WHAT SHALL WE DO? 357 



grades of clothing (which I begin seriously to doubt) 

 at home and here, the bulk of English potters, accord- 

 ing to their own statements, have but 50 cents a week 

 to invest, aside from actual cost of keeping body and 

 soul together." 



From Leeds, in the great woolen district, Mr. Por- 

 ter writes, under date of January 23, 1873 : - 



" Some of the most trustworthy of Bradford's man- 

 ufacturers assured me that young persons from thir- 

 teen to eighteen years of age never earned more than 

 12s. (less than $3) a week, and that they descended 

 as low as 6s. (less than $1 50) a week for fifty-six 

 hours of steady, confining, dusty, tedious work, and 

 that men varied in their earnings from 15s., 18s., to 

 20s. (from $3 75 to $5), but that the latter was 

 exceptional, he said. And this with a family to 

 maintain. 



" And so toiling and sorrowing, with no future and 

 little hope, contented to live and die in the shadow 

 of these giant factories, with little or no chance to 

 better themselves ; fixtures, in fact, around the mills, 

 as the peasants were to the land in the feudal times, 

 the English operatives slave on, while the mill owner 

 discusses in the club how he can produce an article a 

 farthing cheaper per yard. The idea of cheapness per- 

 vades the whole kingdom. It is all some people seem 

 to live for. There is no limit to it. The struggle for 

 cheapness sometimes brings ruin to the mill owner 

 and starvation to the operatives. But for all that 

 the struggle goes on. For example, when in Scot- 

 land, in December, I travelled in some cases for less 



