Under William IV., by the act of 1832, the laboring hours of children
were reduced to _ten hours_. By the act of 1847 women were included in
the ten-hour law. By 1867 the power of the English working man had
secured the permanence of a custom making ten hours a day's work. In the
factories of Nottingham, England, the men make as high as fourteen
dollars a week. Improved machinery has raised their wages. At the
spinning machines which formerly required two men, who each received
$4.50 a week, there is now required one man, who gets $6.25. At the
beginning of the present century the workman in these mills earned 4-1/2
shillings a week. At the present day he earns 10-1/2 shillings, with
twenty-four hours' less labor.