"It has been already stated, that although the whole population of the town of Wolverhampton and the neighborhood, of all ranks, are engaged in the different manufactures of the place, yet that there are few manufactories of large size, the work being commonly carried on in small workshops. Those workshops are usually situated at the backs of the houses, there being very few in the front of a street; so that the places where the children and the great body of the operatives are employed are completely out of sight, in narrow courts, unpaved yards, and blind alleys. In the smaller and dirtier streets of the town, in which the poorest of the working classes reside, 'there are narrow passages, at intervals of every eight or ten houses, and sometimes at every third or fourth house. These narrow passages are also the general gutter, which is by no means always confined to one side, but often streaming all over the passage. Having made your way through the passage, you find yourself in a space varying in size with the number of houses, hutches, or hovels it contains. They are nearly all proportionately crowded. Out of this space there are other narrow passages, sometimes leading to other similar hovels. The workshops and houses are mostly built on a little elevation sloping towards the passage.'"--(Second Report, p. 33.) The most painful portions, however, of the Report on the metal manufactures, are those which relate to the treatment of the children and apprentices at Willenhall, near Wolverhampton, and to the noxious influences of those departments which are carried on at Sheffield.--(P. 83.) "455. The district which requires special notice on account of the general and almost incredible abuse of the children, is that of Wolverhampton and the neighborhood. In the town of Wolverhampton itself, among the large masters children are not punished with severity, and in some of the trades, as among the japanners, they are not beaten at all; but, on the other hand, in the nail and tip manufactories, in some of the founderies, and among the very numerous class of small masters generally, the punishments are harsh and cruel; and in some cases they can only be designated as ferocious. "456. In Willenhall the children are shamefully and most cruelly beaten with a horsewhip, strap, stick, hammer handle, file, or whatever tool is nearest at hand, or are struck with the clenched fist or kicked.