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fourteen hours. The effects in many cases have been found to be "deformity, stunted growth, relaxed muscles, and slender conformation," and, as Dr. Loudon has said, "twisting of the ends of the long bones, relaxation of the ligaments of the knees, ankles, and the like." Another of the reporters states, that the common representation which makes it possible for some persons invariably to distinguish factory from other children, is not justified by the reality, but at the same time, he admits that the individual instances in which some one or other of these effects is discernible, are rather frequent than rare, and this appears more particularly to the children in the Bradford mills and elsewhere. The conclusion of another medical reporter is, that upon the whole he has no doubt upon his mind, that under the system pursued in many of the factories, the children of the labouring classes stand in need of, and ought to have, legislative protection against the conspiracy insensibly formed between their masters and parents, to tax them to a degree of toil beyond their strength!

We come now to the general report for the counties of Lancaster, Cheshire, and Derbyshire, as drawn up by Dr. Hawkins. Upon a great variety of evidence delivered to him by the medical men in the factory places of these three counties, he has drawn some very important conclusions. And, first of all, he does not hesitate to declare it to be his deliberate opinion, that no child should be employed in factory labour below the age of ten, that no individual, under the age of eighteen, should be engaged in it longer than ten hours daily, and that it is highly desirable to procure a still further diminution of the hours of labour for children below thirteen years of age. In regard to night-work in factories, he believes that no one ought to be employed under the age of eighteen. The answers. with which a large majority of eminent medical men favoured him to the queries, which he widely circulated, evince a considerable degree of concurrence as to the necessity of limiting children below thirteen years to eight, or eight hours and a half, daily; and a remarkable agreement as to limiting all below eighteen, to ten or eleven hours. Twenty-eight medical practitioners have returned answers to the medical circular, four of them make no reply on the subject of hours; of the remaining twenty-four, twenty deliver an affirmative on the reduction of hours, two are doubtful, and tvo believe that twelve hours are not too much. Of the twenty-four, nine are for reducing labour to eight hours, or eight and a half daily, for children below thirteen; and fifteen are of opinion that the hours should be reduced to ten, ten and a half, or eleven, for all individuals below eighteen years of age.

From a variety of reports which illustrate the physical and moral condition of the factory classes, and from comparisons with other classes, has drawn some results which must be deemed important. To determine the state of the health of the youthful factory classes, he examined the children at the Bennett great Sunday-school at Manchester, for here was an abundance of those

of all trades. He took an account of three hundred and fifty of both sexes not engaged in factories, and next three hundred and fifty more who were engaged in factories. The result was as follows:

Of 350 not in factories,

21 had bad health,

88 had middling health, 241 had good health.

But of 350 in factories,

73 had bad health, 134 had middling health, 143 had good health.

Again, at the St. Augustine's Sunday-school at Manchester, he compared fifty boys engaged in factories with fifty boys not in factories, some of whom lived at home doing nothing, while others were engaged in shops and in various trades.

Of the 50 not in factories, 1 had bad health,

18 had middling health,

31 had good health.

But of the 50 in factories,

13 had bad health,
19 had middling health,
18 had good health.

From these comparisons will be seen, that the advantage of health is at least double, at these institutions, on the side of those young people who are not engaged in factory work.

In thirteen factories, in various parts of my district, Dr. Hawkins took an estimate of the health of the individuals employed below eighteen years of age. Of 1,190 of both sexes thus examined, 787 had good health, 311 had middling health, and ninetytwo had bad health. Here the proportion of health among factory youth improves, because a large part of these factories was in rural districts. The factories in the country, and in or near the smaller towns, appear to possess a considerable advantage over the Manchester ones, in point of health, of contentment, and of the natural animation and gaiety of youth. He says, that the boys and girls whom he examined from the Manchester factories, very generally exhibited a depressed look, and a pallid complexion; none of the alacrity, activity, and hilarity of early life shone on their countenance and gestures. This was more perceptible on the side of the boys than of the girls. A large number of both, in reply to his questions, declared that they had no wish to play about on the Saturday afternoon and on the Sunday, but that they preferred remaining quiet. The deformities which he witnessed below the age of eighteen were not numerous; they occurred to about one in 100 of all whom he examined. Deformities, indeed, appear to be far less frequent at present than formerly.

