
+ Matching girls, 109
+
+ Matheson: M. Cécile, 3
+
+ Maxwell: Mr, Scottish Wholesale Co-operative Society, 261, 262
+
+ Maxwell: W. B., 72
+
+ _Melbourne Age: The_; crusade against sweating, 247
+
+ Minimum wage: legislation in New Zealand, 231–246;
+   in Australia, 246–258;
+   practicability of legislation in England, 258–259;
+   effect of a minimum wage, 271
+
+ Miscellaneous trades, 21
+
+ Mitchell: John, 149–151
+
+ Moral aspect of shop assistant’s life, 72
+
+ Moral effect of child labour, 127–131
+
+
+ Nail and chain making, 12
+
+ National Anti-Sweating League, 261
+
+ National aspect of better conditions, 192
+
+ National income, 195
+
+ National Union of Shop Assistants, etc., 55
+
+ New Zealand: state arbitration, 231–239;
+   industrial unions of, 234;
+   arbitration court, 235, 236;
+   wages in, 244
+
+ Non-competitive systems, 176
+
+ Non-producers, 195
+
+ Novels: showing shop assistant’s life, 72
+
+
+ Old age pension: in Australia, 256
+
+ Omnibus men: drivers and conductors; licences, 81;
+   wages, 83;
+   expenses, 83;
+   liability for accidents, 85;
+   drivers and conductors of motor omnibuses;
+   hours of work, 92;
+   wages, 92;
+   breakdowns, 94;
+   uniform, 98;
+   spies, 99;
+   general remarks, 140, 143, 164
+
+ “Organised labour,” 151
+
+ Ormsby: Sir Lambert, 124
+
+ Over population, 195
+
+
+ Packing and filling: cocoa, 25;
+   tea, 26;
+   jam, 26;
+   cartridges, 26
+
+ Paper-bag making, 11, 24
+
+ Payment, _See_ Wages
+
+ Peel: Sir Robert, 114
+
+ Physical deterioration, 273
+
+ Pipe making, 13
+
+ Potteries: children working in, 114
+
+ Poverty: investigations into, 148–149;
+   physical and mental effects on the individual, 273–274
+
+
+ Railway workers: hours, 77;
+   porters’ wages, 77;
+   “blacklisting,” 78;
+   general remarks on, 140, 164
+
+ Reeves, W. Pember, 231, 233, 237, 239, 248
+
+ Rochdale pioneers, 178
+
+ Romilly: Sir Samuel, 113
+
+ Rowntree: Seebohm, 148, 149
+
+ Ryan: Father, 149, 151
+
+
+ Sanitary Acts: competition checked by, 181, 191, 194
+
+ Sanitary conditions: of factories, 33;
+   shop assistants’ quarters, 58;
+   high standard in cotton factories, 223
+
+ Schoenhof: J., 131, 165, 184, 228
+
+ Scottish Council for Women’s Trades, 3, 126
+
+ Scottish Wholesale Co-operative Society, 261
+
+ Shann: Geo., M.A., 3
+
+ Shirt making, 10, 144
+
+ Shop assistants: living in, 48;
+   code of rules, 54;
+   wages, 60;
+   “premiums,” 60;
+   commissions, 62;
+   condition in Scotland, 66;
+   general remarks, 138
+
+ Small: Prof. Albion, 149
+
+ Spiers & Pond, Ltd., 70
+
+ Squire, Miss: Inspector of Factories, 35, 36
+
+ State arbitration in New Zealand, 231;
+   success of, 239
+
+ Steel covering, 108
+
+ Street trading by children, 109
+
+ Strikes, 183, 184;
+   in the colonies, 232
+
+ String bag making, 107
+
+ “Sweating”: definition of the term, 1;
+   not confined to cheap goods, 22, 142;
+   general remarks, 132, 143;
+   not unknown in the colonies, 230;
+   a source of weakness to nations, 266–269
+
+
+ Tailoring, 29;
+   wages in New Zealand, 244
+
+ Tariff Commission, 220, 225, 226
+
+ Tattersall: Mr W., 222
+
+ Temperance, 198, 211
+
+ Temperature: extremes of, 40;
+   in cotton factories, 223–224
+
+ Textile trades: Children’s work, 110–111, 112–113
+
+ Thear: Miss, Inspector of Factories, Victoria, 256
+
+ Thomas: Dr, 123
+
+ Thrift among working classes, 201;
+   not advisable, 202–205
+
+ Tooth brush making, 18, 20, 107
+
+ Toy making, 12
+
+ Trade unions, 182, 184;
+   mistakes of, 185;
+   as provident societies, 201, 202;
+   in cotton trade, 225, 226;
+   lack of trade organisation in Bristol cotton mills, 227, 228;
+   in New Zealand, 237
+
+
+ Underpaid worker: cost to the nation, 170–171
+
+ Underpayment: how it comes about, 144–160;
+   not caused by inefficiency, 159
+
+ United States: _see_ America
+
+
+ Ventilation, 224
+
+ Verney, Mr: Inspector of Factories, 222
+
+ Vines, Miss: Inspector of Factories, 31, 37
+
+
+ Wages: match box making, 5, 7;
+   shirt making, 10, 144–145;
+   paper-bag making, 12;
+   toy making, 13;
+   clay pipe making, 14;
+   ball covering, 16;
+   brush making, 20;
+   miscellaneous trades, 21;
+   packing and filling, 23, 26, 27, 28;
+   machinists, 41;
+   shop assistants, 60;
+   waitresses, 70;
+   female clerks and bookkeepers, 71;
+   railway porters, 77;
+   omnibus men, 83;
+   motor omnibus men, 92;
+   children’s wages for home work, 105–106;
+   wages, how determined, 152;
+   what is a fair wage, 161;
+   articles of dress, 188;
+   textile workers, 218–219;
+   tailoresses in New Zealand, 244;
+   factory wages in Australia, 252–254;
+   high wages and cheap production, 260–261
+
+ Waitresses: in restaurants, 67;
+   in railway stations, 68;
+   hours of work, 67, 68;
+   expenses of, 69;
+   general remarks on, 138
+
+ Washing appliances, 37
+
+ Watts: Alderman; of Manchester, 123
+
+ Weaving, 14
+
+ Webb: Catherine, 176
+
+ Webb: Mrs Sydney, 114
+
+ Wells: H. G., 72
+
+ Whiteley’s, Ltd.: William, 54
+
+ Women in the printing trades, 65
+
+ _Women’s Co-operative Guild_, 180
+
+ “Women’s employment in shops,” 67, 69
+
+ _Women’s Industrial Council_, 2, 3, 6, 7, 17, 56, 72, 188, 189
+
+ “Women’s work and wages,” 3, 39, 65
+
+ Women workers: difficulty of organisation, 185, 186
+
+ Wood chopping, 107
+
+ Wood polishing, 107
+
+ Woodward: S. W., 130
+
+ Work done below cost price, 164
+
+ Worth: meanings of, 162
+
+
+ Zola: E., 72
+
+
+                               PRINTED BY
+                          TURNBULL AND SPEARS,
+                               EDINBURGH
+
+-----
+
+Footnote 1:
+
+  A. Aftalion, “Le developpement de la fabrique et le travail à domicile
+  dans les industries de l’habillement.” Paris. Librairie du recueil J.
+  B. Sirey et du Journal du Palais.
+
+Footnote 2:
+
+  “Home Industries of Women in London.” Report of an Inquiry in
+  thirty-five trades.
+
+Footnote 3:
+
+  “Women’s Work and Wages.” A phase of life in an industrial city. By
+  Edward Cadbury, M. Cécile Matheson and George Shann, M.A.
+
+Footnote 4:
+
+  Handbook to the Exhibition, p. 139.
+
+Footnote 5:
+
+  Mrs F. G. Hogg was one of the most valued members of the Women’s
+  Industrial Council. Her ability, judgment, perseverance, and devotion
+  were all admirable, and her early death has left in the memories of
+  those who worked with her a blank that can never be filled up.
+
+Footnote 6:
+
+  Report of the Chief Inspector, 1905, pp. 297–98.
+
+Footnote 7:
+
+  A friend has just sent me a note of a similar case, that of a
+  cartridge filler, who received 1d. for filling 1000 cartridges. She
+  said that she could fill 25,000 a day, when busy. “But,” adds my
+  friend, “she is a physical wreck, having worked at this for ten
+  years.”
+
+Footnote 8:
+
+  Report of the Chief Inspector, 1905, p. 50.
+
+Footnote 9:
+
+  Report of Chief Inspector, 1905, p. 99.
+
+Footnote 10:
+
+  Report of Chief Inspector, 1905, p. 300.
+
+Footnote 11:
+
+  Report of Chief Inspector, 1905, p. 302.
+
+Footnote 12:
+
+  Report of Chief Inspector, 1905, p. 290.
+
+Footnote 13:
+
+  Report of Chief Inspector, 1905, p. 34.
+
+Footnote 14:
+
+  Report of Chief Inspector, 1905, p. 292.
+
+Footnote 15:
+
+  Report of Chief Inspector, 1905, p. 293.
+
+Footnote 16:
+
+  Report of Chief Inspector, 1905, p. 280.
+
+Footnote 17:
+
+  The article from which this is an extract was published (in the _New
+  Review_) in September 1891; but the practices described, are, I fear,
+  not yet extinct, though the law is succeeding by degrees in making
+  them risky.
+
+Footnote 18:
+
+  “Life in the Shop.” A series of articles reprinted from the _Daily
+  Chronicle_, pp. 5 and 6.
+
+Footnote 19:
+
+  The National Union of Shop Assistants, Clerks, and Warehousemen, now
+  growing very powerful, and guided by able, experienced and energetic
+  officials, has of late done much towards inducing employers to abolish
+  or diminish some of their fines.
+
+Footnote 20:
+
+  A peculiarly shocking example of the abuses that may arise from a
+  system of fining was lately brought to my knowledge. It is not recent,
+  and must, I think and hope, be unique. I have found no witness who has
+  ever heard of a similar instance. Of its truth, however, the source
+  from which it comes forbids doubt. These are the facts. In a certain
+  retail shop selling drapery and fancy goods the foreman, whose
+  business it apparently was to collect fines, was required to make up a
+  fixed sum of money from this source every week; and being a man with
+  wife and children, afraid above all things of being left without
+  employment, was accustomed to inflict sufficient fines to make up this
+  total. Two girls, whose weekly wage of 11s. he had thus reduced, on
+  one occasion, to 4s., took to evil courses; and the foreman when dying
+  (in a hospital) told a lady visitor the circumstances, and said that
+  he felt himself responsible for the downfall of the girls. The lady
+  (an experienced worker in a girls’ club) made enquiries, which
+  confirmed the startling tale. She followed up the girls, reclaimed one
+  and put her into respectable employment, but failed with the other and
+  was unable to keep sight of her.
+
+Footnote 21:
+
+  These cases are taken from the reports of an investigator employed
+  some years ago by the Women’s Industrial Council. This lady, who was
+  an experienced assistant, spent over two years in passing from shop to
+  shop, remaining long enough in each to obtain complete information as
+  to wages, conditions, food, rules, etc.
+
+Footnote 22:
+
+  _Daily News_, 25th August, 1906. Letter signed “Onesimus.”
+
+Footnote 23:
+
+  Women’s Work and Wages, p. 47, note.
+
+Footnote 24:
+
+  Edited by J. Ramsay MacDonald. P. S. King & Son.
+
+Footnote 25:
+
+  Women’s Employment in Shops. Report of an enquiry conducted for the
+  National Federal Council of Scotland for Women’s Trades; by Margaret
+  Irwin, p. 7.
+
+Footnote 26:
+
+  Women Shop Assistants. The evidence given by Miss Irwin before the
+  Select Committee of the House of Lords on Early Closing of Shops, p.
+  5.
+
+Footnote 27:
+
+  Women’s Employment in Shops, p. 6.
+
+Footnote 28:
+
+  Report of Select Committee on the Cabs and Omnibuses (Metropolis)
+  Bill, 1906, p. 5, par. 31.
+
+Footnote 29:
+
+  As these terms may possibly be unfamiliar to some readers, it may be
+  as well to explain that, on a time and a half rate, every penny of the
+  ordinary wage becomes a penny-halfpenny; and that, on a time and a
+  quarter rate, every such penny becomes a penny-farthing.
+
+Footnote 30:
+
+  Report of Select Committee on the Cabs and Omnibuses (Metropolis)
+  Bill, 1906, p. 4, par. 19.
+
+Footnote 31:
+
+  Report of Select Committee on the Cabs and Omnibuses (Metropolis)
+  Bill, 1906, p. 4, par. 19.
+
+Footnote 32:
+
+  Juvenile wage earners and their work. By Nettie Adler, hon. Sec.
+  Committee on Wage-Earning children. Progress, July 1906.
+
+Footnote 33:
+
+  Report for 1905, p. 52.
+
+Footnote 34:
+
+  Report for 1905, p. 52.
+
+Footnote 35:
+
+  A “young person” means, according to the Factory Acts, one under 18.
+
+Footnote 36:
+
+  Report for 1905, p. 296.
+
+Footnote 37:
+
+  The Case for the Factory Acts. Edited by Mrs Sidney Webb. Chapter II.
+  The Historical Development of the Factory Acts. By Miss B. L.
+  Hutchins, pp. 80–81.
+
+Footnote 38:
+
+  Case for the Factory Acts, pp. 82–3.
+
+Footnote 39:
+
+  Bye-laws under the Employment of Children Act have now been passed in
+  many towns, and the London County Council has at last been permitted
+  by the Home Office to establish a fairly satisfactory code. Really
+  satisfactory no code can be which sanctions any employment of children
+  during school years, but in this department, as in others, the
+  interposition of the law has done something to check glaring
+  industrial evils.
+
+Footnote 40:
+
+  _Child Labor._ A menace to industry, education and good citizenship
+  (No. 93 of the Annals of the American Academy of political and social
+  science. March 1906.) p. 318.
+
+Footnote 41:
+
+  _Child Labor_, p. 293.
+
+Footnote 42:
+
+  Some ethical gains through legislation. By Florence Kelley, p. 44.
+
+Footnote 43:
+
+  _Ibid._, p. 45.
+
+Footnote 44:
+
+  _Ibid._, p. 49.
+
+Footnote 45:
+
+  Juvenile wage earners. By Nettie Adler, Hon. Sec. Committee on Wage
+  earning children. _Progress._ July 1906.
+
+Footnote 46:
+
+  Minutes of Evidence. Questions 12644, 12758.
+
+Footnote 47:
+
+  These facts and more to the same purpose may be found in an article by
+  Miss Adler in the _Guardian_ of May 9, 1906.
+
+Footnote 48:
+
+  Some ethical gains through legislation, p. 86.
+
+Footnote 49:
+
+  Pp. 12, 13, 14.
+
+Footnote 50:
+
+  Inter-Departmental Committee on the employment of school children.
+  Minutes of Evidence, pp. 275, 455, 471.
+
+Footnote 51:
+
+  Child Labor, p. 302.
+
+Footnote 52:
+
+  Child Labor, p. 275.
+
+Footnote 53:
+
+  Some ethical gains through legislation, p. 17.
+
+Footnote 54:
+
+  Some ethical gains through legislation, p. 42.
+
+Footnote 55:
+
+  Mr S. W. Woodward, of the firm of Woodward and Lathrop, Washington, in
+  a short paper called: “A Business Man’s View of Child Labour,” writes:
+  “It may be stated as a safe proposition that for every dollar earned
+  by a child under 14 years of age tenfold will be taken from their
+  earning capacity in later life.” Child Labor, p. 362.
+
+Footnote 56:
+
+  J. Schoenhof. Economy of High Wages, p. 38.
+
+Footnote 57:
+
+  It must not be assumed from the above anecdote that all factory girls
+  are foul-mouthed. This was by no means true even in the year after the
+  Dock strike, and is much less true now. But I have no doubt there are
+  still factories in which the habit of foul speech is a sort of
+  fashion.
+
+Footnote 58:
+
+  Handbook to Sweated Industries Exhibition, p. 23.
+
+Footnote 59:
+
+  Poverty. By J. Seebohm Rowntree, p. 229.
+
+Footnote 60:
+
+  A Living Wage: Its ethical and economic aspect. Macmillans. New York,
+  April 1906.
+
+Footnote 61:
+
+  _Ibid._, p. 136. I must not be understood as committing myself to
+  these figures, which apply to America. They are employed here to show
+  that a large proportion of American wage earners do not receive the
+  sum considered by experts as affording a “Living Wage.”
+
+Footnote 62:
+
+  I have not personally referred to Mr Mitchell’s book, the title of
+  which is “Organised Labour.” Professor Ryan gives the pages from which
+  this extract comes: pp. 116, 117.
+
+Footnote 63:
+
+  A Living Wage, p. 150.
+
+Footnote 64:
+
+  _Ibid._, p. 164.
+
+Footnote 65:
+
+  The Strength of the People. By Helen Bosanquet, p. 114.
+
+Footnote 66:
+
+  Of course efficiency is valuable for other than financial reasons; but
+  we are dealing now only with the question of payment.
+
+Footnote 67:
+
+  Economy of high wages, p. 392.
+
+Footnote 68:
+
+  If, at this point, any reader should pause to ask: “What, then, ought
+  the Brothers Cheeryble to do? Ought they to leave the selling of
+  safety pins to some less scrupulous persons? Or ought they to go on
+  underpaying the cappers?” I reply that the worthy twins should follow
+  neither of these courses, but should bend their minds to inventing or
+  getting invented a machine that would cap the pins even more cheaply,
+  because much more expeditiously, than the hand workers. The reduction
+  in the cost of production would then allow the payment of decent wages
+  to the operators. Mechanical operations should be done by machines,
+  and hand work should be reserved for those which demand individual
+  variation or peculiar and special perfection. The capping of safety
+  pins, which falls under neither of these heads, is emphatically an
+  operation to which the human brain and hand should not be put.
+
+Footnote 69:
+
+  Industrial Co-operation. Edited by Catherine Webb, p. 242.
+
+  These figures do not include middle class joint stock associations,
+  such as the Army and Navy Stores.
+
+Footnote 70:
+
+  Industrial Co-operation, p. 80.
+
+Footnote 71:
+
+  In order to do so readers must address themselves to the Co-operative
+  Union, 2 Nicholas Croft, High St., Manchester. It is much to be
+  regretted that so valuable and informing a work should be published in
+  a manner that almost restricts its influence to persons who are
+  already convinced co-operators. The outer world of readers who badly
+  need to understand the facts and meanings of the great co-operative
+  movement have no opportunity of meeting with the one volume that
+  compendiously explains the existing conditions.
+
+Footnote 72:
+
+  Economy of high wages, p. 63.
+
+Footnote 73:
+
+  Of course a minimum rate of wages and sometimes indeed a complete
+  scale of wages has often been fixed by various local bodies or
+  departments; but only when such bodies have been, directly or
+  indirectly, employers of labour. Thus the duty of employers to pay a
+  fair wage has been recognised, but not, as yet, the duty or the right
+  of the State to enforce the payment.
+
+Footnote 74:
+
+  It may be worth noting here—though the point lies outside the scope of
+  this chapter—that an expansion of trade when wages do not rise leads
+  to the extraordinary state known as overproduction, in which producers
+  complain that they cannot find a market for their wares, at the same
+  time that hundreds of fellow citizens are seen to be in crying need of
+  these same wares.
+
+Footnote 75:
+
+  Mr Charles Booth’s tables show that in 1889, out of a population of
+  891,539, in East London, there were no less than 47,225 members of
+  various Friendly Societies.
+
+Footnote 76:
+
+  This explanation of the impracticability of a Consumers’ League is
+  reprinted, with the alteration of a few words, from the Supplement to
+  the _Guardian_, the Editor of which has given me leave to reproduce it
+  in this chapter.
+
+Footnote 77:
+
+  A prominent employer writes to me in December 1906 that wages have
+  since risen 2½ per cent.
+
+Footnote 78:
+
+  A Reply to the Report of the Tariff Commission on the Cotton Trade.
+  Written for the Free Trade League by S. J. Chapman, M.A., Professor of
+  Political Economy at the University of Manchester.
+
+Footnote 79:
+
+  Since writing these lines I have been informed that improved machinery
+  and management have been introduced, and that the outlook has
+  consequently improved also. But it is safe to prophesy that unless her
+  wages should rise very substantially, the Bristol worker will not
+  reach the standard of the Lancashire worker.
+
+Footnote 80:
+
+  Economy of High Wages, p. 66.
+
+Footnote 81:
+
+  Economy of High Wages, p. 398.
+
+Footnote 82:
+
+  W. Pember Reeves. State Experiments in Australia and New Zealand. Vol.
+  ii. p. 29. To this volume I am indebted for the account of all the
+  facts preceding and accompanying the enactment of the earliest laws
+  under which a minimum wage could be legally fixed in the colonies. Any
+  reader desiring fuller details of these most interesting developments
+  should refer to Mr Reeves’s second volume.
+
+Footnote 83:
+
+  It seems from the context that 1s. 6d. was the price paid for making
+  the dozen shirts throughout, and that the finisher’s share was but a
+  part of this, since a night’s work, in which she did a dozen shirts
+  and something more, only brought her one shilling.
+
+Footnote 84:
+
+  W. Pember Reeves. State Experiments in Australia and New Zealand. Vol.
+  ii. pp. 111–112.
+
+Footnote 85:
+
+  Journal of the Department of Labour. New Zealand. Vol. XI. pp.
+  267–268.
+
+Footnote 86:
+
+  Journal of the Department of Labour. New Zealand. Vol. XIV. pp. 70–76.
+
+Footnote 87:
+
+  This account of the establishment of the first Wage Boards is derived
+  from Mr Reeves’s State Experiments in Australia and New Zealand, vol.
+  ii. chap. 1.
+
+Footnote 88:
+
+  A resolution of both Houses is now required.
+
+Footnote 89:
+
+  Report of the Chief Inspector of Factories, work-rooms and shops.
+  Victoria, 1905, p. 62.
+
+Footnote 90:
+
+  Report of Chief Inspector of Factories. Victoria, p. 68.
+
+Footnote 91:
+
+  Report of Chief Inspector of Factories. Victoria, 1905, p. 43.
+
+Footnote 92:
+
+  Report of Chief Inspector of Factories. Victoria, 1905, p. 19.
+
+Footnote 93:
+
+  _Ibid._, p. 63.
+
+Footnote 94:
+
+  Report of Chief Inspector of Factories. Victoria, p. 58.
+
+Footnote 95:
+
+  Report of the Chief Inspector of Factories. Victoria, 1905, p. 60.
+
+Footnote 96:
+
+  _Ibid._, p. 14.
+
+Footnote 97:
+
+  Report of Chief Inspector of Factories. Victoria, 1905, p. 39.
+
+Footnote 98:
+
+  See the speech of Mr Maxwell (to whom personally, it may be added,
+  this excellent state of things is due) on p. 38 of the National
+  Anti-Sweating League’s Report of a Conference on the Minimum Wage.
+
+Footnote 99:
+
+  A very strange instance of divergence of wages in one factory came
+  under my notice some 15 or 16 years ago. This also was in the shirt
+  trade. A strike arose in a large factory, and when a register came to
+  be taken of the wages received by the various women it was
+  discovered—greatly to the surprise of the workers concerned—that there
+  was a difference of almost 50 per cent. between the rates paid in one
+  workroom and those paid in another, both being under the same roof,
+  and the work being so absolutely identical that the two groups were
+  frequently engaged upon garments cut by the same stroke from the same
+  roll of material. The one room was superintended by a forewoman who
+  resisted any attempt to lower wages, and who, being a valuable
+  official, was able to impose her wishes; in the other the forewoman
+  meekly accepted any reductions proposed by the firm. I need hardly add
+  that the young women who worked in the former room were markedly
+  superior in appearance, in manners and in intelligence to those
+  belonging to the latter. Those who worked under the good forewoman
+  were, indeed, some of the best looking and most agreeable girls with
+  whom I have ever been brought into contact.
+
+Footnote 100:
+
+  There are no doubt plenty of industries of which employers engaged in
+  them would declare beforehand that wages could not possibly be raised
+  without the ruining of the trade. But employers in the cotton trade
+  were of the same opinion and experience has shown that they were
+  mistaken.
+
+------------------------------------------------------------------------
+
+
+
+
+                          TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES
+
+
+ Page           Changed from                      Changed to
+
+  251 vary to a remarkable decree, and vary to a remarkable degree, and
+      it is to be                      it is to be
+
+ ● Typos fixed; non-standard spelling and dialect retained.
+ ● Used numbers for footnotes, placing them all at the end of the last
+     chapter.
+ ● Enclosed italics font in _underscores_.
+
+
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 75467 ***
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+<div style='text-align:center'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 75467 ***</div>
+
+<div class='tnotes covernote'>
+
+<p class='c000'><strong>Transcriber’s Note:</strong></p>
+
+<p class='c000'>New original cover art included with this eBook is granted to the public domain.</p>
+
+</div>
+
+<div class='chapter ph1'>
+
+<div class='nf-center-c0'>
+<div class='nf-center c001'>
+    <div>SWEATED INDUSTRY</div>
+    <div>AND THE</div>
+    <div>MINIMUM WAGE</div>
+  </div>
+</div>
+
+</div>
+
+<p class='c002'>“The whole spectacle of poverty indeed is incredible.
+As soon as you cease to have it before your eyes—even when
+you have it before your eyes—you can hardly believe it, and
+that is perhaps why so many people deny that it exists, or is
+much more than a superstition of the sentimentalist.”</p>
+
+<div class='lg-container-r c003'>
+  <div class='linegroup'>
+    <div class='group'>
+      <div class='line'><span class='sc'>W. D. Howells.</span></div>
+    </div>
+  </div>
+</div>
+
+<p class='c004'>“The system which produces the happiest moral effects
+will be found most beneficial to the interest of the individual
+and the common weal; upon this basis the science of political
+economy will rest at last, when the ponderous volumes with
+which it has been overlaid shall have sunk by their own
+weight into the dead sea of oblivion.”</p>
+
+<div class='lg-container-r c003'>
+  <div class='linegroup'>
+    <div class='group'>
+      <div class='line'><span class='sc'>R. Southey.</span></div>
+    </div>
+  </div>
+</div>
+
+<div class='titlepage'>
+
+<div>
+  <h1 class='c005'>SWEATED INDUSTRY<br> <span class='small'>AND THE</span><br> MINIMUM WAGE</h1>
+</div>
+
+<div class='nf-center-c0'>
+<div class='nf-center c006'>
+    <div>BY</div>
+    <div class='c007'><span class='xlarge'>CLEMENTINA BLACK</span></div>
+    <div class='c007'>WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY</div>
+    <div class='c007'><span class='large'>A. G. GARDINER</span></div>
+    <div class='c007'><span class='small'>CHAIRMAN OF THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE OF THE NATIONAL ANTI-SWEATING LEAGUE</span></div>
+  </div>
+</div>
+
+<div  class='figcenter id001'>
+<img src='images/i_title.jpg' alt='[Logo]' class='ig001'>
+</div>
+
+<div class='nf-center-c0'>
+  <div class='nf-center'>
+    <div>LONDON</div>
+    <div>DUCKWORTH &#38; CO.</div>
+    <div>3 HENRIETTA STREET, COVENT GARDEN, W.C.</div>
+    <div>1907</div>
+  </div>
+</div>
+
+</div>
+
+<div class='nf-center-c0'>
+<div class='nf-center c001'>
+    <div><span class='small'><em>All rights reserved.</em></span></div>
+  </div>
+</div>
+
+<p class='c008'>So many persons have kindly helped me
+with material for this volume that it is
+impossible to name all of them; but I cannot
+forbear to express my thanks to Mr W.
+Pember Reeves, to Mr Tom Garnett of
+Clitheroe, to my old friends Mrs Bogue Luffmann
+and Mr H. H. Champion, who have
+collected information for me in Australia, and
+last, but not least, to Mr Gardiner for his
+valuable introduction.</p>
+
+<div class='lg-container-r'>
+  <div class='linegroup'>
+    <div class='group'>
+      <div class='line'>C. B.</div>
+    </div>
+  </div>
+</div>
+
+<p class='c002'><em>March 1907</em></p>
+
+<div class='chapter'>
+  <span class='pageno' id='Page_vii'>vii</span>
+  <h2 class='c009'>CONTENTS</h2>
+</div>
+
+<table class='table0'>
+  <tr>
+    <th class='c010'></th>
+    <th class='c011'>PAGE</th>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>INTRODUCTION</td>
+    <td class='c011'><a href='#Page_ix'>ix</a></td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c011'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr><td class='c012' colspan='2'>PART I</td></tr>
+  <tr><td class='c012' colspan='2'>SWEATED INDUSTRY</td></tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c011'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr><td class='c012' colspan='2'>CHAPTER I</td></tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>THE POOREST OF ALL</td>
+    <td class='c011'><a href='#Page_1'>1</a></td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c011'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr><td class='c012' colspan='2'>CHAPTER II</td></tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>WORKERS IN FACTORIES AND WORKSHOPS</td>
+    <td class='c011'><a href='#Page_23'>23</a></td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c011'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr><td class='c012' colspan='2'>CHAPTER III</td></tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>SHOP ASSISTANTS, CLERKS, WAITRESSES</td>
+    <td class='c011'><a href='#Page_48'>48</a></td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c011'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr><td class='c012' colspan='2'>CHAPTER IV</td></tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>TRAFFIC WORKERS</td>
+    <td class='c011'><a href='#Page_75'>75</a></td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c011'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr><td class='c012' colspan='2'>CHAPTER V</td></tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>WAGE-EARNING CHILDREN</td>
+    <td class='c011'><a href='#Page_104'>104</a></td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c011'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr><td class='c012' colspan='2'>CHAPTER VI</td></tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>SUMMARY</td>
+    <td class='c011'><a href='#Page_132'>132</a></td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'><span class='pageno' id='Page_viii'>viii</span>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c011'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr><td class='c012' colspan='2'>CHAPTER VII</td></tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>HOW UNDERPAYMENT COMES</td>
+    <td class='c011'><a href='#Page_144'>144</a></td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c011'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr><td class='c012' colspan='2'>CHAPTER VIII</td></tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>LABOUR AS A COMMODITY</td>
+    <td class='c011'><a href='#Page_161'>161</a></td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c011'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr><td class='c012' colspan='2'>PART II</td></tr>
+  <tr><td class='c012' colspan='2'>THE MINIMUM WAGE</td></tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c011'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr><td class='c012' colspan='2'>CHAPTER I</td></tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>EXISTING CHECKS</td>
+    <td class='c011'><a href='#Page_175'>175</a></td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c011'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr><td class='c012' colspan='2'>CHAPTER II</td></tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>SUPPOSED REMEDIES</td>
+    <td class='c011'><a href='#Page_195'>195</a></td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c011'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr><td class='c012' colspan='2'>CHAPTER III</td></tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>THE LESSONS OF THE COTTON TRADE</td>
+    <td class='c011'><a href='#Page_212'>212</a></td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c011'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr><td class='c012' colspan='2'>CHAPTER IV</td></tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>THE MINIMUM WAGE IN PRACTICE</td>
+    <td class='c011'><a href='#Page_230'>230</a></td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c011'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr><td class='c012' colspan='2'>CHAPTER V</td></tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>FOREIGN COMPETITION</td>
+    <td class='c011'><a href='#Page_260'>260</a></td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c011'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr><td class='c012' colspan='2'>CHAPTER VI</td></tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>GAIN TO THE NATION</td>
+    <td class='c011'><a href='#Page_272'>272</a></td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c011'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c010'>INDEX</td>
+    <td class='c011'><a href='#Page_277'>277</a></td>
+  </tr>
+</table>
+
+<div class='chapter'>
+  <span class='pageno' id='Page_ix'>ix</span>
+  <h2 class='c009'>INTRODUCTION</h2>
+</div>
+
+<p class='c013'>The sweating evil has long engaged the
+attention of social and industrial workers in
+many fields. Some have approached it from
+the philanthropic point of view, and have
+sought a remedy in voluntary means such as
+consumers’ leagues; others have approached
+it from the point of view of industrial organisation,
+and have sought to deal with it by the
+extension of trade unionism and legislative
+action. So far all efforts alike have been
+futile. The evil is too wide-spread and too
+remote in its operations to be touched by
+charity. It involves a class too forlorn, too
+isolated, and too impoverished to be reached
+by trade unionism. The cry of the victims
+has hitherto been too feeble and hopeless to
+command the attention of Parliament.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>This has happily been changed by the object
+lesson presented by the Sweating Exhibition
+organised by <cite>The Daily News</cite> last May and
+opened by the Princess Henry of Battenberg.
+That exhibition, held right in the heart of West
+London, visited by thirty thousand people, and
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_x'>x</span>commanding the attention of all serious students
+of our social system, brought the question
+instantly into the sphere of practical politics.
+Sweating was no longer a vague term concerning
+some more or less apocryphal wrongs. It
+was made real and actual. It was seen to be
+not an excrescence on the body politic, having
+no bearing upon its general health, but an
+organic disease. It was seen to be an evil
+not simply affecting some obscure lives in the
+mean streets of our cities, but an evil that
+wasted the whole industrial physique—a
+running sore that affected the entire fabric
+of society, a morass exhaling a miasma that
+poisoned the healthy elements of industry.
+Its spectre haunted not only the fever dens of
+the slums, but was present in the most costly
+garments of the most fashionable West-End
+shops, in the rich embroideries of the wealthy
+as well as in the household matchbox. Well
+dressed people who came with the comfortable
+belief that sweated goods were necessarily
+cheap goods realised with a shock that cheapness
+and sweating had no intrinsic relationship.
+They saw with more or less clearness that
+sweating reduced to its true meaning was not
+the oppression of the poor in the interests of
+the poor; but the effort of an uneconomic
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_xi'>xi</span>system to extract from the misery of the
+unorganised, ill-equipped worker the equivalent
+of organised, well paid and well equipped
+industry. It was the competition of flesh and
+blood with machinery. Sweating, it was seen,
+did not make goods cheap: it only made human
+life cheap. It did not benefit the consumer:
+it only benefited the man who set the slum
+to compete with the workshop, the man or
+more often the woman and the child to compete
+with the machine. It was seen that the
+evil lowered the whole vitality of industry.
+It preyed upon the defenceless and used them
+to depress the general industrial standard. It
+had no chance in a highly organised community,
+and found its victims in the hopeless and the
+broken, among the poor widows of the courts
+and alleys and all those who had lost heart in
+the battle and were sunk into the lowest
+depths of the social abyss.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Not the least disquieting revelation that
+emerged from the Exhibition and the lectures
+which accompanied it was the bearing of the
+evil upon our collective life. The sweated
+reacted upon the community. It was seen
+that they not only lowered the industrial
+standard: they were a menace to the communal
+good, a drain upon the resources of
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_xii'>xii</span>society in the interests of the people who
+exploited them. They provided a reserve of
+incredibly cheap labour which the community
+had to subsidise from the rates. Having no
+power of combination or resistance they were
+beaten down by the employer far below the
+barest means of subsistence, and the task of
+keeping them alive was left to the public.
+This was the case even when they were employed;
+but in many instances the work
+was seasonal and subject to long periods of
+unemployment. Then their whole existence
+depended upon a mingling of pauperism and
+charity until a fresh demand for their labour
+sprang up, and the public purse was relieved
+of some portion of the task of keeping them
+alive. It was seen, in short, that sweating
+meant the maintenance out of the rates of a
+vast mass of low class labour which enabled the
+sweater to compete successfully with high
+class labour. Many of the complaints of high
+rates in the East End for example came from
+the very firms whose high dividends were
+actually being paid out of the rates in the
+form of poor relief to the underpaid worker.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The bearing of the evil upon child life was
+made equally clear. It was not merely that
+the children of the sweated were ill-nourished
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_xiii'>xiii</span>and ill-clad. They were made to take their
+share in the incessant struggle for food. They
+too became competitors with healthy industry,
+and by increasing the family output actually
+served to still further lower the starvation
+wages. For in this social morass there is no
+minimum. The excess of labour is so great
+and the demand for food so urgent that the
+tendency is constantly downward. It is a
+fight for bread in which the sweater plays off
+the dire misery of these against the deeper
+misery of those. And in this struggle the
+child life of the slums is used as a counter in
+the game and a new generation of the physically
+unfit and socially dead springs up like
+rank weeds to choke the hope and effort of
+the future.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Finally, it was made clear that sweating is
+the enemy of the development of industry.
+It makes it possible to extract from the
+necessities of the poor what ought to be
+extracted from highly developed processes. It
+checks the natural evolution of commercial
+effort by an uneconomic substitute. Mr
+Sidney Webb states this point with much
+force in his “Industrial Democracy” when he
+says:</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>“We arrive, therefore, at the unexpected
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_xiv'>xiv</span>result that the enforcement of definite minimum
+conditions of employment positively
+stimulates the invention and adoption of new
+processes of manufacture. This has been
+repeatedly remarked by the opponents of
+Trade Unionism. Thus Babbage, in 1832,
+described in detail how the invention and
+adoption of new methods of forging and
+welding gun-barrels was directly caused by
+the combined insistence on better conditions
+of employment by all the workmen engaged
+in the old process. ‘In this difficulty,’ he
+says, ‘the contractors resorted to a mode of
+welding the gun-barrel according to a plan for
+which a patent had been taken out by them
+some years before the event. It had not then
+succeeded so well as to come into general use,
+<em>in consequence of the cheapness of the usual
+mode of welding by hand labour</em>, combined
+with some other difficulties with which the
+patentee had had to contend. But <em>the
+stimulus produced by the combination of
+the workmen for this advance of wages</em>
+induced him to make a few trials, and he was
+enabled to introduce such a facility in welding
+gun-barrels by roller, and such perfection in
+the work itself, that in all probability very
+few will in future be welded by hand-labour.’”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_xv'>xv</span>The profound impression made by the
+Exhibition found expression in a universal
+desire for action. The question one heard
+again and again was “What can we do?
+What can we do?” It was the question
+which the Princess of Wales asked as she
+passed round the stalls where the workers
+were engaged at their various forms of slavery.
+It was the question which continued like a
+hopeless refrain throughout the six weeks of
+the Exhibition. Most people came with
+vague ideas of the evil and went away with
+vaguer ideas of the remedy. Many of them
+were doubtless glad to forget this contact
+with that other forlorn world which seemed
+such a disquieting challenge to the splendour
+and luxury of the world of society. It was a
+painful interlude between a visit to the shops
+in the morning and a visit to the theatre in
+the evening.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The general feeling however was not one
+of idle curiosity, but of grave concern, and
+when the Exhibition closed it was felt that the
+public conscience once awakened must not be
+allowed to go to sleep again. The Exhibition
+had been an appeal to the individual; but all
+experience showed that voluntary action on
+the part of the individual, while worthy and
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_xvi'>xvi</span>desirable, would not touch the evil. Consumers’
+leagues had been at work in this
+country and still more in America; but they
+had done little to reduce the vast sum of
+misery. If the Exhibition was to bear fruit it
+must be in the direction of legislative action.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The immediate outcome was the formation
+of the Anti-Sweating League to secure a
+minimum wage, and later in the year a three
+days’ conference, opened by the Lord Mayor and
+representing two millions organised workers,
+was held at the Guildhall. This conference,
+which was addressed on various aspects of the
+evil and its remedy by authorities like Sir Chas.
+Dilke, Lord Dunraven, Mr Pember Reeves, Mr
+Sidney Webb, Mr J. A. Hobson, Mr Bernard
+Wise, Miss Clementina Black and others, unanimously
+endorsed the programme of the League
+which was embodied in the Bill now before
+Parliament. That Bill is purely experimental.
+It is based upon the lines of the Victorian
+Wages Board system and is applied only to a
+certain group of trades which furnish the best
+field for an experiment which has become
+firmly established and generally operative in
+the Australian colony. Many authorities
+prefer the Arbitration system of New South
+Wales and New Zealand; but the difficulty in
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_xvii'>xvii</span>the way of the adoption of that system in this
+country is the opposition of the trade unions.
+All are agreed on the principle of the minimum
+wage, and the Wages Board has been accepted
+as the only possible legislative expression of
+that principle in this country. So far as can
+be seen, then, the Bill offers the one available
+remedy for an evil which all are agreed must
+be dealt with.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>It is not necessary here to argue at length
+the case for the principle of the minimum
+wage. Those interested in the subject will
+find it stated in the addresses given at the
+Guildhall Conference and published in pamphlet
+form by the National Anti-Sweating
+League, Salisbury Square, E.C. It is forty-seven
+years since Ruskin shocked the economists
+of his time by declaring for the regulation
+of wages irrespective of the demand for
+labour.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>“Perhaps one of the most curious facts in
+the history of human error,” he said, “is the
+denial by the common political economist of
+the possibility of thus regulating wages; while
+for all the important and much of the unimportant
+labour on the earth, wages are
+already so regulated.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>“We do not sell our Prime-Ministership by
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_xviii'>xviii</span>Dutch auction; nor on the decease of a
+bishop, whatever may be the general advantages
+of simony, do we (yet) offer his diocese
+to the clergyman who will take the episcopacy
+at the lowest contract. We (we exquisite
+sagacity of political economy) do indeed sell
+commissions; but not openly, generalships;
+sick, we do not inquire for a physician who
+takes less than a guinea; litigious, we never
+think of reducing six-and-eightpence to four-and-sixpence;
+caught in a shower, we do not
+canvass the cabmen, to find one who values
+his driving at less than sixpence a mile.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Ruskin was duly punished. The publishers
+closed their magazines against such revolutionary
+teaching, and Carlyle’s “ten thousand
+sparrows” chirped in one furious chorus the
+current equivalent for “Socialism” and
+“Wastrel.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>To-day the minimum wage, like so much
+else of Ruskin’s teaching, is a commonplace of
+the industrial system. No Government or
+municipality to-day issues a contract which
+does not contain a fair wages clause which is
+drawn up irrespective of the demand for
+labour, and every healthy organised industry
+has a fixed scale which is dependent on
+prices, it is true, but which is wholly independent
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_xix'>xix</span>of the demand and supply of labour.
+The whole teaching of modern industry is that
+cheap labour is dear labour, and that it is as
+important for successful competition to have a
+well equipped human instrument as to have
+well equipped machinery.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>To take the example of the cotton trade.
+Sixty years ago the condition of the Lancashire
+trade was deplorable. It was based
+largely on sweated labour, including the
+labour of wretched little slaves drafted in
+groups from the workhouses, and kept alive
+on porridge, their compound a shed or barn
+on the premises. To-day there is no industry
+more highly organised, and no class of worker—certainly
+no class of female worker—more
+adequately paid. Trade unionism with its
+fixed wage has made the Lancashire cotton
+trade the most wonderful industrial organism
+in the world. Four thousand miles from its
+raw material, ten thousand miles from its
+greatest market, it yet dominates the cotton
+industry as completely as our shipping trade,
+with all its relative advantages in regard to
+raw material and geographical situation, dominates
+the shipping industry of the world.
+Not least important is the peace which this
+high state of organisation has produced in the
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_xx'>xx</span>trade. It is many years since there was a
+serious conflict in Lancashire.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The cotton trade in a word has had this
+enormous success not because labour is cheap,
+but because labour is dear—and good; because
+the human machine being kept at the
+highest point of perfection is the most productive
+instrument of its kind in the world.
+It has succeeded, above all, because the
+standard wage has removed the competition
+of low class, sweated labour, which is not
+only iniquitous in itself, but which has the
+effect of depreciating the whole currency of
+industry.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>And in depreciating the currency of industry
+it lowers the general standard of the
+community. Where wages are low, there
+the poor rate is necessarily high, and the
+general trader shares in the universal impoverishment.
+For it must be remembered
+that the working classes are the bedrock of
+commerce. Their condition reacts immediately
+upon society. The money they
+receive comes back instantly in a fertilising
+stream to the grocer, the bootmaker, and
+the clothier. These get nothing but bad
+debts and insolvency from the operations of
+the sweater, whose poor instruments, moreover,
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_xxi'>xxi</span>in falling upon the public purse, still
+further depress the shopkeeper.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>What has happened in the cotton trade
+may be paralleled by the experience of other
+trades. Wherever sweating has been eliminated
+by the regulation of wages, the health
+of the trade is established. Wherever the
+trade is only partly organised, as in the
+umbrella, the boot or the tailoring trade, the
+wholesome part suffers by the competition of
+those whose stock in trade is the misery of
+the unorganised poor. As an illustration of
+this competition I may quote the following
+comparison given by Miss Gertrude Tuckwell
+at the Guildhall Conference.</p>
+
+<table class='table1'>
+  <tr><th class='c012' colspan='3'>AMALGAMATED SOCIETY OF TAILORS AND TAILORESSES.</th></tr>
+  <tr>
+ <td class='brt c015'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c016'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c016'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr><th class='c012' colspan='3'><span class='sc'>Statement of Prices as Agreed to between this Body and the London Master Tailors’ Association, and of the “Sweated” Rates for Similar Work.</span></th></tr>
+  <tr>
+ <td class='brt c015'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c016'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c016'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+ <th class='brt c015'></th>
+    <th class='c016'><span class='sc'>Trade Union.</span></th>
+    <th class='c016'><span class='sc'>Non-Union.</span></th>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+ <td class='brt c015'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c016'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c016'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+ <td class='brt c015'>Making Dress Coat</td>
+    <td class='c016'>£1. 5s. 6d. to £1. 7s. 6d.<br>(6d. to 7d. per hour).</td>
+    <td class='c016'>10s. to 16s.<br>(These are prices where middleman is employed —16s. rarely reached.)</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+ <td class='brt c015'>Gentleman’s Frock Coat</td>
+    <td class='c016'>Do.</td>
+    <td class='c016'>Do.</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+ <td class='brt c015'>Dress Vest</td>
+    <td class='c016'>8s. to 9s. 3d.</td>
+    <td class='c016'>2s. 6d.</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+ <td class='brt c015'>Dress Trousers</td>
+    <td class='c016'>7s. 3d. to 8s. 5d.</td>
+    <td class='c016'>2s. to 4s.</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+ <td class='brt c015'><span class='pageno' id='Page_xxii'>xxii</span>Ladies’ Costume—</td>
+    <td class='c016'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c016'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+ <td class='brt c015'>Pressing</td>
+    <td class='c016'>With very little</td>
+    <td class='c016'>2½d.</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+ <td class='brt c015'>Machining</td>
+    <td class='c016'>extras) 30s.</td>
+    <td class='c016'>9d.</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+ <td class='brt c015'>Baisting</td>
+    <td class='c016'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c016'>7d.</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+ <td class='brt c015'>Felling</td>
+    <td class='c016'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c016'>1¼d.</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+ <td class='brt c015'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c016'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c017'>——1s. 7¾d.</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+ <td class='brt c015'>Ladies’ Jackets—</td>
+    <td class='c016'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c016'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+ <td class='brt c015'>Pressing</td>
+    <td class='c016'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c016'>1¼d.</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+ <td class='brt c015'>Baisting</td>
+    <td class='c016'>23s.</td>
+    <td class='c016'>3½d.</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+ <td class='brt c015'>Machining</td>
+    <td class='c016'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c016'>4½d.</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+ <td class='brt c015'>Felling</td>
+    <td class='c016'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c016'>½d.</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+ <td class='brt c015'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c016'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c017'>——9¾d.</td>
+  </tr>
+</table>
+
+<p class='c014'>Ninepence three farthings against twenty
+three shillings! How is it possible for honest
+industry to compete against this exploitation
+of flesh and blood subsidised by the ratepayer?
+It was staggering facts of this sort
+that induced the Guildhall Conference to go
+beyond the scope of its reference by passing
+an amendment calling for the abolition of the
+outworker in all trades and the provision of
+workshop accommodation.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Trade unionism has succeeded in regulating
+wages in the great industries whose operations
+can only be carried on on a great collective
+scale; but trade unionism alone is clearly
+unable to destroy sweating in the many industries
+in which the fabrication of the parts
+is let and sub-let until the origin of the whole
+is found in the dim, one-roomed tenement
+of the slum where the victim of the sweater
+carries on her tragic struggle with famine.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_xxiii'>xxiii</span>“Isn’t the remedy Protection?” was a
+question frequently heard at the lectures
+given at the Exhibition. Most of us would
+agree with Mr Bernard Shaw who, in answering
+such a question, said he would be ready
+to protect our industry against sweated competition.
