Mexico Missouri Message

WORKERS FINED FOR PETTY OFFENSES.

At a recent official inquiry into factory conditions in England the evidence showed some queer instances of petty tyranny upon the part of employers.

In a cotton mill, should a weaver do the most trifling injury to a piece of cloth he has to pay for the whole piece. This may swallow his entire week's wages; but there is this to be said: He gets the cloth, and at wholesale price, and may cut it up and sell it to his neighbors.

It is pieceworkers, especially those employed in the hosiery and tailoring trades, who suffer most severely from the fine system. Workers are in many cases forced to purchase all work which does not exactly comply with the directions given.

A collarmaker made a slight error in the stitching of 12 dozen collars. The unfortunate woman was forced to buy them all at a cost of over $5.

The question of the living rooms of shop assistants was also gone into, and here again was disclosed a system of fines of the most cruel description. In a large number of cases the food and accommodations are poor, the wages low, and the code of rules and fines most strict and exacting.

To give a few examples of shop law. No pictures are allowed on the walls; all bedrooms must be cleared by 8 a. m.; no flowers may be put in water glasses; all lights must be out by 11 o'clock; no matches or candles are allowed. For not turning out the gas in a bedroom the fine is 25 cents.

In one drapery house a mistake in a bill entails a fine of 10 cents; talking to a girl in another department is punished by a similar fine.

In one factory, it was said, girls are actually fined for sneezing.