The factories at Manchester it seems supply about a fifth of all the patients to the Lock Hospital; they contribute none to the Lunatic Asylum, or to the Deaf and Dumb. Dr. Hawkins, in making this transition immediately to Manchester, notices with surprize and regret, the total absence of public gardens, parks, and walks, at Manchester; it is scarcely in the power of the factory workmen to taste the breath of nature, or to look upon its verdure,

and this defect is a strong impediment to convalescence from disease, which is usually tedious and difficult at Manchester.

The effect of this privation has a deal to do with the degeneracy of the human form, which is so striking amongst the factory people at Manchester. Most travellers, he says, are struck by the lowness of stature, the leanness, and the paleness which present themselves so commonly to the eye, at Manchester, and above all among the factory classes. He has never been in any town in Great Britain, nor in Europe, in which degeneracy of form and colour from the national standard has been so obvious. The married women fall remarkably short of the usual characteristics of the English wife.

But Dr. Hawkins observes, that notwithstanding this state of things, which would be so likely to constitute a predisposition to a prevailing disease, yet the factories experienced a remarkable degree of freedom from cholera. The accidents and casualties have not been by any means numerous in the Manchester factories. The coroner of Derby returned only one fatal accident from machinery, which occurred in that borough during the year 1832. The coroner of Manchester has delivered to Dr. Hawkins a list of thirteen fatal accidents which have occurred during the last nine months, from October, 1832, to June, 1833, through machinery; eight of those were in cotton mills, one in a flax-mill, one in a silkmill, one in print-works, one in a dye-house, and one in bleachingworks. To compare those numbers with other situations of life: sixty-nine persons were burned fatally during the same nine months, fifty-six were drowned, twenty-three perished through falls, and sixty-seven by other accidents, exclusive of those which happened in coal-pits. It must be observed, that this district embraces 450,000 souls. To afford some slight comparison on this head between Manchester and Liverpool:-at Liverpool, from June 1832, to June 1833, twenty persons were drowned, and 126 deaths occurred through other accidents.

Throughout the whole of the Manchester district, so far as the researches of this learned physician went, he conceives that suicide and child murder are very rare crimes. Intemperance, debauchery, and improvidence, are the chief blemishes on the character of the factory work-people, and those may be easily traced to habits formed under the present system, and springing from it almost inevitably. On all sides it is admitted that indigestion, hypochondriasis, and languor, affect this class of the population very widely. After twelve hours of monotonous labour and confinement, it is but too natural to seek for stimulants of one kind or another; but when we superadd the morbid states above alluded to, the transition to spirits is rapid and perpetual. The abuse of spirits is, indeed, one of the greatest evils of this class: many deaths occur annually in Manchester from excessive drinking. In the Manchester excise collection, which embraces a population of

460,447 souls, there are no less than 1,856 gin-shops, publichouses, and beer-houses. In the Preston collection, of which the collector has not been able to supply the number of souls, the total number of such places is 653. With respect to debauchery, an easy preparation is afforded for it by the mixture of a large number of both sexes in the same room. The number of factory girls who finally recruit the ranks of public prostitution is perhaps small; at least, out of fifty prostitutes who have entered the Manchester Penitentiary during the last four years, only eight proceeded from the factories, while twenty nine had been in service. Three of these factory girls were admitted at the age of fifteen, one at sixteen, and one even at the age of fourteen. The number of illegitimate children at present on the Manchester parish list is 1,189. The average proportion of illegitimate births at Manchester, during the years 1824, 1825, and 1826, was about one in twelve annually of all the births.

