female, in future. XLI. 1843. The fate of this bill was very curious, CHAP. and strongly illustrative of the varying and antagonistic influences which had now come to bear on the House of Commons. When the bill was sent to the committee, Lord Ashley moved an amendment, by which the working hours of women and young persons under fourteen years of age were to be reduced from twelve to ten hours a-day. Sir James Graham opposed this with reluctance and pain, on the ground that the change was too violent; that the limiting the hours of women and children would necessarily draw after it that of adults also; and that thus the change would come to reduce the hours, and of course the produce, of labour in factories by a sixth, and put in hazard the subsistence of two millions of persons. There was some truth, but great exaggeration, in these statements, to which O'Connell lent the additional weight of his powerful voice, which declared, that if the amendment became law, "Manchester would become a tomb." Notwithstanding these sinister predictions, the amendment was carried by Lord Ashley in the Commons by a majority of nine, the numbers being 272 to 263. This was considered a serious defeat to ministers, as the amendment had been opposed by their whole strength, and great efforts were accordingly made to get the veto rescinded. They succeeded in doing so by a majority of seven in a subsequent stage of the bill, and immediately before, they had by a majority of three negatived the proposal of twelve hours. Government, seeing the House thus vacillating, hinted in no obscure terms that they would withdraw the bill; and Lord Ashley upon this gave way, and moved the adoption of eleven hours in all cases, as a reasonable compro- 1 Parl. Deb. mise for three years, and ten hours after that time. xxii. 277, After a long and interesting debate, the bill as amended 1101, 1110, was carried, the substitution of ten for eleven hours being 1460, 1463, rejected by a majority of 138.1 It was not seriously 1104. opposed in the House of Lords, and became law without 1xxiii. 1073, 1263, lxxiv. lxxv. 915, VOL. VII. F 1843. CHAP. any educational clauses; affording a melancholy proof XLI. of the prevalence of sectarian over philanthropic views in the religious, and of considerations of gain over those of humanity in the worldly portion of the community. 81. on this sub ject. In reflecting on this important question, there is one Reflections consideration of paramount importance, to which the public are now only beginning to open their eyes, but without a due regard to which, all legislation on the subject will be evaded and become inoperative. This is, that such is the inversion of the feelings of nature which takes place in manfacturing and mining districts, and such the straits to which, from the vicissitudes of commerce, the persons engaged in them are reduced, that the worst enemies of children are often their own parents, and all attempts at general education are elusory, unless due provision is made to guard against the fatal precocity of labour. In agricultural pursuits, the severity and strength required in the toil is in general a sufficient protection to children against the oppression of infant labour; but in manufactories and collieries the case is different,-something can be extracted from the employment of the young even in their earliest years. From seven upwards the work of a child is worth something-often as much as four or five shillings a-week. No strength is required to watch a wheel, or pour out oil, or open a valve. The workshop stands in fearful competition with the school.* Education in general is not wholly neglected, but it is given in so imperfect a manner, or to so small an extent, that it is of scarcely any benefit in life. The inevitable contagion of vice from the assemblage of numbers, the facilities afforded for the indulgence of precocious passion, by the young of both sexes being constantly * So general is the operation of this cause, that it has been ascertained by recent statistical researches, that in Leeds, Manchester, Birmingham, Sheffield, Bolton, and other manufacturing towns, the proportion of children at school to the entire population is only 4 or 5 per cent, or 1 in 20 or 25, whereas in Prussia it is 1 in 10; in Austria, 1 in 9; in Canada, 1 in 7. XLI. 1843. together, counteract all the incipient benefits of education. CHAP. Hence the vast proportion of the criminals who turn out to be persons" imperfectly educated," and the astounding fact, that the persons convicted by a jury or summarily in England, are now a hundred thousand in a year, being about 1 in 180 of the population. Unless the employment of children in mines and manufactories is absolutely prohibited below fourteen years of age, all attempts to educate generally the manufacturing and mining population will prove, generally speaking, nugatory and useless. 