Chapter XXV: Appendix (15)

We everywhere find (in contradiction to statements frequently made in popular declamations) that the labourer gains by his connexion with large capital: in the instances presented in the course of this inquiry, of residences held from the employer, we find that the labourer gains by the expenditure for the external appearance of that which is known to be part of the property,—an expenditure that is generally accompanied by corresponding internal comforts; he gains by all the surrounding advantages of good roads and drainage, and by more sustained and powerful care to maintain them; he gains by the closer proximity to his work attendant on such an arrangement, and he thus avoids all the attacks of disease, occasioned by exposure to wet and cold, and the additional fatigue in traversing long distances to and from his home to the place of work, in the damp of early morning or of nightfall. The exposure to weather, after leaving the place of work, is one prolific cause of disease, especially to the young. When the home is near to the place of work, the labourer is enabled to take his dinner with his family instead of at the beer-shop.

The wife and family generally gain, by proximity to the employer or the employer’s family, in motives to neatness and cleanliness by their being known and being under observation; as a general rule, the whole economy of the cottages in bye-lanes and out-of-the-way places appears to be below those exposed to observation. In connexion with property or large capital, the labourer gains in the stability of employment, and the regularity of income incidental to operations on a large scale; there is a mutual benefit also in the wages for service being given in the shape of buildings or permanent and assured comforts; that is, in what would be the best application of wages, rather than wholly in money wages.

In the manufacturing districts there is a mutual and large gain by the diminution of the labour of the collection of rents, the avoidance of the risks of non-payment, and also in the power of control for the prevention of disturbances, and the removal of tenants of bad character and conduct.

Surprise is frequently expressed at the enormous rents ranging up to and beyond 20 per cent. on the outlay, exacted by the building speculators in the towns. But when the experience of these descriptions of tenements is examined, it is found that the labour of collecting the rents, and the labour of protecting the property itself against waste from unprincipled tenants, is such as to prove that accommodation given to the disorderly and vicious is scarcely remunerative at any price. The tenants are loosely attached, and large numbers migratory, partly from the nature of their work; and having little or no goods or furniture, they have no obstacles to removal; they frequently, before absconding, commit every description of waste; they often burn shelves and cupboard-doors, and the door itself, and all timber that can be got at for the purpose.[39] An objection frequently made against laying on the water in houses inhabited by a population addicted to drinking is, that they would sell the receptacles and destroy the pipe, and let the water run to waste, for the sake of the lead. The expense and delay of legal remedies precludes redress for such injuries.

In some of the worst neighbourhoods in Manchester, the whole population of a street have risen to resist the service of legal process by the civil officers. In the course of the Constabulary Inquiry I was informed by the superintendent of the old police of that town, that one of the most dangerous services for a small force was attending to enforce ejectments. This they had often to do, cutlass in hand, and were frequently driven off by showers of bricks from the mobs. The collection of the rents weekly in such neighbourhoods is always a disagreeable service, requiring high payment. This, and the frequent running away of the tenant, and the waste, greatly reduce the apparently enormous rent obtainable from this poorer class of tenants. For all these vices, risks, and defaults of others, the frugal and well-conducted workman who has no choice of habitation, is compelled to pay in the shape of an increased rent; he is most largely taxed in the increased rent, necessary as an insurance for the risks and losses occasioned by the defective state of legal remedies.

All these risks the employer is enabled to diminish or avoid, by selecting his own tenants, and he has the best means of doing so; by reservations of rent on the payment of wages, he saves the labour and risks of collection; nor will the vicious workman so readily commit waste in the house belonging to his employer as in one belonging to a poorer and unconnected owner. The employer has, moreover, the most direct interest in the health and strength of his workpeople.

It is not supposed that these are arrangements which can be universal, or readily made the subject of legislation. At the commencement of some manufactures, the additional outlay may not be practicable. But those manufactures have generally had the greatest success where good accommodation for the workpeople was comprehended in the first arrangements. When, however, a manufactory has been once established and brought into systematic operation, when the first uncertainties have been overcome and the employer has time to look about him, there appears to be no position from which so extensive and certain a beneficial influence may be exercised as that of the capitalist who stands in the double relation of landlord and employer. He will find that whilst an unhealthy and vicious population is an expensive as well as a dangerous one, all improvements in the condition of the population have their compensation. In one instance, of a large outlay on improved tenements, and in provision for the moral improvement of the rising generation of workpeople, by an expensive provision for schools, the proprietor acknowledged to me that although he made the improvements from motives of a desire to improve the condition of his workpeople, or what might be termed the satisfaction derived from the improvements as a “hobby,” he was surprised by a pecuniary gain found in the superior order and efficiency of his establishment, in the regularity and trustworthiness of his workpeople, which gave even pecuniary compensation for the outlay of capital and labour bestowed upon them. He stated that he would not, for 7000_l._, change the entire set of workpeople on whom care had been bestowed for the promiscuous assemblage of workpeople engaged in the same description of manufactures.

I would now submit for consideration, with the view to promulgation for voluntary adoption, instances of the arrangements which have been found most beneficial in their operation on the condition of the manufacturing population.