+But the general operation of Protection
+would be wholly in the interest of
+the sweater. It would put a new premium
+upon his vocation. And the fact remains
+that sweating is more rampant in protected
+countries even than in our own. It was the
+Berlin Exhibition which suggested the <cite>Daily
+News</cite> Exhibition, and since that event there has
+been an exhibition in Philadelphia which has
+shown that the horrors of sweating in Protectionist
+America go deeper even than those
+in Free Trade England. And it is three of
+our Protectionist colonies which, realising the
+social menace of this trade in misery, have
+indicated the true path of reform. They have
+realised that the community must protect not
+only the individual but itself against a traffic
+which is slavery in the thinnest disguise, and
+which is not only cruel to the individual but
+destructive of honest industry and ruinous to
+social health. The policy which Australia has
+applied holds the field as the one effective
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_xxiv'>xxiv</span>remedy discovered for dealing with this appalling
+social evil. The victims cannot protect
+themselves. They are beyond the reach of
+organisation. In their isolation and poverty
+they have no defence against the raids of the
+conscienceless sub-contractor who is as literal
+a slave-driver as any who ever wielded a whip
+in the cotton fields, a slave-driver none the
+less because his whip is hunger instead of
+thongs.</p>
+
+<div class='lg-container-b c018'>
+  <div class='linegroup'>
+    <div class='group'>
+      <div class='line'>Poor naked wretches, wheresoe’er you are,</div>
+      <div class='line'>How shall your loop’d and window’d raggedness defend you</div>
+      <div class='line'>From seasons such as these? Oh, I have ta’en</div>
+      <div class='line'>Too little care of this.</div>
+    </div>
+  </div>
+</div>
+
+<p class='c019'>It is the State alone which can take care of
+them, protect them against the rapacity of the
+oppressor and, in protecting them, protect
+itself also. For this is primarily not a
+problem for pity; but a duty to the commonwealth.
+No Society can be sound in health
+which has at its base this undrained morass
+of wretchedness—a morass which charity
+and the cold mercy of the Poor Law only
+develop and which social justice can alone
+drain dry.</p>
+
+<div class='chapter'>
+  <span class='pageno' id='Page_1'>1</span>
+  <h2 class='c009'><span class='c020'>PART I</span><br> SWEATED INDUSTRY</h2>
+</div>
+
+<h3 class='c021'>CHAPTER I<br> <span class='c020'>THE POOREST OF ALL</span></h3>
+
+<p class='c022'>“Sweating”—General interpretation of the term—Work in the
+worker’s home—Some special investigations—Characteristics
+of home work—Match box making—The process—The payment—History
+of the Jarvis family—Shirt making—Some
+individual cases—Paper-bag making—Some cases—Some men
+home workers—Racquet balls—The process—The payment—Health
+of home workers—The married woman and the single
+woman as home workers—Brushmaking—Mrs Hogg’s description—Tooth brushes—Other
+trades and rates of pay—Home work,
+underpayment, and high priced goods.</p>
+
+<p class='c013'>The term “sweating,” to which at one time
+the notion of sub-contract was attached, has
+gradually come to be applied to almost any
+method of work under which workers are
+extremely ill paid or extremely overworked;
+and the “sweater” means nowadays “the
+employer who cuts down wages below the
+level of decent subsistence, works his operatives
+for excessive hours, or compels them
+to toil under insanitary conditions.” It is
+in this wide general sense that the word
+will be employed in these pages; and the
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_2'>2</span>first part of this volume will be devoted to
+showing how wide-spread is the prevalence
+of sweating throughout the whole field of
+British industry.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Probably the most completely wretched
+workers in our country may be found among
+those who ply their toil in their own poor
+homes. It is by no means the case that all
+home work is sweated; but it is the fact that
+a good deal of home work, in this country
+and in others, exists solely because the home worker
+can be ground down to the lowest
+stage of misery. As an acute French observer
+writes:—</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>“Home work, or at least an important fraction
+of that industry, is in the odd condition
+of only surviving on account of its evils.
+Low pay and long hours of work are among
+the chief conditions of its existence.”<a id='r1'></a><a href='#f1' class='c023'><sup>[1]</sup></a> Into
+the conditions of women workers in this
+branch of industry—which, however, is by
+no means confined to women—the Women’s
+Industrial Council made an investigation,
+published in 1897.<a id='r2'></a><a href='#f2' class='c023'><sup>[2]</sup></a> Two inquiries were also
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_3'>3</span>made by Miss Irwin, in Scotland, on behalf
+of the Scottish Council for Women’s Trades;
+and particulars as to the home work of women
+in Birmingham appear in <cite>Women’s Work and
+Wages</cite>.<a id='r3'></a><a href='#f3' class='c023'><sup>[3]</sup></a> All these records exhibit much the
+same features: unremitting toil, a high degree
+of mechanical speed and accuracy, and at the
+same time the lowest standard of workmanship
+that will pass muster; above all, a cruelly
+heavy burden resting on the shoulders of the
+woman who tries to be at the same time
+mother, housekeeper, and bread-winner,
+and who in return for her endless exertion
+seldom receives enough even to keep her
+properly fed, and never enough to satisfy her
+own very modest standard of comfort.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The investigators of the Women’s Industrial
+Council visited personally nearly four hundred
+workers. Perhaps the very poorest trade investigated
+was matchbox-making, which, for
+the last fifteen years at least, has occupied
+some hundreds of workers in East London
+alone. The women fetch out from the factory
+or the middlewoman’s, strips of notched wood,
+packets of coloured paper and sandpaper, and
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_4'>4</span>printed wrappers; they carry back large but
+light bundles of boxes, tied up in packets
+of two dozen. Inside their rooms the boxes,
+made and unmade and half-made, cover the
+floor and fill up the lack of furniture. I have
+seen a room containing only an old bedstead
+in the very last stage of dirt and dilapidation,
+a table, and two deal boxes for seats. The
+floor and the window-sill were rosy with
+magenta matchboxes, while everything else,
+including the boards of the floor, the woodwork
+of the room and the coverings of the bed,
+was of the dark grey of ingrained dust and
+dirt. At first sight it is a pretty enough
+spectacle to see a matchbox made; one motion
+of the hands bends into shape the notched
+frame of the case, another surrounds it with
+the ready-pasted strip of printed wrapper,
+which, by long practice, is fitted instantly
+without a wrinkle, then the sandpaper or
+the phosphorus-paper, pasted ready beforehand,
+is applied and pressed on so that it
+sticks fast. A pretty high average of neatness
+and finish is demanded by most employers,
+and readers who will pass their matchboxes
+in review will seldom find a wrinkle or a
+loose corner of paper. The finished case is
+thrown upon the floor; the long narrow strip
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_5'>5</span>which is to form the frame of the drawer
+is laid upon the bright strip of ready-pasted
+paper, then bent together and joined by an
+overlapping bit of the paper; the edges of
+paper below are bent flat, the ready-cut
+bottom is dropped in and pressed down, and
+before the fingers are withdrawn they fold
+over the upper edges of the paper inside the
+top. Now the drawer, too, is cast on the
+floor to dry. All this, besides the preliminary
+pasting of wrapper, coloured paper and sandpaper,
+had to be done 144 times for 2¼d.; and
+even this is not all, for every drawer and case
+have to be fitted together and the packets tied
+up with hemp. Nor is the work done then, for
+paste has to be made before it can be used,
+and boxes, when they are ready, have to be
+carried to the factory. Let any reader, however
+deft, however nimble-fingered, consider
+how many hundred times a day he or she
+could manage to perform all these minute operations.
+But practice gives speed, especially
+when stimulated by the risk of starvation.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The conditions of life secured in return for
+this continuous and monotonous toil are such
+as might well make death appear preferable.
+The poor dwelling—already probably overcrowded—is
+yet further crowded with matchboxes,
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_6'>6</span>a couple of gross of which, in separated
+pieces, occupy a considerable space. If the
+weather be at all damp, as English weather
+often is, even in summer, there must be a fire
+kept up, or the paste will not dry; and fire,
+paste, and hemp must all be paid for out of
+the worker’s pocket. From her working time,
+too, or from that of her child messenger, must
+be deducted the time lost in fetching and
+carrying back work, and, too often, in being
+kept waiting for it before it is given out.
+The history of one matchbox-making family
+visited by a representative of the Women’s
+Industrial Council may be given in detail,
+since no single member survives.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The Jarvis household consisted of a father,
+mother, and nine children. They lived in an
+alley some fifty yards long and very narrow,
+entered through a row of posts from a street
+that runs northward from Whitechapel Road.
+Mr Booth’s “Poverty” map shows it coloured
+with the dark blue that signifies “Very poor,
+casual. Chronic want.” The houses in it, of
+which there were not many, were and are
+four-roomed cottages of two floors, and the
+Jarvis family occupied the upper floor of No.
+9. Below them lived a young man with his
+wife and their baby, his mother, and three
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_7'>7</span>sisters; sixteen persons thus inhabiting the
+four rooms. All these people seem to have
+been industrious and respectable. Mr Jarvis,
+who had poor health, worked in the last
+summer of his life at matchbox-stamping, and
+earned “sometimes” 16s. a week. His wife
+worked constantly at matchbox-making, two
+of the girls nearly all day, and two of the boys
+out of school hours. The journey to and from
+the factory took from an hour to an hour and
+a half. In the beginning of the winter of
+1897 the father fell ill, and had to go into the
+infirmary. The mother and the children remained
+at home, and the combined earnings
+of Mrs Jarvis and her four young helpers produced
+from 10d. to 1s. a day. It was at this
+time that the investigator of the Women’s
+Industrial Council paid her visit, and she
+notes in the brief space for “Remarks”:
+“This house was very poor and bare....
+Family is often nearly starving.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>At about half past six on the morning after
+Christmas Day—a Sunday morning, when it
+was freezing hard and when there was a thick
+fog, the young man who lived on the ground
+floor awoke and got up to make tea for his
+wife. He found smoke in the room, and when
+he opened the door of the room in which his
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_8'>8</span>mother and sisters were sleeping, a burst of
+smoke met him. He succeeded in getting out
+his own family—in their nightdresses—sent a
+neighbour to call the fire engine, and tried in
+vain, as did a next door neighbour, to arouse
+the Jarvises. The firemen arrived within
+a very few minutes—three minutes, indeed,
+from the time of their summons—but the
+house was already in a blaze, the windows
+gone and the roof fallen in. The engine could
+not get through the posts at the entry of the
+court, but while it was being taken round to
+the back, a ladder was carried in, and a fireman
+bravely attempted to enter the burning
+house. But it was too late; all ten were
+already dead. All had, it was believed, been
+suffocated before the first call of their neighbour
+from below. The children had probably
+passed out of life without warning, but the
+mother was found lying on the floor, with her
+baby of seven months old in her arms, its
+body so protected by hers as to be scarcely
+burned at all. The father died next day in
+the infirmary, without having learned what
+fate had overtaken his wife and children; and
+their poor neighbours—for whom the weeks
+after Christmas are the leanest of the year—raised
+a subscription to defray the funeral
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_9'>9</span>expenses of the eleven, who were buried
+together.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In all but its tragically sudden close the
+history of the Jarvis family is the history of
+scores of East End households. In some there
+is a husband in intermittent work; in some
+the mother is widowed; in all the children, if
+children there are, help; in all the human
+beings are slaves of the matchbox. The nine
+years since that December morning have
+brought no change, unless it be that, impossible
+though it would have appeared, pay
+has rather decreased than advanced, and that
+a recent investigation, not yet completed,
+seems to reveal a higher proportion of workers
+in receipt of out-relief.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Such matchbox makers, if they worked at
+the same rates in the factory during the far
+shorter hours permitted by the Factory Acts,
+would earn no less than they do now, for they
+would no longer waste time in putting
+together box and drawer—whereby at present
+some other worker also wastes time in
+separating them again before they can be
+filled—and the employer would pay for paste
+and drying. That, indeed, is really the reason
+why they are working at home.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>But although matchbox-making is among
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_10'>10</span>the poorest of trades, there are others but a
+shade better. The wages of shirtmaking, for
+instance, are often extremely low, and are yet
+further reduced by the fact that the home worker
+provides cotton for sewing. I remember
+seeing, seventeen years ago, a young
+deserted wife who was trying to support herself
+and two young children by making shirts.
+These were flannel shirts of a fair quality, and
+were handed to her cut out. She did not sew
+on buttons nor make button holes; but except
+for these items made the shirt throughout, by
+machine, and put in a square of lining at the
+back of the neck. She was paid 1s. 2d. a
+dozen, and bought the cotton herself. She
+could make in a week “five dozen all but
+one”; for which the payment would be five
+shillings, eightpence and a fraction of a
+penny, less the cost of cotton, machine needles,
+oil, and perhaps hire of machine.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>At the <cite>Daily News</cite> Exhibition of Sweated
+Industries was to be seen an elderly Scotchwoman
+cutting and making shirts from the
+first stitch to the last, who was a singularly
+intelligent, skilful, and industrious worker.
+For varying styles of shirts she received from
+9½d. to 1s. 9½d. per dozen. “For the shirts
+paid at 1s. 9½d. per dozen the following work
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_11'>11</span>is required:—Make and line yoke and bottom
+bands, put in four gussets, hem skirts, run
+and fell side seams, make sleeves and put
+them in.... The shirts paid at 9d. per
+dozen require her to hem necks, button-stitch
+two stud holes, sew on six buttons and clip
+threads from all seams. The shirts at 1s. per
+dozen have two rows of feather stitching, six
+button holes, eight buttons, four seams bridged
+and eight fastenings made.”<a id='r4'></a><a href='#f4' class='c023'><sup>[4]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The better sorts of these shirts were such
+as are worn, not by poor, but by well-to-do
+purchasers.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>“Paper-bag making,” says the Factory
+Inspectors’ Report for 1905, “is an industry
+largely carried on in homes in Glasgow, and
+no trade is more disturbing to the home. The
+paste seems to find its way everywhere, and
+many more things than the bags are found
+firmly pasted together. I visited two women,
+who, working usually in workshops, were,
+during the enforced period of absence owing
+to the birth of a child, given employment as
+outworkers. Nothing could exceed the misery
+and squalor amongst which the work was done.
+In both cases the workroom was also the living
+room and bedroom, and the whole of the available
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_12'>12</span>furniture, including the bed, was covered
+with damp bags, some hundreds of which had
+to be removed in one home before I could be
+shown the baby. The surroundings were unpleasant
+ones for making bags destined to hold
+pastry.” (p. 322.) Of another woman it is
+reported that “she personally took out work
+until the day before her child’s birth, and found
+the load of bags which had to be carried downstairs
+and upstairs very heavy and tiring.
+This work is poorly paid. Bags, by no means
+of the smallest size, are made for 3d. to 5d.
+a thousand, so that it is indeed a heavy weight
+which has to be carried for the daily shilling.”
+(p. 320.)</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Although the cases quoted hitherto are
+those of women, and although the very worst
+instances of underpayment invariably occur
+among women, it must not be supposed that
+all home workers are women. In the nail and
+chain making districts many men as well as
+women work at forges in their own backyards;
+and even in London there is quite a
+small population of home working tailors,
+shoemakers, and cabinetmakers, to say nothing
+of men who make toys and trifles of
+various sorts for hawking in the streets.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In one afternoon last summer I was taken to
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_13'>13</span>visit some men working in their own homes,
+all within a very short distance. Two
+were toy makers, two manufactured pipes, and
+another cages for parrots; one was a shoemaker,
+and the last was the most skilled handweaver
+in London. One toy maker was
+engaged upon wooden hoops with handles and
+beaded spokes, for South Africa. He also
+made wooden engines, finding all the materials,
+iron wheels included, and for these he was
+paid 22s. a gross. The selling price is sixpence
+each. In his workshop, too, were to be
+seen attractive little waggons with sacks in
+them; and horses of that archaic type which
+has a barrel body, straight legs, and harness of
+red and blue paper. The other toy maker was
+making little go-carts adapted to the use of
+good-sized dolls. All the material was found
+by the maker, and the price received by him
+varied from 3s. 3d. to 6s. 6d. a dozen, according
+to size. Here again iron wheels had to be
+provided. In both these cases the wife and
+some other member of the family helped. The
+pipes were roughly shaped by hand, then
+pressed in a mould, the seam scraped smooth,
+and the pipes stacked in great clay pans and
+fired in an oven. They are not made to order,
+but sold by the maker to private customers—generally
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_14'>14</span>publicans—at 2s. 6d. or 3s. a gross.
+The cage maker, a consumptive man, transforms
+bands of tin and thick wires into domed
+cages, with a speed and dexterity amazing to
+the beholder. I have mislaid my note of the
+prices paid for this skilful work, but I know
+that they were horribly low. The elderly
+shoemaker and his wife—interesting, intelligent
+people—were full of family cares and of
+curious industrial reminiscences. They are
+now on a dry bank, as it were, a foot or two
+above the deep waters of hopeless struggle, in
+which the Jarvises, their neighbours, were
+immersed. The weaver was a survivor from
+another period, and a child of another race.
+Face and name alike proclaim him a descendant
+of the Huguenots; and not only is he a weaver
+of silk, but also one of the very, very few hand
+weavers of velvet still left in our country.
+The coronation robe of King Edward—perhaps
+the finest velvet ever woven, was his
+handiwork.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Moreover, a little remnant is still left of the
+old silk-weaving trade that came to Spitalfields
+and Bethnal Green when Louis XIV.
+was so ill advised as to revoke the Edict of
+Nantes. Instances of man and wife working
+at home together appear in the Report of the
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_15'>15</span>Factory Inspectors. “Husband and wife,
+with two children, occupy one room only.
+The wife weaves, while her husband is occupied
+in ‘finishing’ canvas boots in the same
+room.” “Husband, wife, and six children
+occupy the workroom (which contains two
+looms) and an attic.” “In the weaving room
+are three low beds <em>under</em> the looms, in which
+three adults sleep. They cannot sit upright
+in bed, as they knock against and injure the
+warp.” (p. 322.)</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Racquet balls are articles bought mainly by
+persons in prosperous circumstances, few of
+whom would desire that women engaged in
+making their tools of play should receive less
+than a living wage. Yet the rates of pay are
+such that probably no coverer of racquet balls
+ever subsisted without aid from other sources.
+The cores or centres of these balls are made of
+shreds of rag, much compressed, and covered
+with strands of wool. These are prepared in
+the factory, but the covering is done by
+women working at home. The coverer receives
+a gross of cores, together with a gross
+of squares of white leather and a skein or
+skeins of a special thread. The squares of
+leather must be damped between wet cloths.
+Laying one of these damp squares on her left
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_16'>16</span>palm, the worker places upon it the core,
+“pulls the skin tightly over it, pares off with
+a pair of sharp scissors any superfluous leather,
+and sews together with neat regular stitches
+the edges at their meeting-places. While still
+damp the ball must be rolled, so as to smooth
+down any projection of the seam. This rolling
+is best effected between two slabs of marble,
+the upper one of which need be only a little
+larger than the ball. Considerable pressure is
+necessary, but in the hands of a practised
+worker the process is a quick one. These
+slabs of marble are not provided by the employer,
+and many women roll their balls
+between two plates; to do this takes rather
+longer, because the plate will not bear so
+much pressure as the slab. The scissors also
+have to be provided and kept sharp by the
+worker.” For covering a gross of the smallest
+sized balls (sold retail at 2d. or 3d.), the usual
+payment is 2s. per gross; but there is one
+prosperous employer who still pays only
+1s. 10d. Working steadily for eleven to
+twelve hours a day, a superior young woman
+known to me who covered balls before her
+marriage used to earn about 5s. a week. She
+was quick and skilful, but obviously ill-nourished,
+and an accidental sprain, from
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_17'>17</span>which a girl in good health would quickly
+have recovered, developed in her case into an
+ulcer, in consequence, said the doctor who saw
+her, of her anæmic condition.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Ill-health, indeed, is the chronic state of the
+woman home worker. She misses that regular
+daily journey to and from her work-place
+which ensures to the factory worker at least
+a daily modicum of air and exercise; and she
+misses also that element of changed scene and
+varied human intercourse which makes for
+health and happiness. If she depends upon
+her own exertions she will inevitably be ill fed
+and ill clothed; and this is probably one
+reason for the fact, noted both by the investigators
+of the Women’s Industrial Council and
+by Miss Irwin, that the woman who is self-supported
+often earns less, even at the same
+rates of pay, than the woman who is comfortably
+married. The half-starved and apathetic
+human creature cannot maintain a high output
+of work; and even the out-relief which is so
+frequent a factor in the income of the widowed
+or single home worker, seldom suffices to keep
+her in more than a half-starved condition.
+Her work grows, like herself, poorer and
+poorer; and the employer thereupon declares
+that it is worth no more than its poor price.
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_18'>18</span>From a national point of view it would pay
+better to save the human machine from falling
+into that state of disrepair wherein it ceases to
+be profitable.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Tooth brushes, again, are articles purchased
+by the wealthy even more frequently than by the
+poor, and so are household brushes of all kinds.
+Of brushmaking an account was written in
+1897 by the late Mrs Hogg,<a id='r5'></a><a href='#f5' class='c023'><sup>[5]</sup></a> and being still
+applicable, was printed in the Handbook of
+the Sweated Industries Exhibition. “The
+brushes are given out in dozens, ready bored,
+and the worker supplied with fibre or bristles,
+as the case may be. Their work consists in
+selecting the little bundles of bristles from the
+heap, fastening them securely in the centre
+with wire, and then, with a sharp pull against
+the edge of the table, drawing them through
+the hole. They are kept in position by a wire
+at the back of the brush, and each row of
+bristles is trimmed with a large pair of shears
+fastened to a table-vice. The fingers, though
+protected by a leather shield, are often badly
+cut with the slipping of the wire, and the
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_19'>19</span>constant jerk of the drawing causes a strain to
+the chest. All the women complain of this.
+More serious accidents occasionally happen
+from the shears, which are hard to manipulate,
+and often beyond the strength of these exhausted,
+underfed workers. Materials, with
+the exception of lamp-black for painting the
+backs of the brushes, are provided by the shop.
+As lamp-black costs something, and soot can
+be had for nothing, a concoction of soot and
+water boiled is often used as a substitute for
+the more expensive pigment. But the shears
+are a serious outlay, costing from 18s. to
+£1, and needing constant sharpening. Many
+of the drawers, never having been in possession
+of the capital to buy them, or being forced by
+hunger to ‘put them away,’ are obliged to
+get their trimming done at the shop, at the
+cost of terrible waste of time and of iniquitous
+and capricious deductions from the price given
+for the work. Deductions are also made for
+short returns of fibre or bristle sweepings,
+where these have to be returned to the shop.
+The material is weighed out and weighed in.
+It is calculated that if the material weighed so
+much, the clippings or sweepings ought to
+weigh so much; but the worker is never told
+<em>how</em> much, and has no means of checking the
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_20'>20</span>calculation; yet if the amount is short, she
+either ‘gets the sack’ or has to pay for the
+deficiency. The rate of payment varies with
+the number of holes and the quality of brush,
+bristles always commanding a higher rate than
+fibre. Coarse fibre scrubbing brushes fetch
+anything from 3½d. to 1s. a dozen. One
+woman will make brushes with 145 holes for
+10d., while another will get 9d. for brushes with
+only 100. There is no uniformity of payment;
+it all depends, they tell you, on the shop you
+work for.... The fibre drawers rarely make
+more than 7s. to 8s. for a week of seventy-two
+hours. Taking into consideration the various
+lets and hindrances to which they are subject,
+and the time wasted at the shop, 6s. would
+fairly represent the average during the season
+when it suits the masters to keep them regularly
+employed.... It is only by seeing the
+homes of the brush drawers that it is possible
+to realise all that is implied in the carrying on
+of a trade and of the travesty of family life in
+one single room, or the misery of these lives of
+endless toil, where the tragedy which endures
+on is so much more pitiful than the tragedy
+to which death brings rest from labour.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Tooth brushes, of which it is estimated that
+a worker can make four in an hour, are paid
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_21'>21</span>at the rate of 4d. a dozen, and best hair
+brushes at 2d. each, or ¾d. for 100 holes.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>These examples might be multiplied a
+hundredfold. Blouse makers (receiving from
+1s. 6d. a dozen), underclothing makers,
+trouser finishers (from 2½d. a pair), sack
+makers (at 8d. or 9d. for a “turn” of 12,
+15, or 18), makers of boot boxes (at 1s. 4d.
+a gross), of soap boxes and tack boxes,
+makers of baby clothes and of children’s
+shoes, finishers of woollen gloves, tassel
+makers, umbrella coverers, artificial flower
+makers, forgers of chains and strikers of
+nails, carders of buttons (at 3s. per 100 gross),
+and of hooks and eyes (at 8d. and 9d. per
+24 gross), cappers of safety pins (at 1s. 6d.
+per 100 gross)—all of these are busy among
+us hour after hour, and day after day, for
+seven days a week, and are receiving in return
+a remuneration ranging from ¾d. to 2d. per
+hour. Their work, in some shape or form,
+comes into every house in this country. Our
+potatoes and our flour are carried in sacks,
+although not perhaps to our doors; our eggs
+are sold to us in cardboard boxes; our
+garments are fastened with buttons or with
+hooks—or perchance with safety pins; the
+gentleman’s collar and tie and the lady’s waist
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_22'>22</span>belt may probably be the handiwork of some
+half-starved home worker whose life is being
+shortened by her poverty. Only ignorance
+can flatter itself—as indeed ignorance is fond
+of doing—with the idea that none but cheap
+goods or cheap shops are tainted with sweating.
+Any person inclining to that opinion is advised
+to hang about the back doors of leading shops
+soon after they open in the morning, or just
+before they close at night, and to observe the
+furtive figures that pass in and out with
+bundles. The taint is everywhere; there is
+no dweller in this country, however well-intentioned,
+who can declare with certainty
+that he has no share in this oppression of
+the poorest and most helpless among his
+compatriots.</p>
+
+<div>
+  <span class='pageno' id='Page_23'>23</span>
+  <h3 class='c005'>CHAPTER II<br> <span class='c020'>WORKERS IN FACTORIES AND WORKSHOPS</span></h3>
+</div>
+
+<p class='c022'>Wherein factory workers are better off than home workers—Life
+on five to ten shillings a week—Health—Ancillary processes—Paper
+bags—Packers—Case of a cocoa filler—Of a cartridge
+filler—Jam fillers—Pay sheets of confectionery workers—Observations
+of an uninstructed observer—Slack times—Long
+hours—Some cases—“Emergency” processes—Discomforts—Some
+cases—Danger of fire—Lead poisoning—Instances—Washing
+appliances—Extremes of temperature—Fines and
+deductions—Divergent views of two employers upon fines—“Earned
+too much”—Summary.</p>
+
+<p class='c013'>The poorer class of workers in factories and
+workshops are financially little better off—if,
+indeed, better off at all—than the poorer
+sort of home workers; but they have some
+other advantages. Their hours and conditions
+are in some degree regulated, and at least some
+degree of change and variety enters into their
+lives. But for them too existence is a hard
+battle. Upon a wage of from five to ten shillings
+a week life cannot but be narrow and stinted.
+Food, clothing, and lodging must all be of the
+poorest; an omnibus fare, a halfpenny newspaper,
+a penny stamp are luxuries in which
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_24'>24</span>only the thriftless indulge; and good health,
+as the middle class man or woman knows it,
+is a treasure seldom enjoyed. There is, indeed,
+no fact more painfully forced upon the middle
+class observer who becomes intimately acquainted
+with ill paid workers than the frequency
+with which they succumb to ailments
+that would be regarded in the observer’s own
+circle as trifling. Many girls injure themselves
+permanently by going to work when they are
+actually seriously ill. To stay away means
+loss of pay and possibly loss of employment,
+so they hold out to the last gasp.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Many of the worst paid workers are engaged
+in various processes that facilitate buying and
+selling, rather than in actual manufacture.
+The paper-bags into which a civil shop
+assistant so obligingly pops our small purchases
+are given nominally without charge to us, and
+are bought in very large quantities at a very
+low rate by the shopkeeper, their real cost
+being paid in flesh and blood by the women
+who make them. Some of these women, as
+appears in the previous chapter, work at home;
+some, possibly, in well-appointed workshops,
+but many, as the women factory inspectors
+truly observe, “in the poorest kind of workshop,
+badly lighted, ventilated, and heated.
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_25'>25</span>To these conditions, no doubt, the weak,
+inflamed eyes so often seen among the workers
+are due, at least partly. The workers themselves
+attribute it to the strain involved in
+counting over the bags.”<a id='r6'></a><a href='#f6' class='c023'><sup>[6]</sup></a> This remark shows
+us that the simple and time-saving plan of
+weighing instead of counting (which is employed
+for wares so valuable as those of the
+Royal Mint) is not in use in paper-bag manufactories.
+Packing of various kinds occupies
+vast numbers of women and girls, most of
+whom are paid at low rates, by the dozen or
+the gross, and some of whom attain a celerity
+almost incredible. No foreman in the world
+can drive so hard as her own low wage drives
+the piece worker who has to support herself
+and, often enough, to help to support relatives.
+The most worn-out girl whom I remember
+ever to have seen was engaged upon no harder
+task than the packing of cocoa. My attention
+was called to her, in a room full of girls, by
+her ghastly appearance. She may have been
+eighteen or nineteen; she was absolutely
+colourless, and although there was no sign
+about her of any specific illness, seemed exhausted
+literally almost to death. She sat
+day after day pouring powdered cocoa into
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_26'>26</span>ready made square paper packets, of which
+she then folded down the tops and pasted on
+the wrappers. She received a halfpenny for
+every gross. In the week previous to that in
+which I saw her she had earned 7s. Each
+shilling represented 24 gross of packets; she
+had therefore filled, folded and pasted, in the
+week, 188 gross, or 21,792 packets. Her
+mother, who was present, said that the drive
+was killing her and that she must leave. The
+cocoa was of a brand well known in its day
+and sold in good shops, but the firm has now,
+I believe, disappeared. Would that its methods
+had disappeared with it.<a id='r7'></a><a href='#f7' class='c023'><sup>[7]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Tea packers and jam fillers often receive
+wages barely higher. Girls whom I have
+known personally have been paid at the following
+rates for filling pots with boiling jam or
+marmalade: 11 lb. pots (in four trays of thirty-six
+pots), 2d. per gross; 2 lb. jars (in six trays
+of twenty-four jars) or 3 lb. jars (in nine trays of
+sixteen jars), 2½d. per gross. Two girls worked
+together, and my informant reckoned that the
+pair could fill a gross of the largest size in
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_27'>27</span>about half an hour. This would bring the
+wages of each to the comparatively magnificent
+figure of 2½d. an hour, or over 11s. a week.
+In some factories these heavy trays have to be
+lifted and stacked by the girls, the weight of
+the jars being added to that of the contents.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>I was fortunate enough, some years ago, to
+obtain possession of a number of “pay sheets”
+showing the wages received in two consecutive
+weeks by girls employed in a large London
+confectionery factory. For the first week I
+had 107 sheets; for the second 98. Five
+sheets in the first week and ten in the second
+were left out of my reckoning as probably not
+representing a full week’s work; in each of
+these the total was below 4s. The highest
+net payment (there was a deduction for a
+compulsory sick club) was, in the first week,
+15s. 9½d.; in the second, 16s. 1½d. The
+girls who received these wages (both well
+known to me) were superior young women
+of from 22 to 25 years old; both helped to
+support widowed mothers with younger
+children. There were, in the first week,
+20 girls, and in the second 24, who received
+from 10s. to 16s., and most of them came
+much nearer to the lower than to the higher
+figure. In the first week 78, and in the
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_28'>28</span>second 64, received from 5s. to 10s. (57 out of
+the 78, and 49 out of the 64 earning less than
+8s.); while in the first week 9, and in the
+second week 10, received from 4s. to 5s.
+Two-thirds, therefore, of the whole 190 sheets
+(excluding 15, which showed less than 4s.
+received) testified to a net weekly wage of less
+than 10s.—the average being a fraction over
+7s. 6d. a week. Yet so easy is it for the
+inexperienced enquirer to be misled that a
+lady actually published an account of this very
+factory, in which she assured the public of
+wages “rising steadily to 18s. a week,” and
+declared that a girl, “if she ultimately becomes
+a piece worker, may make as much as 24s. to
+25s. a week.” This lady was evidently not
+aware that piece work is not a state “ultimately
+attained,” but the usual system throughout
+the establishment. Nearly all—probably,
+indeed, every one—of those 190 pay sheets
+represented piece work wages. Upon the basis
+of this illusory wage of 24s. and upwards the
+writer proceeded to compare the payment of
+confectionery “hands” with that of High
+School mistresses, forgetting, however, to
+compare the hours of a school with those of
+a factory, or to deduct those slack seasons to
+which the confectionery trade is so sadly
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_29'>29</span>liable. A High School mistress, moreover,
+works forty weeks in the year and is paid by
+the year; a confectionery worker often works
+for less than forty weeks in the year, and since
+she is paid by the week her blank weeks are
+blank to her exchequer, so that even if she did
+earn £1 a week (which she does not) she would
+not earn £52 a year. Seasonality—the word
+is so useful that it must be admitted—though
+it falls one degree less heavily upon the factory
+worker than upon the worker at home, is to
+her too a terrible evil. The long “slack
+times” of the West-End tailor or tailoress
+reduce a wage that looks handsome in a pay
+sheet of May or June to a very meagre annual
+income; and many a West End dressmaker
+who has worked overtime—as often as not
+without extra pay—through the long hot
+evenings of the London season finds herself, in
+January or February, shivering, without work
+or pay, beside her own empty grate.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Long hours, which are in effect one form of
+low wages, have been checked by the Factory
+Acts, but not yet ended. The inspector for
+West London writes: “The Jew tailor of West
+London has an idea that seven days a week is
+not too long to work his hands.”<a id='r8'></a><a href='#f8' class='c023'><sup>[8]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_30'>30</span>From Birmingham a case is reported of a
+Christmas card maker, who had already been
+cautioned for keeping “female young persons,”
+<em>i.e.</em> girls under eighteen, at work till 9 of an
+evening. He was found to be keeping two
+women and a girl at work till 6.15 on Saturday,
+a day on which work should, by law, end
+early, and was said to be keeping his hands at
+work on Sundays also—a privilege which the
+law allows only to the laundry proprietor.
+“On the succeeding Sunday,” writes the
+inspector, “the place was inspected, but with
+difficulty. It was only after considerable
+delay that admittance was obtained, and then,
+although the place had every appearance that
+work had been going on, no females were
+found. The upper parts of the premises were
+in use as residence, and I had reason to think
+that women had been sent up there upon my
+arrival, but the occupier would not allow me
+to go up. It has subsequently been admitted
+that eight women and two female young persons
+were at work and hidden as suspected.”<a id='r9'></a><a href='#f9' class='c023'><sup>[9]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>That such cases would be not the exception,
+but the rule, if there were no legal prohibition
+and no fear of fines, may be judged by the
+state of things actually existing in laundries,
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_31'>31</span>where, although the law allows the monstrous
+stretch of 14 consecutive hours of work, the
+permitted hours are frequently exceeded. The
+report of the lady inspectors contains a significant
+paragraph on this subject. “The hours
+worked in London laundries by women and
+girls,” says Miss Vines, “seem to be increasing
+in length, and to be more excessive than
+ever.... The firm I prosecuted in February
+had employed several young women, one of
+them only 17 years of age, for 28 consecutive
+hours, from 8 <span class='fss'>A.M.</span> on Friday till 12, midday,
+on Saturday; while their hours, including
+meals on the previous days of the week, had
+numbered 14 on Thursday, 12 on Wednesday
+and Tuesday, and 11 on Monday. The 28
+hours’ period included 2½ hours’ interval
+during the night, when the girls were permitted
+to lie on the floor of the calendar-room
+with their coats for pillows ‘for a
+rest!’ I prosecuted the other firm twice in
+June, and on the second occasion it was
+proved at the hearing of the case that an
+ironer had been employed for 37 consecutive
+hours, including meal times and short breaks,
+and another, an ironer and calendar worker,
+32½ hours&#160;... 14 days previously I had
+taken proceedings against the same firm....
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_32'>32</span>It was then proved that, in one week, a
+young packer had been employed by them, exclusive
+of meal hours and absence of work, for
+73½ hours; and two girls, aged respectively
+16 and 17, for 68½ hours.”<a id='r10'></a><a href='#f10' class='c023'><sup>[10]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Very similar results ensue in the jam-making
+industry, where, on the pretext
+of emergency, the law permits the working
+of prolonged hours. “In more than one case,”
+writes the inspector, “I have found emergency
+created by the simple expedient of allowing
+fruit to lie untouched at the factory till the
+close of the normal working day, when workers
+from all departments were turned on to it.”<a id='r11'></a><a href='#f11' class='c023'><sup>[11]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>It must be remembered that, in the case of
+workers paid by the day, as is usual in dressmaking
+establishments, and in some departments
+of laundry work, there is frequently
+no extra payment made for overtime. I
+have indeed heard a West-End working woman
+declare that overtime would cease if the law
+made payment for it compulsory; and although
+that assertion was much too sweeping, the
+experience of strong trade unions shows that
+when employers are compelled to pay at a
+higher rate for overtime, that necessity for
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_33'>33</span>overtime of which so much is heard whenever
+the Factory Acts are under discussion, does
+diminish in a very remarkable manner. Meanwhile,
+the law does its best to make undue
+hours of work costly by prosecuting persistent
+offenders. In 1905 the fines inflicted in the
+North-Western district of England alone, for
+illegal overtime, amounted to no less than
+£728, 4s. 0d., and the accompanying costs to
+£627, 16s. 0d.; and this in spite of the fact
+that magistrates in certain localities are
+decidedly hostile, and inflict derisory penalties.
+When we further reflect that the North-Western
+district contains both a large number
+of highly-organised workers, ready to complain
+of any breach of law, and also a large number
+of exceedingly enlightened employers who
+believe long hours to be inimical to their
+own true interests, we may fairly infer that
+there are other districts in which things are
+considerably worse, and in which the inspectors,
+zealous though they are, fail to
+discover all or nearly all the offenders.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Sanitary conditions are still sometimes far
+from satisfactory, although greatly bettered of
+late years. There is perhaps no point upon
+which the influence of women inspectors has
+been more beneficial. A case is reported
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_34'>34</span>to me, by a most trustworthy witness, of a
+box factory, where “women and men worked
+together in a room in which was the lavatory,
+with seldom a flush of water.” The same
+witness reports another case, in a rope factory
+employing both men and women, the details
+of which are so repulsive, that it is impossible
+I should print them.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Nor are long hours and underpayment the
+only ills from which factory workers suffer.
+In spite of laws and of inspectors, dangers and
+discomforts are still prevalent in many workplaces—especially
+in those where workers are
+ill paid. Many instances may be gathered
+from a single year’s Report of the factory
+inspectors; and of course the inspectors neither
+discover all the instances nor print all that
+they discover. Looking into the Report for
+1905, we find, on p. 13, an account from
+Southampton of the tea-room “provided by
+a high class dressmaker employing about 60
+females.” This apartment was “underground
+with concrete floor and walls and the ceiling
+only 6 feet high, with no ventilation and no
+natural light.” Not a few women employed
+by West-End firms may be found at the
+present day, not only eating, but also working,
+by artificial light, in basement-rooms
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_35'>35</span>that are little better than cellars, or in
+cramped upper rooms, from which there
+would be little hope of escape in case of
+fire. The law, in its wisdom, does not
+require a special fire escape except in places
+where as many as 40 persons are at work;
+and certain frugal employers are careful,
+therefore, to employ but 39. “In one such
+workshop,” writes Miss Squire, “the condition
+of the 39 women working there seemed
+one of grave danger; it is a large new
+rag sorting warehouse, so filled with bales
+that only narrow passages down which one
+person can pass are left. On the second
+floor the women rag sorters work, their
+tables ranged along a sort of gallery&#160;... the
+centre of the building being open for the hoisting
+of bales; the only means of exit is a
+narrow wooden staircase with open treads, at
+one end of the spacious floor. Were a fire to
+break out below, all exit would be cut off
+very quickly. In this case the local authority
+reply they have no bye-laws and can do
+nothing, as less than 40 persons are employed.”<a id='r12'></a><a href='#f12' class='c023'><sup>[12]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Another case is reported on the same page,
+in which a building originally meant for offices
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_36'>36</span>only has been turned into a factory and warehouses.
+“There is no second staircase and no
+exit on to the roof, which is higher than the
+adjoining houses.... The third floor is
+occupied&#160;... by a blouse manufacturer employing
+between 50 and 60 women. On the
+top floor there is a lace warehouse where 15
+women are employed finishing laces and
+veilings; a large amount of light inflammable
+material is stored on both these floors; there
+are no fire buckets or any means kept for extinguishing
+fire.” Miss Squire sent a notice
+to the Corporation about this building; and
+the Corporation replied that it “did not see
+its way to making any recommendations
+owing to the impossibility of providing an
+outside staircase.” Miss Squire and the City
+Surveyor in vain pointed out how an exit
+could be provided; six months later nothing
+had been done, and, on again approaching the
+Corporation, she found that authority “of
+opinion that no additional means of escape
+can be provided at a reasonable expense.”
+“The chief officer of the Fire Brigade told
+me he has himself reported this building as
+unsafe to the Corporation years ago in vain.”
+From Bristol, Mr Pendock reports a case of
+a clothing factory “employing about 50
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_37'>37</span>females.” “The work is carried on, on the
+third and fourth floors, and these are reached
+by means of an internal wooden, winding,
+narrow staircase, always imperfectly lighted
+on account of its position.” The local authority
+demanded an additional staircase. The
+owner, on the strength of a decision in a
+previous appeal case, did nothing. Immediately
+afterwards the premises were considerably
+damaged by fire which, fortunately,
+took place in the meal time when all the
+workers had left the factory. Since then
+work has been resumed under unimproved
+conditions.<a id='r13'></a><a href='#f13' class='c023'><sup>[13]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>None of these are cases of ignorance, or
+even of carelessness; they are instances of the
+deliberate disregard, for money’s sake, of
+danger to the lives of fellow creatures.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Scarcely less blameworthy is the criminal
+negligence shown by some employers in
+carrying out those precautions prescribed by
+the law, where, as in the potteries, there is a
+risk of lead poisoning. Thus, Miss Vines remarks
+“how frequently one finds the necessary
+supply of soap, nail brushes, and towels
+missing. Yet, when giving instructions as
+to such irregularities, one is almost invariably
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_38'>38</span>met with an attitude of <em>non possumus</em>. Over
+and over again managers defend themselves
+by the assertion that these things, although
+provided by them, have been and are constantly
+stolen by the workers.” She goes on
+to quote the observation of a predecessor: “It
+is impossible not to believe that if expensive
+and highly-finished ware disappeared from the
+factory with the same speed and to the same
+degree that soap, nail brushes, and towels
+disappear, steps would be taken to discover
+the offenders.”<a id='r14'></a><a href='#f14' class='c023'><sup>[14]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In one instance a girl of nineteen, after no
+more than six weeks’ employment at pottery
+dipping, suffered “acute pains, with weakness
+and subsequent unconsciousness for several
+hours.” On the premises where she had
+worked, the inspector found 17 persons
+engaged in dangerous processes. “Notwithstanding,
+in the lavatory for their use, which
+was extremely dirty, there was neither towel
+nor nail brush, and not more than one tiny
+piece of soap. Eventually one small and
+very dirty towel was discovered; this, it was
+stated, had been taken away by the foreman
+to dry.... There was not a single clean
+towel in stock or in reserve on the premises, and
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_39'>39</span>when I questioned the workers it appeared
+that this condition of affairs was normal.”<a id='r15'></a><a href='#f15' class='c023'><sup>[15]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Even where no risk of poison occurs, the
+provision of decent washing appliances would,
+to most of us, appear an essential part of
+a civilised factory. Many employers, however,
+hold a different opinion. The authors
+of “Women’s Work and Wages” write that
+“regulations against washing are still found
+in many factories where excellence of work
+does not depend upon cleanliness of handling.
+Painters and japanners are generally provided
+with turpentine, etc., but the rank and file
+are fortunate if they can get a bucket at the
+sink, and there do exist places where there is
+a fine of 6d. for washing.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>I remember seeing girls, to the number
+of 50 or more, packing tea in a large room
+where an old and grubby sink with one wash
+bowl and one towel formed the sole provision
+for washing. Access to this room was gained
+by one wooden ladder-stair. Yet the manager
+who exhibited this place to a group of visitors
+was not only satisfied, but actually boastful.
+The personal attention of the head of the firm
+was called to these defects, and I am happy to
+say both of them have now been remedied.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_40'>40</span>The discomfort formerly undergone in many
+work-rooms during winter was extreme. Until
+the law required the maintenance of “a reasonable
+temperature” (generally interpreted by
+inspectors as 60 degrees Fahrenheit), a very
+large proportion of women who worked for
+West End dressmakers did so in rooms
+absolutely unwarmed, or warmed only by the
+gas jets meant for lighting the room. I knew
+of a shirt factory in East London, which was
+a wooden edifice erected in a back yard and
+entirely unprovided with any means of warming,
+and have known women who worked
+there during the bitterest days of a particularly
+cold winter.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>On the other hand, some processes of manufacture
+are generally carried on in overheated
+workplaces. “The temperature in starch drying
+stoves,” says one inspector, “is the most
+consistently excessive I have found.... The
+manager of one starch works is of opinion
+that women stand the heat better than men
+do, but says those whom he employs are all
+hard drinkers; no temperate woman will
+stay.<a id='r16'></a><a href='#f16' class='c023'><sup>[16]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Some processes also of lacemaking and of
+cotton spinning are facilitated by damp heat,
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_41'>41</span>and it can hardly be doubted that, but for
+the constant vigilance, both of the organised
+workers and of the inspectors, there would
+be still, as there were before the law intervened,
+many working places in which such
+processes would be carried on without proper
+ventilation or proper precautions for the health
+of the workers. Many people now living have
+seen women and girls come out of a weaving
+shed that has been kept full of steam, their
+clothes wet through and presently frozen stiff
+upon them as they walked home through the
+cold air.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The plan of reducing wages by fines and
+deductions is one dear to the low type of
+employer; and as long as workers remain ill
+paid and desperately afraid of being out of
+work, the evil will probably persist to some
+extent, in spite of increasingly stringent Truck
+Acts. There are many factories and work-rooms
+in which silence is more or less rigidly
+enforced, and fines are inflicted for talking
+or laughing. In many, again, some part of
+the material used is charged to the worker.
+I had in my hands, some years ago, 14 or 15
+wage books belonging to skilled machinists
+employed in a provincial stay factory and paid
+by the piece. The following are the figures
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_42'>42</span>of 3 books for 3 successive weeks. <em>A</em> represents
+the highest, and <em>C</em> the lowest sums
+received.</p>
+
+<table class='table2'>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c024'><em>A.</em></td>
+    <td class='c025'>Nominal wage</td>
+    <td class='c025'>9/8½</td>
+    <td class='c025'>8/–</td>
+    <td class='c026'>10/2½</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c024'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c025'>Deductions</td>
+    <td class='c025'>1/4</td>
+    <td class='c025'>9½</td>
+    <td class='c026'>1/6</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c024'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c025'>Wage received</td>
+    <td class='c025'>8/4½</td>
+    <td class='c025'>7/2½</td>
+    <td class='c026'>8/8½</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c024'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c025'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c025'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c025'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c026'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c024'><em>B.</em></td>
+    <td class='c025'>Nominal wage</td>
+    <td class='c025'>9/2½</td>
+    <td class='c025'>8/6</td>
+    <td class='c026'>8/4</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c024'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c025'>Deductions</td>
+    <td class='c025'>2/2</td>
+    <td class='c025'>1/7</td>
+    <td class='c026'>1/11</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c024'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c025'>Wage received</td>
+    <td class='c025'>7/8½</td>
+    <td class='c025'>6/11</td>
+    <td class='c026'>6/5</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c024'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c025'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c025'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c025'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c026'>&#160;</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c024'><em>C.</em></td>
+    <td class='c025'>Nominal wage</td>
+    <td class='c025'>5/3½</td>
+    <td class='c025'>5/3</td>
+    <td class='c026'>5/5</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c024'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c025'>Deductions</td>
+    <td class='c025'>1/4</td>
+    <td class='c025'>1/9</td>
+    <td class='c026'>1/9</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c024'>&#160;</td>
+    <td class='c025'>Wage received</td>
+    <td class='c025'>3/11</td>
+    <td class='c025'>1/5</td>
+    <td class='c026'>3/8</td>
+  </tr>
+</table>
+
+<p class='c014'>These deductions represent mainly material—cotton,
+and tools—machine needles. Some
+employers oblige their workers to pay hire
+for the sewing machines used in the factory,
+and where these machines are worked by steam,
+gas, or electricity, a charge varying from a
+halfpenny to sixpence “for power” is not
+unusual. I have known instances in which
+the rent of a factory has been partly—perhaps
+wholly—defrayed by a charge upon the
+workers, who had to pay so much a week
+for their places in it. “Cleaning, as well as
+rent, is sometimes met in the same way by a
+weekly charge of 2d. or 3d. for cleaning the
+workroom. I am assured that one ingenious
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_43'>43</span>employer pays a man 15s. a week for performing
+this duty in addition to others, while the
+payments made by the women amount to 30s.
