factures, the nation must necessarily profit most considerably, because it would produce more. I remember a gentleman, a person, moreover, for whose good opinion I have much respect, exclaiming in the House of Commons, that he wondered how I, whom he was kind enough to call his enlightened friend, could be of a different opinion. My opinion, however, if I may presume to have one, is, that a nation does not always profit most considerably when it produces most; my opinion is, that even England, though especially a commercial and manufacturing community, has other sources of greatness beside such as are to be found in her commerce and manufactures, and that benefits have actually their bounds, which it may become dangerous and impolitic to pass. * I see the advantage of collecting a population into towns, but I see also the disadvantages; and those disadvantages I should dread, if any unlimited system was to be worked out to an extravagant extent. I look not merely to the momentary production, but to the health and happiness and character of a people, on which, let us rest assured, depend a nation's prosperity. FACTS AS TO THE UNHEALTHINESS OF "He, whose duty it is," says Dr. Kay, in speaking of the visitation of the cholera, "to follow the steps of this messenger of death, must descend to the abodes of poverty, must frequent the close alleys, the crowded courts, the overpeopled habitations of wretchedness, where pauperism and disease congregate round the source of social discontent and political disorder in the centre of our large towns, and behold with alarm, in the hotbed of pestilence, ills that fester in secret at the very heart of society." "There are a few incontrovertible facts," says Dr. Robert * A country is no more powerful and great solely on account of its wealth than it is happy only on that account; it is powerful and great for the energy and the character which the pursuit of wealth creates, but that pursuit mus be properly directed to the character that is to be produced; and if less riches are attained where nobler passions are developed, poor is the spirit of the legislator who sets any dignity above that of the mind. son, "not adverted to perhaps by the secluded political writer, but which those who mingle in the busy world of a vast manufacturing community will scarcely refuse to admit. One of these is, that sedentary and other occupations, which wholly exclude the artisan, at all seasons, and from a very early age, from the pure air and the green face of nature, generally give rise to some degree of derangement of the health, manifested primarily in the stomach and bowels, and also render the mind torpid and irritable: further, that this uncomfortable condition of body and mind, existing in almost every individual of great masses of people, crowded together in factories, and in the narrow streets and yards where they have their habitations, is apt gradually to increase and to be aggravated by the very means but too commonly adopted to obtain relief: which are, habitual and frequent drunkenness, the stimulus of crude and fantastical politics, the still stronger stimulus of riot and uproar, and not unfrequently, as the recent annals of our country unhappily attest, of savage or malignant crime." The state of the cotton manufacturers has occupied the attention of Parliament since 1802, when the late Sir R. Peel obtained an act of parliament for the protection of parish apprentices employed in them. In 1819, the hours of labour, and the ages of children working in cotton mills, was first regulated, and since that time, up to 1831, four other acts passed, having in view the same object. The irremediable circumstances of this occupation are, in themselves, melancholy to consider. The small particles of cotton and dust with which the air is impregnated in such factories, almost necessarily maintain a perpetual irritation of the lungs, which leads frequently to consumption. Add to this, meagre food, a sickly appetite craving excitement, and toil of so unvarying and unremitting a kind, as almost to extinguish in the cotton weaver the habits and faculties of a * "When we consider the unremitted labour of the whole population engaged in the various branches of the cotton manufacture, our wonder will be less excited by their fatal demoralization. " Prolonged and exhausting labour, continued from day to day, and from Turn to other trades, what a frightful picture of toil! year to year, is not calculated to develop the intellectual or moral faculties of man. The dull routine of ceaseless drudgery, in which the same mechanical process is incessantly repeated, resembles the torment of Sisyphus,—toil, like the rock, recoils perpetually on the wearied operative. The mind gathers neither stores nor strength from the constant extension of the muscles. The intellect slumbers in supine inertness, but the grosser parts of our nature obtain a rank development. "To condemn men to such severity of toil, is, in some measure, to cultivate in him the habits of an animal. He becomes reckless. He disregards the distinguishing appetites and habits of his species. He lives in squalid wretchedness, on meagre food, and expends his superfluous gains in debauchery. "The population employed in the cotton factories rises at five o'clock in the morning; works in the mills from six till eight o'clock, and returns home, for half an hour or forty minutes, to breakfast. This meal generally consists of tea or coffee, with a little bread. Oatmeal porridge is sometimes, but of late rarely used, and chiefly by the men; but the stimulus of tea is preferred, and especially by the women. The tea is almost always of a bad, and sometimes of a deleterious quality; the infusion is weak, and little or no milk is added. The operatives return to the mills and workshops until twelve o'clock, when an hour is allowed for dinner. Amongst those who obtain the lower rates of wages, this meal generally consists of boiled potatoes. The mess of potatoes is put into one large dish; melted lard and butter are poured upon them, and a few pieces of fried fat bacon are sometimes mingled with them, and but seldom a little meat. They all plunge their spoons into the dish, and with an animal eagerness satisfy the cravings of their appetite. At the expiration of the hour, they are all again employed in the workshops or mills, where they continue until seven o'clock or a later hour, when they generally again indulge in the use of tea, often mingled with spirits, accompanied by a little bread." |