tain limits, the lives of probably full 125,000 of its inhabitants, indirectly those of many thousands more; and the result of the struggle was seemingly nil. What the men demanded they could not get; what the masters exacted of their men in turn they were forced to give up. The men could not obtain a reduction of the hours of labour to nine; the masters could not tie the men down to a declaration meant to break up their trade societies. We wish to consider the history of this remarkable interruption in the peaceable working of our commercial machinery simply as an exhibition of the power of the English working classes, viewed in one particular trade or group of trades. We will then contrast this history with that of a movement of an entirely different character, amongst working men belonging to corresponding trades in Paris, considered equally in the light of a development of power in the class from which it springs. From a valuable Report on the London Builders' Strike, drawn up for the Trade Societies' Committee of the Social Science Association by Messrs. T. R. Bennett and G. S. Lefevre, we learn that "under the term building trades' are generally included the four principal trades, viz. bricklayers, masons, plasterers, carpenters and joiners; and the five subordinate trades, smiths, slaters, painters, plumbers, and glaziers," which, however, are "only considered as part of the building trades" when "carried on in connection with one of the former." The 38,000 or 40,000 men employed in these trades are divided into skilled and unskilled, or labourers; the last numbering about 12,000, and earning from 188. to 21s. per week, generally members of registered friendly societies, but not combined in distinct trade societies. Of the skilled workmen, on the other hand, more than half appear to belong to trade societies; thus Of 800 to 1000 masons, about 500 are in society. Of about 5000 bricklayers, about 3000 are in society. Of about 13,000 carpenters and joiners, about 7000 are in society. In all these trades the skilled workman's day is ten hours, except on Saturday, when the hours are shorter. The question of the reduction of time has been in agitation since the spring of 1853, when it was first demanded by the masons, to whom the carpenters and joiners united themselves. On this occasion the agitation was bought off for an extra 6d. per day, making 5s. 6d. instead of 5s., the previous rate. In 1858 the carpenters and joiners again brought forward the question, held an aggregate meeting in Exeter Hall on June 3, 1858, and memorialised the Master Builders' Society, whom they met on deputation on the 26th August. Their memorial was courteously rejected; so had been a request from the masons (1st June) for the Saturday half-holiday. The masons now joined the carpenters and joiners in the nine-hours movement. The bricklayers were invited to join, and did so. A Conference of seven members from each of the three trades now met (September), and, thus united, presented a second memorial to the master builders (18th November); re-soliciting, this time in somewhat firmer terms, the one hour per day, "and the present rate of wages to continue." The master builders, in reply, simply referred the memorialists to their former resolutions of the 26th August. A month more passes by, and the painters and plasterers join the Conference; each still with seven delegates, forming now what are termed the five united building trades. The masters are applied to to receive another deputation. They reply by letter that they adhere to their former resolutions, that no new facts have been brought forward, and decline to receive the deputation. Another meeting of the building trades is held in Exeter Hall (26th January 1859); a resolution passed to ask a definite reply from the masters; a letter forwarded (19th March) requesting an answer, "whether you will consider the nine hours as a day's work, yes or no." A meeting of the metropolitan builders, members or not of the masters' association, is convened (20th April). It resolves, that it is "not expedient to accede to the request of the workmen;" that "the request for nine hours to be paid for as ten hours ought not to be acceded to. " The labourers of the various building trades join the Conference, which now numbers forty-two members. The men meet again in Exeter Hall (11th May); and, in consequence of the resolutions passed, an "ultimatum," sharp in tone as in name, is sent forth (26th May), still requesting a decisive answer, "whether you will concede the nine hours as a day's work." The Master Builders' Society replies that the request has been already "very distinctly" answered (June 10). On the eve of engaging in open warfare, the leaders of the agitation seem to have hesitated, so far at least as to require a fuller assurance of support from their constituents. The Conference delegates put the question to their respective trades, whether the nine-hours question should be postponed or mooted that autumn. The reply of the trades their plebiscitum as it might be called-was in favour of immediate action. The plan followed in such cases now seldom varies. The workmen endeavour to take the masters in detail; the masters meet them by a collective lock-out. It was determined that five firms, afterwards reduced to four, whose names were selected by chance out of a hat, and of which three only were members of the masters' association, should be memorialised for the reduction. The memorial, which requested a reply by the 23d of July, was presented to the four firms separately by four of the working men. To Messrs. Trollope, one of the four, it was presented by a mason in their employ named Joseph Pacey, on the 16th July. On the 20th Joseph Pacey was discharged, his employers say, for neglect of work. But it is absurd to suppose that the men could take the act otherwise than as the flinging in their faces of the glove of war. Anyhow the spark fired the train, and prematurely for the men. The masons in Messrs. Trollope's employ struck work on the 21st. The Conference on the 22d approved the act, and determined upon calling out all the men in the shop. By the 23d, when Messrs. Trollope were to give their reply, it was no longer needed. Nothing, of course, could suit the employers better. Pacey's dismissal may not have been intentional; but if it had been, it could not have worked better to put the men outwardly in the wrong. The strike, then, now began. The Conference called upon the building operatives in general to support it. The metropolitan builders met, 200 in number nearly, at the Freemasons' Tavern (27th July), and resolved to close their establishments on the 6th August, appointing