+In a certain provincial town in a factory which
+I visited, there was no apparent method of
+lighting. I was informed that in the winter
+the women brought their own candles. A
+local competitor, more acute, provides gas,
+and charges each girl 3d. a week throughout
+the dark seasons, at which rate, according to
+his fellow townsmen, he must make a profit
+on his gas bill.”<a id='r17'></a><a href='#f17' class='c023'><sup>[17]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In a large box factory deductions were made
+for glue, for gas to heat the glue, for string to
+tie the boxes together, and for work books—amounting
+in all to 1s. 6d. per week.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>A charge for hot water to make tea is not
+unusual, and is sometimes enforced on all
+workers, the resulting sum, where many are
+employed, being ridiculously in excess of the
+cost of the boiling water. One young woman
+known to me paid this tax (in her case 2d. a
+week) for six weeks, and never once used the
+hot water.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_44'>44</span>Deductions for spoiled work or alleged
+damage are those which seem the most to
+arouse heartburnings and that general feeling
+of grudge which it is so greatly the interest
+of an employer to avoid arousing. Where, for
+instance, glass or earthenware jars are filled
+with boiling preserve, one or two jars in
+every few hundreds are sure to crack. “The
+breakage will probably come to light under
+the hands of the girl who washes the jar and
+sticks on the label, and in some factories she
+is made to pay.” I have known a girl
+charged the full selling price for a seven-pound
+jar from which the bits of glass were afterwards
+picked out and the preserve reboiled
+and sold. Many instances of a similar kind
+from other trades might be quoted if space
+allowed.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Other deductions are in the nature of
+punishment; and of these it may safely be
+said that the master or foreman who cannot
+keep order without the use of them does not
+know his business. One of the best employers
+and kindest men whom I ever knew
+said, indignantly, when I asked him whether
+there were fines in his factory: “If I could
+not run a factory without fines I should be
+ashamed to run one at all.” My real reason
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_45'>45</span>for the question was that an employer of a
+very different stamp had within the same
+week defended himself against an accusation
+of excessive fining by a public declaration
+that unless he inflicted fines his factory would
+be a “bear-garden.” The contrast between
+these two men—carrying on industries not at
+all dissimilar—between the two factories, and,
+above all, between the manners, morals, and
+appearance of the young women working for
+the one and of those working for the other,
+formed one of the most instructive object
+lessons which it has ever been my lot to
+receive.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Deductions for lateness are sometimes made
+a source of profit to the employer. Men who
+pay a penny for an hour’s work will sometimes
+deduct threepence for an hour’s absence; and
+piece workers—who, of course, lose pay for the
+time of absence, are sometimes made to pay
+in addition. I have seen the wage-book of an
+umbrella-coverer, which showed that in the
+course of two years she had paid in fines (to
+the same employer) nearly £6, chiefly for
+coming late in the morning. The case was
+particularly flagrant, because she was a piece worker,
+and was not using a power machine,
+and because work in this workshop was so
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_46'>46</span>irregular that when she did come early she
+was often kept sitting unoccupied, while, if
+orders happened to come in of an afternoon,
+the women were kept late to fulfil them.
+Thus, although there might be no work for
+them, they were fined if they came late;
+being piece workers, they were paid nothing
+for the time spent in waiting for work, and
+they were paid at no extra rate for work done
+late.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Worst of all, there are factories—though I
+hope but very few—in which piece workers,
+when they have succeeded in making up a
+total slightly better than usual, are liable to
+have the surplus deducted. I have in my
+mind a factory where the foreman frequently
+deducted 1s. or 2s. from a week’s payment, on
+the ground that the girl who should have
+received it had “earned too much.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>To sum up then: workers in factories and
+workshops, although they are, on the whole,
+better off in respect of hours, and although
+their lives cannot at the worst, be so horribly
+monotonous as can that of the home worker,
+are frequently exceedingly ill paid, even in
+trades demanding considerable skill: not a
+few of them are employed in places that are
+uncomfortable, unwholesome, or even actually
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_47'>47</span>dangerous; their poor wages are apt to be
+docked by irritating fines and deductions;
+they have no choice as to the companions
+with whom they spend their days, and they
+share with the home worker the constant
+dread of being left without employment and
+without means to pay for lodging or food.
+These are the conditions in which hundreds
+and hundreds of young women in this country
+are earning what it is customary to call “their
+living,” although all of us are aware that no
+young woman can really live, in a large town,
+the life of a civilised human being upon ten
+shillings a week or less.</p>
+
+<div>
+  <span class='pageno' id='Page_48'>48</span>
+  <h3 class='c005'>CHAPTER III<br> <span class='c020'>SHOP ASSISTANTS, CLERKS, WAITRESSES</span></h3>
+</div>
+
+<p class='c022'>The daily life of the shop assistant—Her bedroom—“No pictures,
+photos, etc.”—“Anything so left”—The dining-room—Meals—Impossibility
+of ever being alone—Long hours—Fines
+and rules—Examples—Some notes on health—Baths—Payment—“Premiums”
+and “intro” goods—“Taking the
+book”—Diminished salary with commission on sales—Case
+of a milliner’s assistant—The dictum of a draper—Why not
+domestic service?—The social grade—Assistants who do not
+“live in”—Some Scotch cases—Trade expenses of waitresses—Breakages—Clerks
+and bookkeepers—Salaries offered to a
+competent young woman—Some shops in fiction—The
+question of morals.</p>
+
+<p class='c013'>How many of us, as we sit at ease on the
+customer’s side of the counter, reflect upon
+the life led by the spruce, black-coated young
+man or the trim, deft young woman who
+stands upon the other? For myself, the
+elaborate hairdressing of the shop-girl—all
+those curls and waves and puffs that represent
+so much care and time—always sets me thinking
+of the same girl before her looking-glass
+(taking her turn, probably, with others).
+The dormitory in which she occupies a place
+is bare and unhomelike, all the beds, chairs,
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_49'>49</span>and chests of drawers of the same pattern;
+the walls unadorned, for the decoration of
+them is forbidden. As the rule of one large
+establishment says, with equal harshness and
+bad grammar: “No pictures, photos, etc.,
+allowed to disfigure the walls. Any one so
+doing will be charged with the repairs.” The
+room is chill in winter and stuffy at all
+seasons, and her companions are chosen by
+chance. Amid such surroundings she combs
+and rolls and twists with the skill of a
+practised lady’s maid, in preparation, not for
+an evening’s gaiety, but for a day’s toil.
+Hastily she crams into the small chest of
+drawers which is her sole receptacle all her
+little apparatus of brush and comb and
+curlers and wavers. For what says the
+rule? “Brushes, bottles, etc., must not be
+left about in the room, but put away in the
+drawers. Anything so left will be considered
+done for.” Carefully dressed as to the head,
+but very inadequately washed—for baths are
+too often lacking and hot water seldom provided
+in the mornings—the young lady
+hurries down to breakfast in a dining-room
+which has the same impersonal, depressing
+character as the dormitory. Too often it is a
+basement room, and sometimes infested by
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_50'>50</span>black beetles. Here, among a crowd of companions,
+she takes her meal, consisting in the
+great majority of cases, of bread and butter
+and weak tea.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Twenty or twenty-five minutes later the
+assistant must be in the shop, where, again
+among a crowd of fellow workers, she remains
+till the midday dinner time. In many, indeed
+in most, shops the space behind the counter is
+too narrow, and the assistant is jostled every
+time another passes her. To a tired woman
+with aching back and feet the repetition of
+this discomfort grows, towards the end of the
+day, almost intolerable. The work itself is
+sometimes by no means light; in some departments
+the boxes that have to be lifted down
+from high “fixtures” are of considerable
+weight; the exhibiting of such things as
+mantles or coats and skirts involves much
+carrying to and fro of heavy garments; so that
+a young woman may well be physically exhausted
+by closing time. Nervously exhausted
+she will surely be if the day has been busy, for
+the whole of her occupation is a strain upon
+the nerves. She has to confront strangers all
+day long; to touch without damaging numbers
+of articles, often of a delicate kind; to
+fill up a number of forms, the omission of any
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_51'>51</span>one of which will bring upon her reproof and
+probably a fine. She is never alone. She
+eats her dinner to an accompaniment of clatter
+and chatter in the same dull dining-room
+where she breakfasted. In many shops that
+meal is neither good nor sufficient; and even
+if good the food is monotonous. Each day of
+the week has generally its appointed bill of
+fare. “In many houses the assistants know
+what the dinner will be to-morrow, to-morrow
+week, to-morrow month, to-morrow year. I
+have an Islington shop in my mind where the
+menu for years past has been this:—</p>
+
+<div class='lg-container-b'>
+  <div class='linegroup'>
+    <div class='group'>
+      <div class='line'>Sunday: Pork.</div>
+      <div class='line'>Monday: Beef, hot.</div>
+      <div class='line'>Tuesday: Beef, cold.</div>
+      <div class='line'>Wednesday: Mutton, hot.</div>
+      <div class='line'>Thursday: Mutton, cold.</div>
+      <div class='line'>Friday: Beef, hot.</div>
+      <div class='line'>Saturday: Beef, cold, and resurrection pie.</div>
+    </div>
+  </div>
+</div>
+
+<p class='c014'>On Thursday there is a roly-poly pudding,
+or stewed fruit densely thickened with sago.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>At a large Clapham house the week is
+mapped out thus:—</p>
+
+<div class='lg-container-b'>
+  <div class='linegroup'>
+    <div class='group'>
+      <div class='line'>Monday: Mutton, hot.</div>
+      <div class='line'>Tuesday: Beef, hot.</div>
+      <div class='line'><span class='pageno' id='Page_52'>52</span>Wednesday: Mutton, hot.</div>
+      <div class='line'>Thursday: Beef, cold.</div>
+      <div class='line'>Friday: Fish.</div>
+      <div class='line'>Saturday: Beef.<a id='r18'></a><a href='#f18' class='c023'><sup>[18]</sup></a></div>
+    </div>
+  </div>
+</div>
+
+<p class='c014'>These meals are often supplemented by
+private purchases; in some houses the cook
+is allowed to supply extras at a price; in
+others the assistants may bring in food; in
+yet others there is a refreshment bar at which
+they may and do purchase food. In some
+establishments they are actually fined for
+leaving any food on the plate.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>From dinner the shop assistant returns,
+generally after a bare half hour, to the counter.
+An extra interval of even ten minutes to be
+passed in rest and solitude would be precious,
+and even the institution-like dormitory would
+be a welcome refuge. But, no; rare indeed is
+the “house of business” in which the assistant
+is allowed to enter his or her own bedroom
+during the day, except by special permission
+from the shopwalker.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>For tea, which affords a welcome break at
+about five o’clock, a quarter of an hour or
+twenty minutes will, as a rule, be allotted,
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_53'>53</span>and the meal will in most cases consist of tea
+and ready-cut bread and butter. After tea
+work will go on again till closing time. That
+happy hour varies enormously according to
+the locality and nature of the shop. In the
+West End of London most shops are closed by
+seven, and on Saturdays by two; but in
+poorer districts shops will habitually be kept
+open until 9.30, and on Saturdays until much
+later.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>When the shop has been cleared of customers
+the business of tidying up and covering
+in for the night begins. After that comes
+supper, rather a Spartan meal as a rule; and
+then—then, the assistant is free till 11 <span class='fss'>P.M.</span>,
+or on Saturdays till 12. Fifteen minutes
+after that hour the gas of the firm is turned
+out, and no private light must be kept burning.
+“Any one having a light after that
+time will be discharged.” The “young lady”
+may now sleep, if she can, in her narrow bed,
+with her companions around her, until the
+morning’s bell calls her to rise, wash and dress—still
+not alone—and begin another day like
+the last.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In lower-class shops the assistant does not
+always have even her bed to herself, and has,
+of course, no choice as to the companion who
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_54'>54</span>shares it. In such shops, where the hours are
+long, many young women never, except on
+Sundays or holidays, go out of doors in the
+daylight. What wonder that they grow
+anæmic, that they suffer continually from
+headaches and indigestion and from all the
+long train of woes that lie in wait for the
+overworked, underfed, and shut-in women.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In the matter of hours, of food, and of
+restrictions, young men are no better off than
+young women. They also are subject to fines
+for every petty error, and to a code of rules
+covering every detail of life and work. I
+have inspected several such codes, and very
+curious reading I have found them. I do not
+remember any instance in which the number
+of rules was less than 50. Mr Whiteley’s, at
+the time when I saw them, were 159; those of
+another shop in the same district ran up to
+198. Here are a few sample rules, taken
+almost at random: “Young men coming to
+business with dirty boots, soiled shirts or
+collars, etc., and young ladies with soiled
+collars or cuffs, or otherwise appearing in
+business in an untidy manner, fine 3d.” Of
+course the washing of these immaculate collars,
+cuffs, and shirts is paid for by the wearer.
+“Gossiping, standing in groups, or lounging
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_55'>55</span>about in an unbusinesslike manner, fine 3d.”
+“Assistants must introduce at least two articles
+to each customer, fine 2d.” “Unnecessary
+talking and noise in bedrooms is strictly prohibited,
+fine 6d.” “For losing copy of rules,
+2d.” “For unbusinesslike conduct, 6d.”<a id='r19'></a><a href='#f19' class='c023'><sup>[19]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>It is needless to dwell upon the nagging, ungenerous
+tone that marks such rules as these.
+That their harassing character helps towards
+that collapse of health and nerves which is so
+frequent among women shop assistants, I feel
+persuaded; and it is more than probable the
+abolition of “living-in” with all its accompanying
+petty annoyances would lead to a marked
+improvement in the health of the whole class.<a id='r20'></a><a href='#f20' class='c023'><sup>[20]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_56'>56</span>Here are a few notes upon the question of
+health made by a trustworthy observer at
+close quarters.<a id='r21'></a><a href='#f21' class='c023'><sup>[21]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'><em>A.</em> “During the fifteen weeks I spent at
+——’s, three girls in my department had to
+leave on account of illness. The department was
+entered through others, and had no street door.
+In summer it was so oppressively hot that even
+customers often complained. Out of the sixteen
+assistants I worked with, one was anæmic, one
+had varicose veins, one had a chronic cough,
+one chronic indigestion; all suffered from
+lassitude and headache, and four frequently
+lost their voices through weakness. One of
+those who left broke down from extreme
+weakness, and had to give up altogether.
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_57'>57</span>Another was the case of varicose veins. A
+vein burst, and the girl was taken to the
+hospital, where she was told she must not
+stand much. She could not give up business,
+however, and now wears elastic stockings
+above and below the knee on both legs.
+Anæmia was common. At my table at
+dinner there were six persons with the same
+colourless lips, leaden skins, and hollow eyes.
+This house compares favourably with most
+business houses in London.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'><em>B.</em> “I very clearly remember some very hot
+days&#160;... behind the fancy counter of a West-End
+house. The atmosphere was filled with
+fluff and dust, the very board floors seemed
+to scorch one’s feet, and the effort to drag
+a heavy lace box out of the fixtures made
+one faint and giddy. One day my companion
+at the counter gave a little gasp and collapsed
+on a heap of collar-boxes. The shopwalker
+carried her out of the shop to the housekeeper’s
+room, and in about half an hour she regained
+consciousness. In another half hour she was
+at the counter again. It was only the heat
+and the standing! That night when we
+went to bed she showed me her blistered
+feet and told me they had been very painful
+during the day. She had been unable to
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_58'>58</span>bathe them for three days, for there had only
+been enough water in the bedroom for washing
+in the morning, and she hadn’t time to
+wash her feet then.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'><em>C.</em> “Only strong girls can manage to keep
+a berth in this house for any length of time.
+Ailments: weakness, anæmia, and fainting
+attacks, with frequent headaches and other
+symptoms of a low state of health. Underground
+dining-room lit with gas; a damp
+unpleasant room. In summer it is very
+close and infested with black beetles. The
+shops are warmed with gas in winter.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'><em>D.</em> “The shops of this firm are bitterly
+cold in winter, as there is no artificial heat.
+The assistants get thoroughly chilled and are
+not allowed a fire in the sitting-room unless
+the weather is exceptionally cold. Sanitary
+accommodation objectionable.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The hours of work are in some localities
+very long. I have known of shops in poor
+districts that remained open on Saturdays till
+11, 11.30 or 12; and cases are cited by credible
+witnesses of 12.30 as the Saturday closing
+time. Tobacconists’ and sweet shops are
+often open on Sundays, and assistants employed
+in them are liable to a seven days’
+week. On the other hand, in shops that are
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_59'>59</span>never open on a Sunday there is often a
+tendency to discourage the presence of the
+assistants on the premises during Sundays.
+It used to be not an uncommon practice
+actually to turn the assistants out, from
+closing time on Saturday till Sunday night
+or Monday morning; but it is a good many
+years now since I have met with any instance
+of this. The cruelty and meanness of this
+form of economy are sufficiently obvious; yet
+I have known it practised by a draper who
+was a churchwarden and who was greatly
+surprised at receiving from his vicar earnest
+remonstrances upon the subject.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Sad to say, a bath or bathroom is by no
+means regarded by employers as a necessity.
+There are still houses of good repute in which
+the assistants, male and female, have nothing
+but a basin in which to wash. On the very
+day that I write these words a letter is published
+in the <cite>Daily News</cite> from a shop
+assistant who cites the case of “a large
+house in the West-End where hundreds of
+young men and women ‘live in,’ and not a
+single bath is provided for them.... When
+the poor assistant feels inclined to take a bath
+he has to take it before the public baths close
+at eight o’clock; and as there is no fire in
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_60'>60</span>the sitting-room he is obliged to go straight
+to bed to avoid catching cold on a cold
+winter’s night after taking his bath.”<a id='r22'></a><a href='#f22' class='c023'><sup>[22]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The salaries both of men and women are
+poor. The shopwalker and the buyer may,
+in some instances, receive handsome salaries;
+but for the ordinary saleswoman, £35 a year
+is high pay; indeed, there are many young
+men receiving no more than £20 or £25.
+Out of this income the assistant has to keep
+up the required standard of appearance, providing
+black coats or gowns, as the case may
+be, and spotless starched linen. Often the
+collar and cuffs of the young lady are of a
+regulation pattern that may perhaps not suit
+her again if she goes into another house.
+Towels are not generally included in the
+furnishing of the bedrooms; the purchase
+and washing of these come out of the
+assistant’s pocket.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>These wages are supposed to be supplemented
+by “premiums,” and the subject of
+premiums is not without interest for the customer.
+Certain goods, which for some reason
+it is particularly desired to sell, are “premiumed,”
+<em>i.e.</em> a small commission is given to
+the assistant who effects a sale of them. The
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_61'>61</span>premium, which is in proportion to the selling
+price, is generally but a small sum. Half a crown
+is about the highest figure, and would
+represent a purchase running to some pounds.
+On small things the premium may be as low
+as a halfpenny. The existence of premiums
+explains in great measure the annoyance to
+which all of us have been subjected by the
+endeavours of an assistant to force upon us
+goods for which we have not asked—goods
+known behind the counter as “intro” (or introduced)
+goods. A rule quoted above shows
+that there are shops in which an assistant is
+bound to press two “intro” articles, at least,
+upon every customer. To dispose largely of
+“intro” goods is obviously to the assistant’s
+interest, not only because the premiums make
+a welcome addition to his small income, but
+also because the disposal of these articles is
+viewed with favour by his superior officers.
+To the customer who knows what she wants
+and is anxious to spend no more than the
+needful time and money in getting it, “intro”
+goods are an irritation and a burden—especially
+if she is sufficiently behind the scenes to
+know their significance to the girl or youth
+who compulsorily obtrudes them upon her.
+Such customers are apt to forget the great
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_62'>62</span>commercial truth that shops exist not to
+supply the needs of the public but to fill the
+pockets of the shopkeeper.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Nor is the premium the only instrument of
+pressure applied to the shop assistant. There
+is, in most establishments, an unwritten law
+that each assistant must, each week, sell goods
+to a certain amount. That total goes by the
+name of the “book”; and each young man
+and young woman is aware that repeated
+failure to “take” his or her “book” will be
+followed by dismissal. One very capable employer
+has a different method. He engages
+the assistant at a fixed salary; and when she
+has been at work for a couple of months, she
+is informed that for the future her salary will
+be diminished by a substantial deduction, and
+that she will receive a commission of 1¼ per
+cent. upon her sales. The assistants are said
+not to keep a reckoning of their commission,
+but to be of opinion that they rather gain than
+lose. In the “wools” department, where sales
+would not generally run to high figures, £10
+was deducted from the £30 a year of one
+assistant, and £8 from the £28 of another.
+From a salary of £35 in the underclothing
+showroom, no less than £23 was taken off.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>There are houses in which a list of weekly
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_63'>63</span>“takings” is posted up; and some in which
+the names that stand low in the list are
+marked by the employer with signs of disapprobation.
+To be a good salesman or saleswoman
+is to be an adept in the art of inducing
+fellow creatures to make purchases that they
+did not intend to make. Indeed, there are
+shops where failure to effect a sale, if it occurs
+three times running, means dismissal. I knew
+an instance (a good many years ago) in which
+a girl was dismissed at a moment’s notice from
+a London millinery shop, because she had failed
+to cajole a customer into buying any bonnet.
+She was “living-in”; her home was not in
+London; the dismissal took place between 5
+and 6 o’clock, and she did not know of any
+lodging to which she could go. Fortunately
+a policeman whom she consulted was able to
+direct her to one of London’s many safe
+havens for young women. But what of the
+employer, who, suddenly, and late in the day,
+turned a young girl out of his house into the
+unknown world of London, her only fault
+being that another woman had found in his
+shop no bonnet to suit her—and had been
+resolute enough to resist buying one that did
+not?</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>It is related of a certain provincial draper that
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_64'>64</span>seeing a customer depart having made no
+purchase, he called up the assistant who had
+waited upon her. “Why did not that lady
+buy anything?” “We hadn’t what she
+wanted, sir.” “Anybody can sell people
+what they want. Remember that I keep you
+to sell people what they don’t want.” That
+in a nutshell is the present condition of retail
+shopkeeping—especially, perhaps, in the department
+of drapery; and that condition is
+one reason why some customers find it preferable
+to deal at co-operative stores. The business
+of the assistant in a private shop is to
+sell, reluctantly perhaps, but under stern compulsion,
+articles that the shopkeeper desires
+sold to a customer who does not really
+desire to buy them. Can any employment
+be imagined more straining to the nerves, or
+more trying to the temper of a refined and
+delicate minded person? And there are many
+shop assistants of refinement and of delicate
+feeling; some of them daughters of clergymen
+and of other professional men who have died
+leaving their girls unprovided for.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>At this point some reader will certainly be
+found to demand why these young ladies do
+not, in a body, abandon the shop and enter
+domestic service. The answer is a simple one
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_65'>65</span>enough. These girls, like the vast majority of
+their compatriots, will endure much hardship
+rather than lose caste; and, whatever may be
+the opinion of the wage-payers, there can be
+no doubt that among wage-earners domestic
+service ranks as a low-caste occupation. The
+middle class mother who will not send her
+little girl to a public elementary school, the
+middle class father who would rather see his
+son making a small income as a professional
+man than a large income as a tradesman,
+ought rather to applaud than to condemn
+the “young lady in business” who refuses to
+exchange her black uniform and her title of
+“Miss” for the cap and apron and the name
+without a handle of the domestic servant.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The question of class distinction has, as
+Mr Charles Booth has pointed out, a marked
+influence upon the choice of employment; and
+this influence, the authors of <cite>Women’s Work
+and Wages</cite> truly observe has led to curious
+economic anomalies, which are generally beneficial
+to the employers.<a id='r23'></a><a href='#f23' class='c023'><sup>[23]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>An observation somewhat to the same effect
+may be found on pp. 67, 68 of <cite>Women in
+the Printing Trades</cite>.<a id='r24'></a><a href='#f24' class='c023'><sup>[24]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_66'>66</span>In Scotland “living-in” is not customary,
+but the advantages of freedom have been, in
+the past, sometimes counterbalanced by serious
+drawbacks. Here are some instances from one
+of Miss Irwin’s reports:—</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>“In some of these shops the girls are kept
+on duty continuously; this is more especially
+the case where only one girl is employed....
+In scarcely any of the shops in this district
+is lavatory accommodation provided. Witness
+said she knew of drapery shops where the
+hours are from 8 <span class='fss'>A.M.</span> to 9 <span class='fss'>P.M.</span>, and in some
+cases to 10 <span class='fss'>P.M.</span>; while they are kept open
+till 11 <span class='fss'>P.M.</span> and 12 midnight on Saturdays.
+In these shops the girls are allowed half an
+hour off for breakfast and one hour for
+dinner. Total hours worked per week 82
+and 89 (not including meal hours). No seats
+are provided and there is no sanitary accommodation.
+Witness stated that there are
+frequent cases of girls completely breaking
+down in health in these shops.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>“Witness 504 is about 24 years of age.
+She is saleswoman and manager in a confectioner’s
+shop and is paid 7s. per week.
+The shop she keeps is an East end branch
+belonging to a leading firm in this trade.
+The shops of this firm in better localities
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_67'>67</span>are closed at 8 <span class='fss'>P.M.</span> In the other the following
+are the hours: open 9.30 <span class='fss'>A.M.</span>, close at
+10 <span class='fss'>P.M.</span> Saturdays, open at 8.30 <span class='fss'>A.M.</span>, close at
+11 <span class='fss'>P.M.</span> As witness has sole charge of the
+shop she cannot leave it to take her meals,
+or for any other purpose. Her dinner is
+brought to her and she takes it as she
+can; tea is taken in the same way. Witness
+has in all nine holidays in the year.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>“Witness 418 had been engaged as an
+assistant in a tea shop and gave the following
+evidence: Her hours were from 9 <span class='fss'>A.M.</span>
+to 9 <span class='fss'>P.M.</span>, five days in the week; and from
+9 <span class='fss'>A.M.</span> to 11.30 <span class='fss'>P.M.</span> on Saturdays. Witness
+had sole charge of the shop and was not
+allowed to go out for meals, except on such
+days as her employer, a commercial traveller,
+and seldom at home, came to relieve her;
+frequently she was obliged to fast all day,
+and finally she was obliged to leave on
+account of her health breaking down. Total
+hours worked per day, 12; Saturdays, 14½;
+per week 74½ hours.”<a id='r25'></a><a href='#f25' class='c023'><sup>[25]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In restaurants, both in London and elsewhere,
+the hours are sometimes excessive.
+I have known instances of girls who were
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_68'>68</span>employed at the refreshment rooms of
+stations who were not allowed to leave
+until after the last train had gone at night—which
+meant that they had to walk home
+every night after midnight.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Miss Irwin, in her evidence before the
+Committee of the House of Lords upon the
+early closing of shops, quotes a very similar
+instance: “In another baker’s shop where
+six girls were employed, the hours were
+from 6.45 <span class='fss'>A.M.</span> to 8 <span class='fss'>P.M.</span>, and to 11.30 on
+Saturdays. The girls had to provide their
+own food, and all meals, including breakfast,
+were made and partaken of on the premises,
+the girls having the use of the kitchen for
+this. No regular time was allowed for meals,
+and they were kept running backwards and
+forwards to the shop all the time. Very
+often they were kept beyond the nominal
+closing hour of 11.15 <span class='fss'>P.M.</span> and lost the last
+car home. This was a great hardship to the
+girls who lived at a distance. My informant
+said: ‘When I get home, I just sit down
+and cry with fatigue.’ The firm have a
+number of branch shops. There are in all
+twenty-eight girls employed in them.”<a id='r26'></a><a href='#f26' class='c023'><sup>[26]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_69'>69</span>The nominal maximum hours in restaurants
+visited by her are given by Miss Irwin as
+follows:—</p>
+
+<table class='table2'>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c027'>“In 3 cases</td>
+    <td class='c025'>16</td>
+    <td class='c027'>hours on one or more days in the week</td>
+    <td class='c011'>96 hours.</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c027'>„ 1   „</td>
+    <td class='c025'>15½</td>
+    <td class='c027'>„         „          „</td>
+    <td class='c011'>93   „</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c027'>„ 1   „</td>
+    <td class='c025'>12 to 17</td>
+    <td class='c027'>„         „          „</td>
+    <td class='c011'>93   „</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c027'>„ 1   „</td>
+    <td class='c025'>15</td>
+    <td class='c027'>„         „          „</td>
+    <td class='c011'>90   „</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c027'>„ 2   „</td>
+    <td class='c025'>16</td>
+    <td class='c027'>„         „          „</td>
+    <td class='c011'>87   „</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c027'>„ 1   „</td>
+    <td class='c025'>14½</td>
+    <td class='c027'>„         „          „</td>
+    <td class='c011'>87   „</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c027'>„ 2   „</td>
+    <td class='c025'>13 to 14</td>
+    <td class='c027'>„         „          „</td>
+    <td class='c011'>79   „</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c027'>„ 4   „</td>
+    <td class='c025'>12½ to 15½</td>
+    <td class='c027'>„         „          „</td>
+    <td class='c011'>78   „</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c027'>„ 1   „</td>
+    <td class='c025'>17</td>
+    <td class='c027'>„         „          „</td>
+    <td class='c011'>77   „</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c027'>„ 3   „</td>
+    <td class='c025'>12 to 12½</td>
+    <td class='c027'>„         „          „</td>
+    <td class='c011'>72 to 75   „</td>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c027'>„ 1   „</td>
+    <td class='c025'>13</td>
+    <td class='c027'>„         „          „</td>
+    <td class='c011'>70   „</td>
+  </tr>
+</table>
+
+<p class='c014'>“These,” adds Miss Irwin, “are the <em>nominal</em>
+hours, but&#160;... in several cases the information
+was taken from the women assistants at a later
+hour than the nominal closing time.”<a id='r27'></a><a href='#f27' class='c023'><sup>[27]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The expenses of a waitress are often considerable;
+she almost always has to pay for
+the washing of the aprons, collars and cuffs
+that are a part of her uniform, and in most
+cases to provide them. As nearly every company
+has its different pattern the articles are
+apt to become useless when employment is
+changed. Moreover in some restaurants and
+refreshment-rooms, all breakages, whether made
+by them or by customers, are paid for by the
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_70'>70</span>assistants. I have known girls subject to this
+deduction who complained that they received
+no statement as to how the amount deducted
+was made up. That the sum is in some cases
+not trifling is shown by a newspaper correspondence
+that occurred in the year 1890. A
+representative of Messrs Spiers &#38; Pond, Ltd.,
+wrote to a newspaper complaining that the
+amounts habitually deducted at Waterloo
+Station had been overstated, and assigned
+1s. 9½d. as the weekly average for each assistant.
+This being the firm’s own estimate,
+there can be no injustice in quoting it. When
+we remember that the wages of waitresses
+average, roughly, from 7s. to 14s. a week, less
+8d. or 9d. for washing, we shall probably
+regard an average deduction of 1s. 9½d. a
+week as by no means inconsiderable. A
+certain proportion of breakages is manifestly
+incidental to the refreshment trade and the
+renewal of crockery is as much one of its
+natural expenses as the renewal of fuel. Either
+of these items might just as fairly be laid
+upon the waitresses. It is often made a reproach
+to schemes of industrial partnership
+that the employees share the profits without
+sharing the losses. This particular form of
+partnership, in which employees bear losses
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_71'>71</span>but take no share in gains seems to have
+escaped the economists.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In the matters of poor pay, uncertainty
+of employment and compulsorily “respectable”
+clothing, clerks and bookkeepers occupy
+much the same position as shop assistants;
+and when their employment happens to be in
+shops, their hours are equally long. A young
+woman known to me, a highly competent
+clerk and book-keeper, showed me letters from
+employers with whom she was in treaty. In
+one case she was to be cashier and book-keeper
+in a very well known and flourishing shop;
+she was to be at her post until 11 <span class='fss'>P.M.</span> on
+Saturdays and until 8 (or it may have been
+8.30) on other evenings. Her pay was to be
+8s. a week, living out. I may add that
+shortly afterwards I myself saw this shop
+open one evening, not Saturday, at nearly
+9 o’clock. The other post, again that of
+cashier and book-keeper, was in the office of
+an extremely wealthy wholesale City firm,
+where thousands of pounds would have passed
+through her hands weekly and where the
+book-keeping would have been very complex.
+The salary offered was 14s. a week.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Reviewing this chapter, I see that I have
+dealt almost exclusively with large establishments.
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_72'>72</span>In smaller ones and especially in
+poor districts the food and housing may be
+worse, and the payment will almost certainly
+be lower. On the other hand the regulations
+will in all likelihood be less rigid and sometimes
+the relations between employer and
+employed will be quite human and even
+homelike.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Of the general conditions in a thoroughly
+low class shop, Mr Maxwell’s <cite>Vivien</cite> presents
+a picture faithful probably in most particulars.
+A more typical case, illuminated
+by a spark of real genius, is portrayed in
+Mr Wells’s <cite>Kipps</cite>; and there is an admirable
+vignette in Gissing’s <cite>The Odd Women</cite>.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>It is only just to add that neither the somewhat
+exhaustive investigations made under the
+auspices of the Women’s Industrial Council
+nor such information as, during a considerable
+course of years, I have been able to collect
+personally, confirm those accusations of prevalent
+immorality which might be suggested
+by such novels as Zola’s <cite><span lang="fr">Au Bonheur des
+Dames</span></cite>, and which are freely made in some
+quarters. No doubt instances must from time
+to time occur in which a shopwalker or an
+employer makes use of his position as a weapon
+of seduction; but such instances are certainly
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_73'>73</span>the exception. There may also possibly have
+existed, somewhere, at some time, a basis of
+fact for that persistent legend of the employer
+who offers to young women the free use of a
+latch key by way of compensation for low
+payment.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>For the large majority of shop girls, however,
+the temptations of shop life take the
+form not of illicit lovemaking within the
+shop but rather of continued dulness, driving
+and discomfort, constantly pressing them towards
+any offered means of escape. The
+passion that really prevails in the modern
+shop is the passion for money, which, no less
+than more lurid passions preferred by the
+romance writer, devours the youth and lives
+of girls. It does not, however, consciously fall
+under the classification of the decalogue, and
+the destroyers of these victims often honestly
+believe themselves to be men of singular
+righteousness and virtue, the pillars and bulwarks
+of an industrious, commercial nation.
+The feudal baron, not improbably regarded
+himself in no very different light.</p>
+
+<p class='c002'><em>Note.</em> The daily papers of the week in which this chapter was
+written contained two cases that corroborate the statements
+made in it; and that show the evils described to be by no
+means matters of the past. I give them verbatim, except that
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_74'>74</span>in the second case I have concealed the name of the accused
+lad.</p>
+
+<p class='c004'>George A. Evans, coffee-shop keeper, of Goldsmith’s Row,
+Hackney Road, was summoned at Old Street for breaches of
+the Shop Hours Act by employing two young persons as
+waitresses for more than 74 hours in any one week.</p>
+
+<p class='c004'>Mr D. Carter, for the London County Council, explained
+that girls under the age of 18 were denominated “young
+persons,” and while they might be worked 12 hours for the
+first five days of the week, and 14 hours on a Saturday, all
+meal times were to be counted in as part of the employment.</p>
+
+<p class='c004'>The defendant was found employing a girl aged 17 years and
+7 months, and another 16 years and 2 months, and both had
+in the week ending May 26th worked 85 hours each. Further,
+the defendant had no notice of the hours of labour, as allowed
+by the Act, exhibited in his shop. He was also summoned
+for that offence.</p>
+
+<p class='c004'>Defendant pleaded guilty, and Mr Dickinson imposed fines
+and costs amounting to £4, 18s.—<cite>Daily News</cite>, 23rd August
+1906.</p>
+
+<p class='c004'>A well dressed clerk, named Y. Z., aged 16, was charged at
+Marylebone with having embezzled £2, 2s. belonging to his
+employers Ryland &#38; Co., auctioneers of Edgeware Road.
+His duty was to collect rents, and it was alleged that his
+defalcations amounted in all to £7, 10s. In extenuation of
+the offence he pointed out that his wages only came to 12s. a
+week, out of which he had to pay 4s. rent and 2s. travelling
+expenses, leaving him but 6s. a week with which to clothe and
+feed himself. He took the £2, 2s. intending to pay it back,
+but he was found out before he could do so. His hours were
+from 9 to 6. Mr Paul Taylor said he was at a loss to know
+how Z. could have sustained life on the small salary he was
+receiving. He remanded him to give the missionary an
+opportunity of seeing what could be done for him.—<cite>Tribune</cite>,
+24th August 1906.</p>
+
+<div>
+  <span class='pageno' id='Page_75'>75</span>
+  <h3 class='c005'>CHAPTER IV<br> <span class='c020'>TRAFFIC WORKERS</span></h3>
+</div>
+
+<p class='c022'>The traffic worker and the public safety—“Privileged cabs”—Railway
+workers—The hours of signalmen—The seven day
+week—“Blacklisting”—London’s omnibus men—Paying the
+police for leave to work—“The rest of the evening”—What
+is required of a driver—What is required of a conductor—Wages
+stopped for fogs, fires and processions—Curiosities of
+an “Accident Club”—How a motor man is “passed” for a
+licence—The “journey system”—What it means to the
+passenger—What it means to the men—Breakdowns—Wages
+in the garage—3d. a day for uniform—“The bar up”—The
+best employer in London—Tram men under the London
+County Council.</p>
+
+<p class='c013'>In these days of much journeying, there is
+scarcely one of us whose life and safety do not
+depend, again and again, upon the skill, the
+steadiness, the nerve and the judgment of the
+men who steer our public conveyances. Not
+only in their own interests, therefore, but in
+the interest of public security, it is essential
+that the men upon whom rests so vast a
+responsibility should not be overworked,
+underpaid nor harassed. The sad fact is,
+however, that the vast majority of them are
+both overworked and harassed; and that, if
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_76'>76</span>not the majority, at least a very appreciable
+minority are decidedly underpaid.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Of cabmen I do not propose to speak; the
+subject of their hours, conditions and rates of
+pay being so intricate that anything like a
+general view is difficult to present. I will
+content myself with indicating, by means of a
+paragraph from a Parliamentary Report, the
+kind of exactions to which cabmen are exposed.
+“Privileged cabs” are those admitted, upon
+payment of a fixed charge, to ply in railway
+stations. It appears that the lowest charge
+made by any company maintaining the
+privileged cab system is 1s. per week. The
+smallest number of cabs is “15, at Clapham
+Junction, and the largest number of cabs, 290,
+at Paddington, which at 3s. per week provide
+the Great Western Railway with the substantial
+sum of £2262 per annum.”<a id='r28'></a><a href='#f28' class='c023'><sup>[28]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The railway workers of Great Britain are,
+as a class, men of excellent character, intelligent,
+careful, attentive and worthy of the trust
+reposed in them. They have a strong trade
+union, and their secretary now sits in Parliament.
+Yet this body of grown men, most of
+them voters, was so unable to secure from its
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_77'>77</span>employers a reasonably short working day
+that the legislature, unwilling though it has
+always shown itself to any direct regulation
+of the working hours of men, felt compelled
+in the interests of public safety, to intervene;
+and a special order of the Board of Trade has,
+for many years past, limited the hours of
+railway men. Yet, even now, there are porters,
+generally at small stations, who are on duty
+for 16 hours a day; and 8 hours, which should
+be the longest day of any signalman, are extended,
+except in the busiest boxes, to 10 and,
+in some cases, to 12. Many a porter works
+seven days a week for 16s., perhaps at some
+small station where “tips” are infrequent.
+In this connection it is worthy of note that
+such companies as pay additionally for Sunday
+labour find it possible to do with much fewer
+workers on Sundays. Of how much improvement
+the railway man’s lot is still susceptible
+may be judged from the programme of the
+union, drawn up at the close of 1906, and
+about to be submitted to the various companies.
+Its demands are as follows:—</p>
+
+<div class='lg-container-b'>
+  <div class='linegroup'>
+    <div class='group'>
+      <div class='line'>An eight-hour day for trainmen, shunters and signalmen.</div>
+    </div>
+    <div class='group'>
+      <div class='line'>No railway employee to work more than ten hours a day.</div>
+    </div>
+    <div class='group'>
+      <div class='line'><span class='pageno' id='Page_78'>78</span>An increase of 2s. per week in the wages of all grades receiving less than 30s. per week.</div>
+    </div>
+    <div class='group'>
+      <div class='line'>Sunday labour to be paid for at the rate of time and a half; and overtime at the rate of time and a quarter.<a id='r29'></a><a href='#f29' class='c023'><sup>[29]</sup></a></div>
+    </div>
+  </div>
+</div>
+
+<p class='c014'>The worst form of oppression, however, to
+which the railway man is exposed is one very
+difficult to prove and very easy to deny:
+“blacklisting.” A railway servant, on leaving
+the employ of one company, (whether at the
+company’s instance or at his own) receives no
+written character, nor can he refer any intending
+employer to the report of his immediate
+superior. Enquiry must be made at
+headquarters; and it seldom happens that a
+man who, for whatever cause, has left the
+service of one company, succeeds in getting
+taken on by another. The men are convinced
+that a deliberate understanding exists, and
+this conviction leads many of them, unwillingly
+subservient, to endure the ills they have,
+rather than face loss of employment and of
+pay. Any trade that is in the hands—as the
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_79'>79</span>railway industry of course is—of comparatively
+few and very powerful employers is especially
+liable to develop the tyranny of “blacklisting.”
+The existence of the practice is almost
+invariably denied, and can, in the nature of
+things, very seldom be substantiated; but it
+is possible to remark that, as a matter of
+experience, one company does not engage the
+man who has previously worked for another.
+The men know, experimentally, that to leave
+their present employers means, in the great
+majority of cases, leaving the industry altogether.
+How much such knowledge must sap
+a man’s independence, how much it must try
+his nerves and his temper, it is, surely, unnecessary
+to insist.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The railway workers have, in the course of
+years, conquered the immense difficulties that
+beset the organising of men whose hours are
+long and varying, and whose work brings them
+rather apart than together. Other workers,
+whose employment is closely akin to theirs,
+are still involved in those early struggles
+which seem to the men engaged in them almost
+hopeless. Comparing their position with that
+of the railway men, we shall see, once again,
+how great are the benefits which organisation
+can bestow, and how powerless are even
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_80'>80</span>skilled and licensed workmen unless backed
+by a strong union.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The omnibus men of London form a group
+of workers familiar to all London’s citizens.
+The most tedious of “blocks” has been
+enlivened for us by their “chaff”; the blackest
+of fogs and the most scorching of dog-days
+have failed to destroy their patience and their
+good temper. With the advent of the motor
+omnibus, however, a change has become
+apparent which fills observant Londoners
+with foreboding. The motor man is, to put it
+plainly, snappish; he hustles his passengers in
+and out; he not infrequently turns a blind eye
+to the breathless pursuer; and he is apt to be
+caustic in remarks upon the slowness of the
+aged or the unwieldy traveller. To this
+impatience the jarring motion and irritating
+jangle of the car may perhaps contribute; but
+the main reason of it may, I believe, be found
+in the conditions under which the drivers
+and conductors of motor omnibuses mostly
+work.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>It may be of some interest to compare
+the conditions of three different groups of
+men, all of whom are busied in the work
+of carrying London’s inhabitants to and
+fro; especially since their cases exemplify
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_81'>81</span>a transition which is in course of progress
+around us.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>All drivers and conductors are compelled to
+pay for leave to exercise their calling. It is
+considered that the security of the passenger
+requires to be safeguarded, and that no person
+should be allowed to officiate upon a public
+conveyance unless he has been licensed to do
+so. In London the ultimate licensing authority
+is the Home Secretary, to whom Section 8 of
+the Stage and Hackney Carriages (Metropolis)
+Act of 1869 has allowed a power little less
+than autocratic. These are the terms of it: “A
+licence to the driver or conductor of a hackney
+or stage carriage may be granted at such price,
+on such conditions, be in such form, be subject
+to revocation or suspension in such events and
+generally be dealt with in such manner as the
+said Secretary of State may by order prescribe,
+subject to this provision, that any licence shall,
+if not revoked or suspended, be in force for a
+year, and there shall be paid in respect thereof
+to the Receiver of the Metropolitan Police
+Fund such sum not exceeding 5s. as the said
+Secretary of State may prescribe.” Successive
+Home Secretaries have seen fit to fix the
+maximum charge of 5s. for each year’s licence;
+and between the 1st of April, 1905 and the 31st
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_82'>82</span>of March, 1906, the Commissioners of Police
+received as many sums of 5s. as sufficed to
+make up a total of £7928, 10s.<a id='r30'></a><a href='#f30' class='c023'><sup>[30]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Of the manner in which the police authorities
+exercise their power something will appear
+later on; but, apart from any question of
+administration, there is surely some injustice
+in taxing the men for a licence demanded not
+at all in their interest, but solely in that of
+their passengers. That the owners of public
+conveyances, who derive a profit from running
+them on the public roads, and who in doing so
+assist to wear out those roads, should pay for a
+licence may be not inequitable; but that the
+paid servants of such owners should be taxed,
+as a condition of entering that service, can
+hardly, when judicially considered, be pronounced
+defensible, and it is not surprising
+that the Select Committee should advise
+alteration. “The theory of the Home Office,”
+says the Report, “seems to be that, in view of
+the special benefits derived by the cab and
+omnibus trade from its connection with the
+police, it is only fair that the trade should be
+specially taxed for the maintenance of the
+police.... There seem, however, to be few
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_83'>83</span>other classes of the community who are
+charged in this way for their own police
+inspection, and in our opinion, the system
+requires modification.”<a id='r31'></a><a href='#f31' class='c023'><sup>[31]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The drivers and conductors of horse omnibuses
+(though there have been changes in
+their conditions) are still employed upon
+the system which was once the only one in
+vogue, and are, at least nominally, paid by the
+day. The length of day varies somewhat on
+different routes, but the average is about
+fifteen hours—or very nearly twice the length
+of the working day in the best managed
+industries. Moreover, the omnibus man
+works as a rule thirteen days in a fortnight.
+His share of leisure is pretty well described by
+the reply of an elderly driver who, in the hearing
+of my informant, was asked by a passenger,
+at something after 11 <span class='fss'>P.M.</span>, whether this was
+the last journey. “Yes, sir,” the man answered
+mildly, “this is our last journey—and the
+rest of the evening we have to ourselves.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Out of his nominal daily wage of 7s. or 8s.,
+the driver has to provide rugs, capes and whips.
+Custom requires of him “tips” to horse-keepers,
+pullers-up, &#38;c., the total of which is
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_84'>84</span>estimated at not far short of a shilling a day.
+In only a few cases are the men near enough
+to their homes at dinner time to be met by a
+small son or daughter carefully conveying
+“Father’s dinner” in a covered dish or basin—an
+economy possible to very many cabmen.
+Their meal, on this account, inevitably costs
+them rather more than if it could be prepared
+at home; and the same increase of cost attends
+their tea. Less than two meals in 15 hours, a
+man who works in the open air can scarcely
+do with.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Superhuman punctuality is expected of the
+omnibus. Should it arrive two or three minutes
+late—or two or three minutes early—at one of
+its “points,” its driver may be suspended from
+work for from two to seven days. The conductor,
+whose nominal wage is 6s. a day, is
+liable to be suspended or discharged if his takings
+fall below the average. When a journey
+is stopped by fog, fire or the occurrence of a
+procession, the proportion of pay for that
+journey is deducted from the wage of driver
+and conductor alike, even although they may
+not succeed in bringing the omnibus into the
+yard until after the usual hour, or even if, as
+happens occasionally, they may have to stay
+out all night with it. As one of the fraternity
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_85'>85</span>sardonically remarked to me: “It’s a new
+experience for them, that’s all.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>At the present moment, the drivers and
+conductors of horse omnibuses are face to face
+with the prospect of a lowered wage. On
+one line, there has been a reduction of one
+journey <em>per diem</em> (the working day having
+previously been one of 16 hours) and a
+reduction in the day’s pay of 1s. 6d. for the
+driver (from 8s. to 6s. 6d.) and of 1s. for the
+conductor. It is fully expected that men on
+other lines will, before long, experience the
+same change.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>It will, I am sure, surprise many readers
+to learn that the drivers and conductors of
+omnibuses are expected to defray the expenses
+of accidents. The men employed by one
+large company subscribe to a fund for the
+purpose of meeting such expenses. I cannot
+learn that any direct rule obliges them to
+belong to this so-called “Drivers’ and Conductors’
+Accident Club,” but they are of
+opinion that any man who declined to belong
+would not find himself, for long, in the employ
+of the company. I have been fortunate
+enough to inspect the rules of this club, and
+have carefully preserved a copy. It is a
+document equally remarkable for its oppressiveness
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_86'>86</span>and for its grammar. The preamble
+runs thus: “This Club&#160;... is for
+the purpose of creating a fund by which the
+expenses so frequently arising from accidental
+causes may be met without allowing these
+expenses to fall unjustly upon the company,
+or subjecting the individuals who may be
+the immediate cause of such expenses to perilous
+and embarrassing circumstances, and, be
+it further understood, that each Driver and
+Conductor are responsible for all damages to
+property or person to the amount of Ten
+Pounds, and any Driver or Conductor not
+conforming with the Club Rules will not be
+allowed any assistance from the Funds thereof
+for any accident they may meet with.” Rule
+1 requires “Each Driver to pay 2s. entrance
+fee as soon as he is passed eligible to drive an
+Omnibus belonging to the Club. Each Conductor
+to pay 1s. entrance fee. Each Service
+Driver to pay 1s. per week contribution.
