GONDOLA MAN'S LIFE ONE OF EASE.

In Rome most of the working people seemed to be either guides or tourists, and when I came to Venice I saw what seemed to be the most deliciously delightful workman's life that of being a seafaring man on the canals. It has all the joys of city life, with the apparent laziness of the loafer, and is the only form of travel by water that is absolutely free from seasickness.

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WOMEN WHITE WINGS IN MUNICH.

In Munich, which, by the way, like Tarsus, "is no mean city," I was startled by what to me were new occupations for women. Now we all know that women are angels, but we really do not expect to see them working as "white wings.' Therefore it was all the more a shock when I saw women street cleaners in Munich, and they do their work well, too. It is also quite noticeable that all the switch tenders on the street railway are women.

IN CARLSBAD WOMEN CARRY THE HOD.

When I arrived at Carlsbad, however, I received a real shock when I saw women hod carriers and they were not all old ugly women either-but to see these women carrying on their backs a hod shaped like an inverted butter churn, was really pitiful. I asked various cabmen what wages they received. One said 30 cents a day and another 60 cents, and I concluded both must be doing what "the other little boy did." I therefore sought direct and positive information and found this work was being done for the municipality of Carlsbad, the women receiving for this laborious work 24 heller, or 4.8 cents an hour. Their work in the winter is limited to 5, 7, and 9 hours, and for the privilege of earning this "munificent" wages these women walk from their homes from 3 to 6 miles a day. When I inquired what they did in the summer, I was told, "Oh, they have an easy time; all they do is work in the harvest fields."

LOW WAGES FOR SKILLED LABOR.

Necessarily I was interested in knowing what wages were paid for other occupations, and through the courtesy of an engineer in the employ of the city, I was given the following answer: "The established municipal wages for the city of Carlsbad". first-class masons, for what is called façade work, receive 54 heller, or 10.8 cents an hour; carpenters, 10.8 cents; stonecutters, for heavy work, 10.4 cents; stone quarrymen, 9 cents; day laborers, first class, 7.4 cents and second class, 7 cents.

From a safe distance, with the ocean between us, these are interesting figures to read about, but must be awful figures to get in a pay envelope.

NO ADMITTANCE TO GERMAN FACTORIES.

After taking the "cure" and feeling strong enough to continue seeing other people work, I presented a letter of introduction from Senator Oliver to the consul general at Cologne and expressed my desire to visit the chain factories of Germany. My ardor was somewhat chilled by the smiling statement of the consul that the German Government had issued instructions to all manufacturers not to admit foreign visitors to their works and to be particularly careful of admitting any American or Japanese, as these people were coming for no good purpose except to learn the German methods, to be used in their own works, and from my three days' experience in going about from place to place in Westphalia, I certainly must compliment the German people as being a loyal nation. With frigid politeness I was barely admitted to the offices and was most smilingly and cheerfully given the glad hand at departure, and then only.

NO WOMEN CHAIN MAKERS IN GERMANY.

In all this wilderness, however, of being so near and yet so far, I finally landed in an oasis, and one man gave me information. This was a chain manufacturer, who told me that he had 150 employees, of whom 40 were outside, or colony workers. I was a little surprised to be informed by him that no women were employed in Germany as chain makers. The hours among the German workmen are from 7 a. m. to 7 p. m., with an allowance of 15 minutes for breakfast at 9 o'clock, an hour for noonday dinner, and 15 minutes at 4 p. m. for coffee, making a total net working day of 10 hours. Boys of 12 to 16 years receive 1.40 marks, or about 35 cents a day; from 16 to 18, 1.80 marks, or 45 cents; 18 to 20, 2.40 marks, or 60 cents; married men, 3.50 marks, or 87

cents. I do not mean to say that girls are not employed in factories in Germany, but that they are not employed as chain makers. In a near-by factory in this village girls were employed in making bicycle pedals, and earned from 35 to 45 cents per day of 10 hours.

COLONY WORKERS IN WESTPHALIA.

