to the diminished day’s work, and abolished systematic overtime, as they were required to do, there is no reason to suppose the dictation would have ended. Success would have presently led to still more exacting requirements; and future years would have witnessed further extensions of this mischievous meddling between capital and labour. Perhaps the completest illustration of the industrial regulations which find favour with artizans, is supplied by the Printers’ Union. With the exception of those engaged in _The Times_ office, and in one other large establishment, the proprietors of which successfully resisted the combination, the compositors, pressmen, etc., throughout the kingdom, form a society which controls all the relations between employers and employed. There is a fixed price for setting up type—so much per thousand letters: no master can give less; no compositor being allowed by the Union to work for less. There are established rates for press-work; and established numbers less than which you cannot have printed without paying for work that is not done. The scale rises by what are called “tokens” of 250; and if but 50 copies are required, the charge is the same as for printing 250; or if 300 are wanted, payment must be made for 500. Besides regulating prices and modes of charging to their own advantage, in these and other ways, the members of the Union restrict competition by limiting the number of apprentices brought into the business. So well organized is this combination that the masters are obliged to succumb. An infraction of the rules in any {365} printing-office leads to a strike of the men; and as this is supported by the Union at large, the employer has to yield. That in other trades artizans would, if they could, establish restrictive systems equally complete with this, we take to be sufficiently proved by their often-repeated attempts. The Tin-plate-Workers’ strike, the Coventry-Weavers’ strikes, the Engineers’ strike, the Shoemakers’ strike, the Builders’ strike, all show a most decided leaning towards a despotic regulation of trade-prices, hours, and arrangements—towards an abolition of free trade between employers and employed. Should the men engaged in our various industries succeed in their aims, each industry would be so shackled as seriously to raise the cost of production. The chief penalty would thus fall on the working classes themselves. Each producer, while protected in the exercise of his own occupation, would on every commodity he bought have to pay an extra price, consequent on the protection of other producers. In short, there would be established, under a new form, the old mischievous system of mutual taxation. And a final result would be such a diminished ability to compete with other nations as to destroy our foreign trade.