MINOR EMPLOYMENTS.
Reading edition
524. United States.
A little boy told me he used to catch butterflies, and sell them in New York at a penny apiece for canary birds. Sometimes he would get one hundred a day; and at other times, not as many a week. Some women are seen on the streets of our large cities, selling baskets, brushes, sponges, and wash leather—and many with baskets containing tape, cord, pins, &c. Some women buy waste paper to sell to grocers, butchers, fishmongers, and such others as would use it for wrapping. A few resort to levees and warehouses to seek the scraps of waste cotton that are lost by the removal of bales. Some collect ashes, separate the cinders, wash and sell them; while some collect wood scattered about lumber yards, and catch that drifting in rivers.
525. England.
Some children on the streets of London are employed in the sale of fly-papers. Some sell paper cuttings to ornament ceilings. Sand is sold on the streets for scouring and for birds—also gravel for birds. Some women, in London, go around and buy the skins of rabbits and hares to sell again, and some keep little shops where they buy kitchen stuff, grease, and dripping. In England, women are hired to pick currants and gooseberries, put up fruit, weed gardens, bind grain, pick hops, and sometimes even to cut hay and dig potatoes. On the streets of London, some women sell conundrums and playbills, which are pinned to a large screen, and a number sell stationery. In old countries nothing is lost. Use is found for every article, even when no longer of value for its original purpose. For instance, old tin kettles and coal scuttles, we learn from Mr. Babbage, are cut up for the bottoms and bands of trunks, and by manufacturing chemists in preparing a black dye used by calico printers. In some cities of the old countries, every variety of second-hand miscellaneous articles are sold in shops, from a Jew's harp to a bedstead. In London, Mayhew says: "Among the mudlarks may be seen many old women, and it is indeed pitiable to behold them, especially during the winter, bent nearly double with age and infirmity, paddling and groping among the wet mud for small pieces of coal, chips of wood, copper nails that drop out of the sheathing of vessels, or any sort of refuse washed up by the tide. These women always have with them an old basket, or an old tin kettle, in which they put whatever they may chance to find. It usually takes them the whole tide to fill the receptacle, but, when filled, it is as much as the feeble old creatures are able to carry home." Little girls, too, eagerly press into the mud as the tide recedes, to secure what trifles they can, by which to gain bread.
526. France.
In France, many women are employed in vineyards to pick grapes, tie up the vines, &c. L. told me he had seen women in France employed in preparing a kind of fuel made of clay mixed in water, cast in moulds, and dried. Females are employed by some of the merchants in Paris to carry goods home for purchasers. One of the most flourishing of the minor street trades of Paris is that in fried potatoes, invented some twenty-five years ago by a man that made his fortune at the business. A few years back might have been seen in the grounds of the Tuileries an old woman with a long stick, drawing off the surface of the water the feathers that loosened and fell from the swans that floated on the ponds. That old woman sold the feathers to buy bread.
527. Occupations in which no Women are employed.
I have received information from persons saying women are never engaged in their branches of business, which are the following: Architectural Ornamentation, Bonedust, Buckets, Carriage painting, Copperas ("hard and unsuitable"), Currying, Drug Mills ("only fit for able-bodied men"), Edge Tools ("not adapted to the sex"), Emery Paper, Flour Mills, Glazier's Diamonds, Gunpowder ("dangerous"), India Rubber Belting, Magnesia, Melodeons, Mercantile Agencies, Metallic Furniture, Oil, Oil Cloth, Organ building, Paint Mills, Pattern making (of wood), Pearlash ("unsuitable"), Philosophical Instruments (except Globes), Pine Furniture, Pork packing, Reed making, Rivets, Roll covering, Seed crushing ("requires able bodied men"), Sellers of License, Ship Crackers, Shot and Lead ("dangerous and unhealthy"), Shovels, Slate, Spools, Starch ("too hard"), Steel-letter cutting, Stone quarrying, Street-lamp lighting, Sulphur ("unhealthy"), Superphosphate of Lime ("requires too much muscular strength"), Surveyors' and Engineers' Instruments, Tanning, Tinfoil, Trowels, Vinegar, Wholesale Fruit dealing, Wire drawing, Wool combing, and Zinc manufacture.
