Henry Julian Hunter on the excessive mortality of infants in some rural
districts
of England.
Marx - Capital-Volume-I
336, 337.
) This observation of Ricardo is of course correct in so far as it is directed against J.
B.
Say, who imagines that machines render the --service?
of creating value which forms a part of --profits.
?
25 A horse-power is equal to a force of 33,000 foot-pounds per minute, i. e. , to a force that raises 33,000 pounds one foot in a minute, or one pound 33,000 feet. This is the horse power meant in the text. In ordinary language, and also here and there in quotations in this work, a distinction is drawn between the --nominal? and the --commercial? or --indicated? horse-power of the same engine. The old or nominal horse-power is calculated exclusively from the length of piston-stroke, and the diameter of the cylinder, and leaves pressure of steam and piston speed out of consideration. It expresses practically this: This engine would be one of 50 horse-power, if it were driven with the same low pressure of steam, and the same slow piston speed, as in the days of Boulton and Watt. But the two latter factors have increased enormously since those days. In order to measure the mechanical force exerted today by an engine, an indicator has been invented which shows the pressure of the steam in the cylinder. The piston speed is easily ascertained. Thus the --indicated? or --commercial? horse- power of an engine is expressed by a mathematical formula, involving diameter of cylinder, length of stroke, piston speed, and steam pressure, simultaneously, and showing what multiple of 33,000 pounds is really raised by the engine in a minute. Hence, one --nominal? horse-power may exert three, four, or even five --indicated? or --real? horse-powers. This observation is made for the purpose of explaining various citations in the subsequent pages. -- F. E.
26 The reader who is imbued with capitalist notions will naturally miss here the --interest? that the machine, in proportion to its capital value, adds to the product. It is, however, easily seen that since a machine no more creates new value than any other part of constant capital, it cannot add any value under the name of --interest. ? It is also evident that here, where we are treating of the production of surplus value, we cannot assume a priori the existence of any part of that value under the name of interest. The capitalist mode of calculating, which appears, prima^ facie, absurd, and repugnant to the laws of the creation of value, will be explained in the third book of this work.
27 This portion of value which is added by the machinery, decreases both absolutely and relatively, when the machinery does away with horses and other animals that are employed as mere moving
? ? 330 Chapter 15
forces, and not as machines for changing the form of matter. It may here be incidentally observed, that Descartes, in defining animals as mere machines, . saw with eyes of the manufacturing period, while to eyes of the middle ages, animals were assistants to man, as they were later to Von Haller in his --Restauration der Staatswissenschaften. ? That Descartes, like Bacon, anticipated an alteration in the form of production, and the practical subjugation of Nature by Man, as a result of the altered methods of thought, is plain from his --Discours de la Me? thode. ? He there says: --Il est possible (by the methods he introduced in philosophy) de parvenir a` des connaissances fort utiles a` la vie, et qu'au lieu de cette philosophie spe? culative qu'on enseigne dans les e? coles, on en peut trouver une pratique, par laquelle, connaissant la force et les actions du feu, de l'eau, de l'air, des astres, et de tous les autres corps qui nous environnent, aussi distinctement que nous connaissons les divers me? tiers de nos artisans, nous les pourrions employer en me^me fac? on a` tous les usages auxquels ils sont propres, et ainsi nous rendre comme mai^tres et possesseurs de la nature? and thus --contribuer au perfectionnement de la vie humaine. ? [It is possible to attain knowledge very useful in life and, in place of the speculative philosophy taught in the schools, one can find a practical philosophy by which, given that we know the powers and the effectiveness of fire, water, air, the stars, and all the other bodies that surround us, as well and as accurately as we know the various trades of our craftsmen, we shall be able to employ them in the same manner as the latter to all uses to which they are adapted, and thus as it were make ourselves the masters and possessors of nature, and thus contributing to the perfection of human life. ] In the preface to Sir Dudley North's --Discourses upon Trade? (1691) it is stated, that Descartes' method had begun to free Political Economy from the old fables and superstitious notions of gold, trade, &c. On the whole, however, the early English economists sided with Bacon and Hobbes as their philosophers; while, at a later period, the philosopher [. . . ] of Political Economy in England, France, and Italy, was Locke.
