180 LAISSEZ FAIRE

A.D. 1776
—1850.

them was very considerable; while a frightful amount of
dust was set free in the process, and the state of the atmosphere
 in the room was exceedingly bad.
iii. The conditions of cotton-spinning were similar, in
many ways, to those of flax, though there was nowhere so
much dust as in the heckling rooms, and no wet spinning,
but the temperature in which the hands worked was often
very high; to this, the operatives did not object, but it was
anwholesome, and there is no reason to believe there had
been any improvement in the state of things which existed
in 1816.
iv. The silk mills, in 1833, were generally speaking in a
most unsatisfactory condition’. The work was chiefly done
by girls who were parish apprentices, and there was grave
reason for complaint as to the demoralising effect of huddling
them together during their years of service, as well as of the
reckless manner in which they were cut adrift when they had
served their time.
In attempting to estimate the general result, it is well to
bear in mind that, in 1833, weaving-sheds were not a regular
department of a mill, and that the mill hands were chiefly
engaged in preparing the materials and in spinning, though
in some cases the work of cloth dressing had been added.
The early Though there were some differences in the machinery emix
 A. ployed, the necessity of standing for long hours and of
mera Stooping was similar in most of them ; and there is abundant
wil, evidence that many children were crippled for life and that
young women were seriously injured by their occupations.
The worsted-spinning at Bradford had a special notoriety in
this respect’. The Commissioners rightly connected it with
the very early age at which children went to work, and the
long hours during which they were employed, and the
medical testimony proved that mischief of this kind was
common in all the great industrial centres’. The Commissioners
 are careful to note that the physical evils due to

sotton and

silk mills.

1 In this branch of industry, as in the woollen trade, the arrangements in the
West of England district were so good that the Commissioners saw no cause for
egislative interference. Reports, 1833, xx. 968 (Ap. B. 1, 70).
* Reports. 1833, xx. 603. 8 Ih. 32—35.