must cease at 12 m. as regards employment in any manufacturing process if not less than 1 hour is allowed for meals and at 12.30 p. m. as regards employment for any purpose whatever. If less than 1 hour is allowed, manufacturing processes must cease at 11.30 a. m. and employment for any purpose at 12 m. When work begins at 7 a. m. manufacturing processes must cease at 12.30 p. m. and employment for any purpose whatever at 1 p. m. In nontextile factories and workshops the hours of employment on Saturday may be between 6 a. m. and 2 p. m., or 7 a. m. and 3 p. m., or 8 a. m. and 4 p. m. In every case an interval of not less than one-half hour must be allowed for meals. The maximum is 55 hours per week for textile and 60 hours for nontextile factories.

2. The second corrective principle is the determination of the latest closing hours for each day, although the local authority is left free to distribute the particular closing hours over the different days of the week.

This bill was given a second reading in May, 1908, and the home secretary pledged the Government to introduce legislation in 1909. Public sentiment, awakened through the efforts of the Shop Assistants' Union, has already taken up the battle and helped the union to specific success on behalf of the female shop assistant.

It is interesting to note that in the cases of two adjacent drapery houses in London, one closing from 6 to 6.30 p. m. and the other keeping open until 8 p. m. and after, when the assistants in the lateclosing shops were out on strike, the employers conceded a uniform early closing for all the days in the week and explained that they were forced to the concession by the attitude of their customers, "who affected by the undue excitement over shop legislation," would go elsewhere and buy rather than accept service maintained for "their convenience during the evening hours."

CRUSADE AGAINST LIVING-IN AND TRUCK SYSTEMS.

The crusade conducted by the National Amalgamated Union of Shop Assistants, Warehousemen, and Clerks against the living-in system is so important to the cause of the female worker that a brief explanation of the Truck Act, which deals with this feature of shop life, may be permissible.

Prior to 1831 payment in "truck "—i. e., goods-instead of in money was commonly practiced by employers of labor in Great Britain, and the "tonny shop" or wage-trading exchange was an adjunct of the factory or mill. The abuses to which this system of payment was open are obvious. The employer might pay in inferior goods or in goods overcharged or supply goods in excess of wages

due and so run the worker into debt. The worker handed over the control of his purchasing power and had no check on his earnings. The worker discovered these abuses by bitter experiences, and after a period of agitation the act was passed in 1831. This made the payment of "truck" illegal and insured that the worker should not be compelled to spend his earnings in any particular shop. It also regulated fines and deductions.

* * *

The act of 1887 made more explicit the application of the law in regard to deductions an employer might make from the wages of a workman, and adopted the definition as given in the Employers' and Workmen Act, 1875, as follows: "The expression' workman' does not include a domestic or menial servant, but, save as aforesaid, means any person who, being a laborer, servant in husbandry, journeyman, artificer, handicraftsman, miner, or otherwise engaged in manual labor, whether under the age of 21 years or above that age, has entered into or works under a contract with an employer, whether the contract be express or implied, oral, or in writing." It will be seen that the occupation of shop assistants can not be construed so as to come under these categories, and, as a consequence, the employers of shop labor were able to continue their form of "truck" payment, the so-called "living-in" system, whereby the clerks of an establishment are housed under one roof and a deduction for "rent, victuals, fuel, etc.," made in a lump sum from their wages without, as the Truck Amendment Act stipulates, the agreement for such deductions being in writing and signed by the workman. On the subject of "living-in" an official of the Shop Assistants' Union has written:

Apart from its demoralizing effect on wages, the living-in system has many disadvantages which well-meaning people, who believe it provides a home where the young people are guarded from evil, fail to take into account. Assistants living-in are frequently many miles from home, and dismissal means also immediate loss of shelter; they have very little cash in hand when settling-up day comes, certainly not enough to keep them in lodgings for any length of time; and yet to go home, if they have sufficient money to take them there, is to go probably to some country district where they will have great difficulty in getting situations.

The thought of dismissal brings with it a terror which the poorest worker, who owns a shelter independently of her employer, knows not at all. The sleeping rooms, from the hygienic standpoint, are sadly deficient. The air space varies from 500 to 700 cubic feet per person, but the fireplaces are invariably blocked, the windows at night are either closed entirely or open only an inch or so, and there is no other kind of ventilation.

The atmosphere of such rooms by morning can be better imagined than described.

The washing accommodations are very limited, and there is no privacy in the bedrooms. Except in the best houses no bathroom is provided, and the assistants, too frequently, are content with a weekly washdown in a small hand basin, the daily ablution being confined to face, neck, and hands. (")

The primary cause of consumption among female shop assistants is attributed to "industrial dust," with which the atmosphere of the shops becomes thick toward evening from the continual tramp of feet, the trailing skirts, and the fine particles detached from the goods that are being continually tossed about, but the spread of the disease is largely traced to the living-in system.

As regards the food included in truck payment under the living-in system, much depends in quantity and quality upon the ability and good will of the steward or the housekeeper employed by the firm.

The following is a menu for the week in an average business house in London where the amount allowed for the cost of boarding and lodging the employees is 6s. ($1.46) per head, per week:

BREAKFAST.

Bread and butter or dripping, tea or coffee.

DINNER.

Monday.-Hot roast mutton, potatoes, bread, ale.

