The Statesman.
London, England, 1818-04-28 00:00:00

II

*

to procure sigeatuees by private em.pdro representa-
tions, the Petitions were not a matter of so rpriee.—
The advocate% of the Bill dealt in general assertions
which it was dilficelt to disprove, bee which had been
uniformly disproved when they had beers founded on
fungible statements. It was said that children, in
cotton-mills-were inferinr to other children—l. in
Education;-2: in Morals ;--and, s. its Health.—•
It bad been proved in opposition to this, that
,the
number ot children employed in mills, who. at-
tended Sunday Schools- at Manchester, was equal
to that of other children ; that their morata"Areie
as good, and it would have been strange if habits
of order, Weepy, and regularity had produced
immorality. As. to their health, if the House, in-
stead of looking
_to opinions without any facts
stated in seppart of them, looked to the facts them•
selves, and to opinions founded on an examination of
them, they would find that else statements respecting
their health were as devoid of truth, as those respect.
ing thvit• illocution and morals. In the Manchester
House of Recovery, the patients who had beets em.
played its cotton-mills were as one to twelve to those
engaged in other occupations. In the Infirmary, in
Feb:•1817, the patients who had been employed in
cotton-mills were as one to six to others. In March,
1818,,, the in-patients' who had bees' employed in cot-
ton-mills wen as one to eleven, the out-patients as
one to five or six to those who had been otherwise
employed. The Honourable Member quoted also
the evidence of Dr. Bordsley, Dr. Symonds, and
Dv. hardy, in support of the opinion that the
children were healthy. Mr. Ransom, an eminent
Surgeon, said, that from thirteen years observation
in the Manchester Inhrmary, Ise found the children
who had two employed its cotton-mills much less
subject to glandular swellings, scrophola, and white
swellings, than the weavers. The Surgeon of
the Manchester Workhouse stated, that he had
bad a prejudice against factories ; bat that if
hie experience in the workhouse might be taken
as a rest, they were more healthy than other
children ;—he supposed, therefore, that cleanliness
and ventilation made up for the Iligedrintage6 of their
situation. As to the Right Honourable Gentle-
man's remarks on the statement of deaths in Mr
Finlay's factories, it was to he recollected,
that the children there were all at the healthiest
period of life—[llear, hear 1]—neither was it stated
that the numbers mentioned were all who had died.
They were ell whose deaths were recollected. Mr.
Sendford's evidence had beets referred to, but the
most material fact stated by him had been omitted,
vit. that when five hundred persons et a Sunday
School bad clubbed a certain sum for their support in
case of sickness, the sum drawn out in the year by
those employed in cotton-mills was 2s. Ofd., the sum
drawn out by the others, 3s. ld. for each. The per-
sons employed in cotton-mills bad not the violent la-
bouv and occasional long hours, and occasional idle.
ness of persons employed in some other branches of
manufactures. Their labour was light, their hours
and wages uniform—they suffered less than others in
bad years. They were better fed and better clothed,
and more healthy than other manufactories. Similar
attempts to interefere with the labour of manufactories
had always heed mischievous. The regulations eats.'
blished by Parliament for the Spital. fields weavers had
drive, the silk manufacture to Cheshire. If a sinstlar
measure to that how proposed for the spinners had
been applied to other branches of the cotten trade,
what would have been else consequence? When the
weavers were working 16 hours a day for small wager,
if Parliament had stepped in and said, "you shall
only work 10 hours—you shall not receive less than
so mach wages," what would have been the conse-
quence? They would have been starved into re.
bellies. Whereto, by their persevering labour at that
low rate they had done what no one could have en.
ticipated. By the low prices t which they had worked,
they had crashed the manufactures of the Continent,
and established their own superiority. Ile contended
that all the manufactories throughout the kingdom
were in very good condition, notwithstanding th.
representations of the supporters of the Bill. He
alluded particularly to those in Lancaster, where,
as appeared from the returns of the Committee ot.
the Poor Laws, the number of persons who teceised
parochial relief was less than in any other of the
counties, with the exception of Cumberland. It
they applied their attention to other branches of ma-
nufacture, they would find as great abases; if they
looked even to agriculture, they would find wet sea
sons producing chronic diseases; in the misses she.
would also discover multiplied causes of complaint.
The Speaker himself, sitting in that chair, PR'
through more labour in a single tieseion calculated to
impair his health, than the people in a well-regulated
factory eadured for the whole year.— [A laugh ]—
Confinement, he would allow, must have an effect
upon the complexion—it had in that House. They
had not within their walls the ruddy complexiou of
the husbandman, except in a few instances.—[A
laughl—The temperature of the factories was stated
to be very high. Mr. Molesworth had represented
it as not more 74 degrees, even for the finest spinning;
but even taking it from 70 to 80, the excess was not
very great, particularly whets it was recollected that
the numbers employed in this fine spinning, which
required so much heat, did not exceed 600 or 700
persons. One of the great evils of the Bill was,
that it went to encourage a spirit of combination in
the workmen. The Petitions in favour of it went to
provoke that spirit, and were obtained, in most in-
stances, from disorderly workmen in public-house
committees. If they agreed to this they would be
assailed with applications from every other manufac-
tory, and it would be impossible to draw a distin-
guishing line between them.
Mr. B. WILBRAHAM stated, that the Petitions
were signed by the Clergy and Magistrates, who were
sell acquainted with the facts represented; and that
the evidence of the Medical Gentlemen was in favour
of the regulation proposed. The possibility of
similar applications from other manufactories should
have no effect with the House, if they thought that
its the present instance it was right to adopt it.—
After what the House had already done in the case
of Chimney-sweepers, he hoped they would not use-
glect the case of people, who though they were more
removed from their observation, had not less claims
upon their humanity.
Mr. W. SMITH thought that the best way to pm.
vent combinations amongst workmen was by redress-
ing their real emotes. Ile believed that the sues-