Page:The Economic Journal Volume 1.djvu/493

 WOMEN'S WORK IN LEEDS 471 sider circumstances, trivial in themselves, but affecting the happi- ness of the women considerably, often sufficient to turn the balance in fayour of home work for them, and against factory work. The exceptionally faroarable position of Leeds, its easy access to Hull and Liverpool, its proximity to coal and iron mines, its position as the centre of the cloth trade, have all combined to attract wholesale clothiers from Scotland and from other English towns. The great diversity of skilled men's labour ensures the existence of a class of girls whose work is more likely to be efficient than that of the (laughters of unskilled labourers. Four large factories have been established by Glasgow firms. The wages earned by machinists and finishers in Glasgow are con- siderably less than the wages earned in Leeds, but Leeds supplies a better class of labour, which is really less costly than that of Glasgow. The results of a small census of girls working in a wholesale clothin factory give some notion' of the classes from which this new industry has been recruited. The willingness to satisfy abstract curiosity is not universal; nearly $00 cards were given back to me in sealed envelopes of which nearly 300 were blank; a few conveyed an intimation of the writer's opinion of the impertinence of the questions, and 479 answered carefully and accurately except on one point. Several stated that their mothers before marriage had had no occupation, but a large number merely left a blank, and, although I believe, that this was considered as equivalent to 'no occupation' or 'at home,' this cannot be assumed. Tailoes aged ........ Lets .............. Yorkshire .......... BIRTHPLACES OF 5 & upwards. 20 25. 16 20. 18 16. Total. 87 71 127 95 830 22 22 48 14 101 England .......... 16 118 111 6 8 Wales .. -- Ireland ... I I 67 108 186 118 479 Fathers of above Leeds .............. Yorkshire .......... England .......... Wales .. Ireland .. 17 33 64 42 156 24 35 67 45 171 10 23 37 15 85 -- 2 I 3 I I 3 5 I 3 3 2 9 Total .......... 52 97 172 109 430