+Each Service Conductor to pay 6d. per week
+contribution.” Rules 3 and 5 are worth
+quoting. “Whatever accident may occur
+by any Driver and Conductor, whether
+regular or spare men, he shall pay towards
+such accident not less than one quarter of
+the amount the accident may cost the
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_87'>87</span>Club to settle. If not able to pay the whole
+of such fourth in one payment it must be
+paid by instalments of not less than 2s. 6d.
+per week. Should it be further proved that
+such accident was brought about by intoxication
+or any kind of neglect, the Committee
+shall, at their next meeting, have power to
+levy any further sum they agree upon, and,
+whatever sum fixed, may be paid by weekly
+instalments by such sums as may be agreed
+upon by the Committee.” “Should any Member
+of the Club leave or be discharged from the
+Company’s service within three months of
+his becoming a Member, such Member shall
+forfeit all claims upon the Club funds.” Rule
+7, after providing for quarterly meetings, proceeds:
+“The fourth meeting to take place on
+the most convenient date in December, when
+after putting away as reserve fund, not less
+than £40, any surplus remaining to be equally
+divided among the Members in accordance
+with what they may be entitled to.” Rule 9
+is, perhaps, the most remarkable piece of
+grammatical construction that ever presented
+itself under the guise of English. “Any
+Member having left the Club and is indebted
+thereto shall not be entitled to share, unless
+all arrears be paid up. Any Member having
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_88'>88</span>left the Club and is entitled to share must
+apply for same within the first calendar month
+of the ensuing year, if not his share will be
+lost and will be placed to the credit of the
+Club for the ensuing year.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Thus the nominal wage of every driver in
+this company’s service is really reduced by
+1s. weekly, and that of every conductor by
+6d.; while a fund of “not less than £40,”
+saved up out of these men’s earnings, is held
+in hand to indemnify the company for possible
+accidents, whether such accidents are caused
+by the fault of the men or not. The conductor,
+indeed, can seldom be even remotely
+responsible for an accident; yet the conductor,
+no less than the driver, is made to pay this
+tax. It would be interesting to know whether
+the law would uphold a man who should refuse
+to pay anything at all towards the cost
+of an accident not caused by neglect or misconduct.
+He would, of course, lose all chance
+of further employment in the trade; but he
+might conceivably put an end, once and for
+all, to these exactions.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>It will hardly appear, from all that has
+been said, that the life of the omnibus man is
+extraordinarily enviable; yet his situation is
+decidedly preferable to that of the man who
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_89'>89</span>exchanges the society of a pair of horses for
+that of a snorting and self-willed motor. Like
+the horse driver, the motor driver must secure
+a licence, for which, when he gets it, he must
+pay 5s. yearly to the Police Commissioners;
+and if possessing a horse licence he desires to
+retain it he must pay an additional 5s. per
+annum. Moreover, when he enters his application,
+he has also to pay a fee of 5s. to the
+London County Council for registration. The
+Commissioners have been known to refuse
+motor licences to men who have been driving
+for years, but whose licence shows an endorsement,
+sometimes of distant date and sometimes
+for an offence of trivial character. To the lay
+mind it appears that a man, whose misdemeanours
+were not too great to make him
+unfit for driving a horse omnibus, is likely to
+be a safer driver for a motor than a man from
+some other calling, quite inexperienced in the
+art of threading the maze of London traffic.
+In any case it is clearly an injustice that such
+a man should not be able to learn, before
+spending time and money upon special training,
+that a licence will not be granted to him.
+The test of competence applied is curious but
+probably effective. A certain inspector, whose
+name I refrain from giving, collects a number
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_90'>90</span>of candidates and places himself with one of
+them on the driving stand of a motor omnibus,
+the remainder of the candidates occupying
+seats as passengers. The driver, under orders
+from the inspector, steers the car hither and
+thither until such time as his instructor dismisses
+him to inaction, and selects another.
+Not until the party has returned home, does
+any man learn his fate. Then the inspector
+remarks to each as the case may be: “You
+have passed,” or “You must come up again.”
+The fiat of this gentleman being unchecked,
+it is well that it appears to be dictated by
+justice. Beloved, indeed, of his licencees he
+is not; but I found myself hardly able to
+sympathise with complaints of his unsmiling
+disposition. How should a man smile, whose
+calling in life it is to imperil his existence at
+the hands of an endless succession of unpractised
+motor drivers? A certain proportion
+of these candidates are men who have never
+driven in the London streets—some of them
+never on any road whatever. There is a
+legend of one, said to have been originally a
+shop assistant, who entered upon his career
+unaware that he was expected to drive to the
+left rather than to the right. I have myself
+travelled in a motor omnibus the driver of
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_91'>91</span>which took the wrong side of three refuges
+between Maida Vale and Tottenham Court
+Road. Whether ignorance guided his course
+or a desire to achieve a full complement of
+journeys <em>per diem</em> I cannot, of course, tell.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Having secured his licence and an engagement,
+the motor driver is put upon a certain
+route, to perform a shift, not of so many
+hours, but of so many journeys. The “journey
+system,” which is responsible for nearly all the
+ill temper and not a few of the accidents that
+attend the course of the motor omnibus, is as
+follows. A certain number of journeys each
+day is allotted to each car. Driver and conductor
+are paid by the journey, and the
+required number of journeys is such that only
+under the most favourable possible conditions
+can it be completed. At least one car in
+every three will fail in the task. Let us
+consider, for instance, the case of certain cars
+which, at one period, were timed to do four
+journeys, but have recently been required to
+make six in the day. Two shifts are worked,
+each set of men being supposed to make three
+journeys. Since the very barest measure of
+time is allowed, the men are constantly on the
+strain; they are tempted to take risks, and
+are unwilling to pause long enough for the
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_92'>92</span>picking up and setting down of passengers.
+At the close of the period allowed for the
+first shift, the third journey will in all probability
+not be finished, but it may have been
+begun, and will be concluded before the car is
+brought in. It thus becomes more impossible
+than ever for the second set of journeys to be
+compressed into the shortened hours left for
+the second shift, the rather that the car will
+very probably have suffered from the strain
+put upon it in the endeavour to get out of it
+the utmost amount of work. Two journeys
+may be achieved, in which case the driver
+may receive from 4s. to 5s., and the conductor
+from 3s. to 4s.; or only one may be completed,
+in which case the payment of each will be
+but half as much. Is it wonderful that the
+tempers of men working under such conditions
+display some uncertainty, nor that accidents
+are frequent especially in the latter half of the
+day? The wonder is that so many cautious
+City gentlemen, who obviously regard their
+own lives as precious, should continue to entrust
+their persons to vehicles so precarious.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>On some lines, the men work early and late
+shifts in alternate weeks; on others, they
+change twice a week. A driver, working on
+these terms, explained to me how, on a certain
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_93'>93</span>evening in the week, he came off duty about
+midnight, after which time he had to get
+home, to get himself clean—no rapid process,
+as many an amateur motorist well knows—and
+to get his supper. Soon after six, next
+morning, he was due at the garage to take on
+his early shift, and was obliged, therefore, to
+leave home by about half past five. His
+next leisure for a meal not arriving until
+seven hours later, it behoves him to get his
+breakfast before he sets out. How many
+hours’ rest fall to his share on such occasions,
+and how fit he is, in the morning, to assume
+the responsibility of a motor omnibus and its
+complement of passengers, readers may judge
+for themselves.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Among other evils arising from this system
+we may note the way in which every man’s
+hand is turned against his comrade. It
+becomes the interest of the first shift to snatch
+time enough for their own journeys, to the
+loss of the second shift; while the second
+shift would be more than human if they did
+not resent the time thus lost. The employing
+company alone profits by setting up an
+impossible, or almost impossible, task as the
+measure of the day’s payment. By pretending
+that three journeys instead of two form the
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_94'>94</span>task of one shift of workers, the payment for
+each journey can be fixed at one-third instead
+of at one-half of what may be reckoned as the
+wage of a man’s working day.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>From the moment when the car breaks
+down—and how frequently it does so our own
+eyes assure us—the payment of its driver and
+conductor cease. They must remain by the
+disabled vehicle until a trolley comes to drag
+it away; their period of waiting may stretch
+into several hours—it may even extend
+through the night, but for that part of their
+time in which they were not actually conveying
+passengers they will not receive a penny.
+Some companies have indeed a rule upon their
+code that payment will be made if the road
+engineer employed by the firm certifies that
+the driver is not responsible for the accident.
+One can understand that certificates, the granting
+of which means money out of pocket
+to the company, are not likely to be very
+lavishly issued by an engineer in the company’s
+employ; and there are men who declare
+that this rule is a dead letter and that
+broken journeys are never paid for. Industrially
+speaking, the history of the motor
+omnibus industry in London has been unfortunate.
+One, at least, of the firms that
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_95'>95</span>appeared early in the field followed the tactics
+rendered familiar by the example of American
+trusts. It began, as the trust does, by underselling
+competitors, and offered the passenger
+a longer journey for a penny. A hope was
+probably entertained that these low fares
+would deter the older companies from setting
+up motor conveyances. The older companies
+were not deterred; but they found themselves
+compelled to compete on their rival’s terms;
+so that, for a time, the curious alternative was
+offered to the Londoner, of travelling from the
+Marble Arch to Victoria, either in a slow
+horse omnibus, for 2d., or in a quick motor
+omnibus for 1d. To travel for 1d. instead of
+for 2d. is the desire of every passenger; but
+the gratification may be bought too dear, and
+danger is a high price to pay. How much
+danger the passenger incurs, who travels in
+the motor omnibuses of certain companies may
+be guessed by persons who have heard—as I
+have—the drivers of these vehicles talking
+among themselves of the accidents and of the
+hairbreadth escapes that have formed part of
+their own experience. The running into the
+river of the Barnes omnibus was foretold, less
+than a week before its occurrence, as a thing
+that must, sooner or later, come to pass. The
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_96'>96</span>trained men who face them are fully aware
+what risks they are running; and to some of
+them, no doubt, the very risk is an attraction.
+No motor man need complain that modern
+life lacks incident and adventure. The
+passenger, on the other hand, who, when he
+sits behind a horse, can see for himself its
+weakness or its restiveness, cannot possibly
+judge the strength or the weakness of
+machinery that is not even open to his view.
+Some omnibuses, no doubt, are in excellent
+condition; but it is equally certain that there
+are others, the essential parts of which are
+perilously near to being worn out. Accumulated
+experience has convinced even so
+technically unskilled an observer as myself
+that there is at least one company whose
+vehicles are not, in themselves, dangerous,
+and at least one other with whose habitual
+passengers a prudent life insurance company
+should have nothing to do. In the hands of
+an unskilled driver, or of a driver rendered
+temporarily unskilled by fatigue, by too long
+a fast, or by too little sleep, every motor
+omnibus is dangerous; and every hardship of
+the men thus becomes a source of public
+danger.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The frequency of breakdowns has undoubtedly
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_97'>97</span>been increased by the shortsighted
+policy of some owners who, for economy’s
+sake, have employed in the repairing shop, not
+qualified engineers, but merely “fitters,” or
+even those humbler persons known as “fitters’
+mates.” The lesson of experience, however,
+seems to be teaching wisdom in this respect;
+and the motor companies are learning, as
+other employers have learned before them,
+that to entrust costly property to unskilled
+hands comes expensive, however low the
+wages paid. Meanwhile, we are informed by
+the Report of the Select Committee upon the
+Cabs and Omnibuses (Metropolitan) Bill, that
+during the period covered by that Report,
+25% of the cars were on an average always
+out of use. This means, of course, that a
+certain ratio of the men employed upon such
+cars were always out of a job. Most of these
+would be set to various kinds of work in
+the garage, their payment while so employed
+being but 3s. 6d. a day, a rate representing,
+for ten hours, less than fourpence an hour.
+These are truths which should be recollected
+when persons familiar only with the nominal
+figure of a wage that can hardly ever be
+earned, talk of the good pay of motor
+drivers. Moreover, instances are quoted in
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_98'>98</span>which men have not received even this
+pittance for the time spent in the garage, but
+have been paid only for one day instead of for
+two or three. By one company a notice has
+been posted up that, from the day upon which
+these words are written, no work done in the
+garage will be paid for, unless a certificate has
+been obtained from the superintendent of the
+garage.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>It may be remarked that this principle of
+proportional deduction which is so dear to
+the hearts of the companies is not applied in
+the matter of the uniform, for which although
+it never becomes the wearer’s property a charge
+of threepence a day is demanded, even though
+the day may have been broken and the uniform
+worn only during an hour or two. A tale is
+told of a conductor to whom, the car having
+come to grief early in the shift, fourpence was
+handed as the fraction of wage to which he
+was entitled, out of which sum he was
+requested to hand back threepence in payment
+for his uniform. He had not presence of
+mind enough to reduce this charge in proportion
+to the reduction of his own wages, and to
+proffer a farthing as the nearest equivalent
+to one-fifteenth of threepence, but weakly
+yielded to the demand and went away with a
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_99'>99</span>penny. At threepence a day and 339 days in
+a year (<em>i.e.</em>, deducting 26 Sundays) each man
+would pay £4, 4s. 3d. for his coat, cap, &#38;c. It
+would be interesting to know what price is
+paid for the articles by the company.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Employment in the omnibus trade, whether
+behind a horse or behind a motor, is thus full
+of discomforts and of weariness. Yet, such as
+it is, the men would be thankful for any
+certainty of retaining it. They are liable to
+discharge upon any complaint from an inspector
+(or possibly from an outside person)
+and no opportunity is allowed of exculpating
+themselves. Furthermore they are firmly
+convinced that a number of spies—“spots” is
+their own slang term—travel to and fro in the
+character of ordinary passengers and constantly
+present complaints, ill or well founded
+as the case may be, to the companies.
+“There’s plenty of people,” said one man,
+“who never pay their omnibus fares. They
+send in their tickets to the company and get
+back their money.” “Of course,” said another,
+“they must make plenty of complaints or the
+companies wouldn’t think it worth while to
+keep them on.” Whether this belief is right
+or wrong, its existence is, at least, highly
+significant of the light in which the men
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_100'>100</span>regard their employers, and is, I venture
+to say, a symptom of very unsatisfactory
+relations.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The men are also persuaded that there exists
+among the Federation of masters a tacit compact
+in accordance with which a man who
+has quitted the service of any one of them
+will not, for a certain length of time, be
+admitted into that of any other. In their own
+language “the bar is up” against such a man.
+How far this opinion is well founded it is
+difficult to judge; but it is unquestionably the
+fact that instance after instance can be adduced
+of drivers, holding unendorsed licences, who,
+on leaving the employment of one company,
+have been refused week after week, by the
+others, and have been obliged at last to find
+some other calling. One finds himself happier
+and wealthier as a street sweeper. In at least
+one such case the responsible post eventually
+secured is a guarantee of good character and
+steadiness.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>It is always instructive to compare the
+conditions offered by the best and the worst
+employers, respectively, in the same trade.
+In the matter of traffic, the best employer in
+London is the London County Council. To
+begin with, the men who work upon its trams
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_101'>101</span>pay nothing for their uniforms. Their working
+day is of ten hours. Time lost by such
+hindrances as fog, fire and processions is paid
+extra (at the rate known to the trade as
+“time and a half”). Work on a seventh day
+in the week when it occurs is paid at time-and-a-quarter
+rates. Moreover any horse
+driver in the Council’s service who desires to
+qualify as an electric driver can be trained,
+free of charge, in the municipal technical
+school; whereas the charge for training made
+by one of the private companies is £5. Not
+only does the London County Council issue to
+its inspectors special instructions to avoid
+arbitrary and domineering treatment of subordinates;
+it also affords to every man accused
+by an inspector the opportunity of meeting his
+accuser face to face, and of telling his own
+story. In short, the London County Council
+treats those deserving citizens who do its work,
+with justice and with respect; and they, in
+their turn, treat the public with a degree of
+kindly courtesy most refreshing after the
+asperities of the motor omnibus man. Nor
+can it be maintained by any truthful person
+that the comparatively comfortable conditions
+of the municipal tram men have cost the
+ratepayer too dear; since the profits of the
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_102'>102</span>Southern tramway lines alone in the year 1905
+were assessed by the Exchequer for income tax
+purposes at £203,831; while, in addition to
+the large profits thus indicated, the reduction
+of fares on these lines must, by this time, have
+saved hundreds of pounds to the travelling
+public.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>With the exception, then, of that fortunate
+minority employed by the municipality, the
+workers on the public conveyances of London
+present no very cheering spectacle. In the
+beginning of this 20th century, and in the
+capital of a country that prides itself upon the
+freedom of its citizens and upon the representative
+character of its government, we find
+adult skilled male workers, performing valuable
+public services and occupying positions of
+great responsibility, apparently as powerless
+as any sweated home worker in her garret to
+secure for themselves either a reasonably short
+working day, or equitable treatment, or payment
+for the whole of the hours spent in the
+employer’s service. Yet one group of them
+is guaranteed by the licence of a public
+department as efficient; the services which
+they render are eagerly demanded by the
+public; their industry is one in which foreign
+competition is impossible; and the companies
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_103'>103</span>employing them are in many instances paying
+high dividends. These, surely, are facts very
+much worth the consideration of all those
+fellow citizens for whom, in the last resort,
+the railway man and the omnibus man are
+working.</p>
+
+<div>
+  <span class='pageno' id='Page_104'>104</span>
+  <h3 class='c005'>CHAPTER V<br> <span class='c020'>WAGE-EARNING CHILDREN</span></h3>
+</div>
+
+<p class='c022'>Children and home work—Boot making—Box making—All night
+at match box making—“Can do nearly everything”—A boy
+tooth brush maker—A boy belt maker—Polishing “spindle
+legs”—Children and laundry work—Errands—Street sellers—Boys
+in bakehouses—In brick fields—Girls and heavy
+trays of jam—Half timers’ heavy loads—Things as they were—Terrors
+of the early cotton mills—A five year old maker of
+“blonde net”—Miss Edgeworth’s “Ellen”—Mrs Hogg and
+wage-earning children—Children in American cotton mills—The
+glass bottle works—Effects of juvenile work on health—On
+education—On morals—On industrial efficiency.</p>
+
+<p class='c013'>The very worst feature of underpaid labour is
+that it tends to make wage earners of children
+and, in so doing, deteriorates the coming
+generation of adult wage earners. Where
+work is carried on in the home, the temptation
+to press children into the service is very
+great. The tedious process of fetching and
+carrying work from and to the factory or
+workshop generally falls to their lot; indeed,
+workers who have no children of their own
+not infrequently hire a child, for a few pence,
+to perform that duty. The time of a child is
+considered to be of little value—of less value
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_105'>105</span>than the three halfpence or twopence earned
+by the home worker in the hour or more that
+is often spent in waiting. Not a few children
+are habitually late for school, in consequence of
+being thus employed. Here is an instance.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>“Jane B. Standard 6. Age 13. Father a
+potman at 25s. a week. Mother machines
+uppers of boots; common goods, 10d. a
+dozen; better, 1s. 3d. a dozen. Jane sews
+on buttons, cuts apart work, inks round
+button holes. A little brother, aged nine,
+does buttons” (<em>i.e.</em>, I suppose, sews them on).
+“Mother, who does sometimes three dozen in a
+day, sometimes only three pairs, begins work
+at 7 <span class='fss'>A.M.</span> Jane begins at 7.45. She goes to
+the shop for work, in the morning, and carries
+it in—a heavy load of three dozen pairs sometimes—when
+she comes home from school.
+She gets late for school, and is only in time in
+the afternoons.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>At the same school, a girl of eleven, Alice
+J., pastes in the soles of babies’ shoes and sews
+together the pairs. A sister “sews and beats.”
+These are white buck shoes, and are paid at
+the rate of 1s. 1d. to 1s. 3d. a dozen. Two
+dozen can be done in a day. The father is a
+cabinet maker in regular work; the mother a
+cleaner (apparently at an office or warehouse).
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_106'>106</span>The sister, of 18 or 19, makes 10s. a week.
+The little Alice works from 12 to 1, and again
+from 5.30 to 6.30, doing in that time a dozen
+or fifteen pairs; she reckons that it takes her
+five minutes to finish a pair, or perhaps twenty
+minutes for six pairs.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Esther S., aged ten, and a sister aged six,
+help their mother at the midday break, and
+also in the evening, in lining and covering boxes.
+5d. a gross is paid for the smaller sort; 1s. 9d.
+for the larger sort. The work of the children
+is said to be absolutely necessary. “Dreadful
+home; nice woman,” is the observation of the
+visitor whose notes I have been permitted to
+use.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>A schoolfellow of Esther’s, Sarah W., is
+thirteen years old and in Standard 4. Her
+father was in prison. Her mother drinks.
+These parents hid their children for eight
+months, and the educational authorities had
+great difficulty in finding them. This child,
+“a very bright girl,” used to stay up all night
+making match boxes, so as to get them
+taken in by 11 the next morning. She now
+works, between school times, at capping
+sticks.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Another little girl sews and opens Japanese
+fish and poultry baskets, and sews the handles
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_107'>107</span>upon string bags; she also sometimes makes
+the bags. She does not like the work, because
+it makes her hands sore and is hard
+work. “I can do nearly everything,” this
+person of thirteen is reported as saying.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Employment out of school hours is not of
+course confined to girls. Stanley G., aged
+eleven, works from 5 to 7, wiring tooth
+brushes, and can do seven in an hour; 3½d.
+a dozen is paid for them. The visitor notes
+that he had a sore face.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Alfred D., age 13, Standard 7, helps in
+making white kid belts, receives 1d. in the
+dozen, and can do fifteen or sixteen dozen in
+the week.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>George W., who is thirteen years old, and
+only in Standard 3, does wood chopping and
+dislikes it, because it hurts his hands. His
+mother “does frame work,” and his father,
+looking glasses.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Thomas P., who is thirteen, and in Standard
+5, polishes spindle legs for a cabinet maker,
+from 5 to 8 every evening, and from 9 to 2
+on Saturdays. He receives 2s. 6d. a week;
+and announces that he is going to be a
+tobacconist—a calling for which the polishing
+of furniture legs hardly seems a valuable
+preparation.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_108'>108</span>Cases like these might be multiplied almost
+indefinitely.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>“At a recent enquiry during the spring of
+this year, it was found that in a Hackney school
+one-fourth of the girls were engaged in match
+box making, steel covering, baby shoe making
+and fish basket sewing. This latter work is
+of a specially disagreeable character, and little
+girls often complain that the manipulation of
+the reeds is a most painful process. Children
+working with their parents at home are
+frequently kept at their sewing or pasting
+until ten or eleven o’clock at night. They are
+sent to “shop” before coming to school in
+the morning, and many of them are never
+marked for regular attendance. Particularly
+severe is the lot of the children of small
+laundresses, who are often employed, both in
+housework and in ironing in a steam laden
+atmosphere, two or three nights weekly till
+ten o’clock, and all day Saturday.”<a id='r32'></a><a href='#f32' class='c023'><sup>[32]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Other children are employed by shopkeepers;
+milk and newspapers are delivered before and
+after school, boys are employed by grocers,
+greengrocers, &#38;c., to carry out goods, and—sometimes
+for incredibly long hours—by barbers.
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_109'>109</span>Girls run errands and match stuffs and trimmings.
+In the Parliamentary Return obtained
+from school teachers by Sir John Gorst in 1899,
+out of 144,026 children, about 12% were described
+as engaged in street trading, exposed
+inevitably to every inclemency of weather and
+to all the hazards of promiscuous companionship,
+while acquiring habits that unfit them
+for regular work later in life. Moreover, the
+street seller, juvenile no less than adult, is
+apt to seek for customers in the public house.
+Very few, comparatively, of employed children
+are engaged in work that is likely to be of
+use to them industrially in their maturer life;
+and even of those few, some are working
+under bad conditions. The Factory Inspectors’
+Reports are seldom free from instances of the
+overwork of children. In last year’s, for
+example, mention is made of boys under
+thirteen years of age, and even under twelve,
+being found, on several occasions, at work in
+bakehouses. One boy of twelve, who was
+found by the inspector clearing ashes from
+the oven, before 6 in the morning, had for two
+or three years been employed, before school,
+in delivering rolls, and at the midday break,
+as well as after school, in running errands.<a id='r33'></a><a href='#f33' class='c023'><sup>[33]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_110'>110</span>Several children under 13 years of age were
+found working full time in brick fields.<a id='r34'></a><a href='#f34' class='c023'><sup>[34]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>A bad case is noted on p. 99: “A lad of
+15, employed in a large tin works in West
+Wales, had started work at 6.30 <span class='fss'>A.M.</span> on a
+certain Monday morning and continued working
+till 6 <span class='fss'>A.M.</span> on the following Tuesday. During
+this period he only left the works for one
+hour, viz., 5 till 6 <span class='fss'>P.M.</span> on Monday, when he
+went home and took a short rest. He had
+therefore worked during the whole twenty-four
+hours with only about one hour’s rest.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The chief lady Inspector says, on pp. 302–3,
+“Carrying of jam and of jam-pots, empty or
+full, is still done largely by women and girls,
+and I have cautioned several occupiers about
+the weights I have found little girls lifting.
+A 40-pound tray is a heavy load for a girl
+of fourteen, and the repeated carrying of
+such trays all day long must have a bad
+effect.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Nor are jam makers the only employers who
+offend in this way. Cases have occurred in
+“textile factories, the places where one most
+expects to find labour-saving methods, but
+undoubtedly whenever there is a fairly abundant
+supply of young, cheap labour, there is
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_111'>111</span>less anxiety to introduce these, and carrying,
+pushing or pulling heavy weights is one of the
+duties of the apprentice in almost every trade.
+In a cotton weaving factory in Lancashire I
+found children and young persons<a id='r35'></a><a href='#f35' class='c023'><sup>[35]</sup></a> carrying
+cloth from the shed to the warehouse in an
+upper floor. One bundle was proved to
+weigh 44 lbs. and another 40 lbs. In a
+similar factory, also in Lancashire, I was not
+able to have weighed any of the tins of weft
+which children were found carrying to the
+looms, but from the evident effort it was to
+raise the tin to the shoulder, it was clear that
+the weight was too great. In both cases the
+entire weight was on one shoulder, and it was
+pitiful to see the twisted little figures of the
+children doing their best to accomplish more
+than they were physically fit for.”<a id='r36'></a><a href='#f36' class='c023'><sup>[36]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>On the same page Miss Martindale speaks
+of a boy whom she saw in 1903 carrying a
+piece of clay “weighing 69 lbs., his own
+weight being 77 lbs. During the two years
+which has elapsed he has hardly grown, and he
+informed me that he weighs at the present time
+81 lbs., showing an increase of only four lbs.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_112'>112</span>While it is reported that in Scotland “the
+half time system has almost ceased to exist,”
+there has recently been in some districts of
+England, a marked increase in the number of
+half timers, owing to the unexampled prosperity
+of the cotton trade, and the difficulty of
+satisfying the demand for labour in that
+industry. In a good many districts, a half timer
+may be as young as twelve years old.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>What the conditions of children’s employment
+would be, if there were no Factory Acts,
+may be guessed by the nature of the first Act
+of Parliament passed in their interests. In
+1784 certain Manchester physicians investigated
+an outbreak of fever. They failed to
+discover its primary cause, but reported that
+“we are decided in our opinion that the disorder
+has been supported, diffused and
+aggravated by the ready communication of
+contagion&#160;... and by the injury done to
+young persons through confinement and too
+long continued labour, to which several evils
+the cotton mills have given occasion.” They
+went on to say that they regarded a longer
+recess at noon and a shorter working day as
+“essential to the present health and future
+capacity for labour of those who are under the
+age of fourteen; for the active recreations of
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_113'>113</span>childhood and youth are necessary to the right
+growth and conformation of the human body.”
+The Manchester magistrates, who had asked
+for this report, resolved not to allow in future
+“indentures of Parish Apprentices whereby
+they shall be bound to owners of cotton mills
+and other works in which children are obliged
+to work in the night or more than ten hours
+in the day.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The condition of these unfortunate pauper
+children was wretched in the extreme. They
+were “sent down from the workhouses of
+London and other great towns to any manufacturer
+who would take them, a small premium
+being usually paid as an inducement. There
+was no system of control or inspection from
+outside; the factories were frequently set up
+in some remote glen or lonely valley where a
+waterfall or stream provided cheap power for
+the machinery and where the restraint of
+public opinion and observation was almost
+entirely absent. There can be no reasonable
+doubt that these unhappy children were often
+worked almost or entirely to death by their
+masters or by their overseers whose interest it
+was to work the apprentices to the utmost,
+their pay being in proportion to the labour
+they could extract. Sir Samuel Romilly says
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_114'>114</span>in his diary that he had known cases where
+the apprentices had been actually murdered by
+their masters in order to get fresh premiums
+with new apprentices.”<a id='r37'></a><a href='#f37' class='c023'><sup>[37]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The Act of 1802, the first on this subject,
+dealt only with apprentices and only with the
+textile trades. It limited the hours of work
+to twelve a day, forbade night work, and
+required a modicum of elementary instruction;
+moreover it provided for inspection.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>By and by, it became apparent that the
+evils at which this measure had been aimed
+were not confined to any one group of child
+workers. As late as 1844, Sir Robert Peel
+told the House of Commons that in the
+potteries, “children worked in a temperature
+of from 100 to 130, carrying pieces weighing
+3 lbs, and each child carrying two pieces at a
+time. The calculation is that the child will
+carry per day some thousands of pounds weight.
+In manufactures other than cotton, work might
+sometimes be continued thirteen, fifteen, even
+seventeen or eighteen hours consecutively.”<a id='r38'></a><a href='#f38' class='c023'><sup>[38]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Nor was there any limit as to the earliness
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_115'>115</span>of the age at which a child might be set to
+work. About five or six seems to have been
+a common age for beginning. I have, myself,
+been acquainted with a woman of about eighty
+years old who told me that as a child of five,
+when she was too little to reach the work
+table and had to stand upon a stool, she was
+employed all day long in “running blonde net.”
+Evidence was brought forward—exactly as
+similar evidence is brought forward to-day in
+America—to show that it was not really
+injurious to children of nine years old and
+under to be kept working for 14 or 15 hours
+daily; and, no doubt, there were persons not
+in the least inhumane who really thought so.
+The best of us are liable to social blindness,
+and able to see but a small part of contemporary
+evils that become plainly visible
+and unendurable to succeeding generations.
+An instance of such blindness, in the case of
+the disinterested and open minded Maria
+Edgeworth, may be found in the pages of her
+<cite>Rosamond</cite>—that delightful children’s book
+too little known to the modern child. In
+reading the passage it should be remembered
+that the whole Edgeworth family were persons
+of unusual enlightenment and benevolence,
+and that the view presented probably typifies
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_116'>116</span>the bettermost stratum of contemporary
+sentiment.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Rosamond, with her parents, goes to visit
+a cotton mill conducted by “a very sensible,
+humane man, who did not think only of how
+he could get so much work done for himself,
+but also how he could preserve the health of
+those who worked for him; and how he could
+make them as comfortable and happy as
+possible.” This good employer was in all
+probability drawn from some member of the
+Strutt family. By and by, while the visitors
+are resting and eating “cherries, ripe cherries,
+strawberries and cream,” provided by “this
+hospitable gentleman,” Godfrey calls to his
+parents to “‘look out of this window....
+All the people are going from work. Look
+what numbers of children are passing through
+this great yard!’</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>“The children passed close by the window
+at which Godfrey and Rosamond had stationed
+themselves. Among the little children
+came some tall girls and among these there
+was one, a girl about twelve years old,
+whose countenance particularly pleased them.
+Several of the younger ones were crowding
+round her.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>“‘Laura, Laura, look at this girl! What
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_117'>117</span>a good countenance she has,’ said Rosamond,
+‘and how fond the little children seem of
+her!’</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>“‘That is Ellen. She is an excellent girl,’
+said the master of the manufactory, ‘and those
+little children have good reason to be fond
+of her.’”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>He then relates how a good clergyman, who
+had taught the children and won their grateful
+affection, had been appointed to a post
+elsewhere.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>“‘All the children in the manufactory were
+sorry that he was going away, and they
+wished to do something that should prove
+to him their respect and gratitude.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>“‘They considered and consulted among
+themselves. They had no money, nothing
+of their own to give, but their labour; and
+they agreed that they would work a certain
+number of hours beyond their usual time,
+to earn money to buy a silver cup, which
+they might present to him the day before
+that appointed for his departure. They were
+obliged to sit up a great part of the night
+to work to earn their shares. Several of the
+little children were not able to bear the
+fatigue and the want of sleep. For this they
+were very sorry, and when Ellen saw how
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_118'>118</span>sorry they were, she pitied them, and she
+did more than pity them. After she had
+earned her own share of the money to be
+subscribed for buying the silver cup, she
+sat up every night a certain time to
+work, to earn the shares of all these little
+children.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>“‘Ellen never said anything of her intentions,
+but went on working steadily, till she
+had accomplished her purpose. I used to see
+her night after night, and used to fear she
+would hurt her health, and often begged her
+not to labour so hard, but she said, “It does
+me good, sir.”’”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The modern reader will sigh to think of
+what the admirable Ellen’s health and
+strength would probably be at thirty, and
+will find it difficult to forgive the complacency
+of the employer in whose mill she
+was permitted so to squander her physical
+resources.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In our own country the general development
+of factory legislation has gone far
+towards stopping the overwork of children in
+mills and factories; though it is only of late
+years, and thanks to the exertions of Mrs
+Hogg, that the law has begun to attempt the
+regulation of children’s labour out of school
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_119'>119</span>hours either in their own homes or for
+outside employers.<a id='r39'></a><a href='#f39' class='c023'><sup>[39]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In the United States, however, where each
+State is free to make its own regulations,
+there is, at this present day, one State
+(Georgia) in which the work of children is
+absolutely unrestricted, and several in which
+the practical limitation is extremely small.
+Children of any age may be, and actually
+are, kept at work in the cotton mills of the
+Southern States, precisely as they used to be
+in the mills of Lancashire and Yorkshire.
+“Only last year, in North Carolina, the
+testimony of two doctors was introduced to
+show that there was no need from a hygienic
+point of view, for a law forbidding girls
+under fourteen to stand at their work for
+twelve hours a day, or for boys or girls under
+fourteen to work a twelve-hour night.”<a id='r40'></a><a href='#f40' class='c023'><sup>[40]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Boys of twelve may still legally work in
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_120'>120</span>the coal mines of Kansas and in all mines
+in Iowa, Missouri and North Carolina; and do
+so work. “No colliery has been visited in
+which children have not been found employed
+at ages prohibited by the law of the State.”<a id='r41'></a><a href='#f41' class='c023'><sup>[41]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In some American glass bottle works, quite
+small boys are kept running to and fro with
+loads of hot glass all through the day or the
+night as the case may be. Mrs Kelley,
+reporting personal visits of inspection, says
+that she found it impossible to get from any
+boy “a consecutive statement as to his name,
+address or parentage. A boy would say,
+‘My name is Jimmie’; and then trot to
+the cooling oven with his load of bottles;
+and returning would say, in answer to a
+fresh question, ‘I live in a shanty boat,’
+then trot to the moulder for another load of
+bottles; and returning say, ‘I’m going to be
+eight next summer,’ and so on. Among
+twenty-four lads questioned during one night
+inspection, not one ventured to pause long
+enough to put together two of the foregoing
+statements.”<a id='r42'></a><a href='#f42' class='c023'><sup>[42]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>“There was no restriction upon night work
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_121'>121</span>and pitifully little children were found at
+work at two o’clock in the morning.”<a id='r43'></a><a href='#f43' class='c023'><sup>[43]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Some of these children are directly imported—as
+the little serfs in English cotton mills
+often were—from other districts; and in these
+States of America, as in England once, not
+only ruthless employers but worthless adults
+of their own class, parents and others, make
+profits out of the toil of half grown children.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>“A worn out and dissolute glass blower,
+who had a pension of $8 a month and five
+children under the age of fourteen years had
+recently married a widow with six children
+under fifteen years. Father, mother and the
+eleven children were living in a tent between
+the river and the works where several of the
+children were employed, some by night and
+some by day, so that the beds in the tent were
+used by different children, one set rising
+to go to work when the others returned to
+sleep.”<a id='r44'></a><a href='#f44' class='c023'><sup>[44]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Upon the future of these poor children the
+effect of this early toil is most injurious.
+Physically, mentally and morally, the children—the
+citizens of the next generation—are
+damaged.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Significant is the remark of a mother quoted
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_122'>122</span>in one of the articles in <cite>Child Labor</cite>:
+“‘When Charley works on the night shift, he
+hasn’t any appetite.’” (p. 303.)</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Doubtless the half timers in a good English
+mill are examples of children working under
+the best of existing conditions; and manufacturers
+are fond of assuring us how good
+these conditions are. Yet I shall never forget
+the painful impression made upon myself by
+the peculiar mixture of pallor and eagerness
+on the faces of the little half timers, the first
+time that I went over a weaving mill. The
+working place was light and airy, and the
+situation, just outside a healthy Northern
+town, was admirable; the work was not
+physically hard, and the management, as I
+was assured by a trustworthy witness, who
+was himself at work there, considerate. He,
+for his part, seemed unaware that the children
+looked ill. Incidentally, however, he mentioned
+that a large proportion of his fellow
+workers drank; and I felt that it would be
+interesting to know how many of them had
+been half timers, and whether early exhaustion
+might not lie at the root of their intemperance.
+As to the children, I am quite sure that any
+London doctor, or any woman accustomed
+to the care of children, would have thought
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_123'>123</span>their appearance unhealthy and their expression
+of face abnormal.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Evidence more valuable than any untrained
+observer’s impression is on record in regard to
+London school children. Dr Thomas, assistant
+Medical Officer of Health to the London
+County Council, in investigating the physical
+condition of 2000 school children, in 14
+different schools, gave special attention to 384
+wage earners among the boys. “Of this
+number 233 showed signs of fatigue, 140 were
+proved to be anæmic, 131 had severe nerve
+signs, 64 were suffering from deformities
+resulting from the carrying of heavy weights,
+and 51 had severe heart signs. Barbers’ boys
+were found to suffer most in physique, 72 per
+cent being anæmic, 63 per cent showing
+severe nerve strain, and 27 per cent severe
+heart affection.”<a id='r45'></a><a href='#f45' class='c023'><sup>[45]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Before the Inter-Departmental Committee
+on the employment of school children,
+appointed in 1901, evidence was given by
+Alderman Watts, of Manchester, of the
+abnormal death-rate among children in industrial
+schools, many of whom had drifted
+thither from the streets; and in 1904 Sir
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_124'>124</span>Lambert Ormsby, President of the Royal
+College of Surgeons, of Dublin, gave to the
+Inter-Departmental Committee on Physical
+Deterioration, particulars of the miserable
+physique of the little street sellers and of the
+many cases of pneumonia among them which
+had been brought to his notice in the children’s
+hospitals.<a id='r46'></a><a href='#f46' class='c023'><sup>[46]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In July 1905, when an inquiry was held by
+the Home Office into the Bye-laws for the
+Employment of Children proposed by the
+London County Council, Mr Marshall Jackman,
+of the Michael Faraday School, Walworth,
+gave evidence that, out of 227 boys in that
+school, 27 were at work of whom 13 were
+employed more than eight hours a day, and
+13 after nine o’clock at night. All except six
+were in poor health. One had broken down
+altogether; one had a weak circulation; one
+had fainted in school during the previous
+week; yet another had a defective circulation.
+In one single week, nine boys who worked
+out of school hours were taken ill in school,
+were obliged to leave the class and suspend
+lessons for the rest of the afternoon.<a id='r47'></a><a href='#f47' class='c023'><sup>[47]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_125'>125</span>Very similar evidence may be found in the
+pages of Mrs Kelley’s volume, in those of
+<cite>Child Labor</cite>, and in the Report of the
+American Consumers’ League. On p. 297 of
+<cite>Child Labor</cite> appears the following paragraph
+which should make every British reader
+thankful for the comparative stringency of
+our own Factory Acts: “A recent study of
+the reports of factory inspectors in several of
+our industrial States shows a remarkable
+uniformity in the percentage of accidents.
+We find in the textile mills, foundries and iron
+mills, glass houses and machine shops employing
+children that, in proportion to the number
+of children employed, accidents to children
+under sixteen years of age are from 250 to
+300% more frequent than to adults.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Educationally, the results of early industrial
+labour are naturally disastrous. “In none of
+the great Southern States,” writes Mrs Kelley,
+“in which young children are employed in
+manufacture are 80% of the children between 10
+and 14 years of age able to read and write.”<a id='r48'></a><a href='#f48' class='c023'><sup>[48]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>At the Home Office enquiry, Mr Marshall
+Jackman stated that although the boys who
+worked out of school hours were of more than
+average mental capacity, they were more than
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_126'>126</span>twelve months behind the average of the
+whole school in educational standing, and
+moreover were low down even in their lower
+classes. Of the 27 boys in his school who
+were employed, eleven were one standard
+below the average, two, two standards below;
+four, three standards below; and one, four
+standards below the general average.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>A report prepared in 1901 for the Scottish
+Council for Women’s Trades gives the opinions
+of 14 head masters, who are practically unanimous
+as to the detrimental effect upon the
+children’s progress of long hours of work out
+of school. No. 3 says: “I consider this
+exploiting of children is one of the greatest
+crimes against the children themselves, and
+the greatest possible hindrance to their
+education.” No. 6 thinks “there can be no
+doubt that children who have such long spells
+of employment are heavily handicapped”;
+and No. 7 says: “There is no doubt whatever
+that these long hours stand very much in the
+way of educational progress.” “Message
+running,” says No. 14, “certainly tends to
+sharpen intelligence of a superficial kind but
+weakens the power of sustained attention
+and vigorous mental work in school.”<a id='r49'></a><a href='#f49' class='c023'><sup>[49]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_127'>127</span>When we remember that the Inter-Departmental
+Committee on the employment
+of school children—a cautious official body—estimated
+the <em>minimum</em> number of school
+children employed in the United Kingdom at
+200,000, and that there is no reason to suppose
+that number materially lessened, we perceive
+that the deterioration of national education
+from this cause alone must be by no means
+trifling.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Of moral injury, especially from street
+selling, there is abundant evidence, both in our
+own country and in the United States. The
+committee of 1901 received a statement from
+the Town Clerk of Newcastle on Tyne that
+children had been found in the streets afraid
+to go home, lest they should be punished for
+not bringing in enough money. The children
+often, in consequence, slept out, gambled or
+stole, the girls sinking lower yet in order
+to procure sufficient money to take home.
+The number of such children he reported to
+have increased greatly of late years, and many
+of them were, he feared, on the threshold of a
+life of vice and crime. The Chief Constable
+of Manchester presented a list of 16 women
+known as degraded characters, who had
+formerly been street sellers. The Chief
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_128'>128</span>Constable of Birmingham produced tables
+showing that of 713 children engaged in street
+trading during July 1901, 458 had been
+prosecuted for various offences during the
+previous six months. 163 of the number were
+girls.<a id='r50'></a><a href='#f50' class='c023'><sup>[50]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Boys in American glass works are almost
+proverbially ill conducted. One manufacturer,
+in Ohio, said, in answer to an appeal for the
+education of the boys: “You can’t do anything
+for them. The little devils are vicious
+from their birth.” Statements of the same
+kind used to be made about the poor little
+victims in the English mills but it is not
+observed that the modern half timer, whose
+hours and health are protected by law, is any
+more vicious than other children. The
+principal of a Pennsylvanian school sets the
+corruption of the boys at a much later date
+than infancy. He says: “‘My observation is
+that when a boy leaves school and goes into
+the factory at twelve or thirteen, by the time
+he is fifteen or sixteen he is too foul-mouthed
+to associate with decent people.’”<a id='r51'></a><a href='#f51' class='c023'><sup>[51]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Street occupations on the farther as on the
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_129'>129</span>hither side of the Atlantic are shown to form
+an easy avenue to worse things. “Although
+the street trades in Washington engage only
+one-fourth of the total number of children
+engaged in all occupations, yet of the number
+of children under 15 who have gone to the
+reform school, or who have been turned over by
+the courts to the care of the probation officers,
+over two-thirds have come from the ranks of
+the children engaged in the street trades.”<a id='r52'></a><a href='#f52' class='c023'><sup>[52]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>“A judge told the writer that one-third of
+all the delinquent boys brought before him
+had at one time or another served the public
+as messenger boys.”<a id='r53'></a><a href='#f53' class='c023'><sup>[53]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Nor are those children of school age who go
+to work often found to be acquiring any sort
+of technical training or industrial skill. On
+the contrary, indeed; their employment is
+almost always of a kind that rather unfits
+them than prepares them to become industrially
+efficient. Sadly true are the words written
+by Mrs Kelley out of prolonged and wide
+experience. “The State which accepts the
+plea of poverty and permits the children of
+the poorest citizens to labour prematurely,
+accepts the heritage of new poverty flowing
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_130'>130</span>from two sources; namely, on the one hand,
+the relaxed efforts of fathers of families to
+provide for them, and on the other hand the
+corruption of weak children by inappropriate
+occupations which involve temptations beyond
+the child’s power of resistance and the exhaustion
+of strong children by overwork. It
+is exactly the most conscientious and promising
+children who are worked into the grave or
+into nervous prostration, or into that saddest
+state of all, the moral fatigue which enables a
+man to sit idly about for years while his wife
+or his sister or his children support him.”<a id='r54'></a><a href='#f54' class='c023'><sup>[54]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Thus the employment of the young which
+is generally regarded as a result of poverty is
+really one of the causes of poverty, and that
+for several reasons. It tends to lower the
+wages of the adult worker and tends to make
+the family, instead of the father, the industrial
+unit; it diminishes the adult working power
+of the child itself,<a id='r55'></a><a href='#f55' class='c023'><sup>[55]</sup></a> and it also retards the
+progress of every trade in which it occurs, for
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_131'>131</span>as Mr Schoenhof says: “The cheapness of
+human labour where it prevails is the greatest
+incentive for the perpetuation of obsolete
+methods.”<a id='r56'></a><a href='#f56' class='c023'><sup>[56]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Thus, in every respect, the industrial employment
+of children is an injury to the
+community; and it is more than possible (I
+am not recommending the course as a
+practicable one) that, in the long run, the
+nation would save money by undertaking the
+whole support and education up to the age of
+sixteen of every child who now works for
+wages. Short of this extreme measure, however,
+there is little doubt that, except for the
+fear lest hardships might be intensified, public
+opinion is ready for far more stringent limitation
+of child labour. If it were known that
+the wages of parents were, even approximately,
+adequate (as they would be under a Minimum
+Wage Law) most of the objections now made
+to the restriction of child labour would die
+away. That fact alone is no inconsiderable
+argument in favour of a Minimum Wage Law.</p>
+
+<div>
+  <span class='pageno' id='Page_132'>132</span>
+  <h3 class='c005'>CHAPTER VI<br> <span class='c020'>SUMMARY</span></h3>
+</div>
+
+<p class='c022'>Home work—Factory work—The working girl—Her manners,
+virtues and code of honour—The woman into whom she
+developes—Shop assistants—Traffic workers—Children—“Sweated”
+workers often producing high priced goods—Not
+drunken—Not idle—Not unskilful—Men as helpless,
+economically, as women—Sweating an invariable accompaniment
+of unregulated labour.</p>
+
+<p class='c013'>The preceding chapters do not profess to give
+anything like a general survey of the whole
+field of British labour. It has seemed wise
+for many reasons to confine myself to aspects
+with which I am, in a greater or less degree,
+personally familiar; and therefore the work
+of women, and of London women especially,
+looms rather large. But I hope that I have
+shown, by a sufficient range of instances,
+certain general truths. In trade after trade,
+men, women and children are exhibited working
+in the conditions which are indicated,
+comprehensively but vaguely, by the term
+“sweating.” We have seen the dwelling of
+the home worker robbed of every feature that
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_133'>133</span>makes a home, its narrow space littered with
+match boxes, or with shirts or trousers or
+paper-bags—in any case transformed into one
+of the most comfortless of workshops. In
+some homes the rattle of the sewing machine
+forms a ceaseless accompaniment to the whole
+course of family life; in others, meals, such as
+they are, are eaten in the immediate neighbourhood
+of the glue pot or the paste pot; the
+smell of new cloth, the dust and fluff of
+flannelette pervade the room of the “finisher”;
+damp paper-bags or damp cardboard boxes lie
+piled on beds; home, parents and children are
+all subservient to unintermittent and most
+unremunerative labour.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>One step, but only one step, higher comes the
+factory “hand.” We have seen girls filling
+pots with boiling jam, carrying to and fro
+heavy trays and stacking these trays in piles,
+two together raising, sometimes to above the
+height of their own heads, trays some of which
+weigh well over half a hundredweight. We
+have seen them, even when their work was not
+in itself heavy, worn out by the rapidity with
+which they repeat endlessly, day after day,
+and week after week, operations of mechanical
+monotony. Some glimpse has been given of
+those horrible intervals in which the semistarvation
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_134'>134</span>of “full work” gives place to the
+acute privation of “slack time.” The dangers,
+discomforts, hardships and exactions that must
+be borne if an employer chooses to inflict them,
+have been indicated, though but very inadequately;
+and the example of laundries and
+jam factories has served to suggest how far
+worse yet would be the conditions of factory
+operatives if the law did not intervene for their
+protection.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>One thing I have not succeeded in picturing—and
+it is the thing which seems to me perhaps
+the most terrible of all: the change of
+the working girl into the working woman. I
+have not drawn the factory girl as I have
+known her and delighted in her, gay to
+“cheekiness,” staunchly loyal, wonderfully uncomplaining,
+wonderfully ready to make allowances
+for “the governor” as long as he speaks
+her fair and shows consideration in trifles, but
+equally resolute to “pay him out,” when once
+she is convinced of his meanness or spitefulness.
