mains upon the bodies of the children, unwashed off, for any time from a week to a year.

Are the boys generally washed regularly? No, unless they wash themselves. Did not your master take care you were washed? No. Not once in three months? No, not once a year. Did not he find you soap? No; I can take my oath on the Bible that he never found me one piece of soap during the time I was apprentice.' — Lords' Minutes, p. 41.

The life of these poor little wretches is so miserable, that they often lie sulking in the flues, unwilling to come

out.

'Did you ever see severity used to boys that were not obstinate and perverse? Yes. Very often? Yes, very often. The boys are rather obstinate; some of them are; some of them will get half-way up the chimney, and will not go any further, and then the journeyman will swear at them to come down, or go on; but the boys are too frightened to come down; they halloo out, we cannot get up, and they are afraid to come down; sometimes they will send for another boy, and drag them down; sometimes get up to the top of the chimney, and throw down. water, and drive them down; then, when they get them down, they will begin to drag, or beat, or kick them about the house; then, when they get home, the master will beat them all round the kitchen afterwards, and give them no breakfast perhaps.' Lords' Minutes, pp. 9, 10.

When a chimney boy has done sufficient work for the master, he must work for the man; and he thus becomes for several hours after his morning's work a perquisite to the journeyman.

It is frequently the perquisite of the journeyman, when the first labour of the day on account of the master is finished, to "call the streets," in search of employment on their own account, with the apprentices, whose labour is thus unreasonably extended, and whose limbs are weakened and distorted by the weights which they have to carry, and by the distance which they have to walk. John Lawless says, "I have known a boy to climb from twenty to thirty chimneys for his master in the morning; he has then been sent out instantly with the journeyman, who has kept him out till three or four o'clock, till he has accumulated from six to eight bushels of soot." Lords' Report, p. 24.

9

The sight of a little chimney sweeper often excites pity: and they have small presents made to them at the houses where they sweep. These benevolent alms are disposed of in the following manner:

Do the boys receive little presents of money from people often in your trade? Yes, it is in general the custom. Are they allowed to keep that for their own use? Not the whole of it, the journeymen take what they think proper. The journeymen are entitled to half by the master's orders; and whatever a boy may get, if two boys and one journeyman are sent to a large house to sweep a number of chimneys, and after they have done, there should be a shilling, or eighteen-pence given to the boys, the journeyman has his full half, and the two boys in general have the other. Is it usual or customary for the journeyman to play at chuck farthing or other games with the boys? Frequently. Do they win the money from the boys? Frequently; the children give their money to the journeymen to screen for them. What do you mean by screening? Such a thing as sifting the soot. The child is tired, and he says, "Jem, I will give you twopence if you will sift my share of the soot; " there is sometimes twenty or thirty bushels to sift. - Do you think the boys retain one quarter of that given them for their own use? No.' Lords' Minutes, p. 35.

To this most horrible list of calamities is to be added the dreadful deaths by which chimney sweepers are often destroyed. Of these we once thought of giving two examples; one from London, the other from our own town of Edinburgh: but we confine ourselves to the latter.

James Thomson, chimney sweeper. - One day in the beginning of June, witness and panel (that is, the master, the party accused), had been sweeping vents together. About four o'clock in the afternoon, the panel proposed to go to Albany Street, where the panel's brother was cleaning a vent, with the assistance of Fraser, whom he had borrowed from the panel for the occasion. When witness and panel got to the house in Albany Street, they found Fraser, who had gone up the vent, between eleven and twelve o'clock, not yet come down. On entering the house they found a mason making a hole in the wall. Panel said, what was he doing? I suppose he has taken a lazy fit. The panel called to the boy, "What are you doing? what's

