Up to this date violation of its provisions had been incessant; but
determined enforcement brought about a uniform working day, protection
of dangerous machinery, proper ventilation, improved sanitary
conditions, an interdict on Sunday labor, and many other reforms in
administration. Fourteen years have seen next to no change in the Act,
and the condition of women and child workers in factories and workshops
has come to be regarded as the best that modern systems of production
admit. These workers, whose numbers now mount to hundreds of thousands,
are a class apart, and for them legislation has accomplished all that
legislation seems able to do in alleviating social miseries. Content
with the results achieved, need of further effort in other directions
failed of recognition, and apathy became the general condition.
It was during this season of repose that the public mind received first
one shock and then another. "The Bitter Cry of Outcast London" appalled
all who read; and leaf by leaf the new book of revelations disclosed
always deeper depths of misery and want among all workers with the
needle,--from the days of the fig-leaf the symbol of grinding toil and
often hopeless misery.
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