The Sun.
London, England, 1864-05-10 00:00:00

unjust to compare his present condition—.
with ten or twelve shillings a week for him-
self and his family—with the agricultural labourer
in the south, At the same time, it is undeniable
that there was much " riotous living" among them
when work was plentiful and wages were high, and
the medical officers in the factory districts assign
the discontinuance of those unfortunate habits in
consequence of the distress as one of the causes of
the decrease in sickness which they have observed
among them. The greatly diminished price of bread
and flour, and some other chief articles of food, dur.7
ing the past year, has been of inestimable benefit fd
them, whether employed or unemployed, and the
frequent change from the vitiated atmosphere of the
mills to out-door life has not been without a very
beneficial effect on their health. On the whole, the
general health of the operatives exhibits a marked
improvement. Infant mortality, especially, has
diminished. The mothers are more at home, and
less at the mill. There is less neglect of their off-
spring; they nurse them better, and have less in-
ducement to administer narcotics to keep them quiet.
The state of the schools attended by factory workers
in his district is a subject to which Mr. Redgrave
devotes several pages of his report. He obtained
specific information from fifty of the largest of them
each attended on an average by three hundred chil-
dren. He states that the general results of his
inquiry as to the number of attendants and the
financial condition of the establishments are greatly
in advance of what could have been expected. The
number of children regularly attending these
schools received a great increase in 1882, but a
diminution of almost equal amount took place in the
following year. The reduction in 1863 was caused
chiefly by the withdrawal of relief in the shape of
payment of school fees for the children of parents
who obtained employment. "This," the inspector
remarks, " however correct in principle, has had
the effect of throwing upon the streets many chil-
dren whose parents have been really unable to pay
the school fee, smell as it is, and it is really a sub-
ject of so much importance that it is to be hoped
the Manchester Committee will reconsider their
decision, and not allow the children to be thrown
about, as they will be, upon idleness, and the bad
habits engendered by want of occupation and proper
control." The school attendance of the half-timers
has improved, and this is to be attributed in a great
measure to the effect of the educational provisions
of the Factory Acts in past years. Many of the
parents owe all the book-learning they have to the
half-time system. They know this; they under-
stand the value of what they learnt, and they take
care that their children should enjoy the same ad-
vantage. The sewing and industrial schools for
adults that have been established during the cotton
famine are evidently conferring great benefits upon
the workpeople who attend them. The orderly
discipline maintained in them, and the encourage•
ment there given to the cultivation of neatness
and good behaviour have a very civilising
effect. The young women learn in them some les-
sons that they stand greatly in need of. In many
of the schools, for instance, not one-third of them
knew anything of sewing when they entered, they
had no notion how to mend or patch their clothes,
and when they first took a needle in their hand they
pushed it through their work by pressing it upon
the table, and this not because they were stupid but
solely because they had never been taught, and had
never seen anything of the kind before. In the
adult schools for males it has been found impos.
sible to have any employment so congenial to them
as sewing and knitting to the females, but Mr. Red-
grave notices with approbation the attention of the
men and the anxiety of so many to improve them-
selves, especially in arithmetic. "It sometimes
caused a shade of melancho!y," he tells "to see
an old grey-haired man leaning over his desk, and.
poring over a sum in reduction or practice, but even
this was relieved by being told by a frank spoken
spinner in his own hearty manner, while showing
his sketches of geography and what he was reading
They could not give us work, and so God put it
into their hearts to give its the next best to it.' "