The institution of factory inspection does not as yet exist in the whole Union. According to the report of Mrs. v. Vorst[24] the factories and the homes of laborers in the Southern States are extremely unsatisfactory. Child labor is exploited there, a matter which is now being dealt with by the National Child Labor Committee. According to this same work (the inquiry of Mrs. v. Vorst) the living conditions in the North and Central States are better, and the moral menaces to the young girl are inconsiderable. The women of the property-holding classes are attempting to do their duty toward the women of the factories and stores by founding clubs, vacation colonies, and homes for them. Within recent years the great department stores have appointed "social secretaries," who look after the weal and woe of the employees. It would be well to have such secretaries in the factories and mills also. Since 1874 the working week of sixty hours for women in industry and commerce has spread from Massachusetts to almost the entire Union. Since 1890, night labor has been prohibited by law. The working girls have been provided with seats while at work, partly as a result of legislation and partly by the voluntary act of the employers. In agriculture women find a profitable field of activity. Of course they are never field hands, but are employers and laborers in the dairy business, in poultry farming, and in the raising of vegetables and fruit. Women have introduced the growing of cress, cranberries, and cucumbers in various regions, and have cultivated the famous asparagus of Oyster Bay and the "Improved New York Strawberries." In 1900, there were 980,025 women engaged in agriculture (as compared with 9,458,194 men). The number of women domestic servants in the United States amounts to 2,099,165; fifty per cent of the families dispense with servants, since they cannot afford to pay $15 to $20 a month for a servant, or $30 for a cook. Educated women, called visiting housekeepers, undertake the supervision of some of the households of the better class, aided, of course, by help in the house. The legal status of the American women is regulated by 52 sets of laws, corresponding to the number of states and territories. The civil code is unfavorable to woman in most of the states. In the National Trade Union League (New York) the Reverend Anna Shaw declared recently that in 38 states the property laws made "joint property holding" legal, as a result of which the wife has no independent control of her personal earnings or her personal effects, _e.g._ her clothes. In 38 states the wife also has no legal authority over her children. For full particulars the reader is referred to Volume IV of the _History of Woman's Suffrage_. To an increasing extent the women are using their right to administer their property independently, and the men are usually proud of the business ability and success of their wives.