Litchfield enquirer., 1845-08-21
E-On1 the 9EiblI,ae.
LABOR IN NEW YORK:


 LABOR IN NEW YORK: r[. ITS cIRcUA1srANcEs, CONDITIONS AND REWARDS No. I. The Seamstresses. . There are in this City, according to the closest | estimate that can be made, Ten Thousand women who exist on what they can earn by the needle.- The following are the prices for which majority of these females compelled to work--they being such are paid by the large Depots for shirts and clothing in Cbatham-street and elsewhere: For making Common White and Checked Cotton Shirts, six cents each. Cotton Flannel Under shirts, the same. These are cut in such manner as to make ten seams in two pairs of sleeves A common fast seamstress can make two of these shirts per day. Sometimes very swift hands, by working from sunrise to midnight, can make three. This is equal to seventy cents per week (allow- ing nothing for holidays, sickness, accidents being out of work &c) for the first class, and l,l2 l-2 for the others
 Good Cotton Shirts, with Linen Bosoms, neatly stitched, are made for twenty-five cents. A good seamstress will make one in day, thus earning $l 50 per week, by constant labor
 Fine Linen Shirts, with Plaited Bosoms, which cannot be made by the very best hand in less than fifteen to eighteen hours steady work, are paid ff- ty cents each. Ordinary hands make one shirt of this kind in two days.
 Duck Trowsers, overalls, Sc. eight and ten cents each. Drawers and Undershirts, both Flannel and Cotton, from six to eight cents, at the ordinary shops, and l2 l-2 at the best. One garment is days work for some-others can make two.
 Sattinet Cashmere and Broadcloth Pants, sorne- times with gaiter bottoms and lined, from IS to 30 cents per pair One pair is good days work.
 Vests, 25 to 50 cents-the latter price paid only for work of the very best quality. Good hands make one day.
 Thin coats are made for g to 37 1-2 cents piece.
 Heavy Pilot-cloth Coats, with three pockets, $l a nal ha three days.
 Cloth Roundabouts and Pea.jackets, 25 to 50 cents. Three can be made in two days.
 A great number of females are employed in ma. king Mems and Boys Caps. By constant labor fifteen or eighteen hours day they can make from IA to 25 cents. We are told by an old lady who has lived by this kind ot work long time, that when she begins at sunrise and works till midnight she can earn IA cents day.
 A large majority of these women are American born, from the great middle Glass of life, many Of whom have once been in comfortable and even af1u- ent circumstances, and have been reduced by the death or bankruptcy cfhusbands and relatives, and other causes. to such straits. Many of them are the wives of ship-masters and other officers of ves- sels. Others are the widows of mechanics and poor men, and have children, aged mothers and fathers, &c. to support, by their needle. Ma. ny have drunken husbands to add to their af1c- tions, and to darken every faint gleam of sunshine that domestic affection throws even into the hum. blest abode Others have sick and bed.ridden hus. bands or children, or perhaps have to endure the agony of receiving home fallen daughter an outlawed son suddenly checked in his career of vice.
 The manner in which these women live--the squalidness and unhealthy location and nature of their habitations-the inadequateness of their food and clothing-the impossibility of providing for a. ny the slightest recreation or moral or intellectual culture, or of educating their children-can be easily imagined; but we assure the public that it would require an extremely active imagination to conceive the reality.
 These women generally 'keep house'-that is, they rent single room, perhaps two small rooms, in the upper story or svl'e roor. il con structed, unventilated house in filthy street, santly kept by the absence of back yards and the neglect of the Street Inspector-where sickening and deadly miasm pervades the atmosphere. and in summer renders t totally unfit to be inhaled by human lungs. deposting the seeds of debility and disease with every inspiration In these rooms all the processes of cooking, eating. sleeping washing, working and living are indiscrminately perform ed. For these rooms the tenants never pay less than three 10 four and half dollars per month-and pay they must and do. Some of the very worst single garrets, destitute of closet or convenience of any kind, and perhaps lighted only bya hole cut in the roof, rent as low as two dollars month Of course every cent of the inmates earnings IS eX hansted every week, and in many casas is not suf fcient to buy any other food than a scanty supply of potatoes and Indian meal and moasSes for the family. When winter comes, therefore, they are destitute of the means not only of adding comOra- ble clothing to their wretched wardrobes, but Of procuring an ounce of fuel. Their work, too, at this season is frequently cut off, and ihey are left no resource but the Alms.house or pauper ticket for bread and coal. Here, too, they are too often bauked. The Aims house is full and overrunning the public Charities of all kinds are choking with the fierce assaults of shivering and famished Beg | gary-what can these poor women do: We are truly told that when sometimes hunted out by the ] hand of private charity they have been found st given over to hunger and despair at their repeated | rebuffs from the Aims house or the overdriven Commissioners that they had resolved to starve without farther effort. Understand us not as cen- surfing the directors or distributors of these Public Charities At present we know nothing but that they do all they can. We shall come to the facts about them tn due time.
 Something Ancient-For the benefit of such of our readers as are fond of seeing how things were '' done long time ago. (says the Salem Adverti- ser,) we copy from New'Hampsh,re paper ot revolutionary date, verbatim. the following adver- | tsement. The poetry will be found particularly | worthy of commendafion:
 Whereas, I, Daniel Clay, through misrepre- | sentation, was induced 10 post my wife Rbods, m the Exeter Miscellany, of March last, now beg leave to inform the public, that have taken her again to wife, after settling all our domestic broiIs l in an amicable manner so that every thing, as | usual, goes on like clock work.
 ls Divorc'6 like Scissors rent in twain, Each mourned the rivet out; Now whct and rivetted again, ..-..f They'll make the old Sheers cut."1 , Burning VeH.-A correspondent of the Cleve- land Plain Dealer, gives an account of a burning well that may be seen in Southing Centre, in