Annual salaries of employés in the municipal administration of the city of Venice-Cont'd.

Rates of wages per day allowed by the municipality of Venice for labor on the public works

[These rates include an allowance of 10 per cent. to the contractor, and the discount allowance to the laborer is often more.]

Rates of wages per day allowed by the municipality of Venice, fc.-Continued.

Average retail prices of the principal objects of consumption in the market of Venice. NOTE.-These prices are those of the small retail trade, and in kilograms, and show the cost to the laborer, who provides himself in this way almost without exception.

Average retail price of the principal objects of consumption in the market of Venice-Cont'd.

Market prices of the common kinds of fish and shell-fish consumed by the population of

Knowing that the relative condition of the industrial classes in the United States, as compared with the industrial classes in other countries, is at this time a subject of much interest to the people of the United States, I venture to submit to the Department the following statements, as the result of investigation.

The tables appended will show the salaries and wages given from the highest civil, military, and naval officer to the ordinary uneducated day-laborer.

These tables are collected from official and reliable sources.

The question as to whether it would not be beneficial to control by law the right of employing women and children has been open since 1875, and attempts have been unsuccessfully made to pass a law to control such labor.

Both on the 14th February, 1877, and the 25th July, 1879, circulars

were addressed by the minister of agriculture, industry, and commerce to the prefects of the Kingdom, but the replies to the circulars were not such as to indicate that the employers would be willing that a law controlling female and children's labor should go into force.

The Government then decided to submit the question to the different chambers of commerce in a circular dated November 20, 1883, viz:

J

1st. Whether the employment of children should not be entirely forbidden until the age of nine years had been reached.

2d. That they then should only work a half day, five or six hours per day until the age of twelve or fourteen years.

3d. Whether, after that age, it would not be beneficial to prohibit their employment on Sundays and at night-time until the age of sixteen.

The opinions expressed by the different chambers of commerce may be described as follows:

1st. To prohibit entirely the employment of children at manual labor until they may have arrived at the age of ten years; to forbid their employment on Sundays or at night time until they may have arrived at the age of fifteen years.

2d. To organize committees in the provinces to superintend the execution of the law.

It is to be hoped that such action will be taken that the employment of children may be controlled, and then many at present unavoidable abuses done away with.

In regard to employment throughout Italy at present, women work at spinning and weaving (silk, cotton, and wool), in hemp and paper mills, and in this district principally in making straw plaits and braids. They are also largely employed in the fields and vegetable gardens or truck patches.

One finds children working at all trades, but few are under ten years of age.

The average hours of work are: Fifteen hours from the twenty-four in the summer, with two hours for meals allowed from the fifteen; twelve hours from the twenty-four in the winter, with one hour and a half for meals allowed from the twelve.

Except in foundries, where the necessity exists, and night and day hands are employed, night work after 9 o'clock is the exception.

Sundays are universally used by the working classes as days of recreation; and the more important holidays, with what are called name days, or the day of the saint the children take their names from, are strictly observed, particularly in the south of Italy.

In and in the neighborhood of Florence women are paid from 10 to 22 cents per day, children from 10 to 40 cents per week, or for odd jobs 10 to 17 cents per day; the ordinary labor of men is valued at from 30 to 60 cents per day.

In woolen mills the hands employed are males to females as 60 to 40. In cotton mills women predominate in the same ratio. In the straw trade 80 women are employed to every 20 men.

In regard to the general health of the working classes in Tuscany it can be said to be good. However, certain trades produce certain diseases, just as in the United States or elsewhere, and here in the cities and towns a lack of proper nourishment may add to the tendency to disease.

Drunkenness prevails but to a slight extent among the working classes. The prevailing vice is gambling. Gambling is nourished by 92 A-LAB-101

the Italian Government in its weekly lotteries, which are always attractive to the poor.

The predominating religion is the Roman Catholic, and in Tuscany the working classes pay much attention to their religious duties, although swearing and obscene language are dreadfully prevalent.

The food of the workmen is simple in the extreme and its staple throughout Italy is the polenta, which corresponds to our Indian meal. A cup of bad coffee in the early morning serves till noon, when a meal of bread beans, cooked in olive oil or hog's grease, or polenta, boiled or fried, with a small allowance of wine, is eaten, and the pranzo, or dinner, is taken in the evening when work is finished, and is of very much the same nature as the noon-day meal, with the exception that some salted fish or pork is added, with cabbage or other greens.

I append a table showing about the amount of food eaten by an adult, and the approximate cost thereof.

Fresh meat is but seldom eaten, even by the skilled mechanic. Vegetables and fruit, however, are at times so plentiful as to be accessible to the poorest. Macaroni, which is popularly supposed in America to be the staple food of Italy, is in reality only accessible to the comparatively rich.

The farmers and farm-laborers in Tuscany, in many cases, arrive at a great age, and are generally very healthy. In the cities the average life is lower.

A dispatch sent the Department under date of the 13th December, 1883, and numbered 47, will have given an insight into the death-rate and the prevailing diseases in this district.

The table, No.3, will show the approximate number of people employed in the several industries, aud with soldiers, Government and railway employés, and prisoners they constitute about one sixth of the population.

The laboring classes are generally well and neatly clad, taking usually the thrown-off clothes of their superiors and arranging them to fit themselves. The local costumes, which were very picturesque, are things of the past, except in some few localities in the south.

The working classes are not well-housed; indeed, they are miserably housed, living in the country in damp, badly ventilated hovels, and in the cities crowded together in large but badly ventilated and drained houses in the worst quarters. With all these drawbacks they are cleanly, and may also be said to be healthy.

The working classes cannot be said, as yet, to be educated, but more attention is given each year to the education of the masses.

Enlisted or drafted men in the army are not allowed to leave the colors until able to read and write, and a system of schools throughout the country is about to be adopted for the compulsory education of all children. Steps in this direction have to be taken cautiously by the Government, as strong prejudices exist in the minds of the people against a liberal education, and in the minds of some against any education whatever, except that which is inculcated by the Church. WM. L. WELSH,

UNITED STATES CONSULATE,

Consul.

Florence, Italy, February 11, 1884.