to the towns where every other requisite for carrying on manufacturing
was more easily obtainable. Here the children of families resident in
the town could be obtained, and the practice of using apprentice
children was largely given up. Many of the same evils, however,
continued to exist here. The practice of beginning to work while
extremely young, long hours, night work, unhealthy surroundings,
proved to be as common among these children to whom the law did not
apply as they had been among the apprentice children. These evils
attracted the attention of several persons of philanthropic feeling.
Robert Owen, especially, a successful manufacturer who had introduced
many reforms in his own mills, collected a large body of evidence as
to the excessive labor and early age of employees in the factories
even where no apprentice labor was engaged. He tried to awaken an
interest in the matter by the publication of a pamphlet on the
injurious consequences of the factory system, and to influence various
members of Parliament to favor the passage of a law intended to
improve the condition of laboring children and young people. In 1815
Sir Robert Peel again brought the matter up in Parliament. A committee
was appointed to investigate the question, and a legislative agitation
was thus begun which was destained to last for many years and to
produce a series of laws which have gradually taken most of the
conditions of employment in large establishments under the control of
the government. In debates in Parliament, in testimony before
government commissions of investigation, in petitions, pamphlets, and
newspapers, the conditions of factory labor were described and
discussed. Successive laws to modify these conditions were introduced
into Parliament, debated at great length, amended, postponed,
reintroduced, and in some cases passed, in others defeated.

*68. Arguments for and against Factory Legislation.*--The need for
regulation which was claimed to exist arose from the long hours of
work which were customary, from the very early age at which many
children were sent to be employed in the factories, and from various
incidents of manufacturing which were considered injurious, or as
involving unnecessary hardship. The actual working hours in the
factories in the early part of the century were from twelve and a half
to fourteen a day. That is to say, factories usually started work in
the morning at 6 o'clock and continued till 12, wh