The most prominent of these instances was pointed out to our attention in the course of the Factory Inquiry, in the habitations connected with the mills superintended by the late Mr. Archibald Buchanan, at Catrine, in Ayrshire. Nearly 1000 persons are employed in these mills, the places of work are well ventilated and carefully kept; the village where the workpeople live is advantageously situated, and the houses are well built. They are thus described by his son in answer to my inquiries:—

“The system that has been pursued here, and which was adopted by my
father for the purpose of giving the workers a greater interest in the
place, at the same time that it gave them an object to be careful and
saving, while it raised them in point of standing and respectability,
has been different from that generally acted upon at country works.
Instead of our company continuing the proprietors of the
dwelling-houses and letting them to the workpeople, my father gave the
workers every encouragement to save money, so that they might
themselves become the proprietors of a house and small garden, either
by making a purchase from the company or fencing ground and building a
house for themselves. This plan has been very successful, and many of
our people are proprietors of excellent houses with gardens attached,
which afford them employment and amusement in their spare hours; and
among themselves they have a horticultural society and an annual
competition. Though many houses have been sold in this way, a
considerable part of the village is still the property of our company,
and those that have been built by other parties are in accordance with
a plan of streets laid down; and I should say are about equal to the
others in comfort and conveniences, it being the interest of the
person investing his money to get the best return he can for it; and
that he may get his house let and a fair rent for it, he must build as
good a house as the tenant can get for the same rent from another. The
houses are substantially built of stone and lime, and slated, and are
generally of two stories, containing four families, occupying two
rooms each. They have generally small plots of garden-ground behind,
in which are dungsteads and necessaries, with a space between them and
the houses. The village is well supplied with water by spring-wells
and pumps in various parts of it; and some of the streets have water
conveyed to them in pipes from the aqueduct to the water-wheels that
give motion to the works. I cannot, however, very well give any
distinct plan or drawing of the dwellings of the workpeople, our
houses being a good deal mixed with those belonging to others.

“The population of the village, per census taken 30th December last,
is 2699, and the number of families 566, so that the proportion of
individuals to each family is 4‑435/566, and the number employed in
the works is 936. The proprietors of houses appoint annually a
committee of their number to attend to the repairs of the streets, and
the keeping of them clean; and they have a man constantly in their
employment for this purpose, the expense being defrayed by the feuers
assessing themselves according to the rental of their properties.”

These mills were pointed out to our attention during the Factory Inquiry, by Mr. Stuart, the commissioner, who observed that the workpeople, “more especially the females, are not only apparently in the possession of good health, but many of them (quite as large a proportion as we have seen in any of the extensive well-regulated similar establishments in country districts) are blooming—as unlike as possible to the pale, languid-looking females too frequently to be found in similar works in great cities.”

_Mr. Hill_, the prison inspector for Scotland, stated that the procurator fiscal, or public prosecutor, reported to him that he had nothing to do in that village; and in his Third Report he thus mentions it:—

“There is little crime here, and very few offences of any kind, and it
is reported that there is not a single person in the village who is of
a bad character. Indeed no person of bad character, or who is in the
habit of drunkenness, is allowed to remain in the mills, on which
nearly the whole population of the village is directly or indirectly
dependent. The few offences which are committed are almost all by
vagrants. The inhabitants of Catrine appear to be in the enjoyment of
an unusual amount of comfort; they are well clad, live in neat houses,
many of them their own property, and look healthy and cheerful; indeed
the only person in the village who has reason to be downcast is the
medical man, who complains that he has nothing to do.”

Similar effects are manifested in the mills at New Lanark, at the flax-mills near Cupar. These instances would suffice to establish the fact of the very little sickness that is _essential_ to the occupation itself. _Mr. Hill_ who, by his office, is led to appreciate highly instances of exemption from crime and disorder, exclaims, upon the sight of such establishments,—“Notwithstanding what has been said on the subject of factories, I have no hesitation in declaring that I believe that the workpeople at Catrine, New Lanark, and other similar establishments, form some of the healthiest, happiest, and most moral communities in the world.”

From other examples it appears to be by no means essential to such improvements that the labourers should become proprietors of their occupations. _Mr. Buchanan, jun._, expresses his concurrence in the general conclusions to which I have arrived of the advantages derived by the labourer from his connexion with his place of work, and says,—

“I perfectly agree that a labouring man will generally be found in a
state of greater comfort, holding a tenement from his employer, than
when left to provide a dwelling of whatever kind he chooses for
himself. In our case the proprietors, in the first place, furnished
the house, in which the workmen formed habits of cleanliness and
comfort, and when by care and economy he had saved as much as enabled
him to purchase it, he was advanced a step higher by becoming himself
the proprietor, continuing to occupy part of the house himself, and
letting the other parts to his fellow-workmen.