+Her language is devoid, to a degree remarkable
+even in our undemonstrative race, of any
+tenderness or emotion. She accepts an invitation
+with the ungracious formula: “I don’t
+mind if I do.” Upon the “mate” of her own
+sex, to whom she is so much more warmly
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_135'>135</span>devoted than to her “chap,” she never bestows
+a word of endearment. “Hi, ‘Liza, d’y’
+think I’m going to wait all night for you?”
+is the tone of her address to the friend with
+whom she will share her last penny or for
+whom she will pawn her last item of pawnable
+property. She speaks roughly to her relatives
+and aggressively to the world at large; she is
+no respecter of persons, and her eye for affectation
+or insincerity is unerring. Condescend
+to her and she will “chaff” you off the field.
+But meet her on equal terms, help her without
+attempting to “boss” her, and within a month
+or two you will have won her unalterable
+allegiance; her face will light up at your
+coming; she will bear the plainest speech
+from you, and on occasion of emergency will
+obey implicitly your every command. Nor is
+she lacking in the fundamental parts of politeness.
+Here is an instance. Years ago, in the
+days when some of us still believed in the
+possibility of organising unskilled women, a
+member of the Dockers’ Union sent me word
+that I should find it possible to walk at dinner
+time straight into the dining-room of a certain
+factory and talk to the workers undisturbed,
+since at that hour both the foreman and the
+porter went home to their own meals. I went,
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_136'>136</span>accordingly, though I confess that I felt myself
+very much of a trespasser. As I mounted the
+extremely grimy stair to the dining-room, I
+heard the loud voices of the girls. Their
+language was singularly vile. It did not, no
+doubt, mean very much to them; they used
+horrible words as the young of another class
+use slang. I went in and said my little say.
+After the first few words, most of them
+listened; several asked questions; a certain
+amount of conversation continued to go on.
+But while I was in the room—and, remember,
+I was a complete stranger to all of them—not
+one word was spoken which I could justly have
+felt to be offensive. I distributed my handbills,
+told them I hoped they would come to
+the meeting, and departed. As I went downstairs,
+I heard them relapsing into their
+hideous vernacular. But I could not help
+reflecting that they had shown the essence of
+good manners; and also that, if the literature
+of the eighteenth century is to be trusted, the
+same form of good manners was far from
+being universal among those swearing country
+gentlemen who were the great grandfathers of
+our smooth spoken generation.<a id='r57'></a><a href='#f57' class='c023'><sup>[57]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_137'>137</span>The factory girl’s code of honour is curiously
+like that of the school boy. In no circumstances
+will she denounce a companion. To
+the governor or to the forewoman she will lie
+freely if occasion demands. To those whom
+she recognises as allies, she is truth itself. I
+do not recall one single instance, in disputes
+between workers and employers, in which the
+tale told by working girls has not been proved
+true in every detail. With employers, I am
+sorry to say, this has often been by no means
+the case. Two qualities, in particular, mark
+the factory girl of from sixteen to twenty: her
+exuberant spirits and energy, and the invariable
+improvement in manner and language that
+follows upon any sort of amelioration in her
+position. To watch the rapid development of
+refinement and gentleness consequent upon
+joining a good club is to feel how sound is the
+national character and how lamentable the
+yearly waste of admirable human material.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>A few years pass, a very few, and these
+bright girls become apathetic, listless women
+of whom at 35 it is impossible to guess whether
+their age is 40 or 50. They are tired out;
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_138'>138</span>they toil on, but they have ceased to look forward
+or to entertain any hopes. The contrast
+between the factory girl and her mother is
+perhaps the very saddest spectacle that the
+labour world presents. To be the wife of a
+casual labourer, the mother of many children,
+living always in too small a space and always
+in a noise, is an existence that makes of too
+many women, in what ought to be the prime
+of their lives, mere machines of toil, going on
+from day to day, with as little hope and as
+little happiness as the sewing machine that
+furnishes one item in their permanent
+weariness.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>We ascend another step and come to the
+shop assistants, the clerks and the waitresses
+in restaurants. We find that these dapper
+young men and trim young women whose
+hands and faces are so much cleaner and
+whose speech and manners are so much
+smoother than those of the factory worker,
+are scarcely better off in the matter of pay,
+and often absolutely worse off in the matter
+of working conditions. The factory worker
+is at least free after the factory closes, and,
+except in laundries, the law generally succeeds
+in bringing down the hours of work to something
+near a reasonable limit.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_139'>139</span>But the shop assistant is subject to rule
+during practically the whole of his or her
+working life; food, companions, dress, sleeping
+arrangements, hours of going to bed and
+of getting up, nay, the very medical man to
+be consulted in case of illness are thrust upon
+him without any choice of his own. The
+privilege, so dear to the natural man, of wearing
+an old coat and old slippers in the hours
+of relaxation, is not for the shop assistant;
+nor the modern diversion of experimenting
+with new and strange foods, nor the right
+of voting at elections, either municipal or
+parliamentary. The position combines, in
+short, the disagreeables of boarding school with
+those of domestic service, while failing to offer
+the pleasant features of either. It is indeed
+a moot point in my own mind whether it is
+not worse to be a shop assistant than a home worker,
+supposing the home worker to be a
+single woman. Personally, I would rather
+make cardboard boxes in silence and solitude,
+and buy for myself my own inferior bread and
+cheap tea.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Chapter IV. brings us to the case of workers
+who are all men, who are engaged in a most
+necessary public service and employed for the
+most part by rich companies paying high
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_140'>140</span>dividends. Here the inexperienced would expect
+to find high wages and good conditions
+prevailing. In fact, however, we find, in the
+case of railway servants, that the hours of
+work imposed were so excessive as to constitute
+a public danger and to demand the
+intervention of the law. The drivers and conductors
+of trams and omnibuses have been
+shown to be in a large measure enslaved by
+the companies for which they work, their
+hours often cruelly long, their pay often reduced
+from a decent nominal to a quite inadequate
+actual wage, their conditions of
+work, in many cases, singularly oppressive and
+their liberty of passing into fresh employment,
+although not so completely barred as the
+railway servant’s, yet very seriously hampered
+and restricted. In short we behold a body of
+grown men, skilled and of good character,
+almost as unable as the isolated home worker
+to defend themselves against a strong and
+tyrannical employer.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Last of all, we come to the children. In
+these days we are continually talking in tones
+of alarm about a declining birth rate and
+are at last seriously considering how to check
+the appalling infant mortality that makes an
+annual massacre of the innocents; but most
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_141'>141</span>of us are still very little awake to the sacrifice
+of childhood that is daily being made in our
+midst. We pass a pale child in the street,
+carrying a long bundle in a black wrapper,
+and the sight makes no impression. But, to
+those of us who have seen the under side of
+London, that little figure is a type of unremunerative
+toil, of stunted growth, of weakened
+vitality and of wasted school teaching: an
+example of that most cruel form of improvidence
+described by the French proverb
+as “eating our wheat as grass.” Labour in
+childhood inevitably means, in nine cases out
+of ten, decadence in early manhood or womanhood;
+and the prevalence of it among ourselves
+is perhaps the most serious of national
+dangers. There is probably no branch of
+home work in which child labour is not involved,
+and but very few branches of retail
+trade. Our milk, our newspapers, our greengrocery
+are brought to us by small boys;
+young boys are out at all hours and in all
+weathers with parcel-delivering vans; and
+many and many a perambulator is pushed by
+a small girl whose chin is on a level with the
+handle. If, in 1901, there were, as the Interdepartmental
+Committee declared, <em>at least</em>
+200,000 school children working for wages,
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_142'>142</span>and if, as seems practically certain, the number
+is larger now, can we wonder that so many
+grown up workers have remained inefficient,
+incompetent and listless? We cannot have
+grain, if we choose to eat the wheat in the
+blade.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>We see, then, that large bodies of British
+workpeople are, in these early years of the
+twentieth century, extremely overworked and
+underpaid. These evils are not, as is so often
+declared, a result of cheap selling. One of
+the worst examples of underpayment in the
+Sweated Industries Exhibition was a lady’s
+combination garment, of nainsook, the selling
+price of which was 22s.; and much of the work
+produced by the underpaid is sold at a good
+price to the well-to-do. On the other hand,
+under a well organised factory system, goods
+that are sold at a very low price are sometimes
+produced by workers receiving comparatively
+high wages. Nor is it true that any large
+proportion of these ill paid workers are either
+drunken or idle, or yet incompetent. Incompetent,
+indeed, they eventually become, if
+they are starved, physically and mentally,
+for a long enough period; but many of them
+remain competent for a surprising number of
+years. Very many of them are pathetically
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_143'>143</span>industrious, and by no means all are unskilled.
+Neither my reader nor I, for instance, could
+cover a racquet ball so that it would pass
+muster when inspected by the paymaster; it
+is improbable that either of us could cover
+an umbrella, and pretty certain that neither
+could make a passable artificial rose of even
+the poorest description. The driver of a motor
+omnibus is—in theory at least, and often in
+practice—a highly skilled mechanic; but his
+skill does not enable him (his trade union being
+still comparatively young and weak) to retain
+his freedom of action nor to resist the most
+exhausting and harassing conditions of labour.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The evil is thus not confined to women,
+nor to home workers, nor to any class or trade.
+Nor is it confined to any one country. Nearly
+every instance quoted could be matched from
+Germany and from America. “Sweating,” in
+short, invariably tends to appear wherever and
+whenever industry is not either highly organised
+or else stringently regulated by law.</p>
+
+<div>
+  <span class='pageno' id='Page_144'>144</span>
+  <h3 class='c005'>CHAPTER VII<br> <span class='c020'>HOW UNDERPAYMENT COMES</span></h3>
+</div>
+
+<p class='c022'>A shirtmaker’s story—The “higgling of the market” as seen at
+the factory gate—Mr Booth’s percentage of poverty—Mr
+Rowntree’s—The living wage in America—How wages are
+determined—By relative needs—Not by efficiency—Mr
+Bosanquet’s fundamental fallacy—Ambiguity of word “earn”—Effect
+upon the poor of the pressure of the poorer—Efficiency
+only of pecuniary value while rare—Not inefficiency but
+poverty the real disease.</p>
+
+<p class='c013'>More than seventeen years ago I sat in the
+neat but poverty stricken room of a most
+respectable family and listened to the pathetic,
+uncomplaining words of an admirable woman
+who, together with her sister, had, for years,
+helped to support an early widowed sister-in-law
+and her three children. All three women
+worked at home at shirtmaking, and this one
+of the aunts had certainly gone short of food.
+It was not she who told me of her good deeds.
+She was showing me, at my request, the shirts
+that they were at that time making for a
+payment of 1s. 2d. a dozen. I continue in
+the words of my own report, written immediately
+afterwards.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_145'>145</span>“These shirts are of fair average quality
+and are striped in gay colours. They have to
+be fetched ready cut out but not folded; all
+the sewing has to be done to them, including
+a square of lining at the back of the neck but
+not the button holes.... ‘Has the price gone
+down much?’ I asked. ‘Oh, yes’ said Miss
+Y.; ‘my sister and I used to get sixpence
+apiece. But that was for rather better shirts
+than these. We worked for B.’s then. One
+day my sister was there, waiting for the work,
+and a gentleman came in and said to Mr B.,
+“I’ll take the whole lot at 4s. 6d. a dozen”;
+and Mr B. said to my sister: “Miss Y., will
+you take the work at that, or must I give
+it all to this gentleman?” And my sister
+thought, if we stood out for the price, they
+would come round to us, and she said, “No,”
+she would not take it, and so he gave it to
+the gentleman and we were thrown out; and
+instead of coming round to sixpence again,
+that work has gone down to 2s. 6d. a dozen,
+and even lower than that. I know of people
+who do the very cheapest cotton shirts at 9d.
+or even 7d. a dozen.’”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Miss Y.’s little story is the story of work
+in hundreds—nay in thousands—of work
+places. Sometimes it is at the factory gate
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_146'>146</span>that the cheapening process goes on. Towards
+the end of those bitter weeks, “the slack
+time,” there will be scores of factory girls,
+pale and pinched under their shabby feathered
+hats, going from firm to firm and asking
+whether hands are wanted. At last word will
+go round that X.’s are “taking on” on
+Monday morning. Before the opening hour
+on Monday morning, the entrance to Mr X.’s
+factory will look like the pit door of a popular
+theatre. Often have I heard girls describe
+the dialogue that follows.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>“The foreman says to a young girl in front
+of me: ‘What wages do you want?’ And she
+says: ‘Eight shillings.’ And he told her:
+‘No, she could go.’ So when he come to me,
+I knew it was no good to say, ‘Eight’; so I
+said: ‘Seven and six.’”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>At seven and sixpence, perhaps, she gets
+taken on; and when, presently, the slack
+time comes again, the girls weeded out, to be
+first discharged, are those who have been
+receiving eight shillings weekly ever since
+their engagement in the previous season.
+Seven shillings and sixpence a week (translated
+or not, according to the custom of
+the factory, into terms of piece work) now
+becomes the usual wage; and next season
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_147'>147</span>this descends by another sixpence or another
+shilling.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Below six shillings or five shillings, an
+employer or foreman seldom tries to drive the
+time wage, even of girls, unless, indeed, he
+can salve his conscience by regarding them
+as learners. Yet I have known a wealthy
+employer admit without any signs of compunction,
+both that certain girls in his employ were
+paid four shillings a week, and that they
+could not live on that sum.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The home worker, when he thus suffers
+diminution of an already insufficient wage,
+tries to increase output by setting his children
+to work.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>“The same pressure that leads to the
+employment of the children presently leads,
+in a slack time, to the acceptance of yet lower
+pay for the sake of securing work. The
+poorer the worker the less possible is any
+resistance to any reduction in pay. Thus, by
+and by, mother and children, working together,
+come to receive no more than did the
+mother working alone. The employer—and
+eventually in all probability the public—has
+in fact obtained the labour of the children
+without extra payment. To such an extent
+has this process been carried that in the worst
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_148'>148</span>paid branches of home work, subsistence becomes
+almost impossible unless the work of
+children is called in.”<a id='r58'></a><a href='#f58' class='c023'><sup>[58]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>It is thus true that, economically, a man’s
+enemies are those of his own household; and
+that, wherever workers are not protected by
+organisation or by special laws, the wage,
+first of the individual and then of the family,
+tends to be brought down to the lowest possible
+level of subsistence, and even, possibly if a
+poor-law subsidy can be obtained, below it.
+It is not by chance, nor because their work is
+of little value, nor because they are contented
+to take little pay, that all these many households
+of workers are living lives so cruelly
+straitened by poverty. Nor is it a mere
+effect of chance that in other countries as well
+as in our own, national wealth is beheld increasing
+side by side with extreme poverty
+on the part of those citizens who toil most
+incessantly.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In our own country, the investigations
+of Mr Charles Booth and of Mr Seebohm
+Rowntree, carried out independently and
+on slightly differing methods, the one in
+London, the other in York, have resulted
+in figures strikingly similar. Mr Booth puts
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_149'>149</span>the proportion living in poverty, of the
+whole population of London, at 30·7%; Mr
+Rowntree, that of the whole population of
+York, at 27·84%.<a id='r59'></a><a href='#f59' class='c023'><sup>[59]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In America the same problem has received
+the attention of various careful enquirers, the
+most recent of whom, perhaps, is Father Ryan,
+Professor of ethics and economics in the St
+Paul Seminary, Minnesota.<a id='r60'></a><a href='#f60' class='c023'><sup>[60]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In this volume may be found a careful
+estimate of the figure that may be taken as
+affording a “living wage” in different parts
+of the United States. Professor Albion Small,
+head of the Department of Sociology at the
+University of Chicago, is quoted as having
+said “a few years ago” that “No man can
+live, bring up a family, and enjoy the ordinary
+human happiness on a wage of less than one
+thousand dollars a year” (£200).<a id='r61'></a><a href='#f61' class='c023'><sup>[61]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Mr John Mitchell, President of the United
+Mine Workers, says, in a passage quoted by
+Professor Ryan: “In cities of from five
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_150'>150</span>thousand to one hundred thousand inhabitants,
+the American standard of living should mean,
+to the ordinary unskilled workman with an
+average family, a comfortable house of at
+least six rooms. It should mean a bathroom,
+good sanitary plumbing, a parlour, dining-room,
+kitchen and sufficient sleeping room that
+decency may be preserved and a reasonable
+degree of comfort maintained. The American
+standard of living should mean, to the unskilled
+workman, carpets, pictures, books and
+furniture with which to make his home bright,
+comfortable and attractive for himself and his
+family, an ample supply of clothing suitable
+for winter and summer and above all a sufficient
+quantity of good, wholesome, nourishing food
+at all times of the year. The American
+standard, moreover, should mean to the
+unskilled workman that his children should
+be kept at school until they have attained the
+age of sixteen at least, and that he is enabled
+to lay by sufficient to maintain himself and
+his family in times of illness or at the close of
+his industrial life, when age and weakness
+render further work impossible, and to make
+provision for his family against premature
+death from accident or otherwise.”<a id='r62'></a><a href='#f62' class='c023'><sup>[62]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_151'>151</span>The minimum wage upon which a family
+could be supported, in towns of the size named,
+was estimated by Mr Mitchell in 1903 at $600
+a year (£120). In larger cities the cost would,
+he considered, be higher. Professor Ryan is,
+no doubt, right in saying that “the irreducible
+minimum of necessaries and comforts” could
+not “now” (he was writing in October 1905)
+be obtained in any city of the United States
+for less than $600, and that though that sum
+might be “<em>possibly</em> a Living Wage in the
+moderately sized cities of the West, North
+and East&#160;... in some of the largest cities of
+the last-named regions, it is certainly <em>not</em> a
+Living Wage.”<a id='r63'></a><a href='#f63' class='c023'><sup>[63]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Having established this figure for annual
+income Professor Ryan goes out to enquire
+into its actual prevalence and from various
+official reports and statistics draws the conclusion
+that, “the number of male adults
+receiving less than $12.50 (£2, 10s.) per week,
+in 34 manufacturing industries was, in 1890,
+66%, and, in 1900, 64%.<a id='r64'></a><a href='#f64' class='c023'><sup>[64]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>And it must be remembered that in America
+as in England there are few manufacturing
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_152'>152</span>industries in which wage earners are in full
+work throughout the year.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Thus it appears that, in the two great
+English speaking empires, a considerable proportion,
+even of the upper working classes, do
+not receive remuneration that allows to them
+and to their families that minimum of space,
+food, clothing and recreation which at the
+present day are esteemed essential to civilised
+life.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The reason of this state of things is a fairly
+simple one. Wages, in a state of free competition,
+are determined not by the intrinsic
+cost of the work performed but by the relative
+needs of the worker to sell and of the paymaster
+to buy. Where there are many
+workers able to offer the same service and
+comparatively few buyers, the work will be
+paid for at a low rate, however excellent;
+where would-be buyers’ workers are few and
+would-be buyers many, the work will be highly
+paid, however ill done. Among ourselves the
+numbers competing for manual work are very
+large, and the need of each particular workman
+for employment far greater and more pressing
+than the need of any employer for any
+particular man. Consequently, the wages of
+the manual worker are low in proportion to
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_153'>153</span>the cost of livelihood; and the individual
+worker is absolutely powerless by himself to
+increase them.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>These facts are so familiar, and, when
+definitely stated, so universally admitted, that
+it almost seems necessary to apologise for
+reiterating them. Yet they are continually
+ignored by ordinary middle class people in conversing
+upon labour questions, and not infrequently
+even by writers of some standing.
+Categorically, they are not—and doubtless
+would not be—denied; but whole volumes are
+founded upon the basis of their falsity. The
+entire constructive argument, for instance, of
+Mrs Bosanquet’s “The Strength of the People,”
+a book which, having gone into a second
+edition, may be supposed to have influenced a
+good many readers, rests upon a tacit assumption
+that payment is determined by quality
+of work: an assumption masked by the ambiguous
+character of the word “earn,” which at
+one moment is used in the sense of “deserve”
+and at another in the sense of “receive.” Mrs
+Bosanquet—except indeed when dealing with
+the old Poor Law—cheerfully ignores the
+painful law that wages are determined by the
+conflict of needs, and writes, throughout, as
+though the manual worker who does good
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_154'>154</span>work were sure of being well paid. From
+this assumption she goes on, very logically, to
+suppose that the cure for a man’s poverty is to
+make him do good work. Many persons who
+are not themselves exposed to the pinch of
+competition may be found expressing the same
+view, which obtains apparent support from
+the fact that the very ill paid are observed
+not to be producing good work. For, although
+it is unfortunately not true that good work
+always “earns” good wages, it is true that bad
+pay, sooner or later, but quite inevitably leads
+to bad work. Without a certain modicum of
+food, comfort, good clothing, leisure and ease of
+mind, no human being long remains capable of
+producing good work. The father of a family
+who receives 18s. a week and pays 7s. for
+lodging cannot, if he also feeds his wife and
+children, either remain or become a very good
+workman. Before he can do better work he
+must be better paid.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Mrs Bosanquet thinks otherwise. Efficiency
+and consequently prosperity might, she appears
+to believe, be enforced upon the poor by the
+withdrawal of such help as is now accorded
+them. The prospect of that beloved refuge,
+the workhouse, prevents them from providing
+for their old age; but the prospect of literal
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_155'>155</span>starvation would probably be more effective.
+The hunger and hardship of their daily lives
+do not furnish an adequate spur; but perhaps
+despair might do so. We seem to hear Mrs
+Chick exhorting the dying Mrs Dombey to
+“make an effort.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Again, that terrible pressure of the poorer
+upon the poor which Mr Booth regards as so
+serious an evil appears to Mrs Bosanquet an
+element of hope and strength. Morally, the
+charity of the poor to one another is undoubtedly
+a beautiful thing; economically, it
+is assuredly one of the causes that increase
+and aggravate poverty; and such diminution
+of pauperism as is produced by the maintenance
+out of the workhouse of an aged or sick
+relative may, in the long run, lead to the
+destitution of a whole family. The last result
+of such maintenance may, if wide-spread, be far
+more nationally expensive than if all the sick
+and aged were supported out of the public
+purse.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Let us see, in an example of the commonest
+kind, how this mutual help works out.
+Smith and Brown, manual labourers, are
+working side by side at a wage of £1 a week
+or thereabouts. Both are married men with
+children. Both are contributing to a provident
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_156'>156</span>society which, if they survive the age of sixty,
+will furnish a small pittance to their declining
+years. Slack times come; Smith is discharged;
+Brown is retained. Within a fortnight, Smith,
+with his wife and children, begins to suffer
+hardship; the household property goes, piecemeal,
+to the pawnshop; the “club money”
+is no longer forthcoming, and Smith’s provision
+for his old age lapses. Brown, whose pound
+a week affords, as may be supposed, no great
+superfluity for him and his, finds himself unable
+to see his “mate” and his mate’s children
+in want of bread; Brown’s club money and
+a good deal more which can ill be spared goes
+to their assistance, and Brown’s provision for
+old age lapses.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The Smith family, it is true, has been kept
+from the workhouse—at the cost, not improbably,
+of some weakly little Smith’s life—but
+has not this result been bought too dear? Do
+not justice and good sense alike suggest the
+unfitness of leaving the burden of maintaining
+the Smith family to rest upon precisely that
+class of the community which is least able to
+support it? The maintenance of those who
+cannot maintain themselves by those who can
+barely maintain themselves keeps both groups
+upon a dead level of destitution. If our aim
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_157'>157</span>is really the strengthening of the people we
+must not begin by increasing the burdens of
+the weakest—burdens borne often at so cruel
+a sacrifice of health and life, and with so amazing
+an absence of complaint. The Smith
+family and the Brown family alike are suffering
+because their income is barely adequate
+to their elementary current needs; and their
+troubles will only be cured by the possession
+of a larger real income. This, indeed, Mrs
+Bosanquet sees plainly enough. “How can
+we bring it about,” she asks, “that they” (<em>i.e.</em>
+“those whom we may call the very poor”)
+“shall have a permanently greater command
+over the necessaries and luxuries of life?”
+Gifts she perceives to be no true remedy,
+though she fails to assign the economic reason,
+which is that the possession of outside resources
+enables the recipient to “go one lower” than
+his unendowed competitor in the battle for
+employment. The same objection does not
+apply to the workhouse, which withdraws the
+pauper from the battle altogether, but it does
+apply to outdoor relief, and is the one valid
+economic argument against it. The best
+charity—as Dr Johnson long ago pointed out—indeed,
+the only effectual charity, is to set
+a man to work at good wages. This is not,
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_158'>158</span>however, Mrs Bosanquet’s plan. “The less
+obvious, but more effective remedy is to
+approach the problem by striking at its roots
+in the minds of the people themselves; to
+stimulate their energies, to insist upon their
+responsibilities, to train their faculties. In
+short, to make them efficient.”<a id='r65'></a><a href='#f65' class='c023'><sup>[65]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Unfortunately the ill-nourished, ill clothed
+and ill taught cannot be made efficient. Moreover
+if we could make every one of them
+efficient, they would be no better off, financially
+in their efficient state than they are now, in their
+incompetence.<a id='r66'></a><a href='#f66' class='c023'><sup>[66]</sup></a> While rare, efficiency, like a
+tenor voice, commands a monopoly price; if
+universal, its money worth would be no higher
+than that of the ability to read, which in the
+Middle Ages was a commercial asset of value.
+Furthermore, since extreme poverty destroys
+efficiency, these ill paid efficient persons would
+presently become, like our poorer manual
+labourers of to-day, weak of brain and of
+body, dull, languid, inert and therefore bad
+workers.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Thus efficiency, however desirable upon
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_159'>159</span>other grounds, is no economic remedy for
+underpayment. Not inefficiency but poverty
+is the real disease, and since poverty is an
+inevitable result of unlimited competition in
+labour, the disease can only be cured by some
+interference with the free course of competition.
+How to apply such interference effectually
+is the real problem which organised society
+has to solve. Towards its solution Mrs
+Bosanquet, able though she is, offers no assistance,
+because she never acknowledges the
+character of the problem. For her there are
+only inefficient people to be taught better,
+not underpaid people to be paid better. In
+this respect she represents a considerable
+school of thought and therefore it has seemed
+worth while to examine her thesis at some
+length; especially since any writer is pretty
+sure of welcome who preaches a doctrine so
+soothing to the general conscience. Much
+sympathetic distress would be spared to all of
+us, and much racking of anxious brains to a few,
+if it were but possible to believe with Mrs
+Bosanquet that the poor are themselves the
+architects of their own poverty and that they
+must themselves be its physicians. Unfortunately
+this is not the case. The process of
+cheapening described above is, in a state of
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_160'>160</span>unlimited competition, absolutely inevitable;
+and neither talent nor industry can exempt
+from it any isolated worker whose qualifications
+do not create for him some sort of
+monopoly.</p>
+
+<div>
+  <span class='pageno' id='Page_161'>161</span>
+  <h3 class='c005'>CHAPTER VIII<br> <span class='c020'>LABOUR AS A COMMODITY</span></h3>
+</div>
+
+<p class='c022'>What is a “fair wage”—Two meanings of “worth”—What work
+costs to the worker—Work done below cost price—How the
+worker may lose upon his work—The effect upon commodities
+in general of free competition—The effect upon
+labour—The robber employer—Eventual powerlessness of the
+single employer—Cost to the nation of the underpaid worker—Difference
+in essence between labour and other commodities—Ambiguity
+of word “law”—Recognition of the
+true cost of labour the basis of reform.</p>
+
+<p class='c013'>There are few phrases more current than
+those which include the expression “a fair
+wage.” All workers conceive that they have
+a right to it; and I never met an employer
+who did not maintain that he paid it—although
+I have met more than one who admitted that
+his “fair wage” was one upon which the
+worker who received it could not live. To
+any enquirer venturing to point out this
+peculiarity, the reply is given: “But the work
+is not worth more,” and the reply generally
+silences the enquirer for the moment—whereby
+the employer comes to believe it unanswerable.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In the enquirer’s mind two questions
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_162'>162</span>eventually arise: “Can a wage be fair upon
+which the worker cannot live?” and: “Has
+labour a worth measurable otherwise than by
+the market price?”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>We begin presently to perceive that there
+are two faces to that word “worth”; that
+it represents sometimes the price to the buyer
+and sometimes the cost to the worker. The
+price to the buyer—the “worth” of the work
+in the answer quoted above—is neither more
+nor less than its market price, or, in other
+words, the price brought about by the balance
+of competition between those who want to
+buy labour and those who want to sell it.
+This price is regulated solely by the numbers
+competing on either hand and by their greater
+or less degree of combined action. But the
+cost of work to the worker is the expenditure
+of energy which he has made upon it. Every
+hour’s work of a man or woman takes out of that
+man or that woman a certain fixed amount of
+strength, of energy,—in short, a certain amount
+of life. When we work, we spend, literally,
+something of our substance. To make up
+that expenditure, we must have both a certain
+amount of nourishment and a certain amount
+of rest. If our work is not paid at such a
+rate as to give us that, we lose something in
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_163'>163</span>every hour we work. We spend a little more
+life than is restored to us. Even if we are
+paid at a rate that enables us just to make
+up what we have spent, we have earned
+nothing—we have only had our outlay repaid
+to us. The purchaser who pays a worker
+just enough to make him as fit for work
+afterwards as before, has only paid the
+worker’s expenses; he has not yet begun to
+pay him for his work. The worker in such
+a case is precisely in the position of a capitalist
+who has lent money, and got it back, but
+has made no profit on its use.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The wage of much labour in this and in
+other countries is on that scale. So accustomed,
+indeed, are we to this state of things that
+many of us think a worker quite well paid if
+he receives enough to keep him in good bodily
+condition. Yet the same people who hold
+this opinion in regard to that labour which is
+the sole capital of the worker, consider themselves
+to have made a very bad bargain if
+they so invest their pecuniary capital as to
+receive no interest upon it. It would be
+well if we should bear in mind that the
+worker who receives no more than enough to
+make up the strength expended, is in exactly
+that financial position.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_164'>164</span>But there is a financial stage lower than
+this: the stage of the worker who not only
+gets no interest upon his capital, but does
+not get even back the whole of his capital.
+That labour is so often yielded for less than
+its cost is one reason why a working man’s
+expectation of life is considerably less than
+that of a professional man; or, to put it in
+other words, why the dock labourer and the
+omnibus conductor die younger than the
+lawyer and the clergyman.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>There are two ways in either (or both) of
+which any worker may lose upon his work,
+and the names of them are Long Hours and
+Low Wages. For instance, a railway company
+or an omnibus company that keeps a man at
+work for sixteen hours out of the twenty-four
+uses up more of that man’s vitality than the
+other eight hours can restore. Though he
+were to be paid, like Miss Edna May, at a
+salary of £200 a week he would still lose on
+the bargain. At no price can his employers
+repay him. They have consumed some of his
+capital, and capital of that sort when once
+spent is spent for ever.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Or the worker may receive for each hour’s
+work, even though the stretch of hours be not
+unduly long, too little money to pay for those
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_165'>165</span>necessaries by which alone his outlay can be
+made up. On each transaction he pays out
+a little more than is returned to him. He
+becomes, at each step, a little poorer in bodily
+resources; he is never quite sufficiently fed,
+never quite sufficiently clothed nor healthily
+housed, and he never has that reasonable
+certainty of to-morrow’s provision which goes
+so far towards giving peace of mind and health
+of body. Finally, like other persons who
+spend more than they receive, he becomes
+bankrupt; that is to say, he either dies
+several years earlier than the average of men
+who are better paid, or he sinks into the
+invalid condition of the pauper. “Labour,”
+says Mr Schoenhof, “is an expenditure of
+vital force. Unless this is replaced by wholesome
+nutrition (air, light, sanitation and even
+cheerful surroundings are part of wholesome
+nutrition) the frame will work itself out and
+the labour will become economically of smaller
+and smaller value.”<a id='r67'></a><a href='#f67' class='c023'><sup>[67]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The cost, then, of labour as a commodity
+is the cost of the worker’s existence, a cost
+paid by the worker not in money, but in
+exhaustion, in hunger, in actual flesh and
+blood. This is the point in which labour
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_166'>166</span>differs from every other commodity, and the
+reason for which it should not be treated in
+the same way as other commodities.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In regard to all commodities, the tendency
+of free competition is, as we all know, to bring
+down the selling price to a figure very little
+above the cost of production; and in regard
+to all commodities other than labour, it is
+easy enough to see that this result is advantageous
+to the buyer. It is less easy to
+see, but is probably no less true that, in the
+long run, it is advantageous also to the seller,
+and that every hindrance to free competition
+in goods tends to diminish the volume of
+production and consequently that of human
+enjoyment.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>But when we come to consider that exceptional
+commodity, labour, we find a different
+result ensuing from free competition; we
+find the inevitable consequences to be impoverishment
+of the seller, deterioration of the
+product and increase of human misery. The
+underpaid worker is not only inevitably
+wretched and inevitably unhealthy; he is also
+a danger and a burden to the country in
+which he lives. Since he—or more often she—receives
+less than a living wage for his
+work, and since he continues to live, it is
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_167'>167</span>obvious that some one else is in part supporting
+him.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>I can never forget the impression made
+upon me in the first factory which I ever
+visited by a little scene of which I was a
+silent witness. The head of the firm had
+shown us over various departments, and
+incidentally had talked of how some of his
+children had just gone to the other side of the
+world in a yacht. He was himself a man
+beginning to be elderly, well grown, well
+groomed, fresh coloured, speaking with an
+educated accent and presenting that air of
+prosperous content which is common with
+elderly business men who are making money.
+He presently took us into a department where
+very young and very poor-looking little girls
+were employed; and one of our party shyly
+asked what were their wages. “Four shillings
+a week,” was the answer. The first speaker,
+himself an employer who pays high wages by
+choice, said deprecatingly: “But—surely—they
+can’t live on that!” “Oh, no!”
+returned their employer, cheerfully. “They
+live at home with their parents.” And I,
+new, then, to the facts of commercial life,
+stood staring, silent, at this well fed gentleman,
+with sons and daughters of his own, who
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_168'>168</span>frankly confessed that poor men’s daughters
+had to be supported by their parents in order
+that he might have their work for less than it
+cost. He seemed to me to be owning himself
+a thief. And that, indeed, was exactly what
+he was—although, strangely enough, he failed
+to perceive the fact. He was committing a
+daily robbery upon persons too weak to
+withstand his demands. His being, however,
+a variety of robbery not recognised by the
+laws, he pursued his course not only unremorseful
+and unpunished, but with great
+profit, and died, leaving behind him a large
+fortune which only a small minority of his
+fellow countrymen consider to have been disgracefully
+acquired. Yet his course was
+attended with much more suffering to other
+people than that of any highwayman. It was
+akin rather to that of the mediæval baron who
+by force of arms extracted a reluctant toll
+from all his poorer neighbours. The girls
+submitted to the extortion because it is even
+worse to starve than to be robbed, and because
+they lacked the combination that might have
+enabled them to resist both robbery and
+starvation.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The individual worker whose skill is but
+the dexterity born of constant practice—the
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_169'>169</span>worker, that is to say, who has no sort of
+monopoly—is no more able to regulate the
+payment of his services than an apple or a
+sack is able to regulate its market price. Nor,
+at a certain stage of the downward course, is
+any individual employer able to regulate it.
+It is, for instance, probable enough that at the
+present moment not the Brothers Cheeryble
+themselves could sell safety pins at a profit
+if they paid a living wage to the women who
+“cap” them.<a id='r68'></a><a href='#f68' class='c023'><sup>[68]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>For, in the long run, the process of competition
+generally succeeds in filching from
+the employer that unfair profit which he
+had originally filched from the worker. It is
+now the public at large which, by paying for
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_170'>170</span>safety pins a fraction less than they really
+cost, pockets the balance of the worker’s
+living wage. For the manufacturer who
+desires to pay his workers better there are
+now two courses open; he must either, if he
+can, find out some improved method, which,
+by diminishing his other expenses, will allow
+him to pay higher for labour, or must combine
+with his fellow manufacturers to raise the
+selling price. In practice, he generally does
+neither of these things, but continues to take
+advantage of his workers and to say—not
+without some show of justification—that he
+cannot help it, and that they would be worse
+off if he gave up business. The public at
+large, meanwhile, though it automatically
+pockets the unfair profits, does not, in the
+long run, gain by the transaction. For the
+underpaid worker who fails to be wholly
+supported by the proceeds of his own labour
+is inevitably supported in part out of the
+pocket of some other person or persons.
+Moreover, both the health and the work of
+the underpaid worker presently deteriorates.
+He contributes less than he might and ought
+to the general wealth, and, by and by, when
+his health fails sufficiently, he becomes a
+charge upon the public. Finally, he dies
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_171'>171</span>before his natural time, so that his country
+fails to receive the full natural return for those
+costly and unproductive years of childhood
+during which he was supported. Furthermore,
+his working life is one of continued
+hardship, fatigue and suffering. His existence
+is not an addition to, but a deduction from,
+the total general happiness, the rather that
+underpayment is a burden not only to its
+victim but also to the onlooker. No person of
+ordinary sensibilities can fail to be depressed
+by the knowledge that large numbers of his
+fellow citizens are struggling, to their physical,
+moral and mental detriment, in hopeless
+poverty. Yet this state of things arises
+inevitably if labour is left, like any other
+commodity, at the mercy of unrestricted
+competition.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>This difference in kind, between labour and
+other commodities, is the justification of trade unionism,
+and the explanation of how it is
+that a man can logically be at the same time a
+free trader and a trade unionist. Except the
+trade unionists and the professed socialists,
+however, no great body of persons seems to have
+perceived this peculiarity of labour; and while
+underpayment is very generally deplored, the
+various efforts of the benevolent are mostly
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_172'>172</span>directed either towards supplementing inadequate
+wages or towards transferring the underpaid
+to other branches of work, rather than
+towards securing better payment for the work
+at present done. In the eyes of the average
+Briton, the settling of wages by free competition
+appears, for some unexplained reason, as
+a sacred and permanent principle. Perhaps,
+if this attitude could be exhaustively analysed,
+we should find at its root a vague respect for
+“the laws of political economy,” which respect
+is, in the last resort, but the result of a confusion
+of mind about two aspects of the word
+“law.” Laws in the moral world are, of
+course, different from laws in the scientific
+world. The moral (or social) law is a
+command; the scientific law merely a statement
+of effects. This we see, plainly enough,
+when the effects are material and immediate.
+We do not dream of regarding the law that
+fire burns as a command to put our fingers in
+the flame. But when we come to consider the
+results of wide-spread human action, we seem
+to ourselves to be in the region rather of
+morals than of science, and without clearly
+realising our attitude, we begin, many of us,
+to regard the laws that govern these matters
+rather as precepts to be obeyed than as
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_173'>173</span>sequences to be avoided. The law that free
+competition in labour leads to starvation
+wages is a law of the same kind as the law
+that a dose of prussic acid leads to death; and
+the conclusion to be drawn in each case is that
+if we wish to avoid the result we must avoid
+the cause. Persons who are not desirous of
+committing suicide must abstain from prussic
+acid; persons who desire to see underpayment
+vanish must resist free competition in labour.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>If the nature of labour were as generally
+apprehended as is the nature of prussic acid,
+the laws of our country (which are laws of the
+other kind—laws of command) would gradually
+be so altered as to prevent and punish
+that kind of robbery which was practised, for
+years, by that prosperous gentleman who, year
+after year, paid girls for their work at a trifle
+under a penny an hour, and died thereafter
+wealthy and highly respected. It is more
+than conceivable that persons now living
+may survive to a day in which wealth so
+accumulated will be held as discreditable as
+wealth accumulated by slave trading, and
+when the stealing of labour will be held no
+less criminal than the stealing of cash. The
+foundation upon which any such reform must
+rest will be the recognition that labour is a
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_174'>174</span>commodity differing in its nature from every
+other commodity; and that while there is,
+intrinsically, no such thing as a fair price,
+there is, intrinsically, and in every case, such
+a thing as a fair wage.</p>
+
+<div class='chapter'>
+  <span class='pageno' id='Page_175'>175</span>
+  <h2 class='c009'><span class='c020'>PART II</span><br> THE MINIMUM WAGE</h2>
+</div>
+
+<h3 class='c021'>CHAPTER I<br> <span class='c020'>EXISTING CHECKS</span></h3>
+
+<p class='c022'>How it is that some workers are not “sweated”—Non-competitive
+systems—Co-operation—Public services—Trade unions—Who
+is to blame for strikes?—How trade unions promote trade—Limits
+of their success—Factory Acts—How restriction raises
+wages—An example—How restriction drives the employer into
+better ways—Limit of legal restrictions in Great Britain.</p>
+
+<p class='c013'>If it be true that unlimited competition tends
+to reduce the wage earner to the lowest possible
+rate of subsistence, how does it happen, some
+reader may enquire, that under our present
+competitive system all wage earners are not,
+in fact, at that low level, but that, on the
+contrary, there are occupations in which wages
+tend steadily to rise.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The answer is that the course of competition
+among ourselves is not unchecked, and that,
+wherever concerted human action has interposed
+a check, the downward course of wages
+has been stayed. Nor, indeed, is the competitive
+system, though the most widely prevalent,
+the only system in existence among us.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_176'>176</span>A very considerable proportion of the trade
+of these islands is carried on not upon a competitive
+but upon a co-operative basis. The
+actual sales of goods made by industrial co-operative
+societies in the year 1904 amounted
+to £90,681,406,<a id='r69'></a><a href='#f69' class='c023'><sup>[69]</sup></a> and this total was “exclusive
+of the sums (amounting to £11,874,643 in
+1904) representing the value of the goods
+produced by the productive departments of
+the wholesale and retail societies and transferred
+to their distributive departments.” The
+membership of the various societies included
+in 1904 no less than 2,103,113 persons, an
+appreciable fraction of the population.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The great movement known as Industrial
+Co-operation has two forms: (<em>a</em>) Associations
+of Consumers; (<em>b</em>) Labour Copartnerships.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The theory of Associations of Consumers is
+simple in the extreme. It consists in the
+elimination and reduction of intermediate profits,
+and the purchase by the retail customer
+of goods as nearly as possible at prime cost.
+The method employed is to sell at the usual
+market price and to return the surplus in
+the form of a percentage upon the total of
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_177'>177</span>purchases—which percentage is usually called
+a dividend. The fund from which such
+payments are paid is “the fund commonly
+known as profit,” and commonly retained
+under that name by the individual employer.
+Some writers have pointed out that this fund
+is in truth not profit but only savings.
+“‘Wealth is not created, it is only economised
+by distribution’; but in co-operative distribution
+it is economised to such effect that, for
+the workers at any rate, it has appeared to
+create wealth where none existed nor could
+exist for them under the old system of competitive
+trading.”<a id='r70'></a><a href='#f70' class='c023'><sup>[70]</sup></a> The “fund commonly
+called profit” is in fact “the margin between
+the prime cost of an article and the price paid
+for it over the counter by the individual
+customer.” The appropriation of this margin,
+or of a considerable part of it, to the customer
+is a feature not only of stores belonging to
+working class members but also of such undertakings
+as the Civil Service or the Army and
+Navy Stores. In these instances, however,
+the method adopted is to diminish the selling
+price; and this slight difference of procedure
+has led to a wide difference of results. The
+ordinary customer of the middle class stores
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_178'>178</span>feels himself, for the most part, but a purchaser
+at an exceptionally good and cheap shop; the
+customer at a store that follows the plan of the
+original Rochdale Pioneers feels himself the
+member of a community and the inheritor of
+a tradition. The fund, being collected in the
+hands of the society at large, is recognised
+more clearly as the property of all members
+alike; its destination is regulated by the
+governing body whom those members elect;
+and it forms a continual object lesson in
+political economy.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In these cases, it is clear to all persons who
+understand the processes, that competition has
+been checked. The margin no longer goes
+into an employer’s pocket but returns to the
+customer; and since the working classes are
+the largest customers, most of it returns to
+them. In nearly all instances, however, a part
+of the fund is retained for public uses; few,
+indeed, are the societies that contribute nothing
+towards educational or federal purposes.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The other group of co-operators views its
+members not as consumers but as producers,
+and by this very fact narrows its range, since
+every human being is a consumer, but not all
+of us are, or can be, in the strict sense, producers.
