By Mr. MATHEWS: Q. It will fail, in fact, because there is no provision for recouping the master when such circumstances arise?-A. Yes. By Mr. HUGHES: Q. On the average of years, surely businesses of that kind do not lose ; they make profits on the average of years, or else nobody would carry them on?--I can only say that I know of many businesses in the United States which have not made money on the average of years, but on the contrary have lost money. The iron business has certainly been the source of immense losses. I have testified here before of the number of iron works that have been sold out, and I doubt whether we could point to ten families in the United States which have been successful in the iron business. I only refer to that as showing the necessity for an arrangement which conforms to experience in regard to business. The workmen have to be fed. The workmen do not know the fact that the business is carried on in order to satisfy that prior lien of theirs upon the property, and they are making war in the United States and here and in France upon the business on which they have a prior lien. The lien may not be large enough in certain cases, but the broad fact that the workman has the prior lien upon every business in every branch of labor is an unmistakable one. By Mr. MATHEWS: Q. The difficulty will be to satisfy that prior lien. If the result of the co-operative society did not satisfy that lien sufficiently, and if it did not satisfy the percentage on capital besides, it must fail of itself?-A. Yes. Q. If the workmen only receive bare subsistence wages until the result of the undertaking is known and the profits are realized, do you think there would be a difficulty in their making a fund out of subsistence wages, and out of any profits that they might be entitled to, which would enable them to provide against such a contingency as an unsuccessful year?-A. Yes, I should have supposed so but for the fact of the extent to which the principle of Schultze-Delitzsch has been adopted in Germany. That is really a most marvellous thing. Those people actually abated 20 and in some cases 40 per cent. to get such a fund, and I am satisfied that with the temper of our people in the United States I could go to my leading workmen and say, "We shall go on paying you your present rate of wages, but I ask you to leave behind so much as will form a fund for that purpose," and they would willingly consent to do so. By Mr. HUGHES: Q. Did you ever hear of such things as bare subsistence wages in the United States?-A. I have heard of it, because we have had such things as labor going down to a very low point. Q. I remember, in 1848 and 1849, when many of the associations in Paris were going on for months, the men drawing only 10 francs a week on account of their wages. You never heard of such wages as those in America?-A. I can remember when wages have been down in America, in times of depression, to as low as 50 cents per day, which would be about 28. per day in English money; that is as low as I have ever known anything got in America, and that was very exceptional indeed. There is one other thing which I wish to correct. I saw some comments in the London Times which seemed to look to testimony on my part that certain puddlers had murdered other puddlers coming to Pittsburg. Now I was very careful to state that I spoke of the murders only as evidence of the demoralization of a community where a strike had been going on for months, that I was merely informed that these murders had taken place, and that I did not know by whom, so that any inference from my testimony that one set of workmen had murdered another set was quite unfounded. By Mr. HARRISON: Q. That was clearly so put in your evidence, was it not?—A. I think it was. By the EARL OF LICHFIELD: Q. You said with regard to the employment of children in iron works in America that they were not employed before the age of 13 and 14.— Does that apply to other trades in America?-A. As a general rule it is a rare thing to see a young child not 13 or 14 in any physical employ ment, very rare indeed. Q. Are those children up to the age of 13 or 14 generally at school? A. Yes. Q. And have you any provision, generally speaking, in the iron works and in other trades for the education of those children, continuing after the age when you say they begin to be employed in the iron works?— A. No, there is no provision, except that in the large cities there are night-schools, and in New York, as I testified, the Cooper Institute affords the very largest possible instruction to mechanics. That is a private endowment. By Mr. MATHEWS: Q. I think you gave us some particulars of the Cooper Institute?—A. I did mention some particulars in reference to that. I wish to correct my testimony on another point. A Welsh ironmaster tells me that I am mistaken in my testimony as to women lifting those heavy bars of iron of which I spoke, two inches thick, five feet long, eight inches wide. I say that I actually saw one of those lifted, but this gentleman informs me that these heavy bars are lifted by men who are sent to do this heavy work. I merely saw the women making the piles, and I inferred that they put the tops and bottoms on because they were the only persons there, but I am informed that it is not so. Q. So that the employment of women in iron works is hot so heavy as you thought it was?-A. I still repeat my testimony that it is a great deal heavier work than I have ever seen women do before; but I correct that particular statement as to the bars. By Sir D. GOOCH: Q. Is there any compulsion in America in regard to education?—A. No compulsion in any place, except perhaps recently in Massachusetts. I have heard recently that a law for compulsory education has been passed there, but I am not sure of it; but in the other States there is no compulsion. By Mr. BOOTH: Q. Have you read the statement of the "Times" correspondent to that effect, that there is compulsory education?—A. I have not read the statement, but I know that there is no compulsory education in New York or New Jersey. It is just possible that there is in Massachusetts. By the EARL of Lichfield: Q. But education is provided out of the rates?-A. Education is paid for by the public and assessed for by rates on the district, and most of the States have school funds out of which they make a distribution annu ally to each district. Q. And the children up to the age of 13 or 14 avail themselves very generally of that opportunity of education?