“I believe that our people enjoy as good health, and have as many
comforts as any of the same class either in the same or any other
employment, as their appearance will testify; and the generally
different appearance of the manufacturing population in towns is to be
attributed to the habits of the people themselves, and the way in
which they are crowded together, and not to anything in the nature of
the employment.”[40]

The following account which I have received in answer to inquiries from _Mr. Henry Ashworth_, of Turton, near Bolton, with relation to the manufacturing population of that place, is so far characteristic of the progress of a population of more extensive districts, and of the means of their improvement, that I submit it at full length:—

“On the early introduction of the cotton manufacture, the parties who
entered into it were men of limited capital, and anxious to invest the
whole of it in mills and machinery, and therefore too much absorbed
with the doubtful success of their own affairs to look after the
necessities of their workpeople.

“Families were attracted from all parts for the benefit of employment,
and obliged, as a temporary resort, to crowd together into such
dwellings as the neighbourhood afforded: often two families into one
house; others into cellars or very small dwellings: eventually, as the
works became established, either the proprietor or some neighbour
would probably see it advantageous to build a few cottages; these were
often of the worst description; in such case the prevailing
consideration was not how to promote the health and comfort of the
occupants, but how many cottages could be built upon the smallest
space of ground and at the least possible cost. We find many built
back to back, a most objectionable form, as precluding the possibility
of any outlet behind.

“People brought together as these were for a living, had no
alternative but to occupy such dwellings. Whatever the weekly income,
the wife could never make such a house comfortable; she had only one
room in which to do all her work; it may be readily supposed the
husband would not always find the comfort he wished in such a home.
The public-house would then be his only resort. But here the evil does
not end; the children brought up in such dwellings knew no better
accommodation than such afforded, nor had they any opportunities of
seeing better domestic management. Few of the parents in these parts
have ever lived as domestic servants, so that it becomes no matter of
surprise that the major part should have so little knowledge of
improving their social condition even when the pecuniary means are
within their reach. It must be allowed that the introduction of
manufactures is not justly chargeable with producing the whole of this
evil. About this time the old Poor Law was exercising a very
pernicious influence upon the labouring classes, by means of inducing
both the landowners and farmers to discourage cottage property for
fear the inmates should gain parish settlements.

“Cottages were forbidden to be built; some pulled down when empty, and
others fell to decay for want of repair; poor people were banished as
much as possible from the agricultural districts on account of the
burden of parish settlements; even in this county I saw the ruins of
two cottages, which I was informed were the two last cottages in the
parish.

“Under such depressing causes it is not to be wondered at that we
frequently received families into our employ who did not know how to
conduct (with propriety) a decent cottage in such a manner as to
conduce either to the health or comfort of the inmates.

“About twelve years ago we had occasion to introduce a considerable
number of families into some new houses; in the course of a few months
a most malignant fever broke out amongst them, and went from house to
house, till we became seriously alarmed for the safety of the whole
establishment. We instituted an inquiry into the state of the houses
where the fever first appeared, and found that from the low habits of
the occupants, and the ignorance of the proper decencies of life, the
cottages were in so filthy a state that it was apparent we should not
long be free from a recurrence of the same evil unless we took some
active means to effect a change in the habits of these people.

“Although we felt very unwilling to do anything which appeared to
interfere with the domestic management of our workpeople, still the
urgency of the case at the time seemed to warrant such a step. We
therefore ordered an examination of every cottage in our possession,
both as regarded cleanliness and ventilation, as well as bedding and
furniture.

“The striking difference exhibited in the state of these cottages, the
neatness and cleanness of some, the gross neglect of others, appearing
to have no relation to the amount of income, convinced us that an
occasional repetition of these visits would be essential in order to
effect any permanent improvement amongst them.

“These periodical visits have now been continued through a series of
years; and as no invidious distinction or selection was ever made, do
not appear to have been viewed in the light of an intrusion; a week or
two of notice being mostly given, a laudable degree of emulation has
been excited as to whose house bedding and furniture should be found
in the best order; my brother or myself have occasionally joined in
these visits. By these means we were made acquainted with the wants
and necessities of the various families in our employ. Having had such
opportunity of observing the great inconvenience arising from small
dwellings where the families were large, both as regards bed-rooms and
living-rooms, few cottages having more than two bed-rooms; and where
there were children or young persons of both sexes, the indelicacy of
this arrangement was apparent; we therefore concluded to build larger
cottages, and make them with three bed-rooms in each. These houses
were sought after with the greatest avidity, and families allowed to
remove to them as an especial favour; the increase rent of 1_s._ to
1_s._ 6_d._ per week was a small consideration in regard to the
additional comfort afforded to a family where the income was from
24_s._ to 50_s._ or 60_s._ per week, as is frequently the case with
families employed in manufactories.”

But I am enabled to adduce evidence showing that by structural improvements of the places of work as well as of abode which present the bounty on and security for future adoption, constituted by experience of pecuniary saving, the health of the manufacturing workpeople, now amongst the lowest, may be advanced to the average of health enjoyed by any other class.

On my return from Glasgow, I proceeded to visit and examine the cotton manufactory and machine-making works erected and carried on under the directions of Mr. James Smith, of Deanston, near Stirling, the inventor of the subsoil plough, to whose valuable opinion on the subject of drainage I have already made reference.

