of the person injured for recovery of damages.

the factory from the master of which he will receive certificates. The schoolmaster and the occupier of a factory may appeal to the Secretary of State for the Home Department in the case of annulling certificates; and the inspector is required to report (but the act says annually only, although the inspectors make half-yearly reports) each case of annulment, and the reasons for it to the Secretary of State. By a clause in the first Factory Act it is

sary to any inspector that a new or additional school is required, such inspector is authorized to establish or procure the establishment of such school.

By the limitations of the working time for children under thirteen to half a day, they are enabled to attend school: those children who work in the morning go to the afternoon schools, and those who work in the afternoon have been to school in the morning. In many factories a change is made at the end of each month, and the children who were employed in the morning attend school and work in the afternoon.

By the first Factory Act every child employed in a factory was required to attend school two hours daily; but by the amending act the time is extended to three hours, between eight in the morning and six in the evening, on every working day except Saturday. When the children work on alternate days, they are required to attend school on the other days for five hours each day. The occupier of a fac-enacted that whenever it appears necestory must obtain every Monday a certificate from the schoolmaster that each child has attended school as required by the act, and such certificates must be kept for six months after the date thereof, and be produced during this period when required by either an inspector or subinspector. The inspector may require a sum not exceeding twopence per week to be paid by the occupier of a factory to the schoolmaster towards the expenses of instructing any child employed in the same, and any such sum thus required may be deducted from the child's wages. If an inspector, on his personal examination, or on the report of a sub-inspector, shall be of opinion that any schoolmaster who grants certificates of the school attendance of children employed in a factory is unfit to instruct children, by reason of his incapacity to teach them to read and write, from his gross ignorance, or from his not having the books and materials necessary to teach them reading and writing, or because of his immoral conduct, or of his continued neglect to fill up and sign the certificates of school attendance required by the act, the inspector may annul any certificate granted by such disqualified schoolmaster, by a notice in writing addressed to the occupier of the factory in which the children named in the certificates are employed, setting forth the grounds on which he deems such schoolmaster to be unfit. After the date of such notice no certificate of school attendance granted by such schoolmaster shall be valid for the purposes of this act, unless with the consent in writing of the inspector. When an inspector annuls a schoolmaster's certificate, he is required to name some other school within two miles of

When the Factories Bill (7 Vict. c. 15) was introduced into the House of Commons there was a large party in favour of a greater diminution in the hours of labour than the bill proposed. Lord Ashley moved that the word "night" be construed to mean from six in the evening to six in the morning, and the word "meal-time" to be two hours' cessation from labour. This would have left only ten hours as the time for actual work. This amendment was resisted by ministers, who contended that it would have the effect of reducing wages; or that, if it had not this result, it would affect that portion of our manufactures connected with the export trade (35,000,000l. out of 44,000,000l.) which had already, in many instances, to endure a severe competition in the markets of the world. The amendment (a ten hours' clause) was however carried by 179 against 170 for the original motion (twelve hours). On the following night Lord Ashley stated the plan by which he proposed to carry out the vote of the House: after October, 1844, he would restrict the daily hours of labour to eleven; and two years after, the restriction to ten hours would come into

In former times goods and commodities of every kind were chiefly sold at fairs, to which people resorted periodically. The display of merchandise, and the conflux of customers at these principal and almost only emporia of domestic commerce, was prodigious; and they were therefore often held on open and extensive plains. Warton, in his History of English Poetry,' has given us a curious account of that of St. Giles's hill or down, near Winchester. It was instituted and given as a kind of revenue to the bishop of Winchester by William the Conqueror, who, by his charter, permitted it to continue for three days. But in consequence of new royal grants, Henry III. pro

operation. The government announced their intention of adhering to the period of twelve hours, as fixed by their bill. On the 22nd of March the House went into committee on the Bill, when two divisions took place on the motion that twelve hours a day should be the limits of adult labour, an amendment was proposed which substituted ten hours, which was carried by 186 to 183; but at the next stage of the Bill, the motion that the blank in the bill should be accordingly filled up with the word "ten" was lost by 181 to 188. The ministers in the first instance were in a minority of 3, and in the second they had a majority of 7. From this dilemma the House escaped by bringing in a new bill, which was ulti-longed its continuance to sixteen days. mately carried.