28 According to the annual report (1863) of the Essen chamber of commerce, there was produced in 1862, at the cast-steel works of Krupp, with its 161 furnaces, thirty-two steam-engines (in the year 1800 this was about the number of all the steam-engines working in Manchester), and fourteen steam- hammers (representing in all 1,236 horse-power) forty-nine forges, 203 tool-machines, and about 2,400 workmen-thirteen million pounds of cast steel. Here there are not two workmen to each horse- power.
29 Babbage estimates that in Java the spinning labour alone adds 117% to the value of the cotton. At the same period (1832) the total value added to the cotton by machinery and labour in the fine- spinning industry, amounted to about 33% of the value of the cotton. (--On the Economy of Machinery,? pp. 165, 166. )
30 Machine printing also economises colour.
31 See Paper read by Dr. Watson, Reporter on Products to the Government of India, before the Society of Arts, 17th April, 1860.
32 --These mute agents (machines) are always the produce of much less labour than that which they displace, even when they are of the same money-value. ? (Ricardo, l. c. , p. 40. )
33 Hence in a communistic society there would be a very different scope for the employment of machinery than there can be in a bourgeois society.
34 --Employers of labour would not unnecessarily retain two sets of children under thirteen. . . . In fact one class of manufacturers, the spinners of woollen yam, now rarely employ children under thirteen years of age, i. e. , half-timers. They have introduced improved and new machinery of various kinds, which altogether supersedes the employment of children (i. e. , under 13 years); f. i. , I will mention one process as an illustration of this diminution in the number of children, wherein by the addition of an apparatus, called a piecing machine, to existing machines, the work of six or four half-timers, according to the peculiarity of each machine, can be performed by one young person (over 13 years). . .
? ? 331 Chapter 15
the half-time system ? stimulated' the invention of the piecing machine. ? (Reports of Insp. of Fact. for 31st Oct. , 1858. )
35 --Wretch? is the recognised term in English Political Economy for the agricultural labourer.
36 --Machinery . . . can frequently not be employed until labour (he means wages) rises. ? (Ricardo, l. c. , p. 479. )
37 See --Report of the Social Science Congress, at Edinburgh. ? Oct. , 1863.
38 Dr. Edward Smith, during the cotton crisis caused by the American Civil War, was sent by the English Government to Lancashire, Cheshire, and other places, to report on the sanitary condition of the cotton operatives. He reported, that from a hygienic point of view, and apart from the banishment of the operatives from the factory atmosphere, the crisis had several advantages. The women now had sufficient leisure to give their infants the breast, instead of poisoning them with --Godfrey's cordial. ? They had time to learn to cook. Unfortunately the acquisition of this art occurred at a time when they had nothing to cook. But from this we see how capital, for the purposes of its self-expansion, has usurped the labour necessary in the home of the family. This crisis was also utilised to teach sewing to the daughters of the workmen in sewing schools. An American revolution and a universal crisis, in order that the working girls, who spin for the whole world, might learn to sew!
39 --The numerical increase of labourers has been great, through the growing substitution of female for male, and above all, of childish for adult labour. Three girls of 13, at wages of from 6 shillings to 8 shillings a week, have replaced the one man of mature age, of wages varying from 18 shillings to 45 shillings. ? (Th. de Quincey: --The Logic of Political Econ. ,? London, 1844. Note to p. 147. ) Since certain family functions, such as nursing and suckling children, cannot be entirely suppressed, the mothers confiscated by capital, must try substitutes of some sort. Domestic work, such as sewing and mending, must be replaced by the purchase of ready-made articles. Hence, the diminished expenditure of labour in the house is accompanied by an increased expenditure of money. The cost of keeping the family increases, and balances the greater income. In addition to this, economy and judgment in the consumption and preparation of the means of subsistence becomes impossible. Abundant material relating to these facts, which are concealed by official Political Economy, is to be found in the Reports of the Inspectors of Factories, of the Children's Employment Commission, and more especially in the Reports on Public Health.