528. None in the United States.
There are no women employed in any capacity in connection with mining and shipping coal in our country. Neither could any branch of the business be well placed under their supervision, for very nearly all the labor is performed by foreigners of the most low and illiterate class. None are employed in Baggage transportation, Bleaching, Brokers' Offices, Chemical Works, Cutlery, Furniture moving, Glue drying, Gun making, Iron Works, Landscape gardening, Lead Pencils, Sail making, Savings Banks, Silvering Mirrors, Tending Sheep, and Wood carving.
529. Very few employed.
Attending in offices of ladies' physicians, Charcoal burning, China painting, Chiropody, Clock Work, Lacquering, Marble Work, Mirror Frames, Sign painting, Stencil cutting, and Stone Ware. "As a curious incident of the growing availability of female labor, Vermont returns four females engaged in ship building, and Virginia reports two so employed." Mrs. Swisshelm is an inspector of lumber, receiving a salary of $500 per annum. Mrs. N. Smith was recently elected mayoress in Oskaloosa, Iowa, the first time that office was ever filled by a lady. We have been told of a Miss D., who furnishes houses, receiving a stipulated sum for the exercise of her taste and judgment, and the time and trouble of making purchases. In the Southern States, a few colored women are employed about sugar mills, and many in gathering cotton. I suppose that in some countries women may be, and probably are employed in the preparation of isinglass and gelatine; also, in collecting cochineal, and gathering rice and coffee.
530. The South.
There will be openings in the South for business in the following branches:
Artificial Eyes, Limbs, and Teeth.
Artificial Flowers.
Bags (Cotton and Paper).
Baskets.
Belts (Ladies').
Bonnets.
Bonnet Ruches.
Bonnet Frames.
Books.
Braces and Trusses.
Brushes.
Buttons.
Candles (from the tallow tree of South Carolina and Georgia).
Candy.
Canes.
Caps.
Card Printing and Stencilling.
Carpets.
Carriage Trimmings.
Car and Carriage Ornamenting.
China.
Cigars.
Cloaks and Mantillas.
Clocks.
Clothing.
Cord.
Cordage and Twine.
Cutlery.
Daguerreotype Apparatus, &c.
Designs.
Drawings (Architectural, &c.).
Dress Caps.
Dress Trimmings.
Embroideries.
Envelopes.
Factory Work.
Fancy Stores.
Feather Dressing.
Fishing Tackle.
Furniture.
Gilding.
Gold Chains.
Gold Pens.
Gold and Silver Leaf.
Grape Growing.
Gum-Elastic Goods.
Hair Dressing and Manufacturing.
Hardware.
Hats.
Hoop Skirts.
Horse Coverings.
Ink.
Jewelry.
Labels.
Lamps.
Lapidaries' Work.
Laundries.
Lead.
Leather.
Life Preservers.
Lithographing.
Maps.
Matches.
Military Goods.
Needle and Thread Stores.
Oils.
Paper Boxes.
Patterns (Ladies' and Children's).
Plated Ware.
Paints.
Painting and Staining of Glass.
Perfumery.
Photography.
Practising Medicine.
Picture Restoring.
Pipes.
Places of Summer Resort.
Porcelain.
Potash.
Pottery.
Printing.
Rag Collecting.
Sealed Provisions.
Sewing-Machine Labor.
Shoes.
Shot.
Soda and Saleratus.
Spectacles.
Stair Rods.
Steel Engraving.
Straw Working.
Surgical Instruments.
Suspenders.
Tailors' Work.
Tape.
Tobacco Stripping and Packing.
Toys.
Types.
Umbrellas and Parasols.
Under Wear.
Wall Paper.
Watches.
Willow Growing.
Window Shades.
Wood Engraving.
There will be openings in St. Louis and Chicago for fur sewers. There has been a demand for mill girls in Rhode Island. There is a surplus now of workers in cotton mills, but not of operatives in woollen mills. A gentleman in Middletown, Conn., wrote me a boarding house for work girls is wanted there. Makers of ladies' dress caps and ironers of new shirts have been scarce in New York city.
