SIX MONTHS IN MEXICO. 217 



The wretched system in which public ma- 

 nufactories are conducted is of itself sufficient 

 to disgust even the lowest and most degraded 

 of the human species. Instead of encouraging 

 the love of labour and industry, as the means 

 of obtaining comfort, wealth, and enjoyment, 

 it is here accompanied only by slavery, po- 

 verty, and misery. 



Every manufactory that requires many 

 hands is strictly a prison, from which the 

 wretched inmates cannot remove, but are 

 treated with the utmost rigour. Many of 

 them are really confined for a number of 

 years for crimes against the laws ; and others, 

 by borrowing a sum of money from the 

 owners, pledge their persons and their labours 

 till they redeem it, which it often happens is 

 never done. The proprietor, instead of 

 paying in money, supplies them with spirits, 

 tobacco, &c, and by these means they in- 

 crease, rather than liquidate, the original debt. 



