"'Will you explain these circumstances?' 'The great object in a cotton mill is to turn as much work off as possible, in order to compensate by quantity for the smallness of the profit. To that end every thing is made subservient. There are two classes of superintendents in those establishments. The first class are what are called managers, from their great power and authority. Their especial business is to watch over the whole concern, and constantly to attend to the quantity and quality of the yarn, &c. turned off. To these individuals the second class, called overlookers, are immediately responsible for whatever is amiss. The business of overlookers is to attend to particular rooms and classes of hands, for the individual conduct of which they are held responsible. These individuals, in some mills, are paid in proportion to the quantity of work turned off; in all, they are made responsible for that quantity, as well as for the quality; and as the speed of each particular machine is known, nothing is more easy than to calculate the quantity which it ought to produce. This quantity is the maximum; the minimum allowed is the least possible deficiency, certain contingencies being taken into account. In those mills in which the overlookers are paid in proportion to the quantity of work turned off, interest secures the closest attention to the conduct of every individual under them; and in other mills, fear of losing their places operates to produce the same effect. It is one continual system of driving; and, in order to turn off as great a quantity of work as is possible, the manager drives the overlookers, and the overlookers drive the men. Every spinner knows that he must turn off the average quantity of work which his wheels are capable of producing, or lose his place if deficiencies are often repeated; and consequently, the piecers and scavengers are drilled, in their turns, to the severest attention. On their constant attention, as well as his own, depends the quantity of work done. So that it is not an exaggeration to say, that their powers of labour are subjected to the severity of an undeviating exaction. A working man is estimated in these establishments in proportion to his physical capacity rather than his moral character, and therefore it is not difficult to infer what must be the consequences. It begets a system of debasing tyranny in almost every department, the most demoralizing in its effects. Kind words are godsends in many cotton factories, and oaths and blows the usual order of the day. The carder must produce the required quantity of drawing and roving; the spinner, the required quantity of yarn; a system of overbearing tyranny is adopted toward everybody under them; they are cursed into the