payment of the 10s. 6d. per thousand had been made in goods." And Mr. Baron Bramwell added: "Whatever definition one gives to the term 'wages,' a portion of what the plaintiff gets here is profits made and makeable by the employment of other people under him. If a portion is that, the whole is not wages. If the whole is not wages, it is not a case within the statute, for the statute contemplates that the remuneration shall be wages and nothing more."

In the case of Sleeman v. Todd (33 Law Journ. N. S. Exch. 153), it was held that butty colliers working under verbal contracts, generally by the day, but also by the ton or yard, not being allowed to underlet the work, or to work elsewhere, but doing it as they liked, and in fact working themselves and employing men under them, for whose wages they were responsible, were not within the Truck Act. Chief Baron Pollock said, "The case is within the Truck Act or not, according as the contract is for mere labour or for the result of labour;" that is, for the effect that labour is to produce, as in a contract for the removal of a quantity of clay.

In the case of Millard v. Kelly (22 J. P. 736), the question was whether Miliard was rightly convicted under the Truck Act for the payment of wages in shop goods to Kelly. It was contended that Kelly was not an artificer within the Act. The 19th section extends the operation of the statute to artificers, labourers, &c., and other persons employed in and about the manufacture of iron and other specified trades. It appeared that Kelly was employed in the vicinity of certain iron works in unloading boats which conveyed the coal for the use of the works.

The canal was a private branch belonging to the proprietors of the works, and ran into the middle of the works. The wharf where Kelly worked was in the middle of the works. He was also employed in loading iron into the empty coal-boats. The defendant was not himself an iron-master but a contractor, carrying coal and iron at a certain price per ton. The Court said: "The defendant is employed in loading the manufactured iron. That is quite decisive."

Stoppages from Wages.-In the very recent case of Archer v. James,* a question arose upon sect. 3 of the Truck Act, which enacts that "the entire amount of the wages earned, &c., shall be actually paid to the artificer in the current coin of the realm, and not otherwise." The plaintiff was a frame-work knitter, working in the factory of the defendant, and was paid at the rate of 7d. a dozen. But from this payment there were certain stoppages deducted, under the heads of frame-rent, steam, gas, firing, and waiting-room, &c. It was contended that these stoppages were illegal, and amounted in fact to a payment of wages other than in the coin of the realm. But it was held by the Court of Queen's Bench that such deductions or stoppages were not illegal. Mr. Justice Wightman remarked, that whatever doubt he might have entertained if this case had now come before the Court for the first time, he thought himself bound by the decision in Chowner v. Cummings (8 Q. B. 311).

In that case the plaintiff was a weaver of gloves for

* 1 Cox's Magistrates' Cases, 2.

the defendant in frames provided by the latter at an agreed gross price per dozen pairs. The defendant was a sub-contractor. He settled with the plaintiff weekly, and deducted out of the gross price certain charges according to the known custom of the tradesuch as frame-rent for use of defendant's premises, defendant's loss of time in procuring materials and conveying them to the plaintiff, superintendence of the work, sorting the goods, payment to a boy for winding yarn, &c. &c. There was no written contract. It was held that the agreement to pay plaintiff's wages with these deductions was not a contract to pay part of such wages otherwise than in the current coin within sect. 1, nor was a contract in writing under sect. 23 necessary to legalise such deductions.

The decision of the Court of Queen's Bench in Archer v. James was appealed against and argued in the Exchequer Chamber. The six judges were equally divided, and consequently the judgment of the Court below was affirmed.

In the recent case of Cutts v. Ward (4 Cox's Magistrates' Cases, p. 328), it appeared that the plaintiff was engaged as a collier, and had signed certain rules, one of which provided that all rents of houses due to the owner of the works, and all charges to which a workman should be liable for wood, tools, or working materials obtained from the stores, and for medicine and medical attendance, and all other lawful stoppages, should be deducted from the earnings of each workman before payment thereof. Certain wages having become due to the plaintiff, stoppages were made, 1, for rent; 2, for wood used by him belonging to the de

fendant to support the mine; 3, for subscriptions to a club established by defendant to afford medicines and medical attendance to the men in sickness. It was held that the first and third deductions were lawful as being within the 23rd section of 1 & 2 William IV. cap. 37, but that the second was not lawful as not being within it.

Again, if an artificer receive of his own accord goods at a shop kept by his employer, and the amount is afterwards deducted from his wages at the next settling, this is a payment in goods which comes within the statute. (Wilson v. Cookson, 32 Law Journ. M.C. 117, and 13 C. B. Rep. 496.) And if payment of wages has been made in goods no subsequent payment of the same in cash can purge the offence.

These are some of the most recent decisions upon the statute. A few considerations are added as to the influence of this system upon the position of the employer and the workman.

What influence and practical effect this statute has had in causing a discontinuance of the practices against which it was directed, the writer has no means of discovering. There is no doubt that truck is quite unknown in the great iron-works and collieries in the valley of Merthyr Tydfil, and that no "company's shop" exists there. Nor has any prosecution been instituted in any part of the district over which the author has jurisdiction since his appointment, which is a period of nearly nine years. If, as he has been informed, truck does exist in some places within that district, and also in part of Monmouthshire, it is not difficult to account for the fact

that there have been no recent prosecutions. One reason may be that payments may be made in cash, which is expected and understood to be expended in shops close at hand in which the employer has an interest, but which payments are not strictly within the prohibitions of the statute. In the next place, it is probable that even where illegal acts take place, and orders for goods, in lieu of cash, are directly given, the system is not so unpopular as is commonly supposed. In the more remote districts, the employer, by the greater command of capital, is enabled to purchase more favourably than the small trader, and the certainty of being paid by his own workmen, whose labour is his security, enables him to sell upon favourable terms. Thus the workman gets a better article at a reasonable price, and to some extent is kept out of debt in spite of himself. All this tends no doubt to the comfort of his home. It is probable that the system is not very objectionable in the opinion of the workmen's wives, as it must have some influence in increasing their command over the necessaries of life, and checking expenditure at the public-house. But on the other hand truck was formerly a monstrous evil. Before it was made unlawful, there is no doubt that the truck system was carried on in a manner that was most injurious to the working men. The evidence taken before the committee of the House of Commons proves this to demonstration. At the present time the evil is not so great. Many works have discontinued it altogether, whereby the workman has more chances of obtaining employment where he is sure of receiving payment in cash. If he dis

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