keeping you?" The boy answered that he could not come. The panel worked a long while, sometimes persuading him, sometimes threatening and swearing at the boy, to get him down. Panel then said, "I will go to a hardware shop and get a barrel of gunpowder, and blow you and the vent to the devil, if you do not come down." Panel then began to slap at the wall — witness then went up a ladder, and spoke to the boy through a small hole in the wall previously made by the mason—but the boy did not answer. Panel's brother told witness to come down, as the boy's master knew best how to manage him. Witness then threw off his jacket, and put a handkerchief about his head, and said to the panel, " Let me go up the chimney to see what's keeping him." The panel made no answer, but pushed witness away from the chimney, and continued bullying the boy. At this time the panel was standing on the grate, so that witness could not go up the chimney; witness then said to panel's brother, "There is no use for me here," meaning, that panel would not permit him to use his services. He prevented the mason making the hole larger, saying, Stop, and I'll bring him down in five minutes' time. Witness then put on his jacket, and continued an hour in the room, during all which time the panel continued bullying the boy. Panel then desired witness to go to Reid's house to get the loan of his boy Alison. Witness went to Reid's house, and asked Reid to come and speak to panel's brother. Reid asked if panel was there? Witness answered he was; Reid said he would send his boy to the panel, but not to the panel's brother. Witness and Reid went to Albany Street; and when they got into the room, panel took his head out of the chimney and asked Reid if he would lend him his boy; Reid agreed; witness then returned to Reid's house for his boy, and Reid called after him, "Fetch down a set of ropes with you." By this time witness had been ten minutes in the room, during which time panel was swearing, and asking "What's keeping you, you scoundrel?" When witness returned with the boy and ropes, Reid took hold of the rope, and, having loosed it, gave Alison one end, and directed him to go up the chimney, saying, "Do not go farther than his feet, and when you get there fasten it to his foot." Panel said nothing all this time. Alison went up, and having fastened the rope, Reid desired him to come down; Reid took the rope and pulled, but did not bring down the boy; the rope broke! Alison was sent up again with the other end of the rope, which was fastened to the boy's foot. When Reid was pulling the rope, panel said, "You have not the strength of a cat;" he took the rope into his own hands, pulling as strong as he could. Having pulled about a quarter of an hour,

panel and Reid fastened the rope round a crow bar, which they applied to the wall as a lever, and both pulled with all their strength for about a quarter of an hour longer, when it broke. During this time witness heard the boy cry, and say, "My God Almighty!" Panel said, "If I had you here, I would God Almighty you." Witness thought the cries were in agony. The master of the house brought a new piece of rope, and the panel's brother spliced an eye on it. Reid expressed a wish to have it fastened on both thighs, to have greater purchase. Alison was sent up for this purpose, but came down, and said he could not get it fastened. Panel then began to slap at the wall. After striking a long while at the wall he got out a large stone; he then put in his head and called to Fraser, "Do you hear, you sir?" but got no answer: he then put in his hands, and threw down deceased's breeches. He then came down from the ladder. At this time the panel was in a state of perspiration : he sat down on a stool, and the master of the house gave him a dram. Witness did not hear panel make any remarks as to the situation of the boy Fraser. Witness thinks, that, from panel's appearance, he knew the boy was dead.'— Commons' Report, pp. 136-138.

We have been thus particular in stating the case of the chimney sweepers, and in founding it upon the basis of facts, that we may make an answer to those profligate persons who are always ready to fling an air of ridicule upon the labours of humanity, because they are desirous that what they have not virtue to do themselves, should appear to be foolish and romantic when done by others. A still higher degree of depravity than this, is to want, every sort of compassion for human misery, when it is accompanied by filth, poverty, and ignorance, to regulate humanity by the income tax, and to deem the bodily wretchedness and the dirty tears of the poor a fit subject for pleasantry and contempt. We should have been loath to believe, that such deep-seated and disgusting immorality existed in these days; but the notice of it is forced upon us. Nor must we pass over a set of marvellously weak gentlemen, who discover democracy and revolution in every effort to improve the condition of the lower orders, and to take off a little of the load of misery from those points where it presses the

hardest. Such are the men into whose heart Mrs. Fry has struck the deepest terror, who abhor Mr. Bentham and his penitentiary; Mr. Bennet and his hulks; Sir James Mackintosh and his bloodless assizes; Mr. Tooke and his sweeping machines, and every other human being who is great and good enough to sacrifice his quiet to his love for his fellow creatures. Certainly we admit that humanity is sometimes the veil of ambition or of faction; but we have no doubt that there are a great many excellent persons to whom it is misery to see misery, and pleasure to lessen it; and who, by calling the public attention to the worst cases, and by giving birth to judicious legislative enactments for their improvement, have made, and are making, the world somewhat happier than they found it. Upon these principles we join hands with the friends of the chimney sweepers, and most heartily wish for the diminution of their numbers, and the limitation of their trade.

We are thoroughly convinced there are many respectable master chimney sweepers; though we suspect their numbers have been increased by the alarm which their former tyranny excited, and by the severe laws made for their coercion: but even with good masters the trade is miserable, with bad ones it is not to be endured; and the evidence already quoted shows us how many of that character are to be met with in the occupation of sweeping chimneys.

After all, we must own that it was quite right to throw out the bill for prohibiting the sweeping of chimneys by boys-because humanity is a modern invention; and there are many chimneys in old houses which cannot possibly be swept in any other manner. But the con

struction of chimneys should be attended to in some new building act; and the treatment of boys be watched over with the most severe jealousy of the law. Above all, those who have chimneys accessible to machinery, should encourage the use of machines*, and not think it beneath

*The price of a machine is fifteen shillings.