Dr. Hawkins selects one of these factory girls, and he supposes her to be about to become a wife. But up to that moment she has had no time to become acquainted with the character which she will have to fulfil. In consequence of the little time she has to attend to her children they are usually neglected; too often the dwelling of the factory family is no home; it sometimes is a cellar, which includes no cookery, no washing, no making, no mending, no decencies of life, no invitations to the fire-side. In every hundred deaths in Manchester nearly fifty-four occur under five years of age, while in country places the per-centage of deaths under five is something less than thirty-two. On comparing the number of deaths under two years of age in Manchester, Liverpool, and London, they appear to be far more numerous at Manchester than in the two latter places; of 1,000 persons buried in one year in those three places, 424 die at Manchester under two years of age, 362 at Liverpool, and 308 at London. Such is the improvidence of many of those mothers, that apparently more than half of the whole population of Manchester are so destitute, or so degraded, as to permit their offspring to be brought into the world by the aid of the Lying-in Charity.

We shall give the concluding words of Dr. Hawkins, which we think are auspicious of better things than those which we have been now contemplating.

'Wherever I entered a factory, I am bound to remark that I experienced much readiness on the part of the proprietors, and of their overlookers, in procuring for me ample means of making an impartial inquiry. If I am to confide in my own observation, and in the accounts furnished to me by work-people of every age, in private conversations frequently repeated, I must arrive at the conclusion, that the proprietors are generally anxious to promote the convenience and comfort of their dependents, as far as the system admits; that they usually endeavour to prevent acts of harshness and of immorality; that if such cases arise, it is mainly owing to their ab

sence, or to their neglect of personal superintendence; and there are not a few among them who really act a paternal part, and receive the recompense of respect and gratitude. Their situation is a difficult one; but the more closely they asume the character of the observant master of a great family, and the more narrowly they investigate, appreciate, and purify the composition of their family, the more likely is every factory to become respectable and happy. In some few factories I could not trace the slightest desire for change; neither the name nor the necessity of the Ten Hours' Bill sappeared to have penetrated so far. In particular, I must cite the mills of the Messrs. Strutts, at Belper, as uttering one voice of satisfaction, and as presenting no dark shades which I had the power of discerning. These gentlemen allow to all who choose to avail themselves of the offer of a pint of good tea, or coffee, with sugar and milk, for one halfpenny; and those who accede to this plan obtain medical assistance gratis. They have provided a dancing room in their mill, where festoons of flowers are suspended, and a band of music is heard on holydays, as a substitute for the public-house to their female youth. I must refer for some more proofs of the attention of masters to their work-people to the tabular examination of factories which accompanies this letter.'

Such is the present domestic condition of these manufacturing establishments, which constitute so large a portion of the nominal splendour of this country. The matter is still subjudice, and therefore is not a proper subject at this moment for commentary; all that belongs to us, under such circumstances, is, to state and vindicate the truth.

ART. I.

1. Traditional Stories of Old Families, and Legendary Illustrations of Family History; with Notes, Historical and Biographical. By ANDREW PICKEN, Author of "The Dominie's Legacy." In 2 vols. London: Longman, Rees, and Co. 1833.

2. Character; or Jew and Gentile: a Tale. By Mrs. Leman GRIMSTONE.

3. Conrad Blessington: a Tale. By a LADY. 1 vol. London: Longman, Rees, and Co. 1833.

4. Notre Dame: a Tale of the "Ancien Regime," from the French of M. Victor Hugo; with a Prefatory Notice, Literary and Political, of his Romances. By the Translator of Herring's "History of the Norman Conquest." In 3 vols. E. Wilson. 1833.

THE traditionary stories of Mr. Picken form a new and very valuable branch of our general literature, inasmuch as they embrace materials which have been preserved in private archives, or are handed down by colloquial tradition, and possess the highest interest. In turning inquiry into the curious department of family

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