In the Christmas number of 1879 he tells the life story of George Smith, of Coalville, who began life as a poor lad in the brickfields; worked his way up to the post of foreman and manager; and then devoted his life to calling attention to the cruel overwork and ill-treatment of the children whose labour he had once shared. In spite of neglect, opposition, and obloquy, he secured the passing of an Act which brought these hopeless little outcasts under the eye of Inspectors, limited their hours of labour, and secured them some measure of teaching. Though his action gave grievous offence and he lost his job, he set to work to render a similar service to the children of the bargees, and was the main agent in passing a law for the registration and inspection of canal boats. In these labours he sacrificed not only his time, but his means, and _Punch_ appealed to his readers to contribute to the support of "this practical preacher of good will to man, this friend of the friendless, this helper of those who, till he came, had none to help them." [Illustration: CRAMMING VERSUS "CLEMMING"! BOARD-SCHOOL MASTER: "Now then, boys, we must get to work again!" ADVANCED SCHOLAR: "Please, Sir--mayn't we have somethin' to relieve the craving of 'unger fust?"] In 1881 the hard time of boys in attendance on weighing machines, said to be on duty for thirteen or fourteen hours a day, aroused _Punch's_ sympathy and ire. Invention, however, rather than philanthropy, furnished a remedy in the "automatics." In the same year _Punch's_ appeal for the fund to provide poor children with country holidays, embodied in "The Children's Cry," enabled him to forward £280 to the promoters. In 1885 the "almost formidable success" achieved by the experiment of Poor Children's Play-Rooms, in the parish of St. Martin's-in-the-Fields, delighted his heart. In 1888, _Punch_, in "Cramming _versus_ 'Clemming'" emphasizes the need of providing free meals for poor children. At the very end of the period under review in this volume I have come across a notice of a book purporting to show up the cruelties practised on young people and animals in training them for acrobatic performances. The book was poor as literature, but if true called for searching inquiry. Children have, we may safely assume, been long safeguarded from the mishandling alleged to have been possible in 1892; but at the moment of writing these lines--August 11, 1921--an inquiry is being held into the treatment of animals by showmen and conjurers. Nor was _Punch_ less concerned with the conditions of women workers. In his "Dream of Fair Women" suggested by factory inspectors' reports in 1875, he points to lack of combination among women as the incentive to slave-driving on the part of "foggers". He prefaces a set of verses in October with a passage from a Report on the Black Country:--