The principle of the improvement of places of work, which constituted the chief object of attention at Deanston, was the erection of manufactories in one large flat or ground floor, instead of story piled upon story as in the old mode.

Mr. Smith had constructed a new department of the cottonmill in one room or flat, which covered about half an acre of ground. The roof was composed of groined arches in divisional squares of 33 feet 6 inches, supported on cast-iron columns, which were hollow, and through which the drainage of the roof was effected. In order to render the roof of the building water-tight, the outer superficies of the arches were covered with a coat of common plaster, over which, when dried, was laid a coating of coal-tar, boiled to a pitchy consistence, and mixed with sand, laid on to a thickness of three-quarters of an inch. Over this was laid a surface of from 12 to 16 inches of garden-soil, which prevents the injurious effects on the pitch of the frost in winter, and the sun in summer.

The height of this large room was 12 feet from the floor to the spring of the arches, and six feet rise, giving a height to the room in which the operatives were engaged of 18 feet. The height of the ordinary rooms in which the workpeople in manufactories are engaged is not more than from 9 to 11 feet. This restricted space arises from various points of economy (now considered to be mistaken) in the old modes of constructing manufactories, which were first erected in towns where land was dear, and in times when the immediate economy of capital was of more pressing importance. The adverse consequences to the operatives are the restriction of space for air; that the heat and effluvia of the lower rooms are communicated to the rooms above; and that the difficulty of ventilating them is exceedingly great, especially in the wide rooms, where it is found to be practically extremely difficult to get a current of fresh air to pass through the centre. The like difficulties have been heretofore experienced in respect to the ventilation of large ships. There is also in the mills of the old construction the additional fatigue of ascending and descending to the higher rooms, and carrying material. To avoid this, in some instances, machinery is resorted to.

The ventilation through the side windows of large rooms is generally found to be imperfect and inconvenient in many of the processes, and annoying to the workpeople from the influx of the air in strong currents. The arrangements for ventilation through the roof of this room appeared to be highly advantageous. The light was brought in from above, through openings eight feet in diameter at the top of each groin, surmounted by domes or cones of glass, at the apex of which there were openings of about 16 inches in diameter, with covers that could be opened or shut at pleasure, to admit of ventilation. The better distribution of the light for the work from these openings was one advantage they appeared to possess over the ordinary mode of getting light from side windows.

The chief arrangements from below for ventilation were made by tunnels 10 feet distance from each other, carried across and underneath the floor of the building, and terminating in the open air on either side. The covers of these tunnels were perforated with holes of about an inch in diameter and 12 inches apart, disposed through the floor so as to occasion a wide and uniform distribution of fresh air throughout the whole building, on the same principle as that adopted for the admission of fresh air through the floor of the House of Commons. In winter time the fresh air admitted was warmed on the same principle, by pipes of hot water, to prevent the inconvenience of the admission of currents of cold air. The whole building was, from its size and arrangements, kept at a steady temperature, and appeared to be less susceptible than other buildings to atmospheric influence. The shaftings for the conveyance of the power were carried through the tunnels, and straps or belts from the shafts rise through the cover of the tunnels, and, by their motion, aid in promoting the circulation of the air. The possibility of fatal accidents from the persons being caught by the straps and wound round the shafts, was by this arrangement entirely prevented. The tunnelling under this arrangement constituted a boxing off of the whole of the shafting. Another advantage from the removal of the driving-straps from above was that the view over the whole room was entirely unimpeded.

Another structural improvement was in the use of a thin flooring of wood over the solid base of stone floors. The floor so arranged affords the solidity of the stone floor, and inconsiderable danger of combustion, whilst the advantages of the wooden surface to the workers were a diminution of swelled ancles and rheumatic affections of the joints, often produced by working bare-footed on stone floors.

There were no entries made from which I could obtain for comparison an account of the amount of sickness experienced by the workpeople in this new room, but it was obvious that the improvement must be considerable, and it was attested by the rosy and fresh countenances of the females and of the workpeople generally. A considerable improvement was manifest in the health of those workpeople who had previously worked in the older and less spacious rooms.

The improvement of the place of work was combined with improvements in the residences of the workpeople. About one-half of the hands employed in the mills resided in houses near the works, which were well drained; the ashes and other refuse was cleared away from the village every morning between six and seven o’clock, and carried to a general dungstead at a distance, for use on their gardens. On inquiry as to the state of the health of the workpeople living in these improved tenements, it appeared that they had not one-half the amount of sickness experienced by the rest of the workpeople who lived in the common ill-regulated houses about a mile distance. The whole population had fewer diseases than any other class of the population in the surrounding country; they presented fewer cases of rheumatism, and there were scarcely any lung diseases amongst them: their general health was decidedly better than that of the adjacent agricultural population.