The colony worker in Westphalia usually lives in a village of nice, clean-looking homes, surrounded frequently by some trees and grass. The picture here shown of a house with a man standing in the foreground is that of a German outworker earning 874 cents a day, and is a house 180 years old. The colony worker's shop is a small brick building and usually contains from one to three forges, each with hand bellows. The iron is brought by him from the factory in bundles of about 56 pounds, and is cut in a simple lever machine operated by hand, which forms the iron in a U-shape link. The colony worker furnishes his own team and on Saturday hauls his iron and coke from the master workman's place. He is given an allowance of 5 per cent for waste on all sizes except very light ones, on which the allowance is 7 per cent. Of course, the master workman charges him a profit on not only the iron that he wastes but on all the coke that he burns. Don't think because these chain makers begin work at 7 in the morning and quit at 7 in the evening that this is all they do. They have their "side line" too, and in the early morning and late evening hours he occupies himself by work in the garden or field. During the winter months if he has a little shop with more than one forge he will rent for 12 cents a day the other forges to other chain makers, so in turn he is both employer and employee.

IRON-BENDING MACHINES OPERATED BY FRENCH GIRLS.

In France I did not have any opportunity to see chain makers at work, but I visited several factories where I saw girls operating machines for bending iron, which in this country are operated by men. For this work these girls are paid 2 francs, or 38.6 cents a day, also a day of 10 hours; for similar work in the United States the pay for men is $1.75 for 10 hours.

WOMEN CHAIN MAKERS IN ENGLAND'S "BLACK DISTRICT."

After I left Germany and France, I said that I had seen a good deal, but I knew I hadn't seen it all. I had heard so very much about the "Black district" of England and the chain makers in and around Birmingham, particularly at Cradley Heath, that I made up my mind that Windsor Castle and Westminster Abbey and a few more historic attractions would probably wait until I could get around again, without much danger of being changed by modern improvements, so as soon as I had my family comfortably placed in a hotel in London, it was "me for Birmingham," and there I saw with my own eyes what I had often heard and really never believedjust think of it, 2,500 women working as chain makers in that district alone, and from the little town of Cradley I understand that 1,000 tons of chain is shipped away weekly-52,000 tons a year. I don't mean to say that all the work is done by womenfar from it. They have hand-made chain makers there, where the heavy ship's cables for the leviathans of the sea are made. Of course, the fact that these chain makers were paid 40 cents a hundred pounds for doing exactly the same work under the same conditions as we pay 84 cents for has no special interest to the general public. It has a lot of interest for me, and with probably changes in the tariff, I imagine there will be others interested also. But this isn't what I started out to say: I wanted to say that it was really true that women were making chain.

Picture No. 3 shows the "palaces of industry" in which these women work. They are all alike. I don't know if they were built by William the Conqueror, but they look as if they dated from about that period, and the amount of money that was spent on them for "upkeep" is nothing. Just imagine what a relief it would be to an American manufacturer if he had no "overhead" expense.

Picture No. 4 is another outworker chain shop, with the women chain makers in the foreground. This is a somewhat better building of the same general type. It also shows the character of the chain made. These women were gathered together from near-by shops, as in most of the shops only two or three fires are placed, although I have seen as many as eight fires in one room.

A closer view of these women chain makers is shown in picture No. 5. You will note that several of these women are nice motherly looking old ladies. I objected very strongly to their putting on fresh, clean aprons, as I told them I wanted to have the picture just as they looked when at work, but you know all women are fond of

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SCHEDULE C.

dress, and these good old ladies laughingly said that they would not have their pictures taken unless in a clean apron.

Picture No. 6 shows a grandfather, father, son, and daughter-all chain makers. The old gentleman is Mr. Tibbitts by name, and he is 75 years old. He has been working as a chain maker all his life. The girl on his right is his granddaughter, and when I saw her she was making a 3-inch chain.

Numbers 7 and 8 are interior views from different positions of the same shop. This is a shop where eight chain makers were at work and all but one were women.

EXPERIENCES AT VARIOUS SHOPS.

In visiting these shops I was accompanied during the first day by the schoolmaster, a man at least 60 years of age, who knew all of these people personally. When I entered a shop, I felt that I had no right to take up their time, and I always laid a sixpence down on the anvil block before engaging them in conversation. These industrious women kept on talking but didn't stop their work, and what is more, in all the visits I made I didn't see a single one of them burn a link or hammer out a bad weld.

