LONDON WORKERS, SECULARISTS, ETC. 95 



remain as manager, and name his own salary. This he de- 

 clined, soon found another offer, built new mills, and carried 

 them on successfully for several years, till, in the year 1800, 

 he became partner and sole manager of the New Lanark mills, 

 and married the daughter of Mr. Dale, the former pro- 

 prietor. 



Gradually, for many years, he had been elaborating his 

 theory of human nature, and longing for an opportunity of 

 putting his ideas in practice. And now he had got his oppor- 

 tunity. He had an extensive factory and workshops, with a 

 village of about two thousand inhabitants all employed in the 

 works, which, with about two hundred acres of surrounding 

 land, belonged to the company. The character of the workers 

 at New Lanark is thus described by Mr. W. L. Sargant in his 

 work " Robert Owen and his Social Philosophy," when describ- 

 ing the establishment of the mills about fifteen years before 

 Owen acquired them : " To obtain a supply of adult labourers 

 a village was built round the works, and the houses were let at 

 a low rent ; but the business was so unpopular that few, except 

 the bad, the unemployed, and the destitute, would settle there. 

 Even of such ragged labourers the numbers were insufficient ; 

 and these, when they had learned their trade and become 

 valuable, were self-willed and insubordinate." Besides these, 

 there were about five hundred children, chiefly obtained from 

 the workhouses of Edinburgh and other large towns, who were 

 apprenticed for seven years from the age of six to eight, and 

 these were lodged and boarded in a large building erected for 

 the purpose by the former owner, Mr. Dale, and was well 

 managed. But these poor children had to work from six in 

 the morning to seven in the evening (with an hour and three- 

 quarters for meals) ; and it was only after this task was over 

 that instruction began. The poor children hated their slavery ; 

 many absconded ; some were stunted, and even dwarfed in 

 stature; and when the apprenticeship expired at the ages of 

 thirteen to fifteen, they commonly went off to Glasgow or Edin- 

 burgh, with no natural guardians, and trained for swelling the 

 mass of vice and misery in the towns. " The condition of the 

 families who had immigrated to the village was also very la- 