+There must be clerks, distributors of
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_179'>179</span>all kinds, policemen, organisers. The work of
+such persons is necessary and useful, but it
+does not produce, like that of the weaver or
+the engineer, an immediate and apparent increase
+in the wealth of the world. In theory,
+the early associations of producers were workers
+who combined themselves into self governed
+workshops and divided the profits of their
+labours. But this ideal is applicable only to
+industries demanding but a small outlay of
+capital, and such industries are always growing
+fewer. “The ideal&#160;... was modified;
+individual sympathisers outside the workshop
+were admitted as members&#160;... so too were
+societies of consumers. Thus, in place of the
+old self governing workshop, the modern
+copartnership workshop developed.” Associations
+of this type have been rapidly growing
+in the last ten or twelve years, and during the
+last two or three have spread amazingly in
+Ireland. All sorts of industries are represented:
+baking, weaving (of cotton, wool and silk),
+spinning, building, printing, quarrying, dairying,
+sick nursing, typewriting, cab-driving and
+bookbinding among them; there are societies
+that make wearing apparel of various sorts,
+pianos, harness, nails, mineral waters, photographs,
+brushes, watches, cutlery, padlocks and
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_180'>180</span>bricks. “Desborough, with its two important
+productive societies and its flourishing store
+which owns much of the land and has built
+most of the houses, is almost a co-operative
+community.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Of the great English and Scotch Wholesale
+Societies made up of federations of societies,
+of the annual conferences, the annual festivals,
+the Women’s Co-operative Guild—that greatest
+and most interesting of working women’s
+associations—it is not my business here to
+speak in detail. Readers who desire to become
+acquainted with co-operation as it exists to-day
+should procure <cite>Industrial Co-operation</cite>.<a id='r71'></a><a href='#f71' class='c023'><sup>[71]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>It must be enough to say that in the ocean
+of commercial competition, co-operation lies
+like a fertile island inhabited by workers who
+are putting into their own pockets the profits
+of their buying and selling, and very often
+also of their labour.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Nor is industrial co-operation the only part
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_181'>181</span>of the nation’s business carried on, in part at
+least, upon non-competitive principles. The
+whole civil service of any country, the army,
+navy, hospitals, museums, prisons, endowed
+schools and municipal undertakings of all
+kinds are examples of enterprises established
+on a non-competitive basis, although often
+influenced as regards internal management
+by competitive methods. In many of these
+cases, the payment of workers is fixed
+otherwise than by competition. Military
+and naval officers are not asked what is
+the lowest figure at which they will consent
+to serve their country; nor do we find in
+advertisements for town clerks or borough
+surveyors that preference will be given to
+candidates willing to accept a reduction of
+salary.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Even in the wider labour market, competition
+has not entirely a free course. It is
+checked by trade organisations, by Factory
+Acts and by Sanitary Acts. It is even
+checked in some slight degree by an uneasy
+feeling that it is not decent to let people
+work for us in return for obviously inadequate
+payment.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The avowed aim of trade unions is to
+check freedom of competition, with the object
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_182'>182</span>of obtaining or maintaining for the workers
+a high level of pay and of comfort. Their
+attempted method has been, almost invariably,
+the establishment not of a fixed wage but of a
+minimum wage. A misconception upon this
+point is so deeply engrained in the mind of
+the ordinary middle class Briton that I
+entirely despair of being believed when I
+make this statement. If I should live to
+celebrate a hundredth birthday, I should expect
+still to hear in the last year of my life the
+words: “What I really can’t bear about trade
+unions is that they insist upon all men being
+paid alike.” Let it be repeated, once again,
+however vainly, that trade unions do not so
+insist. I have never known, nor heard of,
+any trade union that objected to any of its
+members getting paid as much above the
+minimum rate as they possibly could. What
+the union does forbid is the taking of wages
+below the minimum; and the reason of this
+prohibition will be clear to any person who
+has read the chapter: “How Underpayment
+Comes.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The means employed by trade unions for
+securing a minimum wage is the combined
+refusal of all members to work at any lower
+rate. In trades of skill, as distinguished from
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_183'>183</span>trades of mere practice—trades that is to say
+which possess in some degree a natural
+monopoly—unions have often attained considerable
+success; and wherever they have done
+so, poverty has been in a measure checked.
+Not only have the members of the union
+themselves been comparatively well paid, but
+the fact of their being so has helped to raise
+the level around them. Thus, since national
+poverty is the greatest enemy of trade, the
+unions have almost invariably, and indeed
+inevitably, been promoters of trade and
+prosperity.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>At this point the question “How about
+strikes?” becomes almost physically audible.
+Certainly, a strike, during its continuance,
+hinders trade and prosperity in exactly the
+same way as warfare does. It is in fact
+warfare on a lesser scale and—in our country—with
+restrictions upon the weapons that
+may be employed; and war is always an evil,
+though sometimes the lesser of two evils. In
+a strike, as in greater wars, responsibility
+rests upon both parties, but seldom in equal
+degrees. The apportionment of blame must
+largely depend upon the cause in which each
+is fighting. The employer, in nine cases out
+of ten, is fighting for cheap labour; the union
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_184'>184</span>primarily for access to amenities of life which
+the employer enjoys already. In nine cases
+out of ten, therefore, the union is really
+fighting the battle of the whole nation, while
+the employer is fighting against it. Mr
+Schoenhof, a grave State official, sent by
+his own government to examine economic
+questions in Europe, declares of the acts of
+British trade unions that: “economically these
+acts speak of a high degree of wisdom. On
+the other hand the attempts of the employing
+classes to depress the rate of wages show
+frequently an entire misapprehension of the
+principles under which production is conducted.
+Most of the strife would disappear if
+it were more fully recognised that a high rate
+of wages has all the time been the powerful
+lever to reaching the low cost of production
+which practically rules to-day in the industries
+of the United States.”<a id='r72'></a><a href='#f72' class='c023'><sup>[72]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>If therefore that combatant is to be held
+most responsible who is fighting in the worse
+cause, it is not the trade unionist but the
+employer, who, on the whole, is chiefly to be
+blamed for the occurrence of strikes.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>There may, indeed, have been cases—I
+believe there has, in our own day and country,
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_185'>185</span>been at least one—in which a union has followed
+a mistaken course, has restricted output, and
+so lessened the volume of trade, and to that
+degree injured the country. In so far as
+unions have occasionally done this, they have
+been blind to the larger issues; but not so
+blind, even thus, as those employers who
+thought to cheapen production by lowering
+wages. Poverty, always and everywhere,
+hinders production; the wise employer desires
+to see more money in the pockets of working
+class purchasers, and the wise statesman more
+money in the pockets of working class taxpayers.
+Some day, when the history of Great
+Britain comes to be seen in the truer perspective
+of retrospect, it will be the leaders of
+trade unionism and the promoters of Factory
+Acts who will stand out among the real
+makers of this nation’s wealth.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>But trade unions have seldom been really
+successful among unskilled workers—precisely
+those who, having no natural monopoly, are
+most liable to the pressure of economic competition
+and most likely to be underpaid.
+Women workers, too, have always been
+difficult to organise; not primarily, as is
+sometimes supposed, because they are women;
+but partly because women, in our present
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_186'>186</span>social state, expect to leave the labour market
+upon marriage, and therefore are comparatively
+indifferent about earning high wages; and
+partly because women have, as a rule, less of
+companionship with one another and of common
+social life out of working hours than
+men, and therefore less opportunity of that
+“talking over” of affairs out of which
+concerted action grows. Home workers are,
+of course, especially isolated; and the successful
+organisation of a union among unskilled
+female home workers would be an industrial
+miracle not looked for by the most sanguine
+toiler in the industrial field.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Co-operation and trade unionism have both
+been, in the main, working class movements,
+and both are examples of that curious inarticulate
+instinct for right collective action
+which seems to be inherent in the English
+democracy. From an assembly of average
+English artisans—I say, English, not British—you
+will not get logically reasoned statements;
+you will very seldom get a clear
+exposition of principles; but you will, very
+generally, get that main line of conduct
+which true principles and sound logic would
+dictate.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Not all the checks, however, in the course
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_187'>187</span>of free competition have come from the
+workers. The direct interposition of the law
+was invoked and secured by men whose
+personal concern in the question was only
+that of fellow citizens. These men were
+actuated by a horror of the sufferings undergone
+by the poorest workers; they felt that
+moral order was outraged and the nation
+disgraced by the existing industrial conditions.
+Restriction of hours was the first check
+imposed by British law, which has shrunk
+hitherto from directly fixing a rate of wages.<a id='r73'></a><a href='#f73' class='c023'><sup>[73]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>But since prolonged hours of labour are in
+fact but a form of diminished wages, the law
+has, as it were despite itself, led to a real, and
+often also to a nominal, rise of wages. The
+way in which this comes about was exemplified
+with singular completeness in a case that
+occurred some years ago in London. The
+managers of a girl’s club, enquiring into the
+non-attendance of a certain member of the
+club, learned that her employer was giving
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_188'>188</span>every day to her and to her fellow workers a
+considerable number of articles to be made at
+home after the closing of the work room and
+to be brought in next morning. In order to
+complete this task, she was often, she declared,
+obliged to work till two in the morning. The
+articles were accessories of dress, and were
+paid for, by the dozen, at such a rate that the
+girls (there were seven of them) earned each
+about seven shillings a week, or about 1s. 2d.
+a day for a working day of from 14 to 16 hours.
+The ladies of the club reported the case to the
+Women’s Industrial Council, the members of
+which knew—as the girls did not—that the
+Factory Act forbade such employment at home
+after a working day on the employer’s premises.
+Now this, it will be seen, was just the kind of
+case in which, to people who have but little
+industrial experience, the interference of the
+law seems harsh, and its strict enforcement
+disastrous. If, working 14 to 16 hours a day,
+these poor girls earned but 1s. 2d., how cruel
+to let them work but 10 hours, and so earn
+but ninepence or tenpence! The Women’s
+Industrial Council, however, ruthlessly reported
+the facts to the Factory inspectors;
+and one evening, shortly afterwards, a lady
+inspector appeared at the workshop door just
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_189'>189</span>as the girls were leaving. Each girl carried a
+parcel. The inspector enquired the contents,
+and on learning them, turned the girls back
+and made each leave behind her the work
+which should have occupied her until after
+midnight. She herself interviewed the employer
+and no doubt expounded to him the
+provisions of the Act. Next morning—or
+possibly a day or two later—this ingenious
+gentleman presented to his employees a statement
+for their signature which declared that
+they carried home work to be done, not by
+themselves but by their relatives. They all
+signed; girls who work part of the night as
+well as all day and who receive but seven
+shillings a week are not persons likely to have
+spirit for much resistance. But they told the
+club leaders, and the club leaders told the
+Women’s Industrial Council, and the Industrial
+Council hastened to tell the Factory
+inspectors. Again the lady inspector appeared
+and met the girls coming out with parcels.
+Again she bade them return the work, and
+again she went in and saw their employer.
+What she said to him can only be surmised;
+for neither Factory inspectors nor employers
+report these things to the outer world. Whatever
+it may have been, it was effectual. No
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_190'>190</span>more work was given out to be carried home
+and the girls were thenceforward able to spend
+their evenings, if they chose, at the club and
+their nights in sleep. But, at the week’s end,
+every girl had done much less work, and being
+paid at the usual piece work rate, received
+considerably less than her weekly average.
+Thereupon, they represented to their employer
+their hard case. The inspector had forbidden
+them to work at night, and they could not
+live upon the proceeds of their work by day.
+Would he therefore be pleased to raise their pay;
+otherwise, they would be obliged to seek work
+elsewhere. The employer did raise their wages,
+paying them at a rate per dozen which, while
+still but a very few pence, was yet somewhere
+between 40 and 45 per cent. higher than he
+had paid before. Nor was this all. Finding
+that seven girls were now unable to accomplish
+all his work, he enlarged his workshop and
+took on six more. There were now therefore
+thirteen girls at work instead of seven, and all
+thirteen were receiving wages a shade higher
+for ten hours’ work than the seven had received
+for about fifteen hours. Nor did the retail
+selling price of the goods advance by so much
+as the fraction of a penny. In such ways as
+this do legal checks tend to impede the course
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_191'>191</span>of free competition and to prevent the extremity
+of underpayment.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>It is not, however, only by preventing undue
+hours of labour but also by insisting upon
+reasonable sanitary conditions that the law
+promotes better wages and improved trade.
+An employer who can no longer either overwork
+or overcrowd his “hands” is driven to
+seek other channels of saving. He demands
+some method of getting more work done in
+an hour, and finds it worth his while to pay
+for the best possible machinery. All sorts of
+improved processes are introduced, some of
+which may demand increased skill and attention
+from the workers. The workers as soon
+as they have leisure enough to think, and
+health enough to develop initiative, begin to
+insist upon better payment, and because they
+are better paid are able to respond to demands
+for better work. The improved methods of
+production, where introduced, lead to an increase
+of production which renders possible
+a lowering of selling price, while the rise in
+wages at the same time increases the buying
+power of the workers. Trade expands and
+finds a ready outlet.<a id='r74'></a><a href='#f74' class='c023'><sup>[74]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_192'>192</span>The profits of the manufacturer, in these
+circumstances, are greatly increased, no longer
+at the cost of increased hardship to the
+workers but with advantage to the whole
+community. Thus the law has already, in
+various ways, interfered with the free course
+of competition, and its interference has been
+beneficial all round. The grounds of its intervention
+have always been moral; legislators
+and constituents alike have felt that
+certain evils must be suppressed at whatever
+loss of profits or of trade. But the results
+have been, not only morally but also economically,
+of immense national benefit. Slowly the
+great truth is emerging into recognition that
+the enforcement of good conditions and good
+payment for the workers of a nation is not
+only the humane but also the profitable policy.
+Slowly, step by step, in that piecemeal, groping
+and wasteful manner which seems to be
+a part of the English nature, and which, while
+so maddening to some of us who happen to
+possess an infusion of more logical but hotter
+blood, yet, on the whole, works out so well
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_193'>193</span>in practice, the British law goes forward,
+setting check after check in the path of unlimited
+competition. Almost every step has
+been taken amid outcries of opposition and
+prophecies of ruin. At every advance, the
+“practical man” has assured the government
+of the day, beforehand, that his particular
+trade would be destroyed, and, afterwards,
+that he had lost nothing.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In spite of all these steps and all these consequences,
+the vast majority of English people
+still believe themselves to be living under
+a <em>régime</em> of pure competition and are ready
+to declare such a <em>régime</em> not only beneficial
+but inevitable. In fact, however, modern life,
+even in our own small islands, comprises not
+one <em>régime</em> only but many. Every stage,
+from a modified feudalism up to an almost
+undiluted socialism, is represented by existing
+conditions in Great Britain. Some stages
+are dwindling; some are growing; and it is
+well within the power of concerted human
+action to determine which shall grow and
+which shall dwindle.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>As far as we have gone, our law has directly
+stopped many gross forms of overwork and
+oppression. The home worker it has helped,
+if at all, only in so far as it has enforced
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_194'>194</span>certain provisions as to housing and sanitation.
+Indirectly, the Factory Acts have served to
+raise wages by forming a basis of minimum
+comfort upon which trade union organisation
+could be built. In Great Britain, the law
+has never yet intervened, directly and of set
+purpose, to raise wages. In parts indeed of
+Greater Britain the law has directly so intervened;
+but the history of that intervention
+belongs to another chapter.</p>
+
+<div>
+  <span class='pageno' id='Page_195'>195</span>
+  <h3 class='c005'>CHAPTER II<br> <span class='c020'>SUPPOSED REMEDIES</span></h3>
+</div>
+
+<p class='c022'>Emigration—Valuable to the individual—Useless for the community—Assumed
+improvidence of early marriage—Drunkenness
+cause of individual poverty, not of general poverty—The
+amazing thrift of working people—Dangers of thrift—Observations
+of a sagacious Scotchman—Consumers’ Leagues—Why
+impracticable as remedy for underpayment—Fields
+in which a Consumers’ League may be of use.</p>
+
+<p class='c013'>The evils described in the first part of this
+volume are no new ones; they have been
+familiar for many years to many persons; a
+variety of remedies have been suggested and
+in many cases attempted. Of these remedies,
+only those are in any degree effectual which
+act as checks upon competition. One group
+of proposed remedies is founded upon the
+assumption that the country is overpopulated.
+This assumption, is, however, disproved by
+the fact (which is unquestioned) that notwithstanding
+the presence among us of a large
+class of rich non-producers, the national income
+has increased at a greater rate than the
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_196'>196</span>population of the country. Still, there are
+persons who believe that England has too
+many people and who, therefore, very logically,
+desire to reduce the number.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Some reformers of this way of thinking
+desire to see fewer births; others desire the
+removal, to parts of the world where population
+is still sparse, of those persons who, in
+this country, are seen to be vainly struggling
+for remunerative employment. Emigration
+has, no doubt, in many individual cases, meant
+a change from indigence to prosperity; but,
+as a remedy for general indigence, it has the
+fatal flaw that every worker removed is also
+a consumer removed, and that every consumer
+removed means the loss of a customer
+and, therefore, to that extent, a diminution
+of trade. The supply of labour is, indeed,
+lessened, but the demand for labour’s product,
+and thus for labour itself, is lessened too.
+It would be better for British trade if the
+emigrant could be made prosperous at home
+instead of being sent to seek prosperity in
+exile. It is, however, true that most emigrants
+go to British colonies, and that these colonies
+need them. For these reasons, emigration is,
+no doubt, useful, but as a remedy for general
+poverty at home it must always remain delusive.
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_197'>197</span>Moreover, so long as the immigration
+of foreigners is permitted, the emigration of
+British subjects is in effect little more than a
+game of “General Post.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Another school of reformers holds the poor
+themselves responsible for their own poverty.
+“Why do they marry so young?” “Why
+do they drink?” “Why don’t they save?”
+These questions are heard at every turn; and
+persons who do not know the life of the poor
+regard them as unanswerable.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>To take first the question of early marriages,
+a point upon which the better off are apt
+to judge with singular unfairness of their
+poorer brethren. The market value of the
+middle class man is probably highest after
+40, certainly after 30. The market value
+of the average workman, on the other hand,
+decreases after 40, if not earlier, and, in a
+vast number of cases, is as high at 22 as
+it will ever be. Therefore, while the middle
+class man is in a financial sense, prudent in
+deferring marriage till 30 or thereabouts, the
+workman would be foolish indeed to delay
+the birth of his eldest children until within
+ten years or so of his own decline in market
+value. The workman who desires, like the
+middle class man, that the infancy and schooltime
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_198'>198</span>of his children shall coincide with his
+own period of greatest prosperity should
+marry—as in fact he does—between the ages
+of 20 and 24. Then, by the time that the
+father begins to experience increasing difficulty
+in getting well paid employment—or
+perhaps employment at all—the elder children
+will at least be of an age to earn for themselves.
+It should be remembered, too, that
+workpeople as a class die younger than
+people who are better off, so that a bricklayer,
+married at 20, and a barrister, married
+at 30, have about even chances of seeing the
+manhood of their elder sons—another reason
+why the former is wise to marry early, if at
+all. Early marriages, then, whether improvident
+or no in the case of middle class
+brides and bridegrooms, are not improvident
+in the case of working people—unless indeed
+it be contended that it is improvident for
+working people to marry at all—a contention
+fraught with rather alarming possibilities to
+the future of the race.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>To the question: “Why do they drink?”
+the answer is not quite so simple. One may
+begin by remarking that there are a great
+many total abstainers among wage earners;
+one may also remark that, if drinking were
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_199'>199</span>as universal among wage earners as, let us
+say, the wearing of boots, even the lowest
+rate of wages would stand at a figure allowing
+for the purchase of drink. Economically, it
+is because the majority of wage earners do
+not drink to excess that the excessive drinker
+finds himself at a disadvantage. Of course,
+he is at a disadvantage also in various other
+respects, but these do not enter into the
+economic argument. That intemperate drinking
+may conduce to poverty is undeniable;
+but that poverty also often conduces to intemperance
+is no less true. Of the two kinds
+of drunkenness that exist among wage earners
+one is largely in the nature of an escape from
+fatigue and from despair. Of the other—the
+outbreak at intervals of the able, energetic
+and often comparatively prosperous man, I
+do not pretend to have fathomed the mystery;
+but it seems likely that the monotony of
+modern working life and the lack of abundant
+personal interests may be among the contributory
+causes. It may also be noted that
+to carouse at intervals was a deeply rooted
+habit among our Northern ancestors, who
+admired a man potent in drinking as they
+admired a man powerful in fight. It is at
+least conceivable that the energetic, capable
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_200'>200</span>man who “breaks out” every month or two
+is a survival of the old type; and it certainly
+seems to be the case that his type does not
+occur among purely Latin races. Be this
+as it may, experience shows convincingly
+that, on the whole, in this country, any and
+every class of workers grows by degrees more
+sober as its hours of work are shortened and
+its wages raised. Individuals of the class
+may still drink heavily, but the average
+of sobriety steadily rises with improved conditions.
+Moreover, in spite of the temptations
+presented by poverty, a steady rise in the
+sobriety of this country is shown by the
+excise returns. If poverty spreads and
+deepens—as I fear it does—the cause cannot
+be found in an increase of drunkenness; for
+the consumption of drink per head grows
+yearly less and less. Temperance is doubtless
+advantageous in many ways to those
+who practise it; but, like efficiency, it
+possesses a money value only while it fails
+to be universal. If every man were temperate,
+no employer would make a point of
+retaining his temperate “hands” when
+reducing his establishment.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>To the question: “Why do not working
+people save?” truth requires the paradoxical
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_201'>201</span>reply that they do save, and that they cannot
+afford to do so. As a class, working people
+save a larger proportion of their income than
+any other class of the community. The shares
+in Industrial Co-operative Societies amounted
+in 1904 to £27,739,123; the Reserve and
+Insurance funds of the same societies to
+£2,677,420. The great Friendly and Provident
+Societies are supported almost wholly
+by working class contributors; and, in
+addition to these, the majority of Trade
+Unions are also provident Societies.<a id='r75'></a><a href='#f75' class='c023'><sup>[75]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Of the thirty families whose household
+expenditure has been tabulated in Vol.
+I. of Mr Booth’s <cite>Life and Labour</cite> (East
+London), only five spent nothing upon insurance
+or club money; and in one household
+this item ran up to 11½ per cent. of the
+whole expenditure. Considering that the
+weekly income, as estimated, ranged from
+about 10s. 3½d. to about 33s. 7d. and that
+the households consisted seldom of less than
+four, and in one case of eight persons, these
+contributions are by no means trifling. Yet
+it is probable that not two families out of the
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_202'>202</span>thirty were able to make anything like an
+adequate provision for old age. It hardly,
+indeed, requires demonstration that a person
+earning just enough to support life can only
+make an adequate provision for his old age
+by laying by 100 per cent. of his income.
+Upon 10s. a week, or less, the saving of
+money becomes something very near to a slow
+form of suicide. Moreover, at the risk of
+horrifying every middle class reader, I must
+frankly declare that, in my opinion, a worker
+does more wisely to abstain from all forms of
+thrift beyond participation in his trade union
+and his co-operative society. His union will
+help to keep up his wages; his co-operative
+society will increase their purchasing power;
+the return upon both these investments is
+immediate and certain: but anything more is
+apt to cost too dear. It is now a good many
+years since an old Scotchman of great intelligence
+and judgment, the secretary of his trade
+union, a member of the municipal council, and
+justly respected by his fellow townsmen of
+various ranks, gave me his opinion on this
+subject. He related to me how, as a young
+man, he had accompanied a benevolent gentleman
+to a lecture upon thrift, and how, as they
+afterwards walked away, the gentleman waxed
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_203'>203</span>eloquent upon the duty of every man to lay
+by. But my old friend, canny even at five-and-twenty
+or so, replied that he was a
+married man with two children, that his
+earnings were two pounds a week, that, if he
+spent less, either his children must go short
+of what was necessary to make them strong,
+healthy and well trained, or he himself must
+go short of what was necessary to maintain
+his efficiency; and that, in his belief, the best
+form of thrift for a man in his position was to
+maintain the highest standard of living which
+his small total income would secure. In his
+case the plan had fully succeeded. He was,
+I suppose, well over sixty, as hale, as active
+and as much interested in the progress of the
+world as any man of thirty, and a most
+valuable citizen. His children had both
+grown up healthy, capable and industrious;
+both were skilled workers, regularly employed
+and in receipt of good wages. But supposing—and
+his trade was one reputed unhealthy—that
+the father had died, leaving a widow and
+young children unprovided for? We may
+note that his risk of doing so was lessened by
+his being better fed and better clothed than
+his more sparing neighbour. Still, death is
+liable to seize even the best nourished and the
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_204'>204</span>most fitly clothed; he might have died long
+before his children had completed their
+excellent education or become capable of self
+support. Even in that case, however, would
+these orphans, in whom a foundation had been
+laid of good health and good teaching, have
+been really worse off than if, with a poorer
+endowment of personal advantages, they had
+inherited the money pittance—so sadly inadequate
+at best—that their father might
+have scraped together in his few years of life?
+For how miserably small is the provision that
+<em>can</em>, even with the utmost exercise of parsimony,
+be made out of a family income of two
+pounds a week! In their inevitably inadequate
+efforts to make such provision,
+workers too often deny themselves the
+absolute essentials of healthy living. To
+abstain from buying new shoes in order to
+save the price for one’s old age, and then to
+die of pneumonia, induced by want of sound
+shoes, is but a doubtful form of thrift, both
+for oneself and one’s nation. The interests
+of the nation, especially, are certainly better
+served by the maintenance among working
+class families of the highest attainable standard
+of life than by the accumulation of very small
+individual provision for possible orphans or
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_205'>205</span>possible old age. Even two pounds a week
+will not suffice (except in remote country
+districts—where no man earns so much) to provide
+really very good food, clothing and housing
+for four persons; and the working class
+family does not often consist of no more than
+four. The present cost of thrift, as thrift is
+generally understood, is too heavy and the
+future return too light; and the wise man is
+not he who saves his money, but he who
+spends it to the best advantage.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The supposed remedies hitherto touched
+upon have been measures demanding the
+agency of the wage earner himself; but there
+is another scheme, particularly attractive to
+the inexperienced reformer, in which the
+consumer is to be the active person. When
+men and women who are not themselves
+underpaid come face to face with the evil of
+underpayment, it is natural enough for them
+to resolve that henceforth the articles purchased
+by themselves shall be articles the makers of
+which have been adequately paid. From this
+individual resolve it is but one step to an
+association of persons all thus resolved, and
+banded together for the purposes of investigation
+and exclusive dealing. Such an association
+is a “Consumers’ League,” the aim of
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_206'>206</span>which is “to check unlimited competition not
+at the point of manufacture but at the point
+of sale.” Such associations, the first of which
+was formed, I believe, in consequence of a
+suggestion made by myself, many years ago,
+in <cite>Longman’s Magazine</cite>, are likely to reappear
+at a time like the present when many
+consciences are disturbed by recognition of
+the fact that a considerable proportion of
+British workers are scandalously underpaid.
+It seems desirable, therefore, to point out how
+and why a Consumers’ League must inevitably
+fail in its aims.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The complexities of modern commerce are
+such that it is absolutely impossible for any
+group of purchasers, however large and however
+earnest, to attain that accurate knowledge
+of myriads of facts which would be
+necessary; or, even, supposing such knowledge
+to have been once obtained, to keep abreast
+of the unceasing changes. Let us take the
+comparatively elementary problem of the large
+retail drapery shops. It appears to be the
+general practice in such establishments for
+each separate department to be under separate
+management, and for the head of each department
+to have a free hand, subject to the one
+condition of producing a certain percentage of
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_207'>207</span>profit. The ability to manage successfully
+and develop a large branch of trade is not, as
+may well be believed, very common, and one
+part of the payment that it demands is freedom
+to do its work in its own way. Thus it is
+not uncommon for one department of a large
+business to be conducted in a spirit of justice
+and consideration, while another is marked by
+the total lack of such a spirit. For instance,
+there was at one time, in a certain firm, a
+manager of the mourning department who was
+among the best employers in the London
+trade; but at the same time, the man in
+charge of the workshop in which certain
+garments were made up or altered, was a
+cutter-down of wages, rude and bullying in his
+behaviour to the workers and entirely inconsiderate
+of their comfort. What reply, in a
+case like this, can be given to a lady who
+asks: “Can I safely go to X’s shop?” How,
+if she is furnished with the information just
+given, can she discriminate, or how, even if
+she did, can she or her informant be sure of
+the continuance of these conditions? Six
+months later, the one manager may have taken
+a better post, and the other have been
+dismissed. The new man at the workshop
+may be an enlightened organiser, who introduces
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_208'>208</span>improved machinery and methods,
+knows the value of contented and well fed
+workers, and raises wages; while the new man
+at the mourning department may have been
+trained in the ways of “a driving trade,” and
+may believe good management to consist in
+harrying his employees, in nibbling at their
+wages and in “cribbing” their leisure. If we
+multiply these facts by the number of shops
+or departments touched by the weekly purchases
+of any well-to-do customer, we shall
+begin to have some conception of the scale
+upon which a Consumers’ League would have
+to conduct its investigations.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Moreover, all this is only on the uppermost
+plane. Few of these retailers manufacture the
+goods sold. In regard to every single article
+it becomes necessary to trace every step of
+production and transmission. A pair of shoes
+cannot be satisfactorily guaranteed until we
+have discovered the wages and conditions of
+employment not only of every person who has
+worked upon the actual shoe, but also of the
+tanner, the thread weaver and winder, the
+maker of eyelets, the spinner and weaver of
+the shoe-lace and the various operatives
+engaged upon the little metal tag at the shoe-lace’s
+end. Nor is the matter finished even
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_209'>209</span>then. At every stage of its evolution, a shoe
+requires the services of clerks, bookkeepers,
+office-boys, warehousemen, packers, boxmakers,
+carmen, railway servants &#38;c., and each new
+service introduces other material and other
+service—paper, ink, ledgers, harness, stable
+fittings, cardboard, string, glue, iron, coal—the
+series is endless. Yet compared with a
+woman’s completed gown, or a man’s suit of
+clothes, how simple a product is a pair of
+shoes. The fact is that even the most
+apparently simple of commercial acts is but
+one link in a network that spreads over the
+whole field of life and labour; and the fabric
+of that network is not woven once and for
+ever, but is in continual process of change.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>At the present stage, then, of our commercial
+development it appears absolutely
+impossible for a Consumers’ League to fulfil
+its aims. If labour were thoroughly organised
+in every branch, so that a strong trade union
+existed in every trade, capable of giving
+information upon every point, then indeed
+a Consumers’ League might become truly
+efficient, but it would become proportionately
+superfluous.<a id='r76'></a><a href='#f76' class='c023'><sup>[76]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_210'>210</span>The cure of underpayment needs to be
+applied at the point of payment; and the
+establishment of a legal minimum wage is the
+most direct method of application.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>But although a Consumers’ League can
+never hope to counteract the results of unlimited
+competition, it may, as the National
+Consumers’ League of America shows, exert a
+valuable influence upon public opinion, and
+may succeed in remedying certain industrial
+scandals. The Report of that body for the
+year 1905–6 (up to March 6, 1906) is a most
+interesting pamphlet, full of details that show
+how useful may be the work, as industrial
+detectives and agitators, of a group of citizens,
+banded together for the purpose of exposing
+and abolishing oppressive and insanitary conditions
+of labour. In a country where public
+feeling is not yet nearly ready for the enactment
+of a minimum wage, the formation of a
+Consumers’ League may possibly be the best
+step forward. An effectual remedy it cannot
+be; but it undoubtedly affords means of
+education, both for its members and for
+the community at large. In our own country,
+however, where the evils are already more or
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_211'>211</span>less generally recognised, and where an increasing
+number of persons are already beginning
+to hope for a minimum wage, the
+Consumers’ League marks a stage that has
+been left behind.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>We see, then, that emigration, though it
+may help the individual, can but affect the
+trade of the country injuriously; that temperance,
+while eminently desirable on other
+grounds, is only of any economic value because
+it is still not universal; that effectual thrift is
+absolutely impossible for the underpaid, and
+that the exercise of even an illusory thrift can
+only be achieved by a sacrifice of things
+essential to good health. We see, furthermore,
+that a Consumers’ League may be a
+valuable social agency, but can never hope
+to be an economic remedy for underpayment.
+Having looked up all these turnings and found
+all of them blind alleys, we now proceed
+to examine a road along which younger
+sisters of ours have travelled already, and at
+the end of which a ray of hope seems to be
+shining. But before entering upon this examination
+we will pause to consider the lesson
+of facts as presented in the history of our
+own cotton trade.</p>
+
+<div>
+  <span class='pageno' id='Page_212'>212</span>
+  <h3 class='c005'>CHAPTER III<br> <span class='c020'>THE LESSONS OF THE COTTON TRADE</span></h3>
+</div>
+
+<p class='c022'>The pessimist view—False assumption on which it rests—Cotton
+trade not natural to Britain—Climate—Temperature—Fallacy
+of inherited skill—Cotton workers as they were—Advancing
+legal restrictions—Rise of wages—Amazing development and
+prosperity of the British trade—Change in the mills—Change
+in the workers—Change in the employers—The case of Bristol—The
+verdict of Mr Schoenhof.</p>
+
+<p class='c013'>Many people who would gladly see working
+people better paid, honestly believe that a
+general rise in wages is not commercially
+possible. Any attempt at giving a fair wage
+all round would, they declare, so diminish
+trade as to throw out of work an additional
+number of persons whose added competition
+would inevitably reduce the average wage to
+below its original level: or who, if their competition
+were effectually barred by the existence
+of a legal minimum wage, would be left
+without employment, in a state more wretched
+than before. It may be remarked that this
+view involves an admission that we live under
+commercial conditions which render dishonesty
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_213'>213</span>not only the best, but actually the only
+possible, policy. Such a belief would appear
+to furnish an unanswerable argument in favour
+of the destruction of such commercial conditions,
+and it is difficult to understand how any
+human being can hold it and not become a convinced
+revolutionist. Yet, strange to say, it is
+from the mouth of upholders of things as existing,
+that this doctrine is most frequently heard.
+In some quarters, indeed, there would seem to
+be actual hostility to the idea of bettering the
+workman’s lot, an inclination to grudge him
+any greater share than he now possesses of the
+comforts and conveniences of modern life.
+This attitude—to some extent, it must be
+supposed, a feudal survival—indicates a very
+ugly spirit of class selfishness which may
+possibly be dangerous, and is certainly
+ignorant. Dull, indeed, must be the man or
+woman upon whom modern conditions of life
+do not impress the closeness of human interdependence.
+Never, since the beginnings of
+history, has the daily life of every man been
+so wonderfully interwoven with that of all his
+fellows: never was there a time when the
+deeds of each were so much a part of his
+neighbour’s pains or pleasures. Consider for
+a single moment how changed would be one’s
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_214'>214</span>own life, if there were no longer in Great
+Britain any person very poor, very dirty or
+very ill mannered, if, in short, no one fell
+below the standard of that skilled artisan
+class which is not only the most solidly
+virtuous, but also, in essentials, the most truly
+courteous section of our society. Is there one
+of us, however selfish, however callous, from
+whose daily existence a burden would not be
+lifted?</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Yes, the pessimist will say, the change
+would be delightful, but it is not possible.
+That very interdependence of which you speak
+makes the whole world but one market, and
+renders it impossible for any one country to
+raise wages while other countries keep theirs
+low. This alleged impossibility rests, it will
+be observed, upon the assumption that higher
+wages conduce to higher selling prices, an
+assumption which experience shows to be
+fallacious. And since it is always more convincing,
+especially, perhaps, to the British
+mind, to narrate what has happened than to
+declare what must happen, the purposes of
+my argument will be best served by a brief
+account of the English cotton trade.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Before entering upon this, let me point
+out how very remarkable a phenomenon it is
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_215'>215</span>that there should exist an English cotton
+trade at all. We cannot grow the required
+material: every ounce of raw cotton has to be
+imported at a price, imported too from a great
+distance, and owing to its bulky nature, at
+comparatively a high heavy cost. Originally
+the possession of coal, iron and a seaboard
+gave advantages to England: the factory
+system developed early with us, and we manufactured
+cotton, as we manufactured other
+goods, because our energies were turned
+towards manufacture in general. But the
+same influences which caused mechanical production
+to begin here have caused it to arise
+elsewhere, and the natural development of
+industry must, one would suppose, eventually
+carry the manufacture of cotton to regions
+where cotton can be grown, especially if they
+happen also to possess the means of motive
+power. The Southern States of America,
+where cotton grows, where coal and water
+power are plentiful, and where population is no
+longer sparse, would seem to be marked out by
+nature as the home of the cotton industry.
+And in fact mills are rapidly rising in that
+region. Not only so, but the workers in them
+are employed for much longer hours and paid
+at a far lower rate per hour than English
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_216'>216</span>cotton workers. Readers of the chapter upon
+child labour, in Part I. of this volume, will be
+aware that children are working, both by day
+and by night, in these mills, whereas no child
+may work full time in any English mill, nor
+any child or woman at night. Yet these
+Southern mills, with every advantage of position,
+with cheap labour, and comparatively
+cheap land, have not succeeded, and are not
+succeeding, in winning from the English their
+immense preponderance in the markets of the
+world. This undeniable fact is explained in
+some quarters as being due to our much
+abused English climate, which is said to provide
+exactly the degree of temperature and
+humidity most favourable to the manipulation
+of cotton yarn. That a very dry atmosphere
+will not suit some processes of the trade
+seems to be generally acknowledged, and if
+England were the only damp country in the
+world, or even the dampest, we might perhaps
+regard ourselves as possessing a sort of
+monopoly advantage. If, however, there be
+any one state of the atmosphere more favourable
+than any other for the manufacture of
+cotton, then it is quite impossible that our
+notoriously variable climate can always present
+it. Moreover, it seems to be the case that for
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_217'>217</span>some processes at least, a combination of
+dampness with great heat is desirable: and
+this combination, natural to some countries,
+is actually forbidden by the English law.
+Countries possessing a climate at once hot and
+damp must, it would seem, have a natural
+advantage over us, and here again, the
+Southern States are favoured by nature.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Another explanation sometimes put forward
+is that the English workers, among whom the
+manufacture was first established, possess a
+hereditary skill of manipulation. The physiological
+possibility of such inheritance seems
+to be questionable: and, considering the great
+changes undergone by the machinery employed,
+the existence of it would be, at least, very
+surprising. Moreover, this supposed hereditary
+dexterity would require to have grown
+up in strangely few generations, since, in 1830
+or so, the cotton workers of England are
+described as being deplorably poor workers,
+degenerate, physically and morally. Their
+condition, at that time and for a good many
+years afterwards, was appalling. A more
+horrible picture than that presented in Mr
+P. Gaskell’s “Manufacturing Population of
+England,” published in 1833, can hardly be
+conceived. These cotton operatives were, in
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_218'>218</span>short, as unpromising in physique, in character
+and in industrial efficiency as any group of
+casual, irregularly employed labourers that
+could be selected to-day from the ranks of
+unorganised industry: as ill paid, as wretched
+and as much oppressed as any sweated home
+worker in a slum garret.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>By slow degrees, from that first Act which,
+in 1802, made some faint attempt at shortening
+the hours of the unhappy parish apprentices,
+the law has gone on, steadily diminishing
+hours of work. From 1854 onward, the
+working week for women in textile trades
+became one of 60 hours. Within a few years
+later, these hours were reduced to 56½; and
+now, the legal week in the textile trades is
+one of 55½ hours. At all these stages, the
+regulations, though nominally affecting only
+women, have, in practice, decided the hours
+of men also. Thus, the British textile worker
+is employed for fewer hours than any foreign
+competitor. Wages, though not high for the
+individual, are, owing to the fact that nearly
+all its members work in the trade, high for
+the family. Rates of pay have steadily risen;
+the average nominal wage of 24s. 9d. for men
+in 1881—itself an immense advance upon the
+starvation rates of the thirties—had risen, in
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_219'>219</span>1902, to 27s. 3d. For later years I cannot
+cite figures, but the amazing prosperity of the
+trade during the last year or two can hardly
+have failed to affect wages favourably.<a id='r77'></a><a href='#f77' class='c023'><sup>[77]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Moreover, these rises have coincided with
+a fall in the price of food so marked that the
+increase in average real wages, between 1881
+and 1902, is reckoned to be more than 36%.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The number of persons employed has also
+steadily grown, and the returns of the Chief
+Inspector of Factories show that in 1901 the
+industry gave occupation to 513,000 persons.
+The increase in the number of spindles
+and of looms, however, has been far greater
+than the increase in the number of hands.
+Machinery has made vast strides and becomes
+daily swifter and more economical of labour;
+so that the total growth of the trade, since
+the days of employers who vowed that a ten-hour
+day would ruin them, almost passes
+calculation. Moreover, the development of
+the industry tends more and more towards
+those branches which demand most skill. Our
+exports increase more largely in fabrics than
+in yarn, and most of all in coloured fabrics,
+the prices of which are rising. We are in
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_220'>220</span>short “specialising in the more expensive and
+difficult work.” We are producing those
+really exquisite coloured cotton stuffs which
+under various fancy names have, during the
+last few years, made summer dresses so attractive,
+and which are well worth the comparatively
+high price at which they are bought.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>On p. 61 of the pamphlet written by
+Professor S. J. Chapman for the Free Trade
+League<a id='r78'></a><a href='#f78' class='c023'><sup>[78]</sup></a> may be found a most interesting
+table of the comparative increase, all over the
+world, in the number of spindles, between the
+years 1870 and 1903. We find that “about
+a fifth of the total increase in the world’s
+spindles in a third of a century has fallen to
+the United Kingdom. The whole of Europe,
+taken together in a period of industrial
+awakening, cannot boast a growth of cotton
+spindles more than twice as great as that which
+has taken place in this country alone, though
+in 1870 Europe was almost at the beginning
+of her cotton spinning, and has since then
+been fostering it.... In 1870 the American
+nation had a fifth as many spindles as the
+United Kingdom, and to-day she does not
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_221'>221</span>possess half as many as the United Kingdom.”
+And this in spite of the fact that the population
+of the United States is so much larger
+than ours.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Another table (on p. 66) deals with exports
+of manufactured cotton goods, and compares
+the average annual exports, from 1891 to
+1902, of Germany, Holland, Belgium, France,
+Switzerland, the United States, and the United
+Kingdom. The absolute increase of British
+exports in the year 1901–2 was £8,170,000;
+that of Germany, £4,100,000; and that of the
+United States, £325,000. All the remaining
+countries together totalled an increase of only
+£13,450,000, as against Britain’s £8,170,000.
+The increase in German exports, which comes
+nearest to our own, is but slightly more than
+half of it. “Of the total trade (exporting)
+done by the chief Western trading nations,
+Great Britain accounts for 62·5%; Germany
+stands next with 12%.” Moreover, these
+figures, reaching only to 1902, take no account
+of the vast prosperity of the cotton trade in
+Great Britain since: a prosperity of which
+some indication is given in the Report of the
+Chief Inspector of Factories for 1905. From
+Oldham, Mr Crabtree reports that “About 20
+new mills have been erected or are in course
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_222'>222</span>of erection for the cotton spinning trade alone.
+These will contain about 2,000,000 spindles.”
+(p. 147.) Mr Verney reports that “in the
+Rochdale district alone three new mills containing
+220,000 spindles started in 1905, and
+at the end of the year there were nine more
+in course of construction to be equipped with
+770,000 spindles. The total number of new
+mills which have commenced to run in 1905
+and which are in course of erection throughout
+Lancashire is no less than 57, with 5,000,000
+spindles. The signification of these figures
+may be better appreciated when it is remembered
+that in the whole of France there
+are but 6,000,000 spindles, and in Germany
+less than 9,000,000.” (p. 147.) On the same
+page the following declaration, by Mr W.
+Tattersall, is quoted from “The Cotton Trade
+Circular”: “The year’s trading has been the
+most prosperous in the history of Lancashire.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>On the whole, the story of the British cotton
+trade—a trade, be it remembered, the very
+existence of which is surprising—is the story of
+one of the most amazing developments in industrial
+history. Raw material that can only be
+grown in distant countries is brought, naturally
+enough, at first, to a land of coal and iron,
+the cradle of the factory system. By and by,
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_223'>223</span>other countries, including some in which the
+raw material can be produced, begin, in their
+turn, to adopt the factory system and to manufacture
+cotton. What would naturally follow?
+Surely, the absorption of the English trade by
+the foreign competitor whom nature favours.
+Moreover, Britain, already handicapped by
+nature, had further handicapped herself by restricting
+hours of work and by imposing high
+and expensive standards of sanitation and
+safety. Yet what is seen to occur? England’s
+trade goes on steadily expanding, year
+by year; wages rise, both nominally and, to a
+greater degree, really; and in the course of last
+year (1905) not only was all the available
+adult labour employed, but it was not possible
+to get enough of it, so that there was actually
+some increase in half time labour, which previously
+had steadily declined.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Nor is the contrast less if we consider the
+mills themselves or the men and women connected
+with them. In the first third of the
+last century, the mills were, in general, dirty,
+ill ventilated, ill provided with sanitary accommodation,
+frequently overcrowded, the
+machinery unguarded and the temperature
+unregulated, so that the operatives suffered
+from extremes both of heat and of cold. At
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_224'>224</span>the present day, there must be a certain cubic
+space for every worker, there must be proper
+sanitary accommodation, moderate temperature
+and—most important of all, perhaps, in this
+industry—there must be proper ventilation
+for carrying off the dust and fluff by which the
+lungs of so many cotton operatives have been
+injured. The old mills were full of overworked,
+underpaid children, stunted, wizened, and, if
+their contemporaries are to be credited, precociously
+vicious; children who dropped asleep
+at their looms, and had to be dragged, crying
+with sleepiness, from their beds to begin work
+again in the morning, while another relay
+of little serfs were actually waiting to enter
+the beds left vacant. The mills ran till late
+at night, sometimes all night long. Diseases
+of many kinds, especially phthisis and spinal
+deformities were rife; while drunkenness and
+immorality seem to have been rampant.
+The masters, many of whom were self made
+men, of little education, vowed that their
+profits were not large, and that any restriction
+of the hours of labour would inevitably land
+them in the Bankruptcy Court. The operatives,
+however, persisted in clamouring for
+relief; parliament granted it; and strange to
+say, instead of being ruined, the trade grew
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_225'>225</span>better and better. The workers, seizing their
+chance, developed strong trade unions that included
+both men and women, and thus secured
+themselves against the disastrous results of free
+competition. Their union helped them to gain
+better wages; the law helped them to health
+and to leisure. In less than three generations,
+the cotton workers of North Western England
+have become intelligent, independent citizens.
+They are no longer oppressed, no longer illiterate
+and no longer vicious. Free libraries and
+co-operative stores grow and flourish, and the
+old English passion for music, still dormant
+in the South, is well awake in the large cotton
+towns of the North. In industrial efficiency
+the English spinners and weavers of cotton
+have no rivals. As the Tariff Commission reported,
+“Nearly every mill started abroad with
+English machinery requires a certain amount
+of British workpeople and overlookers to start
+it and to train up native labour.” (Sec. 205.)
+This increase of skill, dependent very largely
+upon an improved standard of life, has rendered
+possible a vast improvement in methods of
+production, with the usual consequence of a
+greatly enlarged output. The masters, from
+whom the increasing stringency of the law has
+demanded an ever rising standard of capacity,
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_226'>226</span>are men of a better class than their predecessors,
+and among the most enlightened of British
+employers.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Meanwhile, in other countries, many of the
+evils which Lancashire has left behind, still
+prevail. Children toil to-day in certain
+American mills, as they toiled once in ours;
+in many European countries, hours are still
+injuriously long and wages inadequate to the
+demands of a civilised life. Yet employers of
+this cheap labour cannot produce so profitably
+as Lancashire can. “On the general efficiency
+of British labour as compared with that of any
+foreign country witnesses are practically
+unanimous,” says the Report of the Tariff Commission.
+(Sec. 89.) In short, the English
+cotton manufacturer produces more cheaply
+and more profitably, upon the whole, than
+any competitor, and in the highest branches
+of the trade, can hardly be approached. The
+reasons of this pre-eminence are that the good
+conditions enforced by law and the comparatively
+high wage enforced by the trade unions
+combine to create for him the most efficient
+body of cotton workers in the world. Once
+more, the facts of industrial history proclaim
+the truth that efficiency is not the cause but
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_227'>227</span>the product of fair wages, healthy surroundings
+and reasonable leisure.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Do not let us be deceived into supposing
+that, apart from these factors, there is any
+peculiarity in the cotton trade to account for
+these developments. If there were, we should
+behold the ill paid and overworked cotton
+workers of the Southern States, many of
+whom are of the same race as ourselves,
+producing fabrics as good as ours, at the same
+speed, and equal profit. Indeed, we need not
+go so far as America for our object lesson.
+The South West of our own country may
+provide it. Bristol, no less than the more
+northerly parts of the island, had its cotton
+mills. The same advantages were presented:
+the port open to the Atlantic, the moist
+westerly climate, the plentiful supply of
+labour. The same factory law applies, the
+same hours and conditions are enforced; the
+employers, of late years at any rate, have
+been men of capital and of intelligence. One
+factor only has been absent: the powerful
+organisation of workers. Because of its
+absence, wages have fallen to the level of
+unskilled trades in the district. Men do not
+work in the cotton trade in Bristol, nor adult
+women. The employees are girls, earning the
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_228'>228</span>low wage of a Bristol factory girl. Of profits
+there have, for years, been practically none.