I visited one shop where there was a man and woman, each working on a forge, the man on 4-inch chain, and a young girl about 19 years blowing the bellows-an oldfashioned lever blacksmith bellows. This girl commenced to laugh while I was talking to her mother, and I asked whether I had said anything to make her laugh, thinking my American accent might be noticeable, and she said, "Oh, dear, no, the girl is a deaf mute," and on inquiry I found that this bright, healthy-looking girl of 19 had been leading this “dog's treadmill life" ever since she was 5 years of age. Her sole occupation after and in between her required school days and hours was to do this uninteresting, laborious work.

I was talking to another woman chain maker at about five minutes of 8 eight in the evening, but it was quite light there. There were two little children playing on the dirty floor. The husband, a chain maker but a shopworker, was contentedly leaning against the door jamb, smoking a pipe, while "dear little wifey" was hammering away on the chain. She told me that on account of her household work and the care of her children she earned only about 6 shillings or $1.50 per week. husband earned, he told me, 25 shillings, or about $6, a week.

Her

In another shop that I visited there were two women with a pitcher of beer. They were much more interested in talking than they were in working. They told me they only earned about six shillings a week. I don't think this is a fair case, as they evidently spent too much time and money on drink. It was a sad case and I was glad to leave them.

The next shop I visited with my friend, the schoolmaster, was occupied by a young woman chain maker, working alone. She said she was 24 years of age, unmarried, but was going to be married, and when I asked her whether she was going to marry a chain maker, replied, "God defend, no." who earned 25 shillings a week She said she was going to marry an engineman, about a quarter to 8; went to work at 8; at 9 she had breakfast; at 12, noon, her In describing her day's work, she said she got up dinner; at 4.30 she had tea, and worked until 8. This was the day's work from 8 a. m. to 8 p. m., except on Monday night, when she quit work at 5 p. m. Saturday afternoon was not exactly a half holiday, but there was a change of occupation, and you know the doctors say a change of occupation is as good as a rest, and therefore in this sense they rested. All she did was to wheel the chain she had made during the week to the boss's shop and get paid for it, and then trudge back home with a 56-pound bundle of iron, either on her back or on a wheelbarrow-enough for the next week's work. After this was done she had another nice easy job of wheeling her coke home for the weeks' supply. Of course, if she wanted to be gay and spend money fast, she could allow the boss to send the iron and coke to her shop and she pay the cost of

cartage.

NO "HIGH COST OF LIVING ""

PROBLEM TO SOLVE.

Now, a little more about how these people live: You will recall I spoke of a woman who earned about $1.50 a week, and her husband was also a chain maker and earned $6 a week. This family pay as rent for their small house of four rooms, 3 shillings and ninepence a week; that is 90 cents a week, or about $4 a month. This rental includes the rental of the little chain shop, and the wife rents to another woman working in the same shop an extra fire at 3 pence, or 6 cents a week. The hard point about all this distressing circumstance was to think that the man's wages were so low that the wife had to work in the same trade in order to supplement the family income. Surely these people have gone a long way from the "high cost of living." I don't believe that they

even know how to spell it, much less experience it, and "God defend" that we in this country should ever have to work or live under similar conditions.

BRIEF FILED BY W. H. DONNER, PRESIDENT CAMBRIA STEEL Co., PITTSBURGH, Pa. [Relating to the following paragraphs of the metal schedule: Paragraph 117, iron ore; paragraph 118, pig iron, spiegeleisen, ferromanganese, scrap iron, and scrap steel: paragraph 121, beams, girders, and structural material; paragraph 122, boiler and plate, iron and steel; paragraph 126, steel rails, fish plates; paragraph 131, ingots, blooms, clabs; paragraph 134, wire rods; paragraph 135, steel wire; paragraph 161, wire nails.]

Hon. O. W. UNDERWOOD,

Chairman of Ways and Means Committee,

CAMBRIA STEEL Co., Pittsburgh, Pa., January 10, 1913.

House of Representatives, Washington, D. C.