a committee at the same time to consider the best means of opening the doors to non-society men. At an adjourned meeting on the 1st August, the committee reported in favour of the formation of a "Central Association of Master Builders," with subscriptions, contributions for extraordinary expenditure, an executive committee, and all the usual appliances of an ordinary trades union, but formed upon the basis of excluding from employment all members of trades unions among working men, and requiring from all operatives, before taking them into employ, their "distinct agreement and formal assent to the conditions embraced in the following terms of engagement, which shall be read over to every such workman, and a copy whereof shall be handed to him before entering upon his work: 'I declare that I am not now, nor will I during the continuance of my engagement with you become, a member of or support any society which directly or indirectly interferes with the arrangements of this or any other establishment, or the hours or terms of labour; and that I recognise the rights of employers and employed individually to make any trade engagements on which they may choose to agree."" The form of a notification to be addressed to the working men, stating that the works would be opened, on Messrs. Trollope's resuming work, to all such as should agree to the declaration, was further contained in the report. A "cheque or file engagementbook, with duplicate successive numbers," was to be kept; every workman was to be "distinctly required to pledge his word to the observance" of the conditions in the declaration; "and on his name being entered on the file of the engagement-book, and the duplicate agreement detached and handed to him, he may resume his employment." Lastly, the formation of a "new, sound, and legitimate benefit society" for the men was recommended. A vast deal of controversy has been wasted on the point, whether this declaration was to be signed or not. The terms "distinct agreement and formal assent" seem to have been skilfully contrived so as to leave it an open question, to be solved by each employer according to his own views, whether signature was or was not to be required. The words "on his name being entered on the file" might easily be interpreted to imply "by himself." But the controversy is a contemptible one on both sides, and only serves to gauge the depths of debasement in trade morality amongst us. What honest man who really gives his "distinct agreement and formal assent" to an engagement can be bound the more by a few strokes of a pen? What court of justice would refuse to give effect to an unwritten engagement entered into with such formalities as the report prescribes? The making parade of not requiring a signature looks, we must say, far too like an attempt to delude the workman into a belief that he would not be bound when he actually was. On the 6th of August, then, the lock-out took place, all efforts to mediate by a reference to arbitration having failed, through the masters' refusal to withdraw the declaration. More than 20,000 men were thrown out of employ, exclusively of those on strike at Messrs. Trollope's. Of these, somewhat under 10,000 were thrown on the support of the Conference, the remainder leaving for the country, or finding work at the smaller builders'; the numbers of those supported by the Conference gradually diminishing, moreover, to between 5000 and 6000. The sums paid to them were never more than 48. 6d., and averaged only 3s. 6d. per week, but were increased in most cases to from 5s. to 8s. by the separate societies to which the men belonged. An "anti-strike committee" formed amongst the men, though subscribed to by the public and enrolling about 500 men willing to go to work under the declaration, but only as a shop-rule without signature, tried for a while to live, and died. Meanwhile, however, Messrs. Trollope had been gradually obtaining workmen under the declaration. On the 6th September they announced to the Masters' Association that they had 210 men at work (about 100 short of their complement at the time of the strike). The masters now re-opened their shops, always under the declaration. This attempt proved at first an almost complete failure. At the admirable establishment of Messrs. Cubitt only 200 men went in, for 900 that had been locked out, not one skilled mason among the number. At Messrs. Piper's, out of 1100, only 25 sawyers and joiners went in. At another establishment, out of 1200, not more than half-a-dozen. "Most of the great works in the metropolis remained suspended." Scarcely as many men took work under the declaration as had enrolled themselves with the anti-strike committee. Only those employers who chose to re-open without exacting the declaration reëngaged their men without difficulty. Gradually, "by scouring the country in search of men," the workshops began to fill. Efforts to mediate from without still continued. The masons went so far as to offer a resumption of works if the declaration were withdrawn. The offer was rejected, and the lock-out, which till now had not been recognised as a "legal strike" within the terms of the rules of the mason's society, now became such, entitling the lock-out masons to 10s. a-week out of society funds. On the 14th November, the Conference resolved to "withdraw the strike" at Messrs. Trollope's, so as to make the struggle rest entirely on resistance to the declaration. It was evidently a drawn battle. Very opportunely an ex-chancellor came to the rescue. In the beginning of December, Lord St. Leonards suggested that the document should be withdrawn, and that in lieu of it there should be hung up in every shop a statement of the law between masters and men, in terms set forth by him. On the 6th February 1860, the masters agreed to adopt the suggestion. The lock-out ceased. The last dividend of the Conference was paid on the 27th February. The nine-hours movement was postponed. We are now seeing an attempt to revive it. On the whole, then, it would appear that, in the London building trades, masters and men are very fairly matched; that neither can quite coerce the other. Let us now consider a few figures belonging to the contest. One of the appendices to Messrs. Bennett and Lefevre's report gives the "number of mechanics and labourers relieved by the Conference during the strike and lock-out, and the amounts paid away." The number of men relieved diminishes, with slight fluctuations, from 9812 in the week ending the 22d August 1859, to 1572 in that ending the 27th February 1860; the total amount paid, from 14027. 12s. in the week ending 19th September 1859, to 2077. 4s. in that ending 2d January |