Mr. Leonard Horner, who is one of the Inspectors of Factories, in his report dated 16th of May, 1845, gives an instance of the voluntary shortening of the hours of factory labour from twelve to eleven hours per day, which had been effected without any diminution of profit. The plan had been in operation twelve months, and the declaration of the employers was, "that the same quantity of produce and at the same cost has been obtained by the master; and that all the workers, day hands as well as those who are paid by piece-work, earn the same amount of wages in the eleven hours as was done before by the labour of twelve hours." (Report, p. 19.) Mr. Horner remarks that these results, although they may form a good ground for experiments being tried in other mills of the same description, "do not form any ground to justify a further legislative restriction of the hours of labour on the plea that has often been put forward that if the hours be shortened the produce will not be lessened." Proofs of the correctness of this view would involve details of too technical a nature to be generally understood by persons who are not acquainted with manufacturing processes.

FACULTIES. [UNIVERSITY.] FAIR, a meeting of buyers and sellers at a fixed time and place; from the French foire, which is from the Latin feriae, a holiday. Fairs in ancient times were chiefly held on holidays.

Its jurisdiction extended seven miles round, and comprehended even Southampton, then a capital trading-town; and all merchants who sold wares within that circuit, unless at the fair, forfeited them to the bishop. As late as 1512, as we learn from the Northumberland Household-book, fairs still continued to be the principal marts for purchasing necessaries in large quantities, which are now supplied by the numerous tradingtowns.

Philip, king of France, complained to Edward II. A.D. 1314, that the merchants of England had desisted from frequenting the fairs in his dominions with their wool and other goods, to the great loss of his subjects; and entreated him to persuade, and, if necessary, to compel them to frequent the fairs of France as formerly, promising them all possible security and encouragement. (Rymer, Fœd., tom. iii. p. 482.)

When a town or village had been consumed, by way of assisting to re-establish it, a fair, among other privileges, was sometimes granted. This was the case at Burley, in Rutlandshire, 49th Edward III. (Abbrev. Rot. Orig., vol. ii. p. 338.)

The different abridgments of Stow and Grafton's Chronicles, published by themselves in Queen Elizabeth's time, contain lists of the fairs of England according to the months. There is also 'An authentic Account published by the king's authority of all the Fairs in Eng

of the court or of the minister of the day. Sully, the able minister of Henry IV., seeing the dilapidation of the public revenue occasioned, by this system, by which, out of 150 millions paid by the people, only 30 millions reached the treasury, opened the contracts for farming the taxes to public auction, giving them to the highest bidder, according to the ancient Roman practice. By this means he greatly increased the revenue of the state. But the practice of private contracts through favour or bribing was re

(Dugdale's Hist. Warw., pp. 514, 515; Warton's Hist. Engl. Poet., vol. i. p. 279; Henry, Hist. Brit., 8vo. edit., vol.newed under the following reigns: Colviii. p. 325; Brand's Popular Antiq. 4to. edit. vol. ii., p. 215.)

The fairs of Frankfort-on-the-Mayn and Leipzig are the chief fairs in Europe: the former held at Easter and in the months of August and September; the latter at Easter, Michaelmas, and the New Year. The whole book-trade of Germany is centred in the Easter fair at Leipzig. Nishnei Novgorod in Russia, at the confluence of the Oka and Wolga, has a great annual fair in June, which is attended by about three hundred thousand strangers, many of whom come from remote parts of Asia.

bert, the minister of Louis XIV., called the farmers of the revenue to a severe account, and by an act of power deprived them of their enormous gains. In 1728, under the regency, the various individual leases were united into a Ferme Générale, which was let to a company, the members of which were henceforth called Fermiers Généraux. In 1759, Silhouette, minister of Louis XV., quashed the contracts of the farmers-general, and levied the taxes by his own agents. But the system of contracts revived: for the court, the ministers, and favourites were all well disposed to them, as private bargains were made with the farmers-general, by which they paid large sums as douceurs. In the time of Necker, the company consisted of forty-four members, who paid a rent of 186 millions of livres, and Necker calcu