The chief advantages of the improved arrangements of the places of work were, on the side of the workpeople, improved health; security for females and for the young against the dangers of fatal accidents, and less fatigue in the execution of the same amount of work. But beyond these the arrangement of the work in one room had moral advantages of high value. The bad manners and immoralities complained of as attendant on assemblages of workpeople of both sexes in manufactories, generally occur, as may be expected, in small rooms and places where few are employed, and that are secluded from superior inspection and from common observation. But whilst employed in this one large room, the young are under the inspection of the old; the children are in many instances under the inspection of parents, and all under the observation of the whole body of workers, and under the inspection of the employer. It was observed that the moral condition of the females in this room stood comparatively high. It would scarcely be practicable to discriminate the moral effects arising from one cause where several are in operation; but it was stated by ministers that there were fewer cases of illegitimacy and less vice observable among the population engaged in this manufactory than amongst the surrounding population of the labouring class. The comparative circumstances of that population were such as, when examined, would establish the conclusion that it must be so.

The first expense of such a building is higher than a manufactory of the old construction; but it appeared to possess countervailing economical advantages to the capitalist, the chief of which are,—this same facility of constant general supervision, the increase of the certainty of superintendence, and the reduction of the numbers of subordinate managers, the increase of efficiency of management, and a diminution of its expense. Another advantage arose to the manufacturer in the superior action of the machinery. In mills of the ordinary construction the machinery is frequently deranged in its structure, and put out of order by the yielding and unsteadiness of the upper floors. The machinery erected on the ground floor has a firm basis, and a steady and more durable action. The other advantages presented were, the saving of labour in transporting the material from one process to another, a labour which is often considerable in expense, as well as in inconvenience, in lifting it into the higher rooms; the reduction of the hazard of fire, and consequently in expense of insurance against it, as fire could scarcely take place, and certainly could not rapidly extend in a manufactory so constructed. These several sources of economy Mr. Smith calculated would more than compensate for any increase of ground-rent, even if the building were erected on land costing 1000_l._ per acre. Mr. Marshall, of Leeds, on consulting with Mr. Smith, has constructed a new manufactory (on the principle of that in Deanston) in Leeds, where ground is valuable. This manufactory covers more than two acres of ground, and is reported to be eminently successful. Power looms are frequently arranged in buildings of one story, and I was informed of another manufactory in Lancashire, nearly as large as that of Messrs. Marshalls, built on one floor, but it did not appear to possess the arrangements for ventilation and warming, and the other arrangements necessary to the complete action of a place of work on the plan of that at Deanston.

Mr. Smith considered that the principle of arrangement for superior inspection and management of a manufactory was equally applicable to agricultural operations, and that it would be proportionately advantageous in the superior ventilation and equality of temperature for cattle, in the avoidance of labour and wet and cold, in removing from one small separate building to another, and in the transport of produce, to have all under one large roof, where the whole direction and inspection of the homestead farming operations are brought under one view.

Of the manufacturing advantages of such arrangements I have had strong testimony: of the advantages of such arrangements to the health and moral and social condition of the workpeople, I could not entertain the slightest doubt. I feel confident that the more closely it is examined, the more clearly will the coincidence which I have endeavoured to trace, of pecuniary interest with the health and the highest physical and moral improvement of the lowest of the labouring classes, be established. Mr. Smith avowed his confidence in this coincidence from his own experience and observation as a practical principle. The improved health of the workpeople was attended by more energy and better labour; by less of lassitude and waste from relaxed attention; by fewer interruptions from sickness, and fewer spare hands to ensure the completion of work. Under the persuasion of the coincidence of interest, he had endeavoured to direct the structural alterations to the promotion of the health of the workpeople; he believed they might be advantageously carried further, and had it in contemplation to make arrangements to promote habitual bathing amongst them. He had, moreover, retained the services of a medical gentleman to inspect the workpeople from time to time, and give them timely advice, and, as far as possible, to prevent disease. He agreed, and had long considered, that it was in the power of the masters of Britain “entirely to extirpate excessive and habitual drinking. We never,” said he, “permit a man to come near the works who is in the slightest degree intoxicated, and never permit any one to be absent one day drinking. You never can be well or cheaply served by a dissipated workman. The most skilful workman, the man whose services I can the least spare, must, if he takes to drinking, leave the place. It may occasion immediate inconvenience and even immediate loss, but if the rule be steadily applied, it will contribute to the comfort and the profit of the master as well as of the man.”

The importance of such beneficent influence on the health, the moral condition and respectability of the labouring classes, is so little understood, that I beg leave to submit further illustrations of the value of—

_The Employers’ Influence on the Sobriety and Health of Workpeople by
modes of Payment which do not lead to Temptations to Intemperance._

The power possessed by extensive employers of labour to influence beneficially their labourers, is not however confined to those who stand in the combined relation of employer and landlord. In the course of another inquiry as to the means of preventing crime, it appeared that a large class of crimes and disorders arose from drunkenness. On carrying the inquiry back into the causes out of which the drunkenness arose, they appeared to be extensively removable, and that by the employers of labour. The important influences that belong to this position will be displayed in the effects of alterations in detail in one point of management, namely, the mode of paying wages. The direct sanitary effects may be best displayed in the following evidence of _Mr. Lomax_, an army pensioner, which has been corroborated by superior officers:—