40 In striking contrast with the great fact, that the shortening of the hours of labour of women and children in English factories was exacted from capital by the male operatives, we find in the latest reports of the Children's Employment Commission traits of the operative parents in relation to the traffic in children, that are truly revolting and thoroughly like slave-dealing. But the Pharisee of a capitalist, as may be seen from the same reports, denounces this brutality which he himself creates, perpetuates, and exploits, and which he moreover baptises --freedom of labour. ? --Infant labour has been called into aid . . . even to work for their own daily bread. Without strength to endure such disproportionate toil, without instruction to guide their future life, they have been thrown into a situation physically and morally polluted. The Jewish historian has remarked upon the overthrow of Jerusalem by Titus that it was no wonder it should have been destroyed, with such a signal destruction, when an inhuman mother sacrificed her own offspring to satisfy the cravings of absolute hunger. ? (--Public Economy Concentrated. ? Carlisle, 1833, p. 66. )
41 A. Redgrave in --Reports of lnsp. of Fact. for 31st October, 1858,? pp. 40, 41.
42 --Children's Employment Commission, Fifth Report,? London, 1866, p. 81, n. 31. [Added in the 4th
German edition. -- The Bethnal Green silk industry is now almost destroyed. -- F. E. ] 43 --Children's Employment Commission, Third Report,? London, 1864, p. 53, n. 15. 44 l. c. , Fifth Report, p. 22, n. 137.
? ? 332 Chapter 15
45 --Sixth Report on Public Health,? Lond. , 1864, p. 34.
46 --It (the inquiry of 1861). . . showed, moreover, that while, with the described circumstances, infants perish under the neglect and mismanagement which their mothers' occupations imply, the mothers become to a grievous extent denaturalised towards their offspring-commonly not troubling themselves much at the death, and even sometimes. . . taking direct measures to insure it. ? (l. c. )
47 l. c. , p. 454.
48 l. c. , pp. 454-463. --Report by Dr.
Henry Julian Hunter on the excessive mortality of infants in some rural districts of England. ?
49 l. c. , p. 35 and pp. 455, 456.
50 l. c. , p. 456.
51 In the agricultural as well as in the factory districts the consumption of opium among the grown-up labourers, both male and female, is extending daily. --To push the sale of opiate. . . is the great aim of some enterprising wholesale merchants. By druggists it is considered the leading article. ? (l. c. , p. 459. ) Infants that take opiates --shrank up into little old men,? or --wizened like little monkeys. ? (l. c. , p. 460. ) We here see how India and China avenged themselves on England.
52 l. c. , p. 37.
53 --Rep. of Insp. of Fact. for 31st Oct. , 1862,? p. 59. Mr. Baker was formerly a doctor. 54 L. Horner in --Reports of Insp. of Fact. for 30th June, 1857,? p. 17.