FARMERS-GENERAL. Fermiers Généraux was the name given in France under the old monarchy to a company which farmed certain branches of the public revenue, that is to say, contracted with the government to pay into the trea-lated their profit at about two millions sury a fixed yearly sum, taking upon itself the collection of certain taxes as an equivalent. The system of farming the taxes was an old custom of the French monarchy. Under Francis I., the revenue arising from the sale of salt was farmed by private individuals in each town. This was and is still in France and other countries of Europe a monopoly of the government. At the present time the government of France derives about 2,200,000l. a year from the salt monopoly. The government reserves to itself the power of providing the people with salt, which it collects in its stores, and sells to the retailers at its own price. This monopoly was first assumed by Philippe de Valois in 1350. Other sources of revenue were likewise farmed by several individuals, most of whom were favourites

yearly-no very extraordinary sum, if correct. But independent of this profit there were the expenses of collection, and a host of subalterns to support: the company had its officers and accountants, receivers, collectors, &c., who, having the public force at their disposal, committed numerous acts of injustice towards the people, especially the poorer class, by distraining their goods, selling their chattels, &c. The "gabelle" or sale of salt, among others, was a fruitful source of oppression. Not satisfied with obliging the people to pay for the salt at the price fixed upon it in the name of the king, they actually obliged every individual above eight years of age to buy a certain quantity of salt whether wanted or not. But the rule was not alike all over France; in some provinces, which en

joyed certain privileges, salt was 9 livres the one hundred weight, whilst in others it cost 16, and in some 62 livres. In some provinces the quantity required to be purchased per head was 25 pounds weight: in others it was 9 pounds. And yet the provinces, nay the individual families of each province, were prohibited under the severest penalties from accommodating each other's wants, and buying the superfluous salt of their neighbours, but whoever wanted more salt than his obligatory allowance was obliged to resort to the government stores. Besides, every article of provisions that was exported from one province to another was subject to duties called Traites. Every apprentice on being bound to a master was bound to pay to the king a certain sum according to the nature of the trade, and afterwards a much larger sum on his admission to practise his trade as a master. These few instances may serve to convey an idea of taxation in France previous to the Revolution. A lively but faithful picture of the whole system is given in Breton's Histoire Financière de la France, 2 vols. 8vo., Paris, 1829. The farmers-general, as the agents of that system, coming into immediate contact with the people, drew upon themselves a proportionate share of popular hatred. But the Revolution swept away the farmers-general, and put an end to the system of farming the revenues: it equalized the duties and taxes all over France; but the monopoly of the salt and tobacco has remained, as well as the duties on provisions, cattle, and wine brought into Paris and other large towns, called the octroi, and the right of searching by the octroi officers, if they think fit, all carriages and individuals entering the barriers or gates of the same.

The system of farming the taxes, although generally disapproved of, is still continued in some European states. Not many years ago the custom-house duties at Naples were farmed by private speculators. For the character and effects of the system see Necker, De l'Administra- | tion des Finances.

In England the only tax that is farmed is that on post-horses. The excise duties were farmed for some years prior to 1683.

The Roman system of levying taxes, at least after the Republic had begun to acquire territory out of Italy, was by farming them out. In the later period of the Republic the farmers were from the body of the Equestrian order. Individuals used to form companies or associations for farming the taxes of a particular district: the taxes were let by the Censors for a period of five years. They were probably let to those who bid highest. These farmers were called Publicani, and by the Greek writers Telonae (rava), which is rendered by Publicans in the English version of the New Testament, where they are appropriately classed with sinners, for they were accused of being often guilty of great extortion. These tax-collectors in the province were however only the agents. The principals generally resided at Rome, where the affairs of each association (Societas) were managed by a director called a Magister. The individual members held shares (partes) in the undertaking. There was also a chief manager in the province or district of which the company | farmed the tax, who was called Promagister.

There are no means of knowing what proportions of the taxes collected reached the Roman Treasury (aerarium). Numerous complaints of the rapacity of the Publicani or their agents occur in the classical writers. These Publicani were the monied men of the late Republic and the early Empire, and their aid was often required by the state for advances of money when the treasury was empty. Part of the mal-administration probably came from the Publicani sub-letting the taxes, which seems to have been done, sometimes at least.

FATHER. [PARENT AND CHILD.]

FEALTY, says Littleton (§ 91), is the same that fidelitas is in Latin. And when a freeholder doth fealty to his lord, he shall hold his right hand upon a book, and shall say thus:- Know ye this, my lord, that I shall be faithful and true unto you, and faith to you shall bear for the lands which I claim to hold of you, and that I shall lawfully do to you the customs and services which I ought to do, at the terms assigned: so help me God