531. Prices of Board for Workwomen, and Remarks of Employers.
Aside from the prices of board for workwomen as mentioned in different parts of this work, I have intelligence from employers in one hundred and fifteen towns and cities of the Eastern States, New York, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey. These places number: Maine 4, New Hampshire 13, Vermont 4, Massachusetts 34, Rhode Island 5, Connecticut 29, New York 19, Pennsylvania 5, and New Jersey 2. Of the places in Maine, prices of board for women run from $1.33 ¹/3 to $1.50 a week. In New Hampshire, they make the same range. In Vermont, the price is given, of all places, at $1.50. In Rhode Island, from $1.50 to $3. In Connecticut, from $1.42. to $3. Massachusetts, from $1.25 to $4. New York, $1.50 to $3.50. Pennsylvania, $1.50 to $5. New Jersey, $1.25 to $1.75. The difference in board is something between a small town and a city in any State. The largest number of employers in cities give, as the most common prices, from $1.50 to $3 per week. Lights and washing are sometimes included in these prices, but washing very seldom—fuel in the rooms of the boarders, never. Employers write the boarding houses of their workmen are comfortable and respectable. We hope they are so, and wish that as much could be said of all. But we must acknowledge that we feel disposed to question the comfort of the majority of those for which such prices are paid in cities as mentioned by the employers. In villages and towns, board could be had at such rates. But we are confident it would be impossible to furnish sufficient wholesome food and clean, well ventilated lodging rooms, at the rates mostly specified in cities, where rent and provisions are high, with any profit to the keepers of the houses. Some employers assert that women can live cheaper than men. They cannot, in most places, to have as good accommodations; and when they can, the difference is slight. So a just proportion in wages is not observed, even with such a plea. Most men in industrial avocations receive $1.50 a day (many $2); women, from 50 cents to $1—most generally the former price. In France, a workman usually receives 60 cents a day; a woman, over 30 cents. So women do not receive even as good wages, in proportion to men, in the United States, as in France. In Lyons, France, women have always been paid for work performed in the same proportion as men. Most hand seamstresses receive starvation prices in both countries. In most industrial employments in Dublin, Ireland, women receive six English shillings a week, for their work of ten hours a day. Yet on the dusty and disagreeable labor of sorting and picking rags, some are enabled to earn eight shillings a week, but they are paid by the piece. School children in Dublin, as well as the working classes, usually take Monday for a holiday. Nor is it confined to Dublin. In France and England, Monday is made a day of freedom from work, and of reckless dissipation, with a large portion of the working people. In most occupations open to women, the times for work are usually not more than six months in the year, while men's extend the year round. Some employers write their women have more time than inclination for mental improvement—that all their time is at their disposal, except those hours employed in the factory, workshop, or store, which run from ten to seventeen hours. A woman's wardrobe requires some hours' attention; and the more limited her means, the more time is needed to keep it in repair. We think employers could do much good by learning the condition of their work people—what their habits and home comforts are; and would recommend to those disposed to learn something of the results, to read a work called "The Successful Merchant." I have heard there is a great laxity of morals in some of the establishments of New York, where men and women are employed. Proprietors and foremen of correct principles could do much to prevent this. Much, too, might be avoided by a careful selection of work people. I learn from one employer that one of his workwomen reads aloud to the others while at work. It is an admirable plan, but, where machinery is employed, could not be adopted, because of the noise. The best policy for any government is a protection of home produce and manufactures—a policy that it is desirable to see carried out more fully in our country. It will be observed that the farther we go south, as a general thing, the better are the prices paid for labor. Living, however, is somewhat higher. So what is gained in one way is lost in another. A majority of workwomen in this country are foreigners. In New York, I have heard the opinion expressed that there are in that city fifteen foreign workwomen where there is one American. One source of trouble among workwomen is the indifferent way in which they execute their work, arising from the want of proper instruction, the want of application, or a careless habit they acquire. Another failing is stopping often when at work. A misfortune with many workwomen is that they have not the physical strength to do much work, to do it constantly, or to do it fast.
532. Number of Work Hours.
In France, the number of work hours is 12; in England, 10; and in most of the United States, 10. In some of the United States there are no laws regulating the number of work hours; and in some States, where such laws do exist, they are evaded.
533. Extracts from the Census Report for 1860.
In advance of publication, Mr. Kennedy, Superintendent of the United States Census Report, writes: "The whole number, approximately, of females employed in the various branches of manufacture, is 285,000. The following are approximations to the average wages paid in New York and New England. Monthly wages of females employed in making
Boots and shoes, $11 25
Clothing, 12 00
Cotton goods, 13 30
Woollen, 16 00
Paper boxes, 14 30
Umbrellas, &c. 13 38
Book folding, 15 38
Printing, 13 65
Millinery, 17 47
Ladies' mantillas, &c. 16 00
Hoop skirts, 14 00