55 L. Horner in --Rep. of lnsp. of Fact. for 31st Oct. , 1855,? pp. 18, 19.
56 Sir John Kincaid in --Rep. of Insp. of Fact. for 31st Oct. , 1858,? pp. 31, 32.
57 L. Horner in --Reports, &c. , for 31st Oct. , 1857,? pp. 17, 18.
58 Sir J. Kincaid in --Reports, &c. , 31st Oct. , 1856,? p. 66
59 A. Redgrave in --Rep. of Insp. of Fact. , 31st. Oct. , 1857,? pp. 41-42. In those industries where the Factory Act proper (not the Print Works Act referred to in the text) has been in force for some time, the obstacles in the way of the education clauses have, in recent years, been overcome. In industries not under the Act, the views of Mr. J. Geddes, a glass manufacturer, still extensively prevail. He informed Mr. White, one of the Inquiry Commissioners: --As far as I can see, the greater amount of education which a part of the working-class has enjoyed for some years past is an evil. It is dangerous, because it makes them independent. ? (--Children's Empl. Comm. , Fourth Report,? Lond. , 1865, p. 253. )
60 --Mr. E. , a manufacturer . . . informed me that he employed females exclusively at his power-looms . . . gives a decided preference to married females, especially those who have families at home dependent on them for support; they are attentive, docile, more so than unmarried females, and are compelled to use their utmost exertions to procure the necessaries of life. Thus are the virtues, the peculiar virtues of the female character to be perverted to her injury - thus all that is most dutiful and tender in her nature is made a means of her bondage and suffering. ? (Ten Hours' Factory Bill. The Speech of Lord Ashley, March 15th, Lond. , 1844, p. 20. )
61 --Since the general introduction of machinery, human nature has been forced far beyond its average strength. ? (Rob. Owen: --Observations on the Effects of the Manufacturing System,? 2nd Ed. , London, 1817. )
62 The English, who have a tendency to look upon the earliest form of appearance of a thing as the cause of its existence, are in the habit of attributing the long hours of work in factories to the extensive kidnapping of children, practised by capitalists in the infancy of the factory system, on workhouses and orphanages, by means of which robbery, unresisting material for exploitation was procured. Thus, for instance, Ficiden, himself a manufacturer, says: --It is evident that the long hours of work were
? ? 333 Chapter 15
brought about by the circumstance of so great a number of destitute children being supplied from different parts of the country, that the masters were independent of the hands, and that having once established the custom by means of the miserable materials they had procured in this way, they could impose it on their neighbours with the greater facility. ? (J. Ficiden: --The Curse of the Factory System,? Lond. , 1836, p. I 1. ) With reference to the labour of women, Saunders, the factory inspector, says in his report of 1844: --Amongst the female operatives there are some women who, for many weeks in succession, except for a few days, are employed from 6 a. in. till midnight, with less than 2 hours for meals, so that on 5 days of the week they have only 6 hours left out of the 24, for going to and from their homes and resting in bed. ?
63 --Occasion. . . injury to the delicate moving parts of metallic mechanism by inaction. ? (Ure, l. c. , p. 281. )
64 The Manchester Spinner (Times, 26th Nov. , 1862) before referred to says in relation to this subject: --It (namely, the --allowance for deterioration of machinery") is also intended to cover the loss which is constantly arising from the superseding of machines before they are worn out, by others of a new and better construction. ?
65 --It has been estimated, roughly, that the first individual of a newly-invented machine will cost about five times as much as the construction of the second. ? (Babbage, l. c. , p. 349.
66 --The improvements which took place not long ago in frames for making patent net were so great that a machine in good repair which had cost ? 1,200, sold a few years after for ? 60 . . . improvements succeeded each other so rapidly, that machines which had never been finished were abandoned in the hands of their makers, because new improvements bad superseded their utility. ? (Babbage, l. c. , p. 233. ) In these stormy, go-ahead times, therefore, the tulle manufacturers soon extended the working day, by means of double sets of hands, from the original 8 hours to 24.
67 --It is self-evident, that, amid the ebbings and flowings of the markets and the alternate expansions and contractions of demand, occasions will constantly recur, in which the manufacturer may employ additional floating capital without employing additional fixed capital. . . if additional quantities of raw material can be worked up without incurring an additional expense for buildings and machinery. ? (R. Torrens: --On Wages and Combination. ? London, 1834, p. 64. )
68 This circumstance is mentioned only for the sake of completeness, for I shall not consider the rate of profit, i. e. , the ratio of the surplus value to the total capital advanced, until I come to the third book.
69 Senior, --Letters on the Factory Act. ? London, 1837, pp. 13, 14.
70 --The great proportion of fixed to circulating capital . . . makes long hours of work desirable. ? With the increased use of machinery, &c. , --the motives to long hours of work will become greater, as the only means by which a large proportion of fixed capital can be made profitable. ? (l. c. , pp. 11-13. ) --There are certain expenses upon a mill which go on in the same proportion whether the mill be running short or full time, as, for instance, rent rates, and taxes, insurance against fire, wages of several permanent servants, deterioration of machinery, with various other charges upon a manufacturing establishment, the proportion of which to profits increases as the production decreases. ? (--Rep. of Insp. of Fact. for 31st Oct. , 1862,? p. 19.
