It is evident, however, that, with all its defects, the law has brought about a great alleviation of the evil of children's overwork. The officer appointed for the execution of the act has been in correspondence with all the manufacturers of the State, and has visited their works. This has at once called the earnest attention of the employers of Massachusetts, who are a very intelligent and philanthropic class, to the extent of this great evil. They have immediately sought for themselves to remedy it. Some of them have established half-time schools, which they require all the children in their employ to attend; and their experience here is similar to that in England-that they secure thereby a much better class of workers. Others arrange double gangs of young operatives, so that one set may take the place of another in the factory while the latter are in school. Others, again, have founded night schools, and great numbers of the young factory laborers are trained in these. The law is considered throughout Massachusetts as having been the commencement of a great and much-needed reform.

The act passed in Rhode Island (Chapter 139) is very similar to that of Massachusetts, except that no child under twelve can be employed in any factory, and no child during the nine months of factory-work is allowed to be employed more than eleven hours per day. The penalty for the violation is only twenty dollars.

Connecticut is in advance in matters of educational reform. Her citizens early saw the terrible evil from children's overwork, and the Legislature passed acts against it as early as 1842. The final and most stringent law, however, passed on this subject in Connecticut was in 1869 (Chapter 115). This law includes agricultural as well as manufacturing labor, and it throws on the employer the responsibility of ascertaining whether the children employed have attended school the required time, or whether they are too young for labor. The rules, too, in regard to school attendance are exceedingly strict. The age at which three months' school-time is required is fourteen. The penalty for each offense is one hundred dollars.

The law, however, is defective in that it does not establish the lowest age under which a child maybe employed in a factory, and does not limit the number of hours of labor per week for children in manufacturing establishments.

The manufacturers of Connecticut seem to have co-operated with the law with the utmost good sense and humanity. One of them writes to the State executive officer: "We do not dare to permit the children within and around our mills to grow up without some education. Better for us to pay the school expenses ourselves than have he children in ignorance." Others have followed the example of Massachusetts manufacturers, and have opened night schools and half-time schools for their little employés, while others have permitted the division of the children into alternate gangs, of whom one is in school while the other is in the factory.

It is difficult to obtain minute or accurate information in relation to children employed in factories in New York city, and more difficult still to gain access to the factories, owing to the reluctance of employers to admit strangers. The manufacturers naturally suspect some sinister motives on the part of the inquirers. They are jealous of one another, and desirous of keeping their various patents and modes of work secret from