776 LAISSEZ FAIRE
terrible suffering that was wantonly inflicted, continues:
“ After all we must own that it was quite right to throw out
the Bill for prohibiting the sweeping of chimneys by boys—
because humanity is a modern invention; and there are
many chimneys in old houses that cannot possibly be swept
in any other manner.” The agitation on the subject con-
tinued, however, and much more stringent rules were success-
fully introduced in 1834?"
In the meantime, public attention was being steadily
directed to the factory children, and to the prejudicial effects
of the long hours during which many of them were accustomed
to work. The Act of 1802 was easily evaded, as children
who were not regularly apprenticed did not obtain protection
From the under it. The impulse for a fresh agitation on the subject
Fert” was given by Robert Owen?, who aimed at reconstituting the
Owen conditions of factory life, so that a better type of factory
operative might be developed. He did not aim merely at
protecting individuals, but at introducing a better system.
In 1815 he published his Observations on the effect of the
manufacturing system, with hints for the improvement of those
parts of it which are most injurious to health and morals, and
endeavoured to interest Sir Robert Peel in the passing of a
fresh Act, which should render some of the changes he had
made at New Lanark, compulsory on other employers; he
was particularly anxious that no child of less than ten years
of age should be set to work in a mill, that until they were
twelve they should only work six hours, and that the hours of
labour should be reduced to ten and a half for all4. A Select
Committee was appointed to consider the matter, and much
interesting evidence was put on record®, but no immediate
action was taken; the Act which was passed in 1819° greatly
A.D. 1776
—1850.
1 Edinburgh Review, 1819, xxxm. 320. The radical paper, the Gorgon, was
also inclined to sneer at the House of Commons for “its ostentatious display of
humanity ” in dealing with “ trivialities ” like the Slave Trade, the climbing boys,
and the condition of children in factories, p. 341 (13 March, 1819).
3 4and 5 Wm. IV. c. 35.
8 See Sir R. Peel's evidence in the Report of the Minutes of Evidence taken
before the Select Committee on the State of the Children employed in the Cotton
Manufactures of the United Kingdom (1816), mr. 370.
¢ Robert Owen, Observations, p. 9. 5 Reports (1816), 1m. 235.
$ 59 Geo. IIL. c. 66. It prohibited the labour of children under nine years of