MY DEAR SIR: I am president of the Cambria Steel Co., of Johnstown, Pa. Wẹ own properties worth about $75,000,000, and employ 19,000 men. We manufactured last year 1,040,000 tons of rails, structural shapes, plates, bars, rods, wire nails, etc. We are deeply interested in the metal schedule which is soon to be considered by your committee. Having been informed that owing to the limited time at its disposal the committee will not be able to give us an oral hearing, it would seem advisable for the Cambria Steel Co. to state briefly its views regarding the items in the metal schedule relating to the products we manufacture.

A most remarkable condition exists in the steel trade to-day. Business on the other side is booming, and the prices of finished steel for the moment are as high abroad as in America. Our experience teaches us that this is of course only a temporary condition. The iron and steel industry is subject to violent fluctuations in times of prosperity and depression probably more so than in any other line of business, and we have no doubt but that your honorable committee will recognize these facts in considering a revision of the tariff at this time. With the rapid increase in the consumption of steel the rich ores have been largely mined, and we are gradually using leaner ores, which means increased costs. Furthermore, the value of ore, coke, and coal has so appreciated that the margins are not now as remunerative as in many other lines of manufacture; and, in fact, the steel business is not as profitable here at the present time as in the leading steel-producing countries of Europe. It should be remembered that in the published reports of the United States Steel Corporation are included the earnings of their railroads and steamboats, which should be considered separately from the profits on steel, as they are not a part of the steel industry.

Foreign manufacturers build their works at a less cost and can earn larger profits on their capital than we can, all because of cheaper labor. European manufacturers export approximately one-half of their product, while American manufacturers export only about one-tenth of their production. In periods of depression, which are certain to come, foreign manufacturers will dump large tonnages on our Atlantic, Gulf, and Pacific seaboard cities at cost, in order to maintain their organizations and help pay fixed charges. Such an invasion would mean a loss to American capital, idleness for thousands of American workmen, and a curtailment of further expansion of the American steel industry.

Your attention is invited to the fact that when the present tariff law was enacted a substantial reduction was made on many items in the iron and steel industry, as the following citation will show:

Your attention is also invited to the great difference between wages in the leading steel-producing countries of Europe and this country. An investigation of the German iron and steel industry was made by the British Board of Trade, and in its report submitted in April, 1908, it is shown that the average rates of wages in the leading steel-producing districts of Germany are as follows:

In the report on the German iron and steel industry, by Special Agent Pepper, of the Department of Commerce and Labor, submitted January 7, 1909, it is shown that the wages paid in the German iron and steel industry is substantially the same as found by the British Board of Trade in its investigation. Mr. Pepper's report, page 24, shows that 227,000 persons employed in the iron and steel industries in the Dusseldorf district in 1907 received an annual wage of 1,448 marks, equivalent to $344.62. A report published in the American Association of Commerce and Trade Bulletin, Berlin, Germany, September 15, 1912, volume 10, No. 6, shows that the average wages paid in the iron and steel industries in Germany at that time was approximately the same as in 1907 and 1908.

The average wages paid to skilled and unskilled labor in the iron and steel industry in this country is more than double the average wages paid for similar work in Germany. Our average wages have not been worked out in detail, but I find, in referring to the annual reports of the United States Steel Corporation, that their rates since 1907 were as follows:

I was in Han-Yang, China, in 1911, and saw three modern blast furnaces, an openhearth steel plant, and a rail mill. Han-Yang is on the Yang-tse-Kiang, which is navigable for ocean-going steamers. It costs Pittsburgh $2.80 per ton freight to reach ocean steamships. These furnaces have richer ore within a few miles of the river on which they are located than we are able to obtain and coke as good as ours. Their raw materials can be more cheaply assembled than in the Pittsburgh district. They were paying for common labor from 5 cents to 15 cents United States gold per day of 12 hours and for native skilled labor, such as brick masons, carpenters, etc., 30 cents per day of 12 hours. The industry there is in its infancy, and it will take time for it to grow, but with any assurance of a low duty in America for a period of time it presents a remarkable opportunity for investment, and one that I think your honorable committee should not encourage.

In the payment of taxes our property helps to support the Government, and we feel we are entitled to a continuance of conditions under which we can continue to successfully operate. Our capital is permanently invested, our workmen are depend