25 A horse-power is equal to a force of 33,000 foot-pounds per minute, i. e. , to a force that raises 33,000 pounds one foot in a minute, or one pound 33,000 feet. This is the horse power meant in the text. In ordinary language, and also here and there in quotations in this work, a distinction is drawn between the --nominal? and the --commercial? or --indicated? horse-power of the same engine. The old or nominal horse-power is calculated exclusively from the length of piston-stroke, and the diameter of the cylinder, and leaves pressure of steam and piston speed out of consideration. It expresses practically this: This engine would be one of 50 horse-power, if it were driven with the same low pressure of steam, and the same slow piston speed, as in the days of Boulton and Watt. But the two latter factors have increased enormously since those days. In order to measure the mechanical force exerted today by an engine, an indicator has been invented which shows the pressure of the steam in the cylinder. The piston speed is easily ascertained. Thus the --indicated? or --commercial? horse- power of an engine is expressed by a mathematical formula, involving diameter of cylinder, length of stroke, piston speed, and steam pressure, simultaneously, and showing what multiple of 33,000 pounds is really raised by the engine in a minute. Hence, one --nominal? horse-power may exert three, four, or even five --indicated? or --real? horse-powers. This observation is made for the purpose of explaining various citations in the subsequent pages. -- F. E.
26 The reader who is imbued with capitalist notions will naturally miss here the --interest? that the machine, in proportion to its capital value, adds to the product. It is, however, easily seen that since a machine no more creates new value than any other part of constant capital, it cannot add any value under the name of --interest. ? It is also evident that here, where we are treating of the production of surplus value, we cannot assume a priori the existence of any part of that value under the name of interest. The capitalist mode of calculating, which appears, prima^ facie, absurd, and repugnant to the laws of the creation of value, will be explained in the third book of this work.
27 This portion of value which is added by the machinery, decreases both absolutely and relatively, when the machinery does away with horses and other animals that are employed as mere moving
? ? 330 Chapter 15
forces, and not as machines for changing the form of matter. It may here be incidentally observed, that Descartes, in defining animals as mere machines, . saw with eyes of the manufacturing period, while to eyes of the middle ages, animals were assistants to man, as they were later to Von Haller in his --Restauration der Staatswissenschaften. ? That Descartes, like Bacon, anticipated an alteration in the form of production, and the practical subjugation of Nature by Man, as a result of the altered methods of thought, is plain from his --Discours de la Me? thode. ? He there says: --Il est possible (by the methods he introduced in philosophy) de parvenir a` des connaissances fort utiles a` la vie, et qu'au lieu de cette philosophie spe? culative qu'on enseigne dans les e? coles, on en peut trouver une pratique, par laquelle, connaissant la force et les actions du feu, de l'eau, de l'air, des astres, et de tous les autres corps qui nous environnent, aussi distinctement que nous connaissons les divers me? tiers de nos artisans, nous les pourrions employer en me^me fac? on a` tous les usages auxquels ils sont propres, et ainsi nous rendre comme mai^tres et possesseurs de la nature? and thus --contribuer au perfectionnement de la vie humaine. ? [It is possible to attain knowledge very useful in life and, in place of the speculative philosophy taught in the schools, one can find a practical philosophy by which, given that we know the powers and the effectiveness of fire, water, air, the stars, and all the other bodies that surround us, as well and as accurately as we know the various trades of our craftsmen, we shall be able to employ them in the same manner as the latter to all uses to which they are adapted, and thus as it were make ourselves the masters and possessors of nature, and thus contributing to the perfection of human life. ] In the preface to Sir Dudley North's --Discourses upon Trade? (1691) it is stated, that Descartes' method had begun to free Political Economy from the old fables and superstitious notions of gold, trade, &c. On the whole, however, the early English economists sided with Bacon and Hobbes as their philosophers; while, at a later period, the philosopher [. . . ] of Political Economy in England, France, and Italy, was Locke.