“When I was in the Life Guards, 14 or 16 years ago, there was a good
deal of ill health prevalent amongst them. Before that time the men
received part of their pay weekly, namely, 7_s._ at the end of the
week. With this 7_s._ they had to provide the food which they
required, except their dinner. The ration for dinner was
three-quarters of a pound of uncooked meat, a pound of potatoes or
vegetables, and a pound of bread. It was found, however, that many of
the men spent the whole of the 7_s._ in a single day in drink or
dissipation. During the remainder of the week the men would be on what
was called the _crib-bite_, that is, living only on their dinner
rations. I knew many of the men who drooped under this system, partly
from the excess of drinking or dissipation, and partly from the
privation of the necessaries of life and the work they had to undergo.
This, again, led them to much temptation. If anything was lost it was
amongst this class of men that we looked for it. The crime-book would
speak as to the further bad consequences of these habits.

“The plan was then tried of paying the men 1_s._ each day. Over and
above that the men were provided with coffee. It was universally felt
that this change was highly beneficial to their health, and it stopped
the dissipation, and the consequences of the dissipation.”

The incapacity to apportion their means for temperate consumption (which is not however confined to the working classes) is extensively shown in the mismanagement of the means for procuring food. It is a subject of complaint which frequently appears in the reports, that the ignorance of domestic economy leads to ill health, by the purchase of unsuitable, and at the same time, expensive food. We have been frequently besought to obtain and promulgate, for popular information, instructions in frugal cookery, and the management of supplies. It is observed by _Mr. Brebner_, the governor of the Glasgow bridewell, where the cost of maintaining the prisoners in health and increased strength is on average only 2¾_d._ per diem, that

“The regularity of diet in the prisons here is of vast importance,
both as to the quantity and the time of serving it up. If the same
persons were to get the same amount of food for a whole week, or for a
less time, at their own discretion, they would suffer from surfeit at
one time, and from long fasting at another. Irregularity of diet is
one of the most fruitful sources of disease that occur in civilized
life.”

In further illustration of the beneficial influence which employers may often exercise to assail such vices by regulations in detail, I cite the following instances from a communication I have received from _Mr. Edwin Hill_, the inspector of stamping machinery for the Government:—

“During a period of nine years (from 1818 to 1827) I was engaged in
the superintendence of one of the largest works in the town of
Birmingham, consisting of two distinct mills, one employed in rolling
copper for the use of braziers and shipwrights, and the other in
rolling silver, brass, and other metals. In each mill there was a set
of skilled workmen, who undertook the work at fixed prices, and who
themselves employed numerous assistants at weekly wages.

“Owing to difficulties in the way of making up the accounts at short
intervals, it was the custom for the master to advance weekly to each
workman in the silver mill a fixed sum of money (besides advancing a
sum to pay the assistants with). The accounts were made up annually,
and the balances due to the several workmen then paid. The payments,
both weekly and annually, were almost always made not to the men but
to their wives. The earnings of the men were considerable, varying
from 80_l._ to 180_l._ a-year. The men were, almost without exception,
highly respectable in their stations, their families were well
provided for, their homes cleanly and not without pretensions to some
degree of elegance, and their children sent to school at the sole
expense of the parents. Some of them had made considerable
accumulations of money, and even become proprietors of houses and
land. The workmen employed in the copper mill, on the contrary, had
been accustomed to receive the full amount of their earnings at the
end of each week, and, after paying their assistants, to divide the
surplus. These men were much addicted to drinking and feasting at the
alehouse; and, although their earnings were nearly as great as those
of the other men, their families were in wretchedness, and their wives
obliged to eke out a slender pittance by washing and other laborious
occupations. There were also several men employed as millwrights and
engineers, at regular and good weekly wages. These men were, almost
without exception, steady and respectable, and their families well
provided for. About the year 1822 the inconvenience and annoyance, and
loss, which arose from the unsteady habits of the second set of men,
led me to inquire into the causes of their inferiority to the others,
and I was soon led to attribute much of the evil to the great
irregularity in the amount of their weekly incomes, which varied from
about 10_s._ to 4_l._ 4_s._ per man.

“The effects were as follows:—The men were reckless, trusting to their
luck to get ‘good work,’ _i. e._, that which bears a high price in
proportion to the required labour. They were enabled to deceive their
wives as to the amount of money obtained. They learned the minimum
with which their wives could contrive to keep house, and, having
learned it, they endeavoured to retain all above this minimum for
their own gratifications. Their wives, under the pressure of
necessity, picked their pockets, opened their drawers, &c., in search
of money believed to be hidden. Their wives actually desired that
their husbands might get drunk on Saturday night, because they could
the more easily abstract the money from their persons.

“Upon the termination of my inquiries I induced the men, with little
difficulty, to receive their money in the way the other men did, viz.,
by regular weekly advances, rather under their average earnings, with
a quarterly or annual settlement; and I took care that the wives
should know exactly what their husbands would receive; and from the
day the plan commenced, a most decided and permanent improvement took
place in the habits of the men, and in the appearance and general
comforts of their families. One of the men commenced saving money
immediately. This man’s savings, as I have lately been informed, now
in January, 1841, considerably exceed 1000_l._; whereas, during the
five or six years which he passed in the same occupation before the
change of plan, he made no saving whatever.”

