Every power-loom weaver detected absenting himself at another time, while the machinery is in motion, forfeits for each hour and each loom, 3 d. Every person who leaves the room during working-hours, without obtaining permission from the overlooker, forfeits 3 d. Weavers who fail to supply themselves with scissors forfeit, per day, 1 d. All broken shuttles, brushes, oilcans, wheels, window panes, etc. , must be paid for by the weaver. No weaver to stop work without giving a week’s notice. The manufacturer may dismiss any employee without notice for bad work or improper behaviour. Every operative detected speaking to another, singing or whistling, will be fined 6 d. ; for leaving his place during working-hours, 6 d.
Another copy of factory regulations lies before me, according to which every operative who comes three minutes too late, forfeits the wages for a quarter of an hour, and everyone who comes twenty minutes too late, for a quarter of a day. Everyone who remains absent until breakfast forfeits a shilling on Monday, and sixpence every other day of the week, etc, etc. This last is the regulation of the Phœnix Works in Jersey Street, Manchester. It may be said that such rules are necessary in a great, complicated factory, in order to insure the harmonious working of the different parts; it may be asserted that such a severe discipline is as necessary here as in an army. This may be so, but what sort of a social order is it which cannot be maintained without such shameful tyranny? Either the end sanctifies the means, or the inference of the badness of the end from the badness of the means is justified. Everyone who has served as a soldier knows what it is to be subjected even for a short time to military discipline. But these operatives are condemned from their ninth year to their death to live under the sword, physically and mentally. They are worse slaves than the negroes in America, for they are more sharply