—A. Very generally. Q. I think you say that a great number of young persons after the age of 13 and 14 avail themselves of night-schools?-A. In the cities. Q. And do not you attribute that very much to the fact of their having been able to obtain tolerable education before beginning their employment?-A. No; I am sorry to state that the opposite is the case; that the ones that go to the night-schools are usually those that have had no opportunity of education in the day-schools. Those who go to the nightschools are, in New York, mostly foreigners who want to learn the language, or mechanics who have not received the ordinary elements of education. But in the case of the Cooper Institute, those who attend the classes are persons who have received some education before. Q. Is that an industrial education? Are men instructed in their trades? -A. No; they are instructed in that kind of knowledge which is necessary for them to conduct their trades intelligently; for instance, the machinist is taught drawing, and we teach chemistry and natural philosophy there. The learning there is all book learning, but it is with reference to the business which the pupil is engaged in. Q. Is not that statement of yours somewhat remarkable, that those who have had the advantage of an education up to 13 or 14 are not desirous of continuing their education afterwards?-A. No, it is not remarkable, for the reason that these night-schools do not teach anything more than what they have already learned in the day-schools. But in New York last winter a higher grade of school was opened, the first one which had ever been opened there, and it was filled to repletion by those who had been to the day-schools and had learned a certain amount and wished to continue their education. Q. You have no night-schools where they have an opportunity of con tinuing their education from the point at which they have arrived at the age of 13 or 14?-A. Except the Cooper Institute we had none until the one that I have just referred to was opened. Q. Do you not think that if they had the opportunity of continuing their education from the point arrived at, at the age of 13 or 14, they would avail themselves of it?-A. Experience makes me certain of that, because everything of that sort that exists has been used to the fullest possible degree. Q. Do you find a very marked difference in the intelligence of those who come from this country and Germany and Ireland and other places, when they come to be employed in your works, as compared with those who were educated in your own country?-A. I think that that question would have to be answered with reference to specific occupations. I think that the experience will be different in different operations. In iron works, certainly, we find that the Englishmen are the best workmen, better than those whom we train up; that is to say, as a general proposition, I think the English workmen are better than those we train up in the iron works. And yet there are some branches of our business in which our own people are better; it is a question very much of adaptability to particular kinds of employment. I think that in guide-rolling our Americans are more active and better rollers than the English, but when it comes to puddling the heavy bars the English are better work men. By Mr. MATHEWS: Q. Where you want physical force combined with skill?-A. Where we want physical force combined with skill we get Englishmen. Q. We can infer from that that they are stronger men that we rear up here than you do in America?—I think they are. By Mr. HUGHES: Q. I think your strongest men go west?-A. I think everybody must remark the superior physical development of the Englishmen over the Americans; that you here are a better physically-developed race than we are. Q. Has that held within the last few years, do you think?-A. It has always appeared to me so. I was struck with it 20 years ago, and I am struck with it now. I consider the English race, as I see it, the best physical race in the world. By Mr. HARRISON: Q. In spite of unionism?—A. In spite of unionism; in fact, I do not think that unionism would be possible anywhere else than in England and America, and so far it is a healthy sign. The witness withdrew. APPENDIX 1. POOR RATES AND PAUPERISM. Return (in part) to an order of the honorable the House of Commons, dated 9th July, 1867, for return of "Comparative statement of the number of paupers of all classes (except lunatic paupers in asylums and vagrants) in receipt of relief on the last day of each week in the months of April, May, June, July, August, September, October, November, and December, 1866 and 1867, respectively; also for the months of January, February, and March, 1867 and 1868, respectively;" "statement of the number of paupers, distinguishing the number of adult able-bodied paupers relieved on the 1st day of July, 1867;" "similar statement for the 1st day of January, 1868;" "statement of the amount expended for inmaintenance and out-relief only, for the half year ended at Michaelmas, 1867;” “similar statement for the half year ended at Lady day, 1868 ;" "statement of the amount of poor-rates levied and expended during the year ended at Lady day, 1867;" "and of the number of insane paupers chargeable to the poor-rates on the 1st day of January, 1868." POOR-LAW BOARD, Whitehall, July 9, 1867. FREDERICK PURDY, Principal of the Statistical Department. QUARTERLY STATEMENT AS TO PAUPERISM, MICHAELMAS, 1867. (Paupers in lunatic asylums and vagrants not included.) The present return completes the monthly series for the quarter ended at Michaelmas, 1867. The four following tables are given in continuation of those prefixed to the monthly publication for June last. The tables are 1. England and Wales; the pauperism in the consecutive weeks of the quarter. 2. (England and Wales;) the comparative pauperism of the quarter. 3. North Midland, Northwestern, and York divisions; the comparative pauperism of the quarter. 4. The Metropolis; the comparative pauperism of the quarter. I. In the first table each week is compared with the one immediately preceding it; 884,829 were the numbers relieved in the last week of June, (midsummer;) but in the fourth week of September (Michaelmas) the numbers were 872,620, which is a decrease of 12,209, or 1.4 per cent. less at Michaelmas than midsummer. |