2446. There is another entry of 11s. 3d, for meal: would that be paid to Smith or to the woman Sinclair?-I think it was paid to herself. 2447. Then why is it entered in your book as being for meal?- Very often we did that in order to distinguish the things she wanted the cash for, and to keep a check on them. For instance, they might come in and ask cash from me and they would receive it. 2448. But why should you wish to keep a check on them in a case like that?-I don't know. 2449. Had you any interest in the way in which the woman was to spend her money?-No; but if we paid cash to a person for one of these women, we marked it down as having been paid. 2450. Then when you put down this sum of 11s. 3d. for meal, did that mean that you had paid the money to Smith or to some other meal-dealer, or that you had paid the money to Mary Ann Sinclair herself?-I cannot recollect. 2451. I only want you to explain, if possible, or to suggest an explanation if you don't remember, about how it happened that that entry was made for meal. If the woman got it in cash, would it not be simply marked down as cash?-I don't remember about that. She might have got the meal from Smith, and paid him the money at any time. She may have told us that she had to pay Smith an account, and asked us to pay it for her. That is the only explanation I can give of it. Sometimes she would ask to get a little meal; and as we did not have meal, we would tell her to go to anyone she liked and get it, and we would pay the party for it. I may say, at the same time, that I did not have a fraction upon that. There was no compact about in between me and the man who supplied her with the meal. We just paid her account to him in cash. 2452. You don't remember either of these payments?-No; I cannot remember them. 2453 Do you know whether such entries are frequent in your books?-They are not; there is no occasion for them being frequent. 2454. Does a woman often come and say to you, 'I want some money to pay for meal or some groceries, and I wish you would give me so much?'-No; I have no recollection of any other case than the one which [Page 52] has been referred to. There may have been cases in which, when selling an article, they may have asked for a few shillings for themselves, and where they may have mentioned what they wanted it for; but with regard to Mary Ann Sinclair's case, to the best of my recollection, this was just an account which I paid for her to a meal-dealer that she was owing it to. 2455. You say that some of your knitters don't have pass-books at all?-The majority of them have. 2456. In that case, the only account kept with them is the one entered in your work-book?-Yes; but whenever we settle, we carefully read over all the items to them and if they take any objection to them, of course they get some explanation. 2457. The work-book you have produced is the current one?- Yes.