28 According to the annual report (1863) of the Essen chamber of commerce, there was produced in 1862, at the cast-steel works of Krupp, with its 161 furnaces, thirty-two steam-engines (in the year 1800 this was about the number of all the steam-engines working in Manchester), and fourteen steam- hammers (representing in all 1,236 horse-power) forty-nine forges, 203 tool-machines, and about 2,400 workmen-thirteen million pounds of cast steel. Here there are not two workmen to each horse- power.
29 Babbage estimates that in Java the spinning labour alone adds 117% to the value of the cotton. At the same period (1832) the total value added to the cotton by machinery and labour in the fine- spinning industry, amounted to about 33% of the value of the cotton. (--On the Economy of Machinery,? pp. 165, 166. )
30 Machine printing also economises colour.
31 See Paper read by Dr. Watson, Reporter on Products to the Government of India, before the Society of Arts, 17th April, 1860.
32 --These mute agents (machines) are always the produce of much less labour than that which they displace, even when they are of the same money-value. ? (Ricardo, l. c. , p. 40. )
33 Hence in a communistic society there would be a very different scope for the employment of machinery than there can be in a bourgeois society.
34 --Employers of labour would not unnecessarily retain two sets of children under thirteen. . . . In fact one class of manufacturers, the spinners of woollen yam, now rarely employ children under thirteen years of age, i. e. , half-timers. They have introduced improved and new machinery of various kinds, which altogether supersedes the employment of children (i. e. , under 13 years); f. i. , I will mention one process as an illustration of this diminution in the number of children, wherein by the addition of an apparatus, called a piecing machine, to existing machines, the work of six or four half-timers, according to the peculiarity of each machine, can be performed by one young person (over 13 years). . .
? ? 331 Chapter 15
the half-time system ? stimulated' the invention of the piecing machine. ? (Reports of Insp. of Fact. for 31st Oct. , 1858. )
35 --Wretch? is the recognised term in English Political Economy for the agricultural labourer.
36 --Machinery . . . can frequently not be employed until labour (he means wages) rises. ? (Ricardo, l. c. , p. 479. )
37 See --Report of the Social Science Congress, at Edinburgh. ? Oct. , 1863.
38 Dr. Edward Smith, during the cotton crisis caused by the American Civil War, was sent by the English Government to Lancashire, Cheshire, and other places, to report on the sanitary condition of the cotton operatives. He reported, that from a hygienic point of view, and apart from the banishment of the operatives from the factory atmosphere, the crisis had several advantages. The women now had sufficient leisure to give their infants the breast, instead of poisoning them with --Godfrey's cordial. ? They had time to learn to cook. Unfortunately the acquisition of this art occurred at a time when they had nothing to cook. But from this we see how capital, for the purposes of its self-expansion, has usurped the labour necessary in the home of the family. This crisis was also utilised to teach sewing to the daughters of the workmen in sewing schools. An American revolution and a universal crisis, in order that the working girls, who spin for the whole world, might learn to sew!
39 --The numerical increase of labourers has been great, through the growing substitution of female for male, and above all, of childish for adult labour. Three girls of 13, at wages of from 6 shillings to 8 shillings a week, have replaced the one man of mature age, of wages varying from 18 shillings to 45 shillings. ? (Th. de Quincey: --The Logic of Political Econ. ,? London, 1844. Note to p. 147. ) Since certain family functions, such as nursing and suckling children, cannot be entirely suppressed, the mothers confiscated by capital, must try substitutes of some sort. Domestic work, such as sewing and mending, must be replaced by the purchase of ready-made articles. Hence, the diminished expenditure of labour in the house is accompanied by an increased expenditure of money. The cost of keeping the family increases, and balances the greater income. In addition to this, economy and judgment in the consumption and preparation of the means of subsistence becomes impossible. Abundant material relating to these facts, which are concealed by official Political Economy, is to be found in the Reports of the Inspectors of Factories, of the Children's Employment Commission, and more especially in the Reports on Public Health.
