s about half an hour's bakehouse work
in the way of getting coals, cleaning biscuit tins, brushing up, &c.
When this is done, all, with the exception of the foreman, who will have
to look in and make the sponge at eight P.M., are free until the
commencement of their most untimely work at midnight.

On Sunday, the work in this particular bakehouse is comparatively nil.
The ovens have to be started on Sunday morning; but this the master does
himself, and puts in the ferment, so that there is only the sponge to
be made in the evening--a brief hour's job, taken on alternate Sundays
by the foreman and the second hand. The "undersellers," my informant
told me, made large sums by Sunday bakings, often covering their rent by
them, so that their abandonment would be a serious question; but there
was little in the way of Sabbath-breaking in my typical bakehouse. As
there were no Sunday bakings, Saturday was a rather harder day than
others, there being a general scrub-up of the premises. The work, my
informant thought, could be condensed by judicious co-operation, and the
"four to four" rule might be adopted in some establishments, but by no
means in all--as, for instance, where there was a speciality for rolls
and fancy bread. It seems, as usual, that the difficulties thicken, not
about the necessaries, but about the luxuries and kickshaws of life. The
master relieved my immediate fears by saying that he scarcely imagined
matters would come to a crisis. There was this difference between the
building and the baking trades, that all the master bakers had been
journeymen themselves, and were thus able to sympathize with the men's
difficulties. They were not, he seemed to think, disposed to haggle over
a few shillings; but he added, "This is not a question of labour against
capital only, but of labour against capital plus labour. I could," he
said, "if my men left me on the 21st, make bread enough myself to
supply all my customers, only they would have to fetch it for
themselves."

Thus my worst fears were relieved. If it only came to going out for my
loaf, and even foregoing French rolls, I could face that like a man; so
I paced the streets gaily in the morning air and arrived home safely
some time after the milk, and about the same hour as those rolls
themselves whose hitherto unguessed history I had so far fathomed by my
brief experiences in the bakehouse.

CHAPTER VIII.

A LONDON SLAVE MARKET.

There is a story call