+No employer can afford to make improvements
+in methods of production; and at the present
+moment it is, I believe, an open secret that
+the one remaining mill is only kept open
+because its owner is unwilling to turn away
+the hands.<a id='r79'></a><a href='#f79' class='c023'><sup>[79]</sup></a> But for the strong trade unions
+of the northern operatives, the whole of
+England’s cotton trade at the present day
+might be in the position of Bristol’s cotton
+trade, and the Lancashire worker might be
+toiling for as many hours and as small a wage
+as his German competitor. To the organisation
+of the workers, English labour owes that
+comparatively fortunate position which is, as
+Mr Schoenhof, years ago, perceived, “the
+only vantage ground which England possesses
+and which secures to her the safe and indisputable
+rulership of the commerce of the
+world.”<a id='r80'></a><a href='#f80' class='c023'><sup>[80]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In this particular industry of cotton, other
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_229'>229</span>nations, as he points out, whose labour is ill
+paid and whose hours of work are long, are
+trying to defend themselves by a high
+protective tariff “against the results of England’s
+high pay and short hours.”... “Yet
+it is all machine work driven by steam power
+and conducted in factories under the best
+intellectual management which the countries
+afford. But how world wide the difference
+in the results!”<a id='r81'></a><a href='#f81' class='c023'><sup>[81]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>World wide indeed—not as to national
+trade only, but as to national happiness.</p>
+
+<div>
+  <span class='pageno' id='Page_230'>230</span>
+  <h3 class='c005'>CHAPTER IV<br> <span class='c020'>THE MINIMUM WAGE IN PRACTICE</span></h3>
+</div>
+
+<p class='c022'>Sweating not unknown in the colonies—Instances published by
+<cite>Otago Daily Times</cite>—Underpaid workers in 1895—Epidemic of
+strikes—State arbitration proposed in New Zealand—Conciliation
+Boards and Court of Arbitration—Details of New
+Zealand law—Objections raised by critics in England—Difference
+in position of British and of New Zealand trade
+unions—New Zealand freed from strikes—The question of the
+poorest workers—Wellington match makers—Tailoresses
+under an agreement and tailoresses under an award—The
+under rate worker—Victoria and Wage Boards—Campaign of
+the <cite>Age</cite>—Factory Act of 1896—Details of Wage Board scheme—The
+first six Boards—Boards in 1905—Several instances of
+the “determinations” of Wage Boards—Effect on home work—The
+case of New South Wales—Summing up.</p>
+
+<p class='c013'>The evils of underpayment, being the invariable
+result of unlimited competition,
+inevitably show themselves in any country
+where trade has come into existence. The
+oversea colonies of Britain are not overcrowded,
+are naturally rich, and ought to be
+free from evils accumulated during an old
+civilisation. Yet, thirty years ago, instances
+of underpayment, exactly on all fours with
+those exhibited in the Queen’s Hall in the
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_231'>231</span>summer of 1906, were to be found in New
+Zealand, in South Australia and in Victoria.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>There, as here, newspapers called attention
+to the facts, and aroused the public conscience.
+In January 1889, the <cite>Otago Daily
+Times</cite>, “a journal distinguished amongst its
+fellows for caution and restraint of language,”
+published a series of articles about underpaid
+labour in Dunedin. “One woman deposed
+that she might make 3s. 6d. on a good day
+but it would be by stitching from half past
+eight in the morning until eleven at night.”<a id='r82'></a><a href='#f82' class='c023'><sup>[82]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>“Yet she counted her lot at that time
+almost happy, for she had lately escaped from
+a factory where, do what she would, she could
+not earn more than eighteenpence daily by
+working until all hours of the night.” Another
+woman reported that she “finished cotton
+shirts at 1s. 6d. a dozen”<a id='r83'></a><a href='#f83' class='c023'><sup>[83]</sup></a> and that she
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_232'>232</span>could “get through a dozen and a half in the
+factory between nine o’clock and six in the
+evening; then she carried a dozen more home
+and sat up sewing by lamplight until they
+were finished.... On one of these evenings
+she had a stroke of good luck; she was
+allowed to take away a dozen flannels as well
+as her dozen shirts. Both bundles were done
+when she went to bed—at three o’clock in the
+morning—and by that night’s work she earned
+a whole shilling.” (p. 30.)</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Individual and combined action followed
+these revelations. A union of tailoresses was
+formed and an effective factory law passed.
+Wages, however, continued upon a downward
+course, and in 1895 “there were in the colony
+591 factory girls who were getting no pay for
+their work, and 175 who were paid half
+a crown a week or less.” (p. 34.) Such facts
+as these were enough to show to thoughtful
+observers that, unless special measures were
+introduced, the evils of European countries
+would grow with the growth of the colonies.
+Another series of events helped to focus
+attention upon labour problems. This was
+the epidemic of unusually wide-spread and
+bitter strikes which ran through the various
+colonies in the early nineties. Into the details
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_233'>233</span>of these it is unnecessary to enter. It is
+enough to say that, in at least one instance,
+associated workers demanded what they had
+no right to demand and that, in at least
+three instances, associated employers refused
+even to confer upon the demands of the
+workers. The mining companies, for example,
+declared in a public manifesto that “The
+mining companies claim the right to work the
+mines as they deem best and cannot refer this
+right to arbitration.” (p. 95.) Acts of violence
+were committed; the public was greatly
+inconvenienced; much money was lost; and
+people began to look about for some legislation
+that would obviate similar troubles in the
+future.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>This was the opportunity of Mr Reeves, at
+that time Minister of Labour in New Zealand.
+He saw that the path of progress lay along
+the line of organisation; and that the field of
+State Arbitration is not between man and man,
+but between association and association. He
+recognised that organised society has a right
+to demand of its different sections that degree
+of class organisation which renders possible the
+application of a common law. Hitherto, sectional
+combination had been used principally as
+a basis for organised war; in Mr Reeves’s plan,
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_234'>234</span>it was to furnish the basis of an organised
+peace. Following out the stages by which
+industrial disputes develop into strikes, he
+substituted for each a more peaceful step.
+His Bill, respecting the divisions of the colony
+into districts, allowed the creation in any
+district of a local Conciliation Board, and
+established a supreme Court of Arbitration.
+The Conciliation Boards were to come into
+existence “if petitioned for,” and were to be
+“composed of equal numbers of masters and
+men, with an impartial chairman.” (p. 101.)
+The right of electing representatives to serve
+on these Boards was given not to individuals
+but solely to such bodies of employers or of
+workers (men or women) as registered themselves
+under the Act. An association of as
+few as seven workers may, at the present
+time, claim registration. When registered,
+such associations are called Industrial Unions,
+and become corporations “with power to hold
+land, to sue and be sued, and to recover dues
+from their members.” (p. 103.)</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The functions of a Conciliation Board are
+as follows: On receiving a request from any
+party to an industrial dispute, it calls before
+it the other parties concerned, hears, examines
+and awards. No strike or lock-out is permitted
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_235'>235</span>while the case is under hearing. The
+Board has full power to take evidence and to
+compel attendance. At first, the awards of
+the Conciliation Boards had no legal force but,
+in 1900, the amended Act made these awards
+“final and legally binding unless appealed
+against within a month.” (p. 127.)</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The higher tribunal, the Court of Arbitration,
+consists of “a president with two
+assessors, one selected by associations of
+employers the other by federations of trade
+unions.” (p. 102.) The three members of the
+Court are appointed for three years and, unless
+bankruptcy, crime or insanity intervenes,
+cannot be removed except by a vote of both
+Houses of Parliament. The Court is not
+fettered by precedent, settles its own procedure
+and may take any evidence that it
+chooses, “whether strictly legal evidence or
+not.” It may hear cases publicly or privately
+at its discretion. Its award is given by the
+majority of the three members, and they may
+decide whether the award is to have the force
+of law or “merely to be in the nature of good
+advice.” If it is to have legal force it must
+be filed in the Supreme Court and after that
+any party to it may be prosecuted for a
+breach of it. The penalty payable by a
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_236'>236</span>single employer or trade union is limited to
+£500; and in case of a union’s possessing
+insufficient funds to meet the penalty every
+member is liable up to £10. The award
+cannot be appealed against nor quashed by
+any other tribunal, nor can the proceedings
+be carried into any other court. On the other
+hand, awards remain in currency only for a
+fixed period, which need not be longer than
+three years at the outside, and at the end of
+which the matter may be reopened.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Though only registered unions of masters
+and of workers can elect the officials of the
+Boards and of the Court, yet the jurisdiction
+of these tribunals extends to all employers
+and to all workers whether registered under
+the Act or not. In any district where there
+is a duly registered body of workers but none
+of employers the Governor in Council may
+nominate the conciliators required to make up
+a Board.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Such were the general features of the Act
+that after three years of endeavour was
+passed at the end of 1894 and came into
+force in 1895. It passed amid steady opposition
+from employers and with extremely
+little support from public opinion. In 1900,
+after five years’ experience of its workings,
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_237'>237</span>when a consolidated and amended Act was
+introduced, only one voice was lifted to attack
+its general principle. Not from its neighbours,
+who are intimate with the workings
+of it, but from this side of the ocean have
+come the attacks to which it has been exposed.
+It has been contended, again and
+again, by English newspapers that the
+measure is unduly favourable to trade unions,
+a contention much strengthened in appearance
+by the fact that in various trades awards
+have been made requiring employers to give
+preference to unionists, so long as the union
+can supply men qualified and ready to fill
+vacancies. Such awards, however, are by
+no means invariable; each case is tried on
+its merits, and the Court is largely guided
+by the general custom of each trade. It must
+be borne in mind also that the position of
+a New Zealand union is very different from
+that of a British union, and that this difference
+has been largely brought about by the colonial
+law, in the interest not of the union but of
+public peace and convenience. As Mr Reeves
+justly remarks: “In New Zealand the community,
+mainly for the purpose of self protection,
+has deprived trade unionists of the
+right of striking—of the sacred right of insurrection
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_238'>238</span>to which all workmen rightly
+or wrongly believe that they owe most of
+what lifts them above serfdom. The Arbitration
+Act, moreover, deliberately encourages
+workmen to organise. When, in obedience
+to the law, they renounce striking and register
+as industrial unions, it does not seem amiss
+that they should receive some special consideration.
+Their exertions and outlay in
+successfully conducting arbitration cases
+benefit non-unionists as well as themselves,
+though the non-unionists have done nothing
+to help them. Nor need the preference
+entail any hardship to their employers. Non-unionist
+labour is usually valued either because
+it is cheaper or because it is more
+peaceable. But under the Arbitration law
+non-unionists must get the same pay as
+unionists, and unionist strikes are abolished.
+It is only the non-unionists (in a trade where
+there is no award in force) who can strike, and
+who—though rarely and then only in petty
+groups—do. They are, therefore, to that
+extent, the more dangerous servants of the
+two. Nor, be it noted, does an employer
+who has only non-union men in his factory
+stand clear of the Act. Nor again can he
+take himself out of it by discharging his
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_239'>239</span>union hands and pleading that he has none
+in his employ. If an award has been made
+dealing with the trade in his district, he is
+bound by it as much as his competitors who
+employ union labour.”<a id='r84'></a><a href='#f84' class='c023'><sup>[84]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In short, New Zealand has taken out of
+the hands of organised labour its principal
+weapon and has placed that weapon in the
+hand of the state. The right of waging
+industrial war is, now, in New Zealand denied
+to unions either of workers or of employers.
+To have enforced this denial without loss
+to either side and at the same time to have
+encouraged organisation is a feat that any
+British minister may reasonably desire to
+emulate.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>It is quite certain that, without the Arbitration
+Act, New Zealand would not have
+enjoyed that immunity from labour battles
+which in fact it has enjoyed. The use of
+the Act happened to coincide, as its author
+points out, with a revival of trade; and a
+revival of trade is, as every experienced trade
+unionist knows, the period in which strikes
+may hope to be successful. “Instead, however,
+of striking on a rising market, as the
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_240'>240</span>traditional custom of trade unionism has been,
+the New Zealand unions were able to arbitrate
+upon it”—to the saving of much money, much
+suffering and much ill feeling.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Other objectors complain that the Arbitration
+Act does nothing to help the unorganised—always
+the most helpless—workers. Those
+who make this complaint have failed to
+appreciate the value of that important
+provision according to which a group of as
+few as seven (originally as few as five)
+workers in any industry are allowed to register
+themselves as an industrial union. Even
+in the poorest and most scattered of English
+trades it would be an easy matter to collect
+seven persons who, <em>if they knew themselves
+protected from dismissal</em>, would be willing
+to appeal for improved conditions to a
+Conciliation Board. So far from shutting
+out the unorganised, the Industrial Arbitration
+law opens to them a door by which
+they may share in all the advantages of
+organisation without waiting for a preliminary
+improvement in their conditions;
+and, at the same time that it holds out to
+them a powerful helping hand, makes them
+not merely passive recipients of a benefit, but
+active agents in their own emancipation.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_241'>241</span>Would that the same door were open to
+our poorest workers on this side of the ocean;
+that the worser paid of English factory workers
+could, by registering some seven of their
+number, present their case to a court or, with
+the support of the court behind them, form
+such an agreement as was made with their
+employers by the Wellington match-factory
+employees in November 1902, and brought into
+court for registration. The schedule of this
+agreement contains but five clauses and is a
+model of brevity and directness. Clause I.
+settles the working hours, on the basis of a
+45 hours week. Clause II. fixes (in 52 words)
+the piece work rates of pay for five different
+branches of work. Clause III. deals with the
+question of union and non-union labour, and
+requires “the company” (there was but the
+one employing company, apparently, in the
+district) “when engaging a worker or workers”
+to “employ a member or members of the
+union in preference to non-members, provided
+there are members of the union equally
+qualified with non-members to perform the
+particular work required to be done, and
+ready and willing to undertake it; provided,
+further, that any person now employed in this
+industrial district in this trade, and any other
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_242'>242</span>person desirous of entering the trade now
+residing or who may hereafter reside in this
+industrial district, may become a member of
+the union upon payment of an entrance fee
+not exceeding 5s., and of subsequent contributions,
+whether payable weekly or not, not
+exceeding 6d. per week, upon the written
+application of the persons so desiring to join
+the union, without ballot or other election.”
+Clause IV. requires the executive of the
+union to keep an “employment book” containing
+the names, addresses and employers during
+the previous six months of members wanting
+to be employed; the book to be “open to the
+company and its servants without fee or charge
+during all working hours on every working
+day.” Clause V. runs as follows: “When
+members of the union and non-members are
+employed together, there shall be no distinction
+between members and non-members, and both
+shall work together in harmony and shall
+receive equal pay for equal work.”<a id='r85'></a><a href='#f85' class='c023'><sup>[85]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>I have thought it worth while to quote
+these clauses in some detail because they are
+typical and illustrate the safeguards both to
+the employer and to the non-union worker by
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_243'>243</span>which a preference clause is generally accompanied.
+The whole schedule occupies only 46
+lines of print—exactly one page of the volume
+in which it appears.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>We see, by this example, that the Arbitration
+Act does not exclude collective bargaining between
+workers and employers but allows the
+registration and enforcement of terms to which
+the representatives of both parties have agreed.
+Thus the field of legitimate activity is still left
+open to organisations both of employers and
+of workers: the Act merely provides for peaceable
+and equitable settlement in cases where
+the parties fail to settle matters for themselves.
+An instance occurs in the history of the
+tailoresses in which one district was governed
+by an agreement, and another by an award.
+The employers in the latter district complained
+that the employers in the former were allowed
+to compete with them on unfair terms; and
+the court having compared the terms of the
+agreement with those of the award, found that
+the agreement was actually in some instances
+the higher of the two and that, in the instances
+where it was lower, the wages actually
+paid were double those set down. This was
+in 1903. In 1905 the trade was once more in
+court asking for the establishment of a weekly
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_244'>244</span>wage. The court, acceding to what it declares
+to have been a general wish, did fix a weekly
+wage, but made the award for a year only,
+from Jan. 1906 to Jan. 1907. The schedule—rather
+a long one—fixes the terms of apprenticeship
+to each class of work, the wages
+of apprentices (5s. a week, rising at fixed
+intervals by 2s. 6d. at a time); defines,
+according to the length of her experience in
+her special department, a first-class and a
+second-class “improver,” a “journey woman,
+and an under rate worker,” and fixes minimum
+rates for all but the last named. Improvers
+in coat and vest work are to receive, for
+second class hands (girls just out of apprenticeship)
+a minimum of 17s.; first class hands (with
+another year’s experience) one of £1, 0s. 6d.;
+journey women are to be paid not less than
+£1, 5s. 0d.<a id='r86'></a><a href='#f86' class='c023'><sup>[86]</sup></a> An under rate wage, for old,
+infirm or incompetent persons, may be fixed
+by the worker concerned and the trade union,
+by the Chairman of the Conciliation Board or
+by any person appointed by the Board. Such
+settlements of under rate wages continue for
+only six months, and opportunity is given to
+the union and to the applicant of “calling
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_245'>245</span>evidence and adducing arguments” before the
+adjudicator. In the four districts to which
+this award applies a tailoress, who is a “full
+hand” and a competent worker, can now be
+sure that her week’s work will not be paid at a
+lower rate than 25s. a week. There is no
+prohibition of home work; but the home
+worker must be paid at the established piece
+work rates, and an employer paying less
+exposes himself to fines up to the sum of £100.
+Thus, in district after district, and in trade
+after trade, a system has been established which
+combines the apparently contradictory virtues
+of uniformity and elasticity.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The scene of a sitting of the Court of
+Arbitration can easily be called up from newspaper
+descriptions. The room is plain and not
+large. At the upper end, between the two
+arbitrators, sits the judge in wig and gown.
+Men and masters, easily distinguishable by
+differences of dress, manner and speech,
+face each other across a table; in the body of
+the room reporters and a sprinkling of spectators
+are gathered to listen. The matter in hand is
+stated; then the representative of the men’s
+union or of the associated masters sets forth
+the plea of his clients, no counsel being employed
+except by agreement of both parties.
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_246'>246</span>The cost and the duration of proceedings are,
+no doubt, both lessened by this provision; and
+it is said that the unprofessional advocates on
+the two parts often show remarkable ability
+in the conduct of the case.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In Victoria a different method of fixing a
+minimum wage has been adopted; the method
+not of the Conciliation Board and Court of
+Arbitration but of the Wage Board. The
+mechanism of the Wage Boards is much more
+easily described and understood than that of
+the New Zealand Boards and Court; and it is,
+no doubt, partly, though not wholly, upon
+this account that advocates of the minimum
+wage are apt to propose the Victorian rather
+than the New Zealand model for imitation.
+Personally, however, considerable study of both
+plans has convinced me that the New Zealand
+method is, in practice, the less cumbrous, and
+that it includes features of great value that are
+lacking in the Victorian system.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Especially valuable seems to be the singular
+ease with which its machinery can be brought
+to bear upon the poorest workers. Were the
+law of New Zealand also the law of England
+I would myself engage to collect, within six
+months, from each of half a dozen underpaid
+women’s trades the seven workers necessary to
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_247'>247</span>form the required unions, and so to bring these
+half dozen trades within the purview of a
+Conciliation Board. Such Boards are established
+upon being asked for by a registered
+association of workers (or of employers), whereas
+the Victorian Wage Boards can only be
+established in any trade by a resolution of both
+Houses of Parliament; and, on this side of the
+ocean at least, Parliaments are apt to require
+much moving before they can be made to
+act.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In Melbourne, as in New Zealand, the first
+impulse towards the legal fixing of a minimum
+wage came from a newspaper. That powerful
+organ, the <cite>Age</cite>, for many years continued to
+print articles on the subject of underpayment
+and bad conditions of work. A Royal Commission
+was appointed and made a Report as
+early as 1884, but no practical reforms were
+attempted. The <cite>Age</cite> continued its crusade.
+In 1893 a Board of Inquiry was appointed and
+the evidence taken by that body showed the
+state of the workers in several trades to be
+deplorable. In 1895 an Anti-Sweating League
+was formed and, finally, in 1896, a new Factory
+and Shops Act was passed, of which the most
+remarkable clauses were those dealing with the
+establishment of Wage Boards. Provision
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_248'>248</span>was made for the appointment of special boards
+“to fix wages and piece work rates for persons
+employed either inside or outside factories in
+making clothing or wearing apparel or furniture,
+or in bread making or baking, or in the business
+of a butcher or seller of meat.”<a id='r87'></a><a href='#f87' class='c023'><sup>[87]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Permission was also given by the Act for
+the appointment of similar boards in other
+trades “provided a resolution has been passed
+by either House<a id='r88'></a><a href='#f88' class='c023'><sup>[88]</sup></a> declaring it is expedient to
+appoint such a Board.”</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>These Boards consist of not less than four
+nor more than ten members, half of whom are
+elected by employers and half by employees,
+or, failing election, are appointed by the
+Governor in Council.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The methods by which the members of
+Wage Boards are elected is extraordinarily
+cumbrous and could scarcely be imitated in
+any large industrial community. The latest
+regulations for such elections (dated Feb. 19,
+1906) are embodied in no less than 28 clauses.
+In each specified trade two electoral rolls must
+be prepared by the factory inspectors, the one
+including names and addresses of all workers,
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_249'>249</span>the other those of all employers. In order to
+facilitate the compilation of this trade census,
+all employers are required to send to the inspectors
+lists of the workpeople employed by
+them. Candidates must be nominated by 10
+employers or by 25 employees; and voting
+papers are printed containing the names of all
+the candidates.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>“The Chief Inspector shall cause every
+voting paper to be posted at least four days
+prior to the date of such election to every
+elector whose name and address is on the roll
+of electors for the special board.” The elector
+must strike out the names of all but those
+candidates for whom he desires to vote and
+must return the paper by 4 o’clock on the day
+of election. Imagine such a process as this
+in one of our own ill paid trades! The workers
+in such trades are migratory in the highest
+degree; by the time that the addresses of all
+qualified electors had been collected, one third
+of them, at least, would have ceased to be
+accurate. This fact alone would lead both to
+omissions and to duplications. The clerical
+labour and postage would be so heavy as to be
+a serious national expense; and the magnitude
+of the enumeration would render its completion
+a work of time. I doubt whether a Board to
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_250'>250</span>deal with any larger British trade could possibly
+be elected in less than a twelvemonth; and
+even such expedition as this would demand
+the employment of an extensive special
+staff.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The members of the Board, when it has at
+last been formed may elect an outside chairman,
+and if they fail to do so, the Governor in
+Council may appoint one. The Boards may
+fix “either wage rates or piece work rates, or
+both; must also fix the hours for which the
+rate of wage is fixed and rate of pay for overtime.”
+They may also fix the proportions of
+apprentices and improvers to be employed;
+and may “determine that manufacturers may
+be allowed to fix piece work rates based on the
+minimum wage.... The Chief Inspector may,
+however, challenge any rate so paid, and the
+employer may have to justify it before the
+Board.” The power to grant a licence to any
+aged or infirm worker to work at less than the
+established minimum wage rests with the Chief
+Inspector.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The first Boards were only six in number.
+Several of these had much difficulty in arriving
+at a “Determination.” The Men’s and
+Boys’ Clothing Board, for instance, occupied
+nine months in drawing up theirs, and finally
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_251'>251</span>established both time and piece rates. With
+the idea of compensating the home worker for
+incidental expenses and loss of time, the piece
+work rates were fixed a shade higher than the
+time rate—with the result that employers
+ceased to send work out. In other instances
+where there has been no such difference, the
+compulsion to pay home workers at something
+near a living wage has tended in the same
+direction.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Though the number of Boards was steadily
+enlarged, the legislation allowing their formation
+was for some years persistently held as
+experimental, and not until 1904, after eight
+years of experience were they made a permanent
+part of the law of Victoria.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>There were at the end of 1905—the latest
+date for which the Report of the Factory
+Inspectors is available—38 Boards the determinations
+of which were in force. The
+wages and conditions fixed by these Boards
+vary to a remarkable <a id='t251'></a>decree,  and it is to be
+regretted that the smallest advances seem in
+general to have been granted in the worst
+paid trades. In some cases the established
+minimum for a competent adult worker is
+sadly low. For instance the female chocolate
+coverer of over 21 has a minimum of only
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_252'>252</span>17s. weekly, while her fellow worker who
+is under 21 but over 18 may be paid as little
+as 14s. a week. The minimum for a youth of
+the same age is also 14s. but the adult male
+chocolate coverer (a person whom I have never
+found in England) must be paid not less than
+30s.<a id='r89'></a><a href='#f89' class='c023'><sup>[89]</sup></a> Worse still is the case of the jam
+trade in which the minimum for “females of
+18 years and upwards” is but 14s.<a id='r90'></a><a href='#f90' class='c023'><sup>[90]</sup></a> Such
+determinations as these point to a desire on
+the part of the Board rather to prevent a
+further drop of wages than to effect a rise to
+what may be esteemed a “living wage.” Still,
+even to arrest the downward course is a step
+in the right direction, and the example of the
+millinery trade, in which there is no Board,
+shows that the jam maker at 14s. is probably
+better off than she would be were there no
+determination at all in her trade. Miss
+Cuthbertson reports that in 1901 the average
+wage for milliners was 11s. 4d. per week per
+individual. “In 1902 the average fell to 11s.
+1d.; in 1903 to 10s. 4d.; in 1904 to 9s. 10d.;—and
+possibly this year will witness a further
+fall.”<a id='r91'></a><a href='#f91' class='c023'><sup>[91]</sup></a> Yet the trade steadily grows, the
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_253'>253</span>number of persons employed rising from 758
+in 1901 to 1410 in 1904.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Dressmakers, however, who work under a
+determination, average 12s. 3d.<a id='r92'></a><a href='#f92' class='c023'><sup>[92]</sup></a> The determination
+in this trade did not come into
+force until September 1904; and in 1903 the
+average wage of dressmakers in Victoria was
+11s. 11d. These averages, of course, include
+apprentices and learners. The established
+minimum for a competent dressmaker is now
+16s. per week.<a id='r93'></a><a href='#f93' class='c023'><sup>[93]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>This contrast serves to suggest how valuable
+has been the influence of the Boards in checking
+the fall of wages. An average weekly
+difference of half a crown between the wages
+of dressmakers and of milliners would scarcely
+have arisen of itself, especially in a comparatively
+small industrial community. Some
+Boards have evidently been timid; and some
+have shown—to put the matter mildly—no
+strong desire to approximate the wages of
+women to those of men engaged in very
+similar work. The difference between 17s.
+and 30s. in the case of chocolate coverers
+may serve as an instance. On the other
+hand, the Bootmaking Board and the Brushmaking
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_254'>254</span>Board have courageously enacted
+that women employed in certain branches
+shall have “the same rate as males.” Thus
+a woman in the bootmaking trade who is
+engaged in “making, finishing or clicking
+(but not skiving or trimming) insides or
+outsides or stuff cutting by hand” must
+receive a minimum of 40s. a week; while
+for women in some other branches of the
+same industry the minimum is fixed at 20s.<a id='r94'></a><a href='#f94' class='c023'><sup>[94]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>The Brushmaking determination, even
+bolder, runs thus: “Any females employed
+in any of the above classes of work to be paid
+at the same rates as males.” These rates vary
+from a minimum of 21s. a week to one
+of 64s.<a id='r95'></a><a href='#f95' class='c023'><sup>[95]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Even the lowest of these minima would be
+an advance of at least 25% on the wages of
+most home working brushmakers in London.
+In Victoria the average throughout the whole
+trade was, in 1905, £1, 9s. 2d.<a id='r96'></a><a href='#f96' class='c023'><sup>[96]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Some Boards have been less successful than
+others. The mingled ignorance, astuteness
+and bland mendacity of the Chinese furniture
+makers appear to have baffled the Furniture
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_255'>255</span>Board, as far as the Chinese department of
+the trade is concerned; and as the figures
+quoted show, the minimum fixed in some
+women’s trades is far too low. But, looking
+at the Report of the Chief Inspector—a most
+interesting document—it seems impossible to
+doubt that the Boards have, in trade after
+trade, both arrested the fall of wages and (not
+always but often) effected a rise. No doubt
+the determinations are sometimes evaded; so,
+in our own country, are the Factory Acts
+sometimes evaded, yet the general influence
+for good of the Factory Acts is no longer
+a matter of doubt. That neither the Industrial
+Arbitration Act nor the Wage Boards
+have by their action checked the trade of the
+colonies in which they exist seems to be
+established beyond question. The Wage
+Boards, without any other prohibitory effort,
+seem by the mere process of forbidding underpayment
+to have imposed a check upon the
+most unsatisfactory sorts of home work. As
+M. Aftalion has pointed out, home work, in
+large part, subsists solely on account of its
+evils. Work given out only because it might
+be sweated naturally ceases to be given out
+when sweating is stopped. On the other
+hand, home work of a better kind, the home
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_256'>256</span>work that is harmful neither to the worker
+nor to the community, is not checked merely
+by a provision that it shall be properly paid.
+While it is very desirable that no person shall
+work at home for very poor pay or under very
+bad conditions, it is emphatically not desirable
+that no person whatever shall be allowed
+to work at home for money. Miss Thear,
+one of the Victorian inspectors, reports a considerable
+decrease in home work in the shirt
+trade, the tasks formerly performed by outdoor
+hands “and in some cases by elderly
+women who are now recipients of the old age
+pension” are now being performed in the
+factories by herring-boning, button-hole and
+button sewing machines. “In addition to
+getting the old age pension and going to work
+inside of factories, other means of employment
+seem to have opened up for others who
+were formerly out workers. Some have
+boarded-out children to care for, and some
+are registered under the Infant Life Protection
+Act.”<a id='r97'></a><a href='#f97' class='c023'><sup>[97]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Miss Cuthbertson, on the same page, says:
+“The tendency in all trades is to get the work
+done in factories, where the supervision is
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_257'>257</span>closer, and where, with improved machinery,
+work can be turned out much more cheaply.”
+The minimum wage law has, in fact, hastened
+the course of that development upon which
+most trades, and the clothing trades, perhaps,
+especially, had already entered.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Legislation of a similar character to that of
+the sister colonies has been established in New
+South Wales, and the kindness of friends in
+Sydney has supplied me with much matter
+published and unpublished; but, after careful
+consideration, I have decided not to attempt
+any account of the minimum wage law of New
+South Wales. The reasons for this abstention
+are twofold. In the first place the Act is but
+five years old, and its history, therefore, is far
+less instructive than that of the legislation in
+New Zealand and in Victoria. In the second
+place the accounts received point some one way
+and some another, so that it is difficult to draw
+from them any plain conclusion. I am well
+aware that by passing over the case of New
+South Wales I expose myself to the accusation
+of adducing only the favourable examples and
+of disregarding those that have not succeeded.
+To this it may fairly be replied that although
+the New South Wales law has not apparently
+fully succeeded, neither has it entirely failed.
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_258'>258</span>It is still in a stage of probation, and therefore
+of far less value to the student than such laws
+as have progressed beyond that stage. Moreover,
+even if it were true—as most emphatically
+it is not—that the Colonial experiments had
+all completely failed, it would by no means
+follow that to devise a successful minimum
+wage law was a task beyond the wit of man.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In fact, however, both forms of minimum
+wage law—the Arbitration Court and the Wage
+Boards—have demonstrably helped to raise
+wages and to diminish underpayment within
+their jurisdiction. The Industrial Arbitration
+Act, in particular, is a very remarkable piece
+of constructive legislation, the full scope of
+which will probably be more and more perceptible
+with the development of the land to
+which it belongs. Its balance, its wide
+applicability, the simplicity and promptitude
+of its working deserve to be better comprehended.
+The Wage Board, by comparison,
+lacks originality, flexibility and ease.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Both examples have great value for British
+students; yet it does not follow that either, in
+precisely its Colonial form, is altogether suited
+to the industrial needs of Britain. A prejudice
+against compulsory arbitration—a prejudice
+which I venture to think rests in some degree
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_259'>259</span>upon imperfect comprehension of the New
+Zealand law—is strong among British trade
+unionists, and the work of dispelling this would
+be long and arduous. On the other hand, the
+comparative slowness and cumbrousness of the
+Wage Board system and the absence of any
+means by which the workers can claim the help
+of the Board are features only too much in
+accord with English inertness and officialdom.
+It seems much to be desired that, if Wage
+Boards should come to be created in this
+country, the appointment of them should be
+effected in the same manner as the appointment
+of the New Zealand Conciliation Boards: i.e.,
+on the request of seven or more associated
+workers; and it is quite imperative that some
+simpler and less costly method of choosing the
+representatives of labour and of capital, respectively,
+should be devised. To establish in
+this country a system which proved to be
+almost unworkable or of which the machinery
+moved so slowly as to be always in arrear of
+actual conditions would tend to promote rather
+than to abate the evil of sweating.</p>
+
+<div>
+  <span class='pageno' id='Page_260'>260</span>
+  <h3 class='c005'>CHAPTER V<br> <span class='c020'>FOREIGN COMPETITION</span></h3>
+</div>
+
+<p class='c022'>High wages and high prices not necessarily connected—Effect of
+increased wages in different groups of trades—Trades in which
+there is a margin for increase—Varying wages in the same
+trade—Scottish Wholesale Co-operative Society’s shirt factory—Trades
+in which higher wages would lead to improved methods—Displacement
+of workers—Cheapened production—Increased
+demand and increased employment—Trades in which higher
+wages would lead to higher prices—Foreign legislation against
+sweating—Effect of higher wages upon home market—Valuelessness
+to the country of very ill paid trades—The two lines
+along which trade may develop—The line of cheap labour—Consequences
+to the British worker—The line of good work—Summing
+up.</p>
+
+<p class='c013'>The foregoing chapters will have been written
+in vain if they have not succeeded in showing
+that there is no necessary connection between
+high wages and high selling prices; but that,
+on the contrary, high wages, in the great
+majority of cases, actually conduce to cheap
+production. Were this invariably the case, it
+is obvious that a general rise of wages, far
+from encouraging foreign competition, would
+rather form a barrier against it. And this, in
+fact, would be—as it is in some instances
+already—the case in many trades.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_261'>261</span>It may be well briefly to consider the
+various groups of cases that would arise in
+consequence of a general rise in the remuneration
+of labour. There exists, in the first place,
+a considerable group of trades in which, for
+similar work in respect of goods sold at the
+same price, different employers pay very
+different rates of wage. A very remarkable
+instance is furnished, in one of the worst paid
+trades, by the shirt factory of the Scottish
+Wholesale Co-operative Society. In that
+establishment, turning out goods for working
+class customers, women have for years received
+about double the wages of the average home
+working shirt maker, they not providing,
+as does she, the sewing cotton used. In
+October 1906 the average wage paid to
+workers in this factory was 18s. 3d. per week,
+and their week was one of 44 hours.<a id='r98'></a><a href='#f98' class='c023'><sup>[98]</sup></a> Yet
+the factory pays and has done so for many
+years.<a id='r99'></a><a href='#f99' class='c023'><sup>[99]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_262'>262</span>It is therefore clear that even in the ready
+made shirt trade it is possible to pay reasonably
+good wages, to compete with the “sweater,”
+and yet to make a profit. Thus the enforcement
+of a minimum weekly wage very near
+the level of Mr Maxwell’s 18s. 3d. would
+neither kill the trade nor stimulate the importation
+of foreign shirts. It would merely
+impose upon other employers that standard
+of management and methods which Mr Maxwell
+has chosen voluntarily to adopt. Those
+employers who lacked intelligence or flexibility
+to carry on a factory on these terms would, it
+is true, be driven out of business; but their
+customers would not cease to buy nor to be
+supplied at the old price. The only change
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_263'>263</span>would be that none of us would, any longer,
+be buying shirts at which some woman had
+sewn, as Hood said,</p>
+
+<div class='lg-container-b c018'>
+  <div class='linegroup'>
+    <div class='group'>
+      <div class='line in8'>“with a double thread</div>
+      <div class='line'>At once a shirt and a shroud.”</div>
+    </div>
+  </div>
+</div>
+
+<p class='c014'>There are other groups of trades in which
+the history of the cotton trade would be
+repeated, that is to say, the employer who
+found himself compelled to pay higher wages
+would at once introduce better machinery—either
+in the narrow sense of actual appliances
+or in the wider sense of improved organisation
+and management. Such an employer would
+also, as the cotton masters have done, demand
+better work from his employees, and would
+get it. At first there might be a diminution
+in the number of hands employed; but if, as
+almost always happens, the improved methods
+led to a considerable reduction in the cost of
+production and consequently to a lowered
+selling price, demand would immediately increase,
+and more workers would again be
+wanted. There is no reason in the nature of
+things why a rise of wages and a powerful
+labour organisation should not do for the silk
+trade and the woollen trade of Britain what
+they have already done for the cotton trade.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_264'>264</span>In the first group of these trades, then, no
+workers would be displaced, and the conditions
+of the market would remain unaltered; in the
+second, there would, at first, probably be a
+displacement and afterwards, probably, a
+renewed, or even an increased demand for
+workers.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>We come next to a group of trades which
+may exist, but of the existence of which I
+personally am somewhat sceptical. These are
+the trades in which there is neither margin
+of profit nor room for improvements that
+might make up for the additional outlay
+upon heightened wages. In these trades—if
+such there be—it is undeniable that if
+British wages rose while foreign wages remained
+stationary the foreigner would be
+extremely likely to capture the market.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>But there are various matters that must be
+set down upon the other side of the account.
+To begin with, our foreign competitors are
+themselves uneasy about the existence of
+sweating within their borders. It is almost
+certain that German legislation directed against
+this evil will precede legislation in this country;
+while in America, as may indeed be judged
+by the quotations from recent American books
+that appear in these pages, there are many
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_265'>265</span>persons much concerned with the problem of
+underpaid labour. If our foreign competitors
+should keep step with ourselves in the prohibition
+of extreme underpayment, the balance of
+international trade would be in no way disturbed.
+Nay, if only Germany should do so,
+the disturbance to the English market would
+not be serious.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Moreover, the payment of high wages to
+working people has, in itself, a beneficial
+effect upon the home market. Some people
+write and speak as though money when it
+once passed into the hands of a wage earner
+passed out of existence. But in fact it almost
+always returns very quickly into active circulation
+and thus quickens the national turnover.
+As a general rule a workman, when
+his wages rise, spends his extra money upon
+additional comfort for himself and his family;
+buys more and better food, more and better
+clothes, more and better furniture; often he
+moves to a better dwelling and almost always
+he extends his recreations. The chances are
+that he will spend something in belonging
+to a club or a friendly society. He will
+not, however, as his enemies are fond of
+asserting, generally drink more; it is to the
+man who lives with his family in one room,
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_266'>266</span>not to the man who has a comfortable parlour,
+that the public-house looks so attractive. We
+may say without much doubt that these will
+be his modes of expenditure because we have
+among us plenty of well paid artisans, and
+observation teaches that these are in fact
+the ways in which they spend their money.
+Now, many of these channels of expenditure
+are practically not open to foreign competition.
+Bread for English eating must be baked
+in English bakehouses: milk is not yet imported:
+the retail shopkeeper, the bricklayer,
+the omnibus driver and the railway servant
+must follow their avocations on the hither
+side of the sea. The better paid worker thus,
+without any premeditation or patriotic design,
+tends, by the mere process of buying what
+he wants, to set his fellow countrymen
+working. It is quite possible that the increase
+of demand thus created would more
+than counterbalance the loss of any trade the
+retention of which depends upon the continuance
+of underpayment. Nor is this all.
+It is a question whether any trade in such
+a condition is either worth keeping or capable
+of being kept. An experienced employer
+who is at the head of a large and successful
+enterprise writes to me: “Broadly speaking,
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_267'>267</span>I am convinced that an occupation which
+does not admit of a decent living wage is
+an occupation we are better without and one
+which in due time will die. I mean that
+the requirements of the Factories and Workshops
+Act must kill it. A trade which can
+only live by means of inadequate wages and
+cheap squalid unhealthy buildings is doomed.”
+Such a trade while it still endures is not
+really a source of national profit. The
+workers whose lives it drains, not being
+supported by the price paid for their labour,
+must come eventually to be partly or wholly
+supported by other people. They are, in
+fact, a national burden, whether the charge
+is nominally borne by the State or by
+private citizens. Poverty, dirt and disease
+are very costly to the country in which they
+prevail; and they are inevitable results of
+underpayment.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>We may seek the development of our trade
+along either of two lines—we may aim either
+at underselling our competitors or at surpassing
+them. If we elect to take the line of
+cheapness, and also determine to seek that
+cheapness by paying very low wages, we must
+confine ourselves to goods that demand neither
+very high skill nor very elaborate machinery.
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_268'>268</span>But these are precisely the sort of goods that
+can best be produced by nations upon a
+lower level than ourselves, by peasants and
+by dwellers in genial climates where comparatively
+little food and clothing and practically
+no heating are required. With workers
+such as these we can never compete on equal
+terms, and we should be wiser not to try. We
+can never bring down an Englishman to the
+standards of the Chinaman or of the Hindoo.
+But we can, in making the attempt, create
+among ourselves a class of helots, degraded
+labour slaves, living on a level that shocks
+our national conscience. To do this is to
+keep open a sore in our midst and to run a
+constant risk of those revolts and disturbances
+which are the greatest possible danger and
+interruption to the regular course of trade—a
+greater danger perhaps than that of being
+undersold by foreigners. For the long-suffering
+of the English poor, though amazing, is
+not probably quite unlimited. No national
+life can be stable while large numbers of the
+people live in great misery. The best safeguard
+of national peace is a general distribution
+of comfort and independence. And the
+safest paths towards this state of security are
+good education and good payment for the
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_269'>269</span>workers. Low wages lead by a path of
+intolerable suffering to an inevitable downfall.
+On the ascending path too there may be
+dangers—but they are the less dangers, and
+they will be faced by citizens fitter to meet
+them.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>After all, even Great Britain cannot expect
+to hold all the trade of the world. What she
+may expect, what she can have if she will, is
+the commercial leadership of the world. She
+may show in other departments, as she has
+shown in cotton and in iron, that her race can
+produce the best workers living, and the best
+organisers of work; and she can continue the
+great lesson which others have learned from
+her history, but which she herself does not
+always remember, the lesson that, other things
+being equal, that nation becomes wealthiest
+which pays its workers best. Health, skill,
+intelligence: these are the true bulwarks of
+national prosperity; and the price of these is
+liberal payment for labour. Nor does the
+prosperity which rests upon these things injure
+those neighbouring nations amid which it
+develops. Rivalry upon the up-grade
+educates and improves all alike; rivalry
+upon the down-grade injures and degrades
+all, but not all alike. In that competition
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_270'>270</span>the nation suffers most whose standards are
+highest.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>To sum up in a few words: in many trades,
+wages could be raised out of profits without
+change of selling price; in some a rise of
+wages would lead to improvements of method,
+to cheapening of production and probably to a
+fall of selling price; in some, though probably
+not in many, a rise of wages would
+necessitate a rise of prices; and of these there
+may be some (it is not proved that there are)
+the retention of which absolutely depends upon
+the payment of excessively low wages.<a id='r100'></a><a href='#f100' class='c023'><sup>[100]</sup></a></p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In regard to the first two groups, which
+together cover the greater part of the industrial
+field, improved payment at home would
+certainly give no advantage to the foreign
+competitor and might in some cases rather be
+disadvantageous to him.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In the other group, a rise of wages would
+probably, wherever the nature of the industry
+admitted of importation, lead to an increase of
+importation as against home production.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>But in cases where the continuance of a
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_271'>271</span>trade actually depends upon aggravated underpayment
+the trade is shown, by that very fact,
+to be already in a declining state, and unable
+to support its own cost; and no trade that is
+in a declining state and that offers no possibility
+of bettered conditions can be regarded as
+a valuable national asset. On the other hand,
+of every additional shilling paid in wages, at
+least sixpence is spent in employing British
+labour, so that if, owing to a general rise of
+wages, we were to lose entirely the third and
+lesser group of industries, we should still enjoy
+a greater volume of trade than before wages
+were raised.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Thus, when we look it squarely in the face,
+we perceive that the bogie of foreign competition
+is a bogie indeed; and that British
+workers well paid would have less ground than
+British workers ill paid to fear that their trade
+would be taken from them.</p>
+
+<div>
+  <span class='pageno' id='Page_272'>272</span>
+  <h3 class='c005'>CHAPTER VI<br> <span class='c020'>GAIN TO THE NATION</span></h3>
+</div>
+
+<p class='c022'>Desirability of better pay to the underpaid—Report of Interdepartmental
+Committee on Physical Deterioration—Its
+hopeful side—No degenerate class—Physical and mental
+effects of poverty on the individual—The better paid artisan—Conclusion.</p>
+
+<p class='c013'>If, then, without seriously diminishing the
+trade of the country or the volume of employment,
+it is possible gradually to raise the wage
+of all ill paid workers to a level that will
+allow them something like a civilised existence,
+how desirable and how urgent is legislation
+that will bring about this result. No person,
+indeed, disputes the desirability of the change;
+the only point in question is its feasibility.
+To prove that the change is feasible and is
+impossible to be effected except by law has
+been the whole purpose of this volume. Now,
+in these last pages, it may be permissible to
+glance at the immense gain to the nation that
+would arise from a general increase in the pay
+of such British workers as are now grossly
+underpaid.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_273'>273</span>Physically, no person familiar with the
+poorer quarters of any industrial district can
+doubt that such workers are suffering seriously.
+The whole report of the Interdepartmental
+Committee on Physical Deterioration is little
+more than a report of the results of extreme
+poverty. Amid the accumulation of melancholy
+facts, however, is to be found evidence
+of a most hopeful kind. In our own country,
+at least, its seems to be true that the physical
+deterioration which comes of poverty (as distinguished
+from that which comes of vice) is
+rather personal than hereditary, and that the
+starved child will regain health and normality
+amid better conditions; so that even in a
+single generation any group of British people
+suffering from the effects of poverty may be
+restored to the average standard of the race
+if properly fed, properly clothed, properly
+housed, not overworked, and allowed plenty
+of air. The higher death rate, the inferior
+physique, the poorer vitality of the ill paid
+mark tendencies not inborn but acquired, all
+of which might and would disappear with the
+diminution of poverty and of that ignorance
+which is one outcome of poverty, and also, by
+reaction, one of the contributory causes of
+poverty. Degeneracy exists; but not a degenerate
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_274'>274</span>class; the class which we sometimes call
+degenerate is, as a class, merely starved. In
+short all that waste of human life, of human
+energy and of human happiness which is
+going on daily around us and is causing to the
+country a daily loss heavier than that of any
+campaign, is neither inevitable nor incurable.