Another valuable example of the easy means possessed by employers of preventing the formation of habits destructive to the health and prosperity of workmen, is set forth in the evidence of Mr. Peter Fairbairn, the extensive mechanist of Leeds.

_Mr. Fairbairn_ examined.

“You are a mechanist at Leeds?—I am.

“What number of men do you employ?—Between 500 and 600.

“Have you ever observed any effects produced in the habits of the
labouring classes in respect to drinking intoxicating liquors by the
mode in which they are paid their wages?—Yes, there are two modes in
which wages are most frequently paid, and both these modes are
prejudicial in their effects. The first effect is connected with the
place of payment. Some masters pay at the public-house, others pay the
men at the counting-house after the work is completed. The effects
produced by payment at the public-house are to oblige the workman to
drink. He is kept waiting in the public-house during a long time,
varying from two to three hours, sometimes as much as five hours. The
workman cannot remain in the house without drinking, even if he were
alone, as he must make some return to the landlord for the use of the
room. But the payment of a number of men occupies time in proportion
to their numbers. We find that to pay our own men in the most rapid
way requires from two to three hours. The assembled workmen, of
course, stimulate each other to drink. Out of 100 men, all of whom
will, probably, have taken their quart of porter or ale, above a third
will go home in a state of drunkenness—of drunkenness to the extent of
imbecility. The evil is not confined to the men; the destructive habit
is propagated in their families. At each public-house a proportion of
the poor women, their wives, attend. According to my own observation,
full 10 per cent. of the men have their wives and children in
attendance at the public-house. The poor women have no other mode of
getting money to market with on the Saturday night than attending at
the public-house to get it from their husbands. They may have children
whom they cannot leave at home, and these they bring with them. The
wives are thus led to drink, and they and their children are made
partakers at the scenes of drunkenness and riot; for there are not
unfrequently quarrels leading to fights between the workmen when
intoxicated.

“Do not these late hours, consequent on such a mode of payment, also
lead them to the inferior markets, and prejudice the domestic economy
of the labourer’s household?—Yes, they have the less money to purchase
with, and must purchase an inferior quality of provisions. I have
observed that they do so. They are driven to the inferior shopkeepers
who keep open late; and they are also driven to make purchases on the
Sunday morning. It is only the inferior shopkeepers or hucksters who
will sell on the Sunday morning, and they sell an inferior commodity
at a higher price. Then the Sunday morning is thus occupied; the
husband, and sometimes the wife, is kept in a state of feverish
excitement by the previous night’s debauch: they are kept in a state
of filth and disorder; even the face is unwashed; no clean clothes are
put on, and there is no church attendance, and no decency. Indeed, by
the pressure of the wants created by habits of drinking, there is soon
no means to purchase clean or respectable clothes, and lastly, no
desire to purchase them. The man, instead of cleaning himself, and
appearing at church on the Sunday, or walking out with his family on
the Sunday afternoon in a respectable condition, remains at home in
filth, and in a filthy hovel. Of course there are no contributions to
sick-clubs under such circumstances; and if the workman has been
previously led to join a club, he is almost always in arrear with his
contributions, and is ultimately expelled. On the occurrence of the
disease to which such habits predispose him, there is nothing but the
most abject and complete destitution and pauperism. I have served the
office of churchwarden and overseer in Leeds three years, and, having
attended the weekly Board where applications for relief are made, I
have seen the end of this train of circumstances in the applications
for relief from parties who had previously been in the receipt of good
and sufficient wages (and even high wages) to have prevented such
applications. I have observed the whole train of these consequences in
several large works in London as well as in this town.

“Are there not consequences too to the employers themselves, as well
as to the ratepayers, in connexion with the habits of labourers thus
created?—One consequence of these habits is the loss of time at the
commencement of the week, and the comparative inefficiency of the
workmen when they do come. The workman who has been absent from
drunkenness comes to his work pale, emaciated, shattered, and
unnerved. From my own observation in my own branch of manufacture, I
should say that the quantity and quality of the work executed during
the first day or so would be about one-fifth less than that obtainable
from a steady and attentive workman.

“This deterioration, then, in a large number of workmen engaged in a
manufactory, may be noted as an important item of saving for the
consideration of a provident manufacturer?—Undoubtedly. Another
consideration for the master is the fact that such workmen, the most
idle and dissolute, are the most discontented, and are always the
foremost in mischievous strikes and combinations.

“You have spoken of the consequences of making the public-house a
place of payment; what are the comparative effects of making the
payments at the counting-house?—A considerable reduction of the evil.
Payments to large numbers at the counting-house is still, however,
attended with much inconvenience and evil. The payment of the number
of men employed at our works (between five and six hundred) would, as
I have stated, occupy between two and three hours. This mode of
payment, therefore, implies the keeping of a large crowd together
during that time. During that time appointments are made of meetings
at public-houses to drink that would not otherwise take place. It also
generates discontent: it gives an opportunity, by assembling a crowd,
for any discontented or mischievous person to operate upon a large
mass of people. Formerly the business of my manufactory, and the
welfare of the working people, were very seriously interrupted by
strikes; and I could not help observing the facilities which such
meetings gave to such mischievous persons.