Tuesday. Cold roast beef, potatoes, currant pudding, bread, ale.

Wednesday.-Stew, bread, ale.

Thursday. Cold salt beef, potatoes, bread, ale.

Friday.-Hot roast beef, potatoes, boiled pudding, bread, ale.

Saturday.-Cold roast beef, potatoes, bread and butter pudding, bread, ale.

Bread and butter, tea.

TEA.

SUPPER.

Bread, cheese, butter, and (twice each week) fried or baked pudding, ale. Yet in one house where practically this menu was in operation the only protest was that it was monotonous. But the assistants ate their meals heartily and spent only from 6d. to 1s. 6d. (12 to 37 cents) per week in extras for breakfast and supper. In other houses it was claimed that the food was neither good nor well cooked; assistants frequently left the dinner untouched and it was necessary for them to spend from 3s. to 5s. (73 cents to $1.22) per week to satisfy hunger. However, in either case there was no alternative to accepting the diet as part payment of their nominal wages except unemployment.

In 1895 the union leaders made a strong case against deductions from wages and a plea for the inclusion of shop assistants under the

• Miss Margaret C. Bonfield, in a paper on "The effect on health of women employment in shops," read before the Royal Sanitary Institute Congress at Glasgow, 1904.

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protection of the Truck Act, and they secured the entering wedge to legislation in the specific amendment that provided for shop assistants under the fines clause, which under the general heading of permissible deductions provides for fines, (a) if the agreement for deductions or payment of either be contained in a notice posted up where the workman can easily see it, read it, or copy it, or else be in writing signed by the workman; (b) if such agreement gives a list of the fines that may be imposed, together with a table showing the amount of each fine; (c) if the fine be on account of some act or omission which causes, or is likely to cause, damage to the employer; (d) if the amount of the fine be fair and reasonable, looking at all circumstances of the case; (e) if particulars in writing be given to the workman, whenever he is fined, showing the reason for the fine, and the amount of the fine.

The Shop Assistants' Union is now engaged in a definite campaign against living-in, and in this connection the National Amalgamated Union asks the Government (1) to extend to shop workers the provisions of the Truck Act, by which their wages shall be paid in full in current coin of the realm, and not partly in kind—i. e., in board and lodging; (2) to provide that when the employer desires to contract out in respect of board and lodging (under section 23 of the act of 1831), it shall be not as a condition of employment, but only under a contract in writing, by which the assistant can be assured that the sum deducted from wages for board and lodging shall not exceed the real and true value of the room and board provided, and that the amount so deducted shall be mutally agreed upon by employer and employee.

A conference on this subject was convened in July, 1907, at Toynbee Hall. There were present representatives of the Drapers' Chamber of Trade and of the National Amalgamated Union of Shop Assistants, and the following terse statement was presented and debated: The union is pledged to the total abolition of the living-in system on the following grounds:

1. It is detrimental to health.

2. It prevents the growth of individuality and self-reliance.

3. The institutional and celibate conditions necessarily imposed conduce to a loose standard of morality.

4. The system is economically unsound.

5. The system excludes the shop workers from the social and civic life of the community; they are voteless.

6. Modern commercialism has outgrown the system; it is unnecessary to the proper conduct of business.

We recognize that a great change of this nature can not take place very rapidly, and that reasonable time must be allowed for the transition from living-in to living-out.

The conference is aware that at the present time the truck inquiry committee are preparing recommendations on the subject. The union

has asked that the Truck Acts should be extended to the shopworkersi. e., that their wages should be paid in full in the current coin of the realm, and that board and lodgings, if provided by the employer, should not be a condition of employment.

The cumulative effect of this persistent agitation on the part of the unions in the distributive trades is shown in several districts where the unrest has crystallized into a definite demand to "live-out," in which public opinion has been with the shop assistants.

In 1907, at Longton, New Castle (Staffordshire), Oxford, Bridgent, and Pontypool, the union officials negotiated settlements to "live-out " on satisfactory terms, and several of the largest drapery houses in London have recently abandoned the living-in system.

PROTECTION AGAINST FINES AND IMPOSITION.

Even with legislation secured, the union sometimes has an important part to play in its execution. For instance, the "fines clause" would have been practically inoperative, since there was no provision made for inspection of shops, if the shop assistants, through their union, had not taken action time and again to resist illegal fines or to secure the total abolition of fines. There is constant application to the union by members who want the organization to back their claims for the remission of unjust fines.

In one house a system of cash payments prevailed, and assistants were held responsible, by heavy fines, if customers left without paying. The union officials interviewed the firm and a new system was adopted. The employees in two London houses wished to secure the abolition of fees for house doctor, boot cleaning, and library, which were extra deductions, besides the usual living-in rate. After deputations from the union had waited on the firm the employees, 75 per cent of whom were members of the union, were relieved of the added tax on their wages.

The individual shop clerk, too, who has been fined for untidy stock when an unusual rush of customers was responsible, comes for redress. Indeed, this minute guardianship over its members finds illustration in the women's trade unions in all industries, even in the textile industry, where the workers have their rights so carefully defined by legislative enactment. There are at present only 200 factory inspectors in Great Britain appointed by the State, so that at best each factory can be visited not more than once a year, and at a trades council meeting in 1894 one woman admitted that she had not seen a factory inspector during her ten years' work. Ten of these inspectors have been women, and on the recommendation of the home