40 In striking contrast with the great fact, that the shortening of the hours of labour of women and children in English factories was exacted from capital by the male operatives, we find in the latest reports of the Children's Employment Commission traits of the operative parents in relation to the traffic in children, that are truly revolting and thoroughly like slave-dealing. But the Pharisee of a capitalist, as may be seen from the same reports, denounces this brutality which he himself creates, perpetuates, and exploits, and which he moreover baptises --freedom of labour. ? --Infant labour has been called into aid . . . even to work for their own daily bread. Without strength to endure such disproportionate toil, without instruction to guide their future life, they have been thrown into a situation physically and morally polluted. The Jewish historian has remarked upon the overthrow of Jerusalem by Titus that it was no wonder it should have been destroyed, with such a signal destruction, when an inhuman mother sacrificed her own offspring to satisfy the cravings of absolute hunger. ? (--Public Economy Concentrated. ? Carlisle, 1833, p. 66. )
41 A. Redgrave in --Reports of lnsp. of Fact. for 31st October, 1858,? pp. 40, 41.
42 --Children's Employment Commission, Fifth Report,? London, 1866, p. 81, n. 31. [Added in the 4th
German edition. -- The Bethnal Green silk industry is now almost destroyed. -- F. E. ] 43 --Children's Employment Commission, Third Report,? London, 1864, p. 53, n. 15. 44 l. c. , Fifth Report, p. 22, n. 137.
? ? 332 Chapter 15
45 --Sixth Report on Public Health,? Lond. , 1864, p. 34.
46 --It (the inquiry of 1861). . . showed, moreover, that while, with the described circumstances, infants perish under the neglect and mismanagement which their mothers' occupations imply, the mothers become to a grievous extent denaturalised towards their offspring-commonly not troubling themselves much at the death, and even sometimes. . . taking direct measures to insure it. ? (l. c. )
47 l. c. , p. 454.
48 l. c. , pp. 454-463. --Report by Dr.
Henry Julian Hunter on the excessive mortality of infants in some rural districts of England. ?
49 l. c. , p. 35 and pp. 455, 456.
50 l. c. , p. 456.
51 In the agricultural as well as in the factory districts the consumption of opium among the grown-up labourers, both male and female, is extending daily. --To push the sale of opiate. . . is the great aim of some enterprising wholesale merchants. By druggists it is considered the leading article. ? (l. c. , p. 459. ) Infants that take opiates --shrank up into little old men,? or --wizened like little monkeys. ? (l. c. , p. 460. ) We here see how India and China avenged themselves on England.
52 l. c. , p. 37.
53 --Rep. of Insp. of Fact. for 31st Oct. , 1862,? p. 59. Mr. Baker was formerly a doctor. 54 L. Horner in --Reports of Insp. of Fact. for 30th June, 1857,? p. 17.