“What is the mode of payment which you have adopted?—I send the pay
clerk into each room in the manufactory immediately after the dinner
hour, and he pays each man individually. Each man is scarcely taken
from his work half a minute. I may observe, that some masters, to save
themselves trouble, so as to avoid the inconvenience of getting small
change, will pay several men together. This again leads to the
public-house, where the men commonly go to get change to divide the
money amongst them; I therefore avoid paying any two men together, and
subjecting them to temptation as well as inconvenience and cost. Each
of my workmen being paid in the shop, without the loss of a minute,
may go at once directly home at the time when the work closes. He is
thus afforded an opportunity of going at once to the market at an
early hour, and is subjected to no factitious inducements to drink,
disorder, improvidence, and destitution.

“What is the average time thus saved to each of the 550 workmen in
your manufactory, as compared with the more ordinary mode of
payment?—About an hour and a half, or half the three hours of payment.

“Then, by this means, instead of bringing 550 persons to the one
person, the pay clerk, sending that one person to the 550 persons, you
save to them upwards of 800 hours of inconvenient waiting?—Just so.

“How many persons, on the average, have you absent from work on the
Monday morning?—Not more than from four to five, until eight o’clock
in the morning; and on the return to work after dinner from one to two
persons.

“That is from one to two persons the entire day during the Monday, out
of between five and six hundred workpeople?—Yes.

“What number would have been absent on the Monday under the ordinary
circumstances?—About 30 per cent., or one-third, would be drunk on the
Saturday night; and full 10 per cent. would not make their appearance
until the Tuesday morning. Instead of only two absent during the whole
of the day, I should have more than 50; or, in other words, more than
50 families not only distressed by what is spent in drink, but losing
one-sixth of their earnings, and I as a master losing from their
deteriorated work on the days when they do return. I beg leave further
to observe, that mere education in reading or writing, precepts or
preaching, are of very little avail against the temptations to drink
held out to working men; and I am confident that if employers could be
made to see and attend to their mutual interests, by a little care in
the removal of temptations, they might generally prevent the most
fruitful cause of disorder, destitution, and pauperism, at least as
extensively as I have prevented those consequences to my workmen and
their families by the adoption of the means I have described.”

In the course of a report on the sanitary condition of the labouring classes in the town of Lancaster, received from _Dr. De Vitrie_, the effects of an amended practice are thus noticed:—

“An excellent example is shown in this neighbourhood by the wealthy
manufacturers and tradesmen almost universally paying their men’s
weekly wages on a Friday evening (or, what is still better, early on
Saturday morning) instead of Saturday, thus putting it into the power
of all to spend their money to the best advantage at Saturday’s
market, and obviating the great temptation which formerly existed of
spending their earnings, or a large proportion of them, in the
public-houses and beer-shops after the termination of the week’s
labour. It may be said that such parties are as likely to dissipate on
a Friday as on a Saturday evening. The propensity I grant may be the
same, but there is no intervening day of rest to shake off the effects
of intemperance and indulgence, and as workmen must resume their
labours on the Saturday, hence it is that such a regulation exercises
not only a salutary but a provident influence.”

The _Rev. Whitwell Elwin_ observes—

“Where gain was dependant on the growth of better habits, I have seen,
with the agency of judicious individuals, encouraging cases of
complete reformation: an intelligent engineer in this neighbourhood
was about paying off a man whose profligacy had left him without a
decent covering, and who often depended for his victuals upon the
generosity of his fellow-workmen. He begged hard to be retained, and
his master at last consented, on condition that he himself should lay
out his wages for the next three months. He provided the man with good
lodgings, allowed him tea, sugar, and bread and butter night and
morning; meat, and either bread or potatoes, with a pint of beer every
day for his dinner; and before the appointed time was up, bought him
with the surplus a new suit of clothes. The man was so sensible of the
advantage of the change, that he became one of the most thrifty and
valuable workmen; and his master has often since tried the same
experiment with the same success. If we could collect all the
philanthropy and much of the self-interest of the country into wise
and profitable channels, we might, I believe in a twelvemonth, do much
towards regenerating the most wretched classes.”

One employer of numerous labourers in a well-conducted establishment stated to me that after long experience he found it necessary, for the protection of the workpeople, as well as the efficiency of the establishment, invariably to discharge every workman who was guilty of drunkenness; and that the first visible sign to excite suspicion of the habits of intoxication was the absence of personal cleanliness, then a pallid countenance, on which inquiry was made. Another employer of numerous labourers, _Mr. William Fairbairn_, of Manchester (the brother of Mr. Fairbairn, of Leeds), who has had between one and two thousand workpeople engaged in the manufactories of machinery in the firm of which he is the first partner, stated, in answer to the question,—