82. The year 1843, however, was marked by a succession of riots in an entirely rural portion of Great Britain, Rebecca which proved that the seeds of evil were not sown only riots. in the manufacturing and mining districts, but that, unless local grievances were looked to and redressed, the country might become as disturbed in the agricultural, as it had ever been in the worst parts of Ireland. Loud complaints had long been made of the heavy tolls paid, especially on the cross-roads in South Wales, and the ruinous multitude of separate trusts, which rendered a ticket given on one line unavailing even within two hundred yards, if you turned off it. Such was the weight of these exactions, that they had come, in many places, to absorb nearly the whole profit of farmers in carrying their humble produce to market. These complaints, however, as is generally the case with the statement of grievances not supported by powerful Parliamentary influence which persuades, or violent popular resistance which intimidates, met with no attention, and the people secretly determined to take the matter into their own hands. In 1839 a set of gates peculiarly obnoxious had been pulled down by the people who suffered under them, and several of the county magistrates, by becoming trustees on the roads, had prevented their being again put up. The victory, as usual in all cases where popular will effects its object by illegal means, only led GO. XLI. 1843. CHAP. to fresh acts of violence. The people held meetings of persons suffering under the exactions in remote and sequestered places at night, and organised a conspiracy of a very singular kind. They chose for their text the words of Scripture, "And they blessed Rebecca, and said unto her, Let thy seed possess the gate of those 1 Gen. xxiv. which hate them."1 In pursuance of the plan agreed on, they elected a chief, dressed him in women's clothes, and set about the destruction of all the gates which they deemed objectionable, and the hindrance of their reconstruction. The work of destruction began in the winter 1842-43, and at first it was deemed rather a mischievous frolic than anything else; but ere long it assumed a more serious aspect. In the daytime everything was quiet and orderly in the extreme. The farmers paid their tolls as usual at all the gates without complaint, and work in the fields and villages went on as usual. But no sooner did darkness set in than bands of armed men began to traverse the roads and surround the obnoxious toll-bars. The loud sound of horns was heard on all sides, calling the peasantry, who were for the most part inclined. to their side, to join in the work of destruction. The discharge of firearms and the sound of the horns announced their approach; in the twinkling of an eye the tollhouse was surrounded by a crowd of men in male and female attire, the doors forced open, and the inmates led out or bound with cords. Immediately the building was unroofed, the walls levelled, the toll-bar destroyed, and nothing but a heap of ruins left to mark where * Ann. Reg. it had stood. In the morning all was again quiet; the 264; Times' labourers were alone seen at work in the fields; carts, Reporter, July 1843; as usual, traversed the roads, and but for the crowds Spectator, 1843, 869, which collected with secret triumph round the scene of ii. 524, 525. former devastation, no one could have suspected that 1843, 258, 875; Mart. anything unusual had occurred.2 These disorders, as is usually the case when they break out in a rural district where no police force exists, or means are in existence either to prevent crime or arrest CHAP. XLI. the riots. its perpetrators, for long went on unpunished. Large 1843. bodies of troops and police were sent down from London 82. to the disturbed districts, with several of the most skilled Increase of detectives of the metropolis. For long, however, the rioters, as often occurs in such cases, eluded the whole efforts of the magistrates, in consequence of the universal adherence of the peasantry to the cause, and the rapid intelligence which they sent to the bands of rioters of the approach of any body of military or police, which was instantly followed by their dispersion and flight. At length, however, matters came to such a point that even the sympathy of the peasantry was alienated from the insurgents. Incendiarism was committed in many places, murder in some. An old woman, aged seventy-two, was shot dead, while the roof of her cottage was blazing around her. These atrocities roused the indignation of the better part of the people, who ceased in consequence to lend their aid to the escape or screening of the culprits. Twice Rebecca's horse was shot dead under her, and though the rider escaped on foot, yet several of her followers were captured, and committed for trial. Government, now thoroughly alarmed, acted energetically. A proclamation was issued by the Queen, calling on the magistrates and all good subjects to do their duty, and a royal commis- 1843, 262; sion sent down for the trial of the prisoners, who had 525. now become very numerous.1 1 Ann. Reg. Mart. ii. tion of the removing Baron Gurney, who presided over the commission, acted 84. with equal humanity and discretion: his addresses to the Terminaprisoners drew tears from the eyes of all who heard them, troubles, from the intermixture they contained of the tenderness of and bill a parent with the justice of a judge. Three of the worst their cause. were sentenced to long periods of transportation; the remainder, who were for the most part deluded peasants, escaped with various periods of imprisonment. The convicts issued an address to their countrymen recommending the cessation of rural disorders; and the commission of inquiry, |