55 L. Horner in --Rep. of lnsp. of Fact. for 31st Oct. , 1855,? pp. 18, 19.
56 Sir John Kincaid in --Rep. of Insp. of Fact. for 31st Oct. , 1858,? pp. 31, 32.
57 L. Horner in --Reports, &c. , for 31st Oct. , 1857,? pp. 17, 18.
58 Sir J. Kincaid in --Reports, &c. , 31st Oct. , 1856,? p. 66
59 A. Redgrave in --Rep. of Insp. of Fact. , 31st. Oct. , 1857,? pp. 41-42. In those industries where the Factory Act proper (not the Print Works Act referred to in the text) has been in force for some time, the obstacles in the way of the education clauses have, in recent years, been overcome. In industries not under the Act, the views of Mr. J. Geddes, a glass manufacturer, still extensively prevail. He informed Mr. White, one of the Inquiry Commissioners: --As far as I can see, the greater amount of education which a part of the working-class has enjoyed for some years past is an evil. It is dangerous, because it makes them independent. ? (--Children's Empl. Comm. , Fourth Report,? Lond. , 1865, p. 253. )
60 --Mr. E. , a manufacturer . . . informed me that he employed females exclusively at his power-looms . . . gives a decided preference to married females, especially those who have families at home dependent on them for support; they are attentive, docile, more so than unmarried females, and are compelled to use their utmost exertions to procure the necessaries of life. Thus are the virtues, the peculiar virtues of the female character to be perverted to her injury - thus all that is most dutiful and tender in her nature is made a means of her bondage and suffering. ? (Ten Hours' Factory Bill. The Speech of Lord Ashley, March 15th, Lond. , 1844, p. 20. )
61 --Since the general introduction of machinery, human nature has been forced far beyond its average strength. ? (Rob. Owen: --Observations on the Effects of the Manufacturing System,? 2nd Ed. , London, 1817. )
62 The English, who have a tendency to look upon the earliest form of appearance of a thing as the cause of its existence, are in the habit of attributing the long hours of work in factories to the extensive kidnapping of children, practised by capitalists in the infancy of the factory system, on workhouses and orphanages, by means of which robbery, unresisting material for exploitation was procured. Thus, for instance, Ficiden, himself a manufacturer, says: --It is evident that the long hours of work were
? ? 333 Chapter 15
brought about by the circumstance of so great a number of destitute children being supplied from different parts of the country, that the masters were independent of the hands, and that having once established the custom by means of the miserable materials they had procured in this way, they could impose it on their neighbours with the greater facility. ? (J. Ficiden: --The Curse of the Factory System,? Lond. , 1836, p. I 1. ) With reference to the labour of women, Saunders, the factory inspector, says in his report of 1844: --Amongst the female operatives there are some women who, for many weeks in succession, except for a few days, are employed from 6 a. in. till midnight, with less than 2 hours for meals, so that on 5 days of the week they have only 6 hours left out of the 24, for going to and from their homes and resting in bed. ?
63 --Occasion. . . injury to the delicate moving parts of metallic mechanism by inaction. ? (Ure, l. c. , p. 281. )
64 The Manchester Spinner (Times, 26th Nov. , 1862) before referred to says in relation to this subject: --It (namely, the --allowance for deterioration of machinery") is also intended to cover the loss which is constantly arising from the superseding of machines before they are worn out, by others of a new and better construction. ?
65 --It has been estimated, roughly, that the first individual of a newly-invented machine will cost about five times as much as the construction of the second. ? (Babbage, l. c. , p. 349.
66 --The improvements which took place not long ago in frames for making patent net were so great that a machine in good repair which had cost ? 1,200, sold a few years after for ? 60 . . . improvements succeeded each other so rapidly, that machines which had never been finished were abandoned in the hands of their makers, because new improvements bad superseded their utility. ? (Babbage, l. c. , p. 233. ) In these stormy, go-ahead times, therefore, the tulle manufacturers soon extended the working day, by means of double sets of hands, from the original 8 hours to 24.
67 --It is self-evident, that, amid the ebbings and flowings of the markets and the alternate expansions and contractions of demand, occasions will constantly recur, in which the manufacturer may employ additional floating capital without employing additional fixed capital. . . if additional quantities of raw material can be worked up without incurring an additional expense for buildings and machinery. ? (R. Torrens: --On Wages and Combination. ? London, 1834, p. 64. )
68 This circumstance is mentioned only for the sake of completeness, for I shall not consider the rate of profit, i. e. , the ratio of the surplus value to the total capital advanced, until I come to the third book.
69 Senior, --Letters on the Factory Act. ? London, 1837, pp. 13, 14.
70 --The great proportion of fixed to circulating capital . . . makes long hours of work desirable. ? With the increased use of machinery, &c. , --the motives to long hours of work will become greater, as the only means by which a large proportion of fixed capital can be made profitable. ? (l. c. , pp. 11-13. ) --There are certain expenses upon a mill which go on in the same proportion whether the mill be running short or full time, as, for instance, rent rates, and taxes, insurance against fire, wages of several permanent servants, deterioration of machinery, with various other charges upon a manufacturing establishment, the proportion of which to profits increases as the production decreases. ? (--Rep. of Insp. of Fact. for 31st Oct. , 1862,? p. 19.
