CONDITIONS OF CHILDREN'S WORK 789 
the masters found it worth while to keep the machinery A.D. 1778 
going for fifteen hours, and managed to evade the law by >> 
means of relay systems’. An amending Act of 1850 in- ould, 
sisted that the hours of work for protected persons must fall working 
within the twelve hours from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. with an hour Tay 
and a half for meals, and thus established a normal day for 
women®. Curiously enough, its provisions did not apply to 
children, and they could be employed on the relay system in 
helping the men, after the women had left off working. In 
1858, the risk of evasion in this manner was brought to of tenkours 
an end, the normal working day of ten and a half hours was sh a half 
established by law for all factory workers? other than adult length ed 
males, and it soon became customary for them as well. 
It thus came about that the programme of factory reform 
which Owen had advocated in 1815 was at length to be 
generally accepted. Each step was gained in the face of 
strong opposition, for the economic experts of the day—of in spite 
whom Mr Nassau Senior was the most effective spokesman — goto 
were clear that a reduction of hours would mean such a “7% 
serious loss to the employers that the trade of the country 
must inevitably suffer, and the mischievous effects react on 
she workmen themselves. It was argued that if the last 
hour of work were cut down, the profit on the capital invested 
in plant would vanish altogether’, Strong in the support of 
such academic authorities, the employers felt no scruple in 
evading the law, when they could; but the excuse was a 
mistaken one. Robert Owen’s experience had established the 
fact that the product in textile trades did not vary directly 
according to the hours of labour. He found that the influence 
! Mr Howells thus describes it: * The system which they seek to introduce 
ander the guise of relays is one of the many for shuffling the hands about in 
endless variety, and shifting the hours of work and of rest for different individuals 
throughout the day, so that you never have one complete set of hands working 
together in the same room at the same time.” Reports, 1849, xxi. 225. The 
intervals when the hands were not actually working were so short, and so 
arranged that they might be of very little use either for purposes of rest or 
recreation. Hutchins and Harrison, op. cst. 80, 101. 
t 13 and 14 Viet. c. 54. . 
8 Women, young persons and children might not be employed before 6 a.m. or 
after 6 p.m. (16 and 17 Vict. e. 104), and they were to be allowed an hour and 
a half for meals (3 and 4 Will. IV. ¢. 103 § 6). 
¢ N. Senior, Letter on the Factory Act, 12.