The cotton manufacturers of India, protected by an import .duty
of 5 per cent., now employ 600,000 spindles, and expect to set double that number at work. Manchester, greatly irritated, bas therefore turned philanthropic on behalf of native mill-hands. They are worked seven days a week and fourteen hours a day, and Manchester, informing Lord Shaftesbury, demanded on Friday -week of the House of Lords that the protection extended to English factory children should be offered to natives also. Lord Salisbury agreed, but observed that his difficulty was that any protective law was considered in India part of the vast English conspiracy to de- prive India of her manufactures. That is true, and there are further difficulties about the age at which Indians become independent, and about factories set up within the boundaries of Goa or native States. A moderately protective law would not, however, be dis- liked, as manufacturers could work the relay system much easier .in India than England. Natives sleep easily by day.
Previous page
