appear at the time and place set forth in the said summons, and shall not make excuse for the default to the satisfaction of such justice, and if the due service of the summons be proved, or if such person appearing according to the summons shall not submit to be examined as a witness, then such justice may adjudge such person so making default in appearing or refusing to give evidence to pay such penalty, not exceeding five pounds, as such justice shall think fit, and the party so adjudged to pay such penalty shall pay the same accordingly.

5. That every summons required by this Act shall be served by delivering the same to the person summoned, or by leaving the same at his or her usual place of abode, twenty-four hours at least before the time appointed by the summons for such person to appear.

6. That if any such penalty or costs so adjudged by any justice to be paid is not paid immediately upon adjudication, such justice may issue his warrant to distrain and sell the goods and chattels of the person so adjudged to pay the same for the amount thereof, with costs; and the proceeds of such distress, after paying the penalty and costs, and the costs of such distress and sale, shall be paid over to the person convicted; and the said penalty shall be paid over to the sheriff or other proper officer of the county, city, borough, or place in which such conviction shall take place, for her majesty's use, and shall be returned to the court of quarter sessions, under the provisions of an Act passed in the third year of the reign of King George the Fourth, intituled "An Act for the more speedy Return and Levying of Fines, Penalties, and Forfeitures, and Recognizances estreated."

7. (Recovery of wages and sums due for work-Repealed by 38 & 39 Vict. c. 86, s. 17, post.)

8. That no order or conviction or proceeding touching the same respectively, shall be quashed for want of form, or be removed by certiorari or otherwise into any of Her Majesty's superior courts of record; and that when any distress shall have been made for levying any money by virtue of this Act the distress itself shall not be deemed unlawful, nor the party making the same a trespasser, on account of any defect or want of form in the summons, warrant, conviction, warrant of distress, or other proceedings in relation thereto, nor shall the party distraining be deemed a trespasser from the beginning, on account of any irregularity afterwards committed by him, but the person aggrieved by such irregularity may recover full satisfaction for special damage (if any) by action on the case.

37 & 38 VICT. c. 48 (1874).

An Act to provide for the payment of wages without stoppages in the hosiery manufacture.

WHEREAS a custom has prevailed among the employers of artificers in the hosiery manufacture of letting out frames and machinery to the artificers employed by them, and it is desirable to prohibit such letting of frames and machinery, and the stoppage of wages for frame rents and charges in the hosiery manufacture. Be it enacted as follows:

1. In all contracts for wages the full and entire amount of all wages, the earnings of labour in the hosiery manufacture, shall be actually and positively made payable in net, in the current coin of the realm, and not otherwise, without any deduction or stoppage of' any description whatever, save and except for bad and disputed workmanship.

2. All contracts to stop wages, and all contracts for frame rents and charges, between employers and artificers, shall be and are hereby declared to be illegal, null, and void.

3. If any employer shall bargain to deduct, or shall deduct, directly or indirectly, from the wages of any artificer in his employ, any part of such wages for frame rent and standing or other charges, or shall refuse or neglect to pay the same or any part thereof in the current coin of the realm, he shall forfeit a sum of five pounds for every offence, to be recovered by the said artificer or any other person suing for the same in the county court in the district where the offence is committed, with full costs of suit.

4. If any frame or machine which shall have been entrusted to any artificer or other person by his employer for the purpose of being used in the hosiery manufacture for such employment, or in any process incident to such manufacture, shall, whilst the same shall be so entrusted, be worked, used, or employed without the consent in writing of such employer or other person so entrusting such frame or machine, in the manufacture of any goods or articles whatever for any other person than the person by whom such frame or machine shall have been so entrusted, then and in every such case the artificer or other person to whom the same shall have been so entrusted, shall forfeit and pay the sum of ten shillings for every day on any part of which any such frame or machine shall have been so worked, used, or employed, to be recoverable by and for the benefit of the person who shall have so entrusted the same, in the county court for the district where the offence shall have been committed, with full costs of suit.

5. No action, suit, or set-off between employer and artificer shall be allowed for any deduction or stoppage of wages, nor for any contract hereby declared illegal.

6. Nothing in this Act contained shall extend to prevent the recovery

in the ordinary course of law, by suit brought or commenced for the purpose, of any debt due from the artificer to the employer.

7. Within the meaning and for the purpose of this Act, all workmen, labourers, and other persons in any manner engaged in the performance of any employment or operation, of what nature soever, in or about the hosiery manufacture, shall be and be deemed “artificers;" and, within the meaning and for the purposes aforesaid, all masters, foremen, managers, clerks, contractors, sub-contractors, middlemen, and other persons engaged in the hiring, employment, or superintendence of the labour of any such artificer shall be and be deemed to be "employers;" and, within the meaning and for the purposes of this Act, any money or other thing had or contracted to be paid, delivered, or given as a recompense, reward, or remuneration for any labour done or to be done, whether within a certain time or