sition, and attempt to reform their ways.
But the necessities of capital on the one side, and the wants of poverty
on the other, soon put the children again at the loom, the machine, and
the bench, and the result is--masses of little ones, bent and wan with
early trial, and growing up mere machines of labor. England has found
the evil terrible, and, during the past ten or fifteen years, has been
legislating incessantly against it; protecting helpless infancy from the
tyranny of capital and the greed of poverty, and securing a fair growth
of body and mind for the children of the laboring poor.

There is something extremely touching in these Night-schools, in the
eagerness of the needy boys and girls who have been toiling all day, to
pick up a morsel of knowledge or gain a practical mental accomplishment.
Their occupations are legion. The following are extracts from a recent
report of one of our visitors on this subject. At the Crosby-street
School, he says:--

"There were some hundred children; their occupations were as follows:
They put up insect-powder, drive wagons, tend oyster-saloons; are
tinsmiths, engravers, office-boys, in type-founderies, at screws, in
blacksmith-shops; make cigars, polish, work at packing tobacco, in
barber-shops, at paper-stands; are cashboys, light porters, make
artificial flowers, work at hair; are errand-boys, make ink, are in
Singer's sewing-machine factory, and printing-offices; some post bills,
some are paint-scrapers, some peddlers; they pack snuff, attend
poultry-stands at market, in shoe-stores and hat-stores, tend stands,
and help painters and carpenters.

"At the Fifth-ward School (No. 141 Hudson Street), were fifty boys and
girls. One of them, speaking of her occupation, said: 'I work at
feathers, cutting the feathers from cock's tails. It is a very busy time
now. They took in forty new hands today. I get three dollars and fifty
cents a week; next week I'll get more. I go to work at eight o'clock and
leave off at six. The feathers are cut from the stem, then steamed, and
curled, and packed. They are sent then to Paris, but more South and
West.' One boy said he worked at twisting twine; another drove a
'hoisting-horse,' another blacked boots, etc.

"At the Eleventh-ward School, foot of East Eleventh Street, there was an
interesting class of boys and girls under thirteen years of age. One boy
said he was employed during the day in making chains of beads, and says
that a number of