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WIIILE engaged in preparing a small treatise, rc Tho State in its
lielation to Labour,” my attention has been strongly called
auew to tho importance of the question of the employment of
married women in factories and workshops. The bearing of
the question is, of course, instantly seen when it is considered
that every mother so employed abandons her infants and
young children for ten hours in the day to the care of other,
usually careless hands. The subject has long been one of
chronic controversy in the manufacturing districts, especially
in Manchester, whero it is every now and then debated in the
nowapapers and public societies, In the “Transactions of the
Manchester Statistical Society,” especially, will be found a
series of papers on tho seven1 phases of the matter, by tho
late Dr. Georgo Greaves, Mrs. M. A. Baines, Dr. Noble,
Dr. Syson, Mr. T’. R. W7ilkinson, and others.
The Manchester Sanitary Association is ever registering
and considering the infant mortality of the district. Almost
every volume of the ‘tTransactions of the Social Science
Association ’’ contains papers more or less directly bearing on
tho subjeot. The Reports of the Factory Inspectors, especially
thoso of Mr. Baker, have recorded from time to time the most
valaable facta, as well as the inferences and reflections of the
Inspectors ; and there are various other official pnblications to
be presently mentioned, in which the question has been almost
‘‘ Contemporary Review,” January, 1W2