+This misery might be sensibly diminished
+within three years, and might be ended within
+the lifetime of children already born.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>Nor is it the body alone that suffers the
+deterioration of poverty. The underfed brain
+too, remains stunted; and to be constantly
+hungry is to be constantly apathetic. Lassitude,
+inertia, the mental dulness that knows
+no pleasure except of the senses, no personal
+initiative and no activity save in response to
+external stimulus, these are the characteristics
+of the adult whose childhood has been passed
+in overcrowded rooms, whose food has been
+insufficient, his clothing inadequate, and to
+whom no wider horizons have ever been
+opened. Such an individual knows nothing of
+the real joys of life; he is a valueless citizen,
+consuming more than he produces, a poor
+worker, and even when not personally vicious,
+an influence rather towards degradation than
+towards progress.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'><span class='pageno' id='Page_275'>275</span>But taken early enough and fed, clothed
+and housed like the children of the better paid
+artisan, the same man might have become
+healthy of body and alert of mind; a reader
+of books, a player of outdoor games, a skilled
+craftsman taking delight in his good work, a
+citizen rendering intelligent public service, a
+parent of healthy hopeful children, enjoying
+and creating prosperity. There are hundreds
+of such men among the superior artisans of
+this country. It has been my lot to know
+many of them, and it is my belief that on
+the whole they and their families form the
+happiest, the most valuable and the best conducted
+portion of our nation. To bring up
+into that class those compatriots of theirs
+and ours who now, by no fault of their own,
+suffer not only the privations but also the
+degradations of extreme poverty is no impossible
+feat, and would be the greatest possible
+of national services. Happily there are signs
+of a growing public desire to remedy the
+appalling evils vaguely summarised under the
+word “sweating,” and of a growing inclination
+to seek the remedy along the lines of endeavour
+marked out by our colonial brethren.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>In the earnest hope that such an endeavour
+may be made, quickly, yet not hastily, by the
+<span class='pageno' id='Page_276'>276</span>law of Great Britain, and that these chapters
+may as soon as possible become out of date,
+I offer to my fellow countrymen the conclusions
+gradually shaped in my own mind by
+nearly twenty years of work among industrial
+problems.</p>
+
+<div class='chapter'>
+  <span class='pageno' id='Page_277'>277</span>
+  <h2 class='c009'>INDEX</h2>
+</div>
+
+<ul class='index c006'>
+  <li class='c028'>Adler: Miss Nettie, <a href='#Page_108'>108</a>, <a href='#Page_123'>123</a>, <a href='#Page_124'>124</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Aftalion: A., <a href='#Page_2'>2</a>, <a href='#Page_255'>255</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Alien immigration, <a href='#Page_197'>197</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>America: Children’s work in, <a href='#Page_115'>115</a>, <a href='#Page_119'>119</a>–122, <a href='#Page_128'>128</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>“sweating” in, <a href='#Page_143'>143</a>;</li>
+      <li>a living wage in, <a href='#Page_149'>149</a>–151;</li>
+      <li>low cost of production, <a href='#Page_184'>184</a>;</li>
+      <li>cotton trade, <a href='#Page_221'>221</a>;</li>
+      <li>child labour in cotton mills, <a href='#Page_226'>226</a>;</li>
+      <li>southern states, <a href='#Page_227'>227</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Anti-Sweating league: in Melbourne, <a href='#Page_247'>247</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Apprentices, parish: Act of, <a href='#Page_218'>218</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Arbitration Courts in New Zealand, <a href='#Page_235'>235</a>, <a href='#Page_236'>236</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Army and Navy Stores, <a href='#Page_176'>176</a>, <a href='#Page_177'>177</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Australia: wage board in Victoria, <a href='#Page_246'>246</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>in Melbourne, <a href='#Page_247'>247</a>;</li>
+      <li>minimum wage in Melbourne, <a href='#Page_251'>251</a>;</li>
+      <li>legislation in New South Wales, <a href='#Page_257'>257</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c006'>Babies’ shoe making, <a href='#Page_105'>105</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Bake houses: boys working in, <a href='#Page_109'>109</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Ball covering, <a href='#Page_15'>15</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Bird cage making, <a href='#Page_14'>14</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Boot finishing, <a href='#Page_15'>15</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Boot making, <a href='#Page_105'>105</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Booth: Chas., <a href='#Page_6'>6</a>, <a href='#Page_65'>65</a>, <a href='#Page_148'>148</a>, <a href='#Page_155'>155</a>, <a href='#Page_201'>201</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Bosanquet: Mrs, <a href='#Page_153'>153</a>, <a href='#Page_154'>154</a>, <a href='#Page_155'>155</a>, <a href='#Page_157'>157</a>, <a href='#Page_158'>158</a>, <a href='#Page_159'>159</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Box making: children’s work, <a href='#Page_106'>106</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Brickfields: children working in, <a href='#Page_110'>110</a></li>
+  <li class='c006'>Cabmen, <a href='#Page_76'>76</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Cabs and Omnibuses Bill: report of select committee, <a href='#Page_82'>82</a>, <a href='#Page_83'>83</a>, <a href='#Page_97'>97</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Cadbury: Edward, <a href='#Page_3'>3</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>“Case for the Factory Acts: The,” <a href='#Page_114'>114</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Chapman: Prof. S. J., <a href='#Page_220'>220</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>“Child Labour” (<cite>No. 93, Annals</cite> <em>of American Academy</em>), <a href='#Page_119'>119</a> 120–122, <a href='#Page_125'>125</a>, <a href='#Page_128'>128</a>–130</li>
+  <li class='c028'><span class='pageno' id='Page_278'>278</span>Children: as home workers, <a href='#Page_104'>104</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>unpunctual at school through home work, <a href='#Page_105'>105</a>;</li>
+      <li>babies’ shoe making, <a href='#Page_105'>105</a>, <a href='#Page_108'>108</a>;</li>
+      <li>dodging educational authorities, <a href='#Page_106'>106</a>;</li>
+      <li>working all night, <a href='#Page_106'>106</a>;</li>
+      <li>match box making, <a href='#Page_106'>106</a>, <a href='#Page_108'>108</a>;</li>
+      <li>string bag making, <a href='#Page_107'>107</a>;</li>
+      <li>tooth brush making, <a href='#Page_107'>107</a>;</li>
+      <li>kid belt making, <a href='#Page_107'>107</a>;</li>
+      <li>wood chopping, <a href='#Page_107'>107</a>;</li>
+      <li>wood polishing, <a href='#Page_107'>107</a>;</li>
+      <li>steel covering, <a href='#Page_108'>108</a>;</li>
+      <li>fish basket sewing, <a href='#Page_108'>108</a>;</li>
+      <li>in small laundries, <a href='#Page_108'>108</a>;</li>
+      <li>half timers, <a href='#Page_112'>112</a>;</li>
+      <li>errand boys, <a href='#Page_108'>108</a>;</li>
+      <li>Saturday and evening boys, <a href='#Page_108'>108</a>;</li>
+      <li>barbers’ lather boys, <a href='#Page_108'>108</a>;</li>
+      <li>matching girls, <a href='#Page_109'>109</a>;</li>
+      <li>street trading, <a href='#Page_109'>109</a>;</li>
+      <li>their labour of little use to them later in life, <a href='#Page_109'>109</a>;</li>
+      <li>boys working in bake houses, <a href='#Page_109'>109</a>;</li>
+      <li>in brick-fields, <a href='#Page_110'>110</a>;</li>
+      <li>heavy loads, <a href='#Page_110'>110</a>–111;</li>
+      <li>in textile trades, <a href='#Page_110'>110</a>–111, <a href='#Page_112'>112</a>;</li>
+      <li>in the potteries, <a href='#Page_114'>114</a>;</li>
+      <li>general remarks on child labour, <a href='#Page_140'>140</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Civil Service Stores, <a href='#Page_177'>177</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Clerks and Bookkeepers, <a href='#Page_71'>71</a>, <a href='#Page_138'>138</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Committee on wage-earning children, <a href='#Page_108'>108</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Competition, free: its effect upon labour, <a href='#Page_166'>166</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>checks upon, <a href='#Page_195'>195</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Confectionery, <a href='#Page_29'>29</a>, <a href='#Page_32'>32</a>, <a href='#Page_110'>110</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Consumers: Associations of, <a href='#Page_176'>176</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Consumers’ League, A: impractibility of, <a href='#Page_205'>205</a>–211;
+    <ul>
+      <li>in America, <a href='#Page_210'>210</a>;</li>
+      <li>influence on public opinion, <a href='#Page_210'>210</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Co-operation: Industrial, <a href='#Page_176'>176</a>, <a href='#Page_177'>177</a>, <a href='#Page_180'>180</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Co-operative Stores, <a href='#Page_201'>201</a>, <a href='#Page_202'>202</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Co-operative Union, <a href='#Page_180'>180</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'><span class='pageno' id='Page_279'>279</span>Cost of labour: recognition of its true cost, <a href='#Page_173'>173</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Cotton mills: children’s work, <a href='#Page_110'>110</a>–111, <a href='#Page_112'>112</a>–113</li>
+  <li class='c028'>Cotton trade: not natural to Britain, <a href='#Page_214'>214</a>–217;
+    <ul>
+      <li>condition of workers in 1830, <a href='#Page_217'>217</a>;</li>
+      <li>prosperity increased under higher wages, <a href='#Page_219'>219</a>;</li>
+      <li>in Bristol, <a href='#Page_227'>227</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>“Cotton Trade Circular,” <a href='#Page_222'>222</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Cotton workers: educational improvement of, <a href='#Page_225'>225</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Crabtree: Mr, Inspector of Factories, <a href='#Page_221'>221</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Cuthbertson: Miss, Inspector of Factories, Victoria, <a href='#Page_256'>256</a></li>
+  <li class='c006'><cite>Daily News</cite>, <a href='#Page_59'>59</a>, <a href='#Page_60'>60</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'><cite>Daily News</cite>: Sweated Industries Exhibition, <a href='#Page_10'>10</a>, <a href='#Page_18'>18</a>, <a href='#Page_142'>142</a>, <a href='#Page_148'>148</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Danger of Fire, <a href='#Page_35'>35</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Dockers’ Union, <a href='#Page_135'>135</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Dressmaking, <a href='#Page_29'>29</a>, <a href='#Page_32'>32</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Drink and Poverty: some facts about, <a href='#Page_198'>198</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>lessened by shorter hours, <a href='#Page_200'>200</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c006'>Early marriages: reason for, among working class, <a href='#Page_197'>197</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Economy of high wages, <a href='#Page_165'>165</a>, <a href='#Page_184'>184</a>, <a href='#Page_228'>228</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Edgworth: Maria, <a href='#Page_115'>115</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Education: effect of child labour on, <a href='#Page_125'>125</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Efficiency: remarks on, <a href='#Page_158'>158</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Emigration, <a href='#Page_196'>196</a>, <a href='#Page_211'>211</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Employers: responsibility for strikes, <a href='#Page_184'>184</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>duty to pay a fair wage, <a href='#Page_187'>187</a>;</li>
+      <li>in cotton trade, <a href='#Page_225'>225</a>;</li>
+      <li>in Bristol, <a href='#Page_227'>227</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Errand boys, <a href='#Page_108'>108</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>Saturday and evening workers, <a href='#Page_108'>108</a>;</li>
+      <li>barbers’ lather boys, <a href='#Page_108'>108</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c006'>Factories: reports of chief inspector, <a href='#Page_25'>25</a>, <a href='#Page_29'>29</a>, <a href='#Page_32'>32</a>, <a href='#Page_37'>37</a>, <a href='#Page_38'>38</a>, <a href='#Page_39'>39</a>, <a href='#Page_109'>109</a>–111, <a href='#Page_221'>221</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>in Australia, <a href='#Page_252'>252</a>–254, <a href='#Page_256'>256</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Factory Acts: beneficial effects, <a href='#Page_181'>181</a>, <a href='#Page_188'>188</a>, <a href='#Page_194'>194</a>, <a href='#Page_224'>224</a>, <a href='#Page_267'>267</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>in Australia, <a href='#Page_247'>247</a>;</li>
+      <li>evasion of, <a href='#Page_255'>255</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Factory girls: an appreciation of, <a href='#Page_134'>134</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>manners of, <a href='#Page_136'>136</a>;</li>
+      <li>code of honour, <a href='#Page_137'>137</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'><span class='pageno' id='Page_280'>280</span>Factory work: general remarks on, <a href='#Page_133'>133</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Factory workers: their condition compared with home workers, <a href='#Page_23'>23</a>, <a href='#Page_46'>46</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Fair wage, a: what is a fair wage, <a href='#Page_161'>161</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>pessimist view, <a href='#Page_212'>212</a>–214</li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Fines and deductions, <a href='#Page_39'>39</a>, <a href='#Page_41'>41</a>, <a href='#Page_54'>54</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Fish basket sewing, <a href='#Page_108'>108</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Foreign Competition: effect on a minimum wage, <a href='#Page_271'>271</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Free Libraries, <a href='#Page_225'>225</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'><cite>Free Trade League</cite>, <a href='#Page_220'>220</a></li>
+  <li class='c006'>Gaskell: P, <a href='#Page_217'>217</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Germany, <a href='#Page_143'>143</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>cotton trade in, <a href='#Page_221'>221</a>;</li>
+      <li>possibility of legislation to curtail sweating, <a href='#Page_264'>264</a>, <a href='#Page_265'>265</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Gissing: Geo., <a href='#Page_72'>72</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Glass works in America, <a href='#Page_120'>120</a>–121</li>
+  <li class='c028'><cite>Guardian: The</cite>, <a href='#Page_210'>210</a></li>
+  <li class='c006'>Half timers, <a href='#Page_112'>112</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Health: of home workers, <a href='#Page_17'>17</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>of factory workers, <a href='#Page_25'>25</a>;</li>
+      <li>of shop assistants, <a href='#Page_55'>55</a>;</li>
+      <li>of child workers, <a href='#Page_115'>115</a>, <a href='#Page_121'>121</a>–125</li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Heavy loads, <a href='#Page_110'>110</a>–111</li>
+  <li class='c028'>High wages and cheap production, <a href='#Page_260'>260</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>“Historical Development of the Factory Acts,” <a href='#Page_114'>114</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Hogg: Mrs, <a href='#Page_18'>18</a>, <a href='#Page_118'>118</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Home Industries for women: report on, <a href='#Page_2'>2</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Home Office enquiry, <a href='#Page_125'>125</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Home work: report on, <a href='#Page_2'>2</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>in Birmingham, <a href='#Page_3'>3</a>;</li>
+      <li>match box making, <a href='#Page_3'>3</a>;</li>
+      <li>shirt making, <a href='#Page_10'>10</a>;</li>
+      <li>paper-bag making, <a href='#Page_11'>11</a>;</li>
+      <li>toy making, <a href='#Page_13'>13</a>;</li>
+      <li>pipe making, <a href='#Page_13'>13</a>;</li>
+      <li>bird cage making, <a href='#Page_14'>14</a>;</li>
+      <li>weaving, <a href='#Page_14'>14</a>;</li>
+      <li>boot finishing, <a href='#Page_15'>15</a>, <a href='#Page_105'>105</a>;</li>
+      <li>ball covering, <a href='#Page_15'>15</a>;</li>
+      <li>tooth brush making, <a href='#Page_18'>18</a>, <a href='#Page_20'>20</a>;</li>
+      <li>miscellaneous trades, <a href='#Page_21'>21</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Home workers: Condition of, <a href='#Page_17'>17</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>general remarks on, <a href='#Page_132'>132</a>;</li>
+      <li>impossibility of organisation, <a href='#Page_186'>186</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Hours of work: piece work, <a href='#Page_16'>16</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>long hours in factories, <a href='#Page_29'>29</a>, <a href='#Page_30'>30</a>, <a href='#Page_31'>31</a>;</li>
+      <li>shop assistants, <a href='#Page_53'>53</a>, <a href='#Page_58'>58</a>;</li>
+      <li>in Scotland, <a href='#Page_66'>66</a>;</li>
+      <li>waitresses, <a href='#Page_69'>69</a>;</li>
+      <li><span class='pageno' id='Page_281'>281</span>railway men, <a href='#Page_77'>77</a>;</li>
+      <li>omnibus men, <a href='#Page_83'>83</a>;</li>
+      <li>motor omnibus men, <a href='#Page_92'>92</a>;</li>
+      <li>children’s hours of work at home, <a href='#Page_108'>108</a>;</li>
+      <li>in tin works, <a href='#Page_110'>110</a>;</li>
+      <li>work at home after closing hours, <a href='#Page_188'>188</a>;</li>
+      <li>women in textile trades, <a href='#Page_218'>218</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>House of Lords Committee on Early Closing of Shops, <a href='#Page_68'>68</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Hutchins: Miss B. L., <a href='#Page_114'>114</a></li>
+  <li class='c006'>Industrial efficiency: effect of Child Labour on, <a href='#Page_130'>130</a>–131;
+    <ul>
+      <li>caused by fair wages, <a href='#Page_227'>227</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Industrial Unions of New Zealand, <a href='#Page_234'>234</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Ireland: copartnership in, <a href='#Page_179'>179</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Ironing, <a href='#Page_108'>108</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Irwin: Miss, <a href='#Page_3'>3</a>, <a href='#Page_17'>17</a>, <a href='#Page_66'>66</a>, <a href='#Page_67'>67</a>, <a href='#Page_68'>68</a>, <a href='#Page_69'>69</a></li>
+  <li class='c006'>Jackman: Marshall, <a href='#Page_124'>124</a>, <a href='#Page_125'>125</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Jam-making. <em>See</em> Confectionery</li>
+  <li class='c028'>Jarvis family: History of, <a href='#Page_7'>7</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Johnson: Dr, <a href='#Page_157'>157</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>“Juvenile wage earners and their work,” <a href='#Page_108'>108</a>, <a href='#Page_123'>123</a></li>
+  <li class='c006'>Kelley: Mrs Florence, <a href='#Page_120'>120</a>, <a href='#Page_125'>125</a>, <a href='#Page_129'>129</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Kid belt making, <a href='#Page_107'>107</a></li>
+  <li class='c006'>Labour and other commodities: difference in essence between, <a href='#Page_171'>171</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Labour co-partnerships, <a href='#Page_176'>176</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>in Ireland, <a href='#Page_179'>179</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Laundries: long hours in, <a href='#Page_31'>31</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Laundry work, <a href='#Page_108'>108</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Lead poisoning: risk of, <a href='#Page_37'>37</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Legislation for a minimum wage: need of, <a href='#Page_272'>272</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Living wage: estimate of, <a href='#Page_149'>149</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>London County Council: as employer, <a href='#Page_100'>100</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>contrasted with private companies, <a href='#Page_101'>101</a>;</li>
+      <li>bye-laws relating to child labour, <a href='#Page_119'>119</a>, <a href='#Page_124'>124</a>;</li>
+      <li>Medical Officer’s report, <a href='#Page_123'>123</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'><cite>Longman’s Magazine</cite>, <a href='#Page_206'>206</a></li>
+  <li class='c006'>MacDonald: J. Ramsay, <a href='#Page_65'>65</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Manchester physicians’ report on child labour in 1784, <a href='#Page_112'>112</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'><span class='pageno' id='Page_282'>282</span>“Manufacturing population of England,” <a href='#Page_217'>217</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Martindale: Miss, Inspector of Factories, <a href='#Page_111'>111</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Match box making, <a href='#Page_3'>3</a>, <a href='#Page_7'>7</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>child workers, <a href='#Page_106'>106</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Matching girls, <a href='#Page_109'>109</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Matheson: M. Cécile, <a href='#Page_3'>3</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Maxwell: Mr, Scottish Wholesale Co-operative Society, <a href='#Page_261'>261</a>, <a href='#Page_262'>262</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Maxwell: W. B., <a href='#Page_72'>72</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'><cite>Melbourne Age: The</cite>; crusade against sweating, <a href='#Page_247'>247</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Minimum wage: legislation in New Zealand, <a href='#Page_231'>231</a>–246;
+    <ul>
+      <li>in Australia, <a href='#Page_246'>246</a>–258;</li>
+      <li>practicability of legislation in England, <a href='#Page_258'>258</a>–259;</li>
+      <li>effect of a minimum wage, <a href='#Page_271'>271</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Miscellaneous trades, <a href='#Page_21'>21</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Mitchell: John, <a href='#Page_149'>149</a>–151</li>
+  <li class='c028'>Moral aspect of shop assistant’s life, <a href='#Page_72'>72</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Moral effect of child labour, <a href='#Page_127'>127</a>–131</li>
+  <li class='c006'>Nail and chain making, <a href='#Page_12'>12</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>National Anti-Sweating League, <a href='#Page_261'>261</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>National aspect of better conditions, <a href='#Page_192'>192</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>National income, <a href='#Page_195'>195</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>National Union of Shop Assistants, etc., <a href='#Page_55'>55</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>New Zealand: state arbitration, <a href='#Page_231'>231</a>–239;
+    <ul>
+      <li>industrial unions of, <a href='#Page_234'>234</a>;</li>
+      <li>arbitration court, <a href='#Page_235'>235</a>, <a href='#Page_236'>236</a>;</li>
+      <li>wages in, <a href='#Page_244'>244</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Non-competitive systems, <a href='#Page_176'>176</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Non-producers, <a href='#Page_195'>195</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Novels: showing shop assistant’s life, <a href='#Page_72'>72</a></li>
+  <li class='c006'>Old age pension: in Australia, <a href='#Page_256'>256</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Omnibus men: drivers and conductors; licences, <a href='#Page_81'>81</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>wages, <a href='#Page_83'>83</a>;</li>
+      <li>expenses, <a href='#Page_83'>83</a>;</li>
+      <li>liability for accidents, <a href='#Page_85'>85</a>;</li>
+      <li>drivers and conductors of motor omnibuses;</li>
+      <li>hours of work, <a href='#Page_92'>92</a>;</li>
+      <li>wages, <a href='#Page_92'>92</a>;</li>
+      <li>breakdowns, <a href='#Page_94'>94</a>;</li>
+      <li>uniform, <a href='#Page_98'>98</a>;</li>
+      <li>spies, <a href='#Page_99'>99</a>;</li>
+      <li>general remarks, <a href='#Page_140'>140</a>, <a href='#Page_143'>143</a>, <a href='#Page_164'>164</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'><span class='pageno' id='Page_283'>283</span>“Organised labour,” <a href='#Page_151'>151</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Ormsby: Sir Lambert, <a href='#Page_124'>124</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Over population, <a href='#Page_195'>195</a></li>
+  <li class='c006'>Packing and filling: cocoa, <a href='#Page_25'>25</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>tea, <a href='#Page_26'>26</a>;</li>
+      <li>jam, <a href='#Page_26'>26</a>;</li>
+      <li>cartridges, <a href='#Page_26'>26</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Paper-bag making, <a href='#Page_11'>11</a>, <a href='#Page_24'>24</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Payment, <em>See</em> Wages</li>
+  <li class='c028'>Peel: Sir Robert, <a href='#Page_114'>114</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Physical deterioration, <a href='#Page_273'>273</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Pipe making, <a href='#Page_13'>13</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Potteries: children working in, <a href='#Page_114'>114</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Poverty: investigations into, <a href='#Page_148'>148</a>–149;
+    <ul>
+      <li>physical and mental effects on the individual, <a href='#Page_273'>273</a>–274</li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c006'>Railway workers: hours, <a href='#Page_77'>77</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>porters’ wages, <a href='#Page_77'>77</a>;</li>
+      <li>“blacklisting,” <a href='#Page_78'>78</a>;</li>
+      <li>general remarks on, <a href='#Page_140'>140</a>, <a href='#Page_164'>164</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Reeves, W. Pember, <a href='#Page_231'>231</a>, <a href='#Page_233'>233</a>, <a href='#Page_237'>237</a>, <a href='#Page_239'>239</a>, <a href='#Page_248'>248</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Rochdale pioneers, <a href='#Page_178'>178</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Romilly: Sir Samuel, <a href='#Page_113'>113</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Rowntree: Seebohm, <a href='#Page_148'>148</a>, <a href='#Page_149'>149</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Ryan: Father, <a href='#Page_149'>149</a>, <a href='#Page_151'>151</a></li>
+  <li class='c006'>Sanitary Acts: competition checked by, <a href='#Page_181'>181</a>, <a href='#Page_191'>191</a>, <a href='#Page_194'>194</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Sanitary conditions: of factories, <a href='#Page_33'>33</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>shop assistants’ quarters, <a href='#Page_58'>58</a>;</li>
+      <li>high standard in cotton factories, <a href='#Page_223'>223</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Schoenhof: J., <a href='#Page_131'>131</a>, <a href='#Page_165'>165</a>, <a href='#Page_184'>184</a>, <a href='#Page_228'>228</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Scottish Council for Women’s Trades, <a href='#Page_3'>3</a>, <a href='#Page_126'>126</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Scottish Wholesale Co-operative Society, <a href='#Page_261'>261</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Shann: Geo., M.A., <a href='#Page_3'>3</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Shirt making, <a href='#Page_10'>10</a>, <a href='#Page_144'>144</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Shop assistants: living in, <a href='#Page_48'>48</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>code of rules, <a href='#Page_54'>54</a>;</li>
+      <li>wages, <a href='#Page_60'>60</a>;</li>
+      <li>“premiums,” <a href='#Page_60'>60</a>;</li>
+      <li>commissions, <a href='#Page_62'>62</a>;</li>
+      <li>condition in Scotland, <a href='#Page_66'>66</a>;</li>
+      <li>general remarks, <a href='#Page_138'>138</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Small: Prof. Albion, <a href='#Page_149'>149</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Spiers &#38; Pond, Ltd., <a href='#Page_70'>70</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Squire, Miss: Inspector of Factories, <a href='#Page_35'>35</a>, <a href='#Page_36'>36</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>State arbitration in New Zealand, <a href='#Page_231'>231</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>success of, <a href='#Page_239'>239</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Steel covering, <a href='#Page_108'>108</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'><span class='pageno' id='Page_284'>284</span>Street trading by children, <a href='#Page_109'>109</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Strikes, <a href='#Page_183'>183</a>, <a href='#Page_184'>184</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>in the colonies, <a href='#Page_232'>232</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>String bag making, <a href='#Page_107'>107</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>“Sweating”: definition of the term, <a href='#Page_1'>1</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>not confined to cheap goods, <a href='#Page_22'>22</a>, <a href='#Page_142'>142</a>;</li>
+      <li>general remarks, <a href='#Page_132'>132</a>, <a href='#Page_143'>143</a>;</li>
+      <li>not unknown in the colonies, <a href='#Page_230'>230</a>;</li>
+      <li>a source of weakness to nations, <a href='#Page_266'>266</a>–269</li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c006'>Tailoring, <a href='#Page_29'>29</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>wages in New Zealand, <a href='#Page_244'>244</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Tariff Commission, <a href='#Page_220'>220</a>, <a href='#Page_225'>225</a>, <a href='#Page_226'>226</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Tattersall: Mr W., <a href='#Page_222'>222</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Temperance, <a href='#Page_198'>198</a>, <a href='#Page_211'>211</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Temperature: extremes of, <a href='#Page_40'>40</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>in cotton factories, <a href='#Page_223'>223</a>–224</li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Textile trades: Children’s work, <a href='#Page_110'>110</a>–111, <a href='#Page_112'>112</a>–113</li>
+  <li class='c028'>Thear: Miss, Inspector of Factories, Victoria, <a href='#Page_256'>256</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Thomas: Dr, <a href='#Page_123'>123</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Thrift among working classes, <a href='#Page_201'>201</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>not advisable, <a href='#Page_202'>202</a>–205</li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Tooth brush making, <a href='#Page_18'>18</a>, <a href='#Page_20'>20</a>, <a href='#Page_107'>107</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Toy making, <a href='#Page_12'>12</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Trade unions, <a href='#Page_182'>182</a>, <a href='#Page_184'>184</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>mistakes of, <a href='#Page_185'>185</a>;</li>
+      <li>as provident societies, <a href='#Page_201'>201</a>, <a href='#Page_202'>202</a>;</li>
+      <li>in cotton trade, <a href='#Page_225'>225</a>, <a href='#Page_226'>226</a>;</li>
+      <li>lack of trade organisation in Bristol cotton mills, <a href='#Page_227'>227</a>, <a href='#Page_228'>228</a>;</li>
+      <li>in New Zealand, <a href='#Page_237'>237</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c006'>Underpaid worker: cost to the nation, <a href='#Page_170'>170</a>–171</li>
+  <li class='c028'>Underpayment: how it comes about, <a href='#Page_144'>144</a>–160;
+    <ul>
+      <li>not caused by inefficiency, <a href='#Page_159'>159</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>United States: <em>see</em> America</li>
+  <li class='c006'>Ventilation, <a href='#Page_224'>224</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Verney, Mr: Inspector of Factories, <a href='#Page_222'>222</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Vines, Miss: Inspector of Factories, <a href='#Page_31'>31</a>, <a href='#Page_37'>37</a></li>
+  <li class='c006'>Wages: match box making, <a href='#Page_5'>5</a>, <a href='#Page_7'>7</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>shirt making, <a href='#Page_10'>10</a>, <a href='#Page_144'>144</a>–145;</li>
+      <li>paper-bag making, <a href='#Page_12'>12</a>;</li>
+      <li>toy making, <a href='#Page_13'>13</a>;</li>
+      <li>clay pipe making, <a href='#Page_14'>14</a>;</li>
+      <li>ball covering, <a href='#Page_16'>16</a>;</li>
+      <li>brush making, <a href='#Page_20'>20</a>;</li>
+      <li>miscellaneous trades, <a href='#Page_21'>21</a>;</li>
+      <li><span class='pageno' id='Page_285'>285</span>packing and filling, <a href='#Page_23'>23</a>, <a href='#Page_26'>26</a>, <a href='#Page_27'>27</a>, <a href='#Page_28'>28</a>;</li>
+      <li>machinists, <a href='#Page_41'>41</a>;</li>
+      <li>shop assistants, <a href='#Page_60'>60</a>;</li>
+      <li>waitresses, <a href='#Page_70'>70</a>;</li>
+      <li>female clerks and bookkeepers, <a href='#Page_71'>71</a>;</li>
+      <li>railway porters, <a href='#Page_77'>77</a>;</li>
+      <li>omnibus men, <a href='#Page_83'>83</a>;</li>
+      <li>motor omnibus men, <a href='#Page_92'>92</a>;</li>
+      <li>children’s wages for home work, <a href='#Page_105'>105</a>–106;</li>
+      <li>wages, how determined, <a href='#Page_152'>152</a>;</li>
+      <li>what is a fair wage, <a href='#Page_161'>161</a>;</li>
+      <li>articles of dress, <a href='#Page_188'>188</a>;</li>
+      <li>textile workers, <a href='#Page_218'>218</a>–219;</li>
+      <li>tailoresses in New Zealand, <a href='#Page_244'>244</a>;</li>
+      <li>factory wages in Australia, <a href='#Page_252'>252</a>–254;</li>
+      <li>high wages and cheap production, <a href='#Page_260'>260</a>–261</li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Waitresses: in restaurants, <a href='#Page_67'>67</a>;
+    <ul>
+      <li>in railway stations, <a href='#Page_68'>68</a>;</li>
+      <li>hours of work, <a href='#Page_67'>67</a>, <a href='#Page_68'>68</a>;</li>
+      <li>expenses of, <a href='#Page_69'>69</a>;</li>
+      <li>general remarks on, <a href='#Page_138'>138</a></li>
+    </ul>
+  </li>
+  <li class='c028'>Washing appliances, <a href='#Page_37'>37</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Watts: Alderman; of Manchester, <a href='#Page_123'>123</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Weaving, <a href='#Page_14'>14</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Webb: Catherine, <a href='#Page_176'>176</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Webb: Mrs Sydney, <a href='#Page_114'>114</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Wells: H. G., <a href='#Page_72'>72</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Whiteley’s, Ltd.: William, <a href='#Page_54'>54</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Women in the printing trades, <a href='#Page_65'>65</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'><cite>Women’s Co-operative Guild</cite>, <a href='#Page_180'>180</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>“Women’s employment in shops,” <a href='#Page_67'>67</a>, <a href='#Page_69'>69</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'><cite>Women’s Industrial Council</cite>, <a href='#Page_2'>2</a>, <a href='#Page_3'>3</a>, <a href='#Page_6'>6</a>, <a href='#Page_7'>7</a>, <a href='#Page_17'>17</a>, <a href='#Page_56'>56</a>, <a href='#Page_72'>72</a>, <a href='#Page_188'>188</a>, <a href='#Page_189'>189</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>“Women’s work and wages,” <a href='#Page_3'>3</a>, <a href='#Page_39'>39</a>, <a href='#Page_65'>65</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Women workers: difficulty of organisation, <a href='#Page_185'>185</a>, <a href='#Page_186'>186</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Wood chopping, <a href='#Page_107'>107</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Wood polishing, <a href='#Page_107'>107</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Woodward: S. W., <a href='#Page_130'>130</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Work done below cost price, <a href='#Page_164'>164</a></li>
+  <li class='c028'>Worth: meanings of, <a href='#Page_162'>162</a></li>
+  <li class='c006'>Zola: E., <a href='#Page_72'>72</a></li>
+</ul>
+
+<div class='nf-center-c0'>
+<div class='nf-center c006'>
+    <div><span class='small'>PRINTED BY</span></div>
+    <div><span class='small'>TURNBULL AND SPEARS,</span></div>
+    <div><span class='small'>EDINBURGH</span></div>
+  </div>
+</div>
+
+<hr class='c029'>
+<div class='footnote' id='f1'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r1'>1</a>. <span lang="fr">A. Aftalion, “Le developpement de la fabrique et le travail
+à domicile dans les industries de l’habillement.” Paris.
+Librairie du recueil J. B. Sirey et du Journal du Palais.</span></p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f2'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r2'>2</a>. “Home Industries of Women in London.” Report of an
+Inquiry in thirty-five trades.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f3'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r3'>3</a>. “Women’s Work and Wages.” A phase of life in an industrial
+city. By Edward Cadbury, M. Cécile Matheson and
+George Shann, M.A.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f4'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r4'>4</a>. Handbook to the Exhibition, p. 139.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f5'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r5'>5</a>. Mrs F. G. Hogg was one of the most valued members of
+the Women’s Industrial Council. Her ability, judgment,
+perseverance, and devotion were all admirable, and her early
+death has left in the memories of those who worked with her
+a blank that can never be filled up.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f6'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r6'>6</a>. Report of the Chief Inspector, 1905, pp. 297–98.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f7'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r7'>7</a>. A friend has just sent me a note of a similar case, that of
+a cartridge filler, who received 1d. for filling 1000 cartridges.
+She said that she could fill 25,000 a day, when busy. “But,”
+adds my friend, “she is a physical wreck, having worked at
+this for ten years.”</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f8'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r8'>8</a>. Report of the Chief Inspector, 1905, p. 50.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f9'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r9'>9</a>. Report of Chief Inspector, 1905, p. 99.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f10'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r10'>10</a>. Report of Chief Inspector, 1905, p. 300.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f11'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r11'>11</a>. Report of Chief Inspector, 1905, p. 302.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f12'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r12'>12</a>. Report of Chief Inspector, 1905, p. 290.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f13'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r13'>13</a>. Report of Chief Inspector, 1905, p. 34.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f14'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r14'>14</a>. Report of Chief Inspector, 1905, p. 292.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f15'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r15'>15</a>. Report of Chief Inspector, 1905, p. 293.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f16'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r16'>16</a>. Report of Chief Inspector, 1905, p. 280.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f17'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r17'>17</a>. The article from which this is an extract was published
+(in the <cite>New Review</cite>) in September 1891; but the practices
+described, are, I fear, not yet extinct, though the law is succeeding
+by degrees in making them risky.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f18'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r18'>18</a>. “Life in the Shop.” A series of articles reprinted from
+the <cite>Daily Chronicle</cite>, pp. 5 and 6.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f19'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r19'>19</a>. The National Union of Shop Assistants, Clerks, and
+Warehousemen, now growing very powerful, and guided by
+able, experienced and energetic officials, has of late done
+much towards inducing employers to abolish or diminish some
+of their fines.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f20'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r20'>20</a>. A peculiarly shocking example of the abuses that may
+arise from a system of fining was lately brought to my
+knowledge. It is not recent, and must, I think and hope,
+be unique. I have found no witness who has ever heard
+of a similar instance. Of its truth, however, the source
+from which it comes forbids doubt. These are the facts.
+In a certain retail shop selling drapery and fancy goods the
+foreman, whose business it apparently was to collect fines,
+was required to make up a fixed sum of money from this
+source every week; and being a man with wife and
+children, afraid above all things of being left without
+employment, was accustomed to inflict sufficient fines to
+make up this total. Two girls, whose weekly wage of 11s.
+he had thus reduced, on one occasion, to 4s., took to evil
+courses; and the foreman when dying (in a hospital) told
+a lady visitor the circumstances, and said that he felt himself
+responsible for the downfall of the girls. The lady
+(an experienced worker in a girls’ club) made enquiries,
+which confirmed the startling tale. She followed up the
+girls, reclaimed one and put her into respectable employment,
+but failed with the other and was unable to keep
+sight of her.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f21'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r21'>21</a>. These cases are taken from the reports of an investigator
+employed some years ago by the Women’s Industrial Council.
+This lady, who was an experienced assistant, spent over two
+years in passing from shop to shop, remaining long enough in
+each to obtain complete information as to wages, conditions,
+food, rules, etc.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f22'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r22'>22</a>. <cite>Daily News</cite>, 25th August, 1906. Letter signed “Onesimus.”</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f23'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r23'>23</a>. Women’s Work and Wages, p. 47, note.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f24'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r24'>24</a>. Edited by J. Ramsay MacDonald. P. S. King &#38; Son.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f25'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r25'>25</a>. Women’s Employment in Shops. Report of an enquiry
+conducted for the National Federal Council of Scotland for
+Women’s Trades; by Margaret Irwin, p. 7.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f26'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r26'>26</a>. Women Shop Assistants. The evidence given by Miss
+Irwin before the Select Committee of the House of Lords on
+Early Closing of Shops, p. 5.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f27'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r27'>27</a>. Women’s Employment in Shops, p. 6.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f28'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r28'>28</a>. Report of Select Committee on the Cabs and Omnibuses
+(Metropolis) Bill, 1906, p. 5, par. 31.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f29'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r29'>29</a>. As these terms may possibly be unfamiliar to some readers,
+it may be as well to explain that, on a time and a half rate,
+every penny of the ordinary wage becomes a penny-halfpenny;
+and that, on a time and a quarter rate, every such penny
+becomes a penny-farthing.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f30'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r30'>30</a>. Report of Select Committee on the Cabs and Omnibuses
+(Metropolis) Bill, 1906, p. 4, par. 19.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f31'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r31'>31</a>. Report of Select Committee on the Cabs and Omnibuses
+(Metropolis) Bill, 1906, p. 4, par. 19.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f32'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r32'>32</a>. Juvenile wage earners and their work. By Nettie Adler,
+hon. Sec. Committee on Wage-Earning children. Progress,
+July 1906.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f33'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r33'>33</a>. Report for 1905, p. 52.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f34'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r34'>34</a>. Report for 1905, p. 52.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f35'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r35'>35</a>. A “young person” means, according to the Factory Acts,
+one under 18.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f36'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r36'>36</a>. Report for 1905, p. 296.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f37'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r37'>37</a>. The Case for the Factory Acts. Edited by Mrs Sidney
+Webb. Chapter II. The Historical Development of the
+Factory Acts. By Miss B. L. Hutchins, pp. 80–81.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f38'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r38'>38</a>. Case for the Factory Acts, pp. 82–3.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f39'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r39'>39</a>. Bye-laws under the Employment of Children Act have
+now been passed in many towns, and the London
+County Council has at last been permitted by the Home
+Office to establish a fairly satisfactory code. Really satisfactory
+no code can be which sanctions any employment of
+children during school years, but in this department, as in
+others, the interposition of the law has done something to
+check glaring industrial evils.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f40'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r40'>40</a>. <cite>Child Labor.</cite> A menace to industry, education and good
+citizenship (No. 93 of the Annals of the American Academy
+of political and social science. March 1906.) p. 318.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f41'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r41'>41</a>. <cite>Child Labor</cite>, p. 293.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f42'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r42'>42</a>. Some ethical gains through legislation. By Florence
+Kelley, p. 44.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f43'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r43'>43</a>. <em>Ibid.</em>, p. 45.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f44'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r44'>44</a>. <em>Ibid.</em>, p. 49.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f45'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r45'>45</a>. Juvenile wage earners. By Nettie Adler, Hon. Sec.
+Committee on Wage earning children. <cite>Progress.</cite> July 1906.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f46'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r46'>46</a>. Minutes of Evidence. Questions 12644, 12758.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f47'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r47'>47</a>. These facts and more to the same purpose may be found
+in an article by Miss Adler in the <cite>Guardian</cite> of May 9, 1906.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f48'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r48'>48</a>. Some ethical gains through legislation, p. 86.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f49'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r49'>49</a>. Pp. 12, 13, 14.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f50'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r50'>50</a>. Inter-Departmental Committee on the employment of
+school children. Minutes of Evidence, pp. 275, 455, 471.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f51'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r51'>51</a>. Child Labor, p. 302.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f52'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r52'>52</a>. Child Labor, p. 275.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f53'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r53'>53</a>. Some ethical gains through legislation, p. 17.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f54'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r54'>54</a>. Some ethical gains through legislation, p. 42.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f55'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r55'>55</a>. Mr S. W. Woodward, of the firm of Woodward and
+Lathrop, Washington, in a short paper called: “A Business
+Man’s View of Child Labour,” writes: “It may be stated as a
+safe proposition that for every dollar earned by a child under
+14 years of age tenfold will be taken from their earning
+capacity in later life.” Child Labor, p. 362.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f56'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r56'>56</a>. J. Schoenhof. Economy of High Wages, p. 38.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f57'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r57'>57</a>. It must not be assumed from the above anecdote that all
+factory girls are foul-mouthed. This was by no means true
+even in the year after the Dock strike, and is much less true
+now. But I have no doubt there are still factories in which
+the habit of foul speech is a sort of fashion.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f58'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r58'>58</a>. Handbook to Sweated Industries Exhibition, p. 23.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f59'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r59'>59</a>. Poverty. By J. Seebohm Rowntree, p. 229.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f60'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r60'>60</a>. A Living Wage: Its ethical and economic aspect.
+Macmillans. New York, April 1906.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f61'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r61'>61</a>. <em>Ibid.</em>, p. 136. I must not be understood as committing
+myself to these figures, which apply to America. They are
+employed here to show that a large proportion of American
+wage earners do not receive the sum considered by experts
+as affording a “Living Wage.”</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f62'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r62'>62</a>. I have not personally referred to Mr Mitchell’s book, the
+title of which is “Organised Labour.” Professor Ryan gives
+the pages from which this extract comes: pp. 116, 117.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f63'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r63'>63</a>. A Living Wage, p. 150.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f64'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r64'>64</a>. <em>Ibid.</em>, p. 164.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f65'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r65'>65</a>. The Strength of the People. By Helen Bosanquet, p. 114.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f66'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r66'>66</a>. Of course efficiency is valuable for other than financial
+reasons; but we are dealing now only with the question of
+payment.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f67'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r67'>67</a>. Economy of high wages, p. 392.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f68'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r68'>68</a>. If, at this point, any reader should pause to ask: “What,
+then, ought the Brothers Cheeryble to do? Ought they to
+leave the selling of safety pins to some less scrupulous
+persons? Or ought they to go on underpaying the cappers?”
+I reply that the worthy twins should follow neither of these
+courses, but should bend their minds to inventing or getting
+invented a machine that would cap the pins even more
+cheaply, because much more expeditiously, than the hand
+workers. The reduction in the cost of production would
+then allow the payment of decent wages to the operators.
+Mechanical operations should be done by machines, and hand
+work should be reserved for those which demand individual
+variation or peculiar and special perfection. The capping of
+safety pins, which falls under neither of these heads, is
+emphatically an operation to which the human brain and
+hand should not be put.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f69'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r69'>69</a>. Industrial Co-operation. Edited by Catherine Webb, p. 242.</p>
+
+<p class='c014'>These figures do not include middle class joint stock
+associations, such as the Army and Navy Stores.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f70'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r70'>70</a>. Industrial Co-operation, p. 80.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f71'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r71'>71</a>. In order to do so readers must address themselves to the
+Co-operative Union, 2 Nicholas Croft, High St., Manchester.
+It is much to be regretted that so valuable and informing a
+work should be published in a manner that almost restricts
+its influence to persons who are already convinced co-operators.
+The outer world of readers who badly need to understand the
+facts and meanings of the great co-operative movement have
+no opportunity of meeting with the one volume that compendiously
+explains the existing conditions.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f72'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r72'>72</a>. Economy of high wages, p. 63.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f73'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r73'>73</a>. Of course a minimum rate of wages and sometimes indeed
+a complete scale of wages has often been fixed by various
+local bodies or departments; but only when such bodies have
+been, directly or indirectly, employers of labour. Thus the
+duty of employers to pay a fair wage has been recognised, but
+not, as yet, the duty or the right of the State to enforce the
+payment.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f74'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r74'>74</a>. It may be worth noting here—though the point lies
+outside the scope of this chapter—that an expansion of trade
+when wages do not rise leads to the extraordinary state
+known as overproduction, in which producers complain that
+they cannot find a market for their wares, at the same time
+that hundreds of fellow citizens are seen to be in crying
+need of these same wares.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f75'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r75'>75</a>. Mr Charles Booth’s tables show that in 1889, out of a
+population of 891,539, in East London, there were no less
+than 47,225 members of various Friendly Societies.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f76'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r76'>76</a>. This explanation of the impracticability of a Consumers’
+League is reprinted, with the alteration of a few words, from
+the Supplement to the <cite>Guardian</cite>, the Editor of which has
+given me leave to reproduce it in this chapter.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f77'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r77'>77</a>. A prominent employer writes to me in December 1906
+that wages have since risen 2½ per cent.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f78'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r78'>78</a>. A Reply to the Report of the Tariff Commission on the
+Cotton Trade. Written for the Free Trade League by S. J.
+Chapman, M.A., Professor of Political Economy at the
+University of Manchester.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f79'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r79'>79</a>. Since writing these lines I have been informed that improved
+machinery and management have been introduced,
+and that the outlook has consequently improved also. But
+it is safe to prophesy that unless her wages should rise very
+substantially, the Bristol worker will not reach the standard
+of the Lancashire worker.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f80'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r80'>80</a>. Economy of High Wages, p. 66.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f81'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r81'>81</a>. Economy of High Wages, p. 398.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f82'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r82'>82</a>. W. Pember Reeves. State Experiments in Australia and
+New Zealand. Vol. ii. p. 29. To this volume I am indebted
+for the account of all the facts preceding and accompanying
+the enactment of the earliest laws under which a minimum
+wage could be legally fixed in the colonies. Any reader
+desiring fuller details of these most interesting developments
+should refer to Mr Reeves’s second volume.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f83'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r83'>83</a>. It seems from the context that 1s. 6d. was the price paid
+for making the dozen shirts throughout, and that the finisher’s
+share was but a part of this, since a night’s work, in which
+she did a dozen shirts and something more, only brought her
+one shilling.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f84'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r84'>84</a>. W. Pember Reeves. State Experiments in Australia and
+New Zealand. Vol. ii. pp. 111–112.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f85'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r85'>85</a>. Journal of the Department of Labour. New Zealand. Vol.
+XI. pp. 267–268.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f86'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r86'>86</a>. Journal of the Department of Labour. New Zealand. Vol.
+XIV. pp. 70–76.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f87'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r87'>87</a>. This account of the establishment of the first Wage Boards
+is derived from Mr Reeves’s State Experiments in Australia
+and New Zealand, vol. ii. chap. 1.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f88'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r88'>88</a>. A resolution of both Houses is now required.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f89'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r89'>89</a>. Report of the Chief Inspector of Factories, work-rooms
+and shops. Victoria, 1905, p. 62.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f90'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r90'>90</a>. Report of Chief Inspector of Factories. Victoria, p. 68.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f91'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r91'>91</a>. Report of Chief Inspector of Factories. Victoria, 1905, p. 43.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f92'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r92'>92</a>. Report of Chief Inspector of Factories. Victoria, 1905, p. 19.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f93'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r93'>93</a>. <em>Ibid.</em>, p. 63.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f94'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r94'>94</a>. Report of Chief Inspector of Factories. Victoria, p. 58.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f95'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r95'>95</a>. Report of the Chief Inspector of Factories. Victoria,
+1905, p. 60.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f96'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r96'>96</a>. <em>Ibid.</em>, p. 14.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f97'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r97'>97</a>. Report of Chief Inspector of Factories. Victoria, 1905,
+p. 39.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f98'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r98'>98</a>. See the speech of Mr Maxwell (to whom personally, it
+may be added, this excellent state of things is due) on p. 38
+of the National Anti-Sweating League’s Report of a Conference
+on the Minimum Wage.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f99'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r99'>99</a>. A very strange instance of divergence of wages in one
+factory came under my notice some 15 or 16 years ago. This
+also was in the shirt trade. A strike arose in a large factory,
+and when a register came to be taken of the wages received
+by the various women it was discovered—greatly to the
+surprise of the workers concerned—that there was a difference
+of almost 50 per cent. between the rates paid in one workroom
+and those paid in another, both being under the same roof,
+and the work being so absolutely identical that the two
+groups were frequently engaged upon garments cut by the
+same stroke from the same roll of material. The one room
+was superintended by a forewoman who resisted any attempt
+to lower wages, and who, being a valuable official, was able
+to impose her wishes; in the other the forewoman meekly
+accepted any reductions proposed by the firm. I need hardly
+add that the young women who worked in the former room
+were markedly superior in appearance, in manners and in
+intelligence to those belonging to the latter. Those who
+worked under the good forewoman were, indeed, some of the
+best looking and most agreeable girls with whom I have ever
+been brought into contact.</p>
+</div>
+<div class='footnote' id='f100'>
+<p class='c014'><a href='#r100'>100</a>. There are no doubt plenty of industries of which employers
+engaged in them would declare beforehand that wages
+could not possibly be raised without the ruining of the trade.
+But employers in the cotton trade were of the same opinion
+and experience has shown that they were mistaken.</p>
+</div>
+
+<div class='pbb'>
+ <hr class='pb c007'>
+</div>
+<div class='tnotes x-ebookmaker'>
+
+<div class='chapter ph2'>
+
+<div class='nf-center-c0'>
+<div class='nf-center c001'>
+    <div>TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES</div>
+  </div>
+</div>
+
+</div>
+
+<table class='table0'>
+  <tr>
+    <th class='c027'>Page</th>
+    <th class='c027'>Changed from</th>
+    <th class='c030'>Changed to</th>
+  </tr>
+  <tr>
+    <td class='c024'><a href='#t251'>251</a></td>
+    <td class='c025'>vary to a remarkable decree, and it is to be</td>
+    <td class='c026'>vary to a remarkable degree, and it is to be</td>
+  </tr>
+</table>
+
+  <ul  class='ul_1'>
+    <li>Typos fixed; non-standard spelling and dialect retained.
+
+    </li>
+    <li>Used numbers for footnotes, placing them all at the end of the last chapter.
+    </li>
+  </ul>
+
+</div>
+
+<div style='text-align:center'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 75467 ***</div>
+  </body>
+  <!-- created with ppgen.py 3.57e (with regex) on 2025-02-03 23:09:25 GMT -->
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+
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+This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements,
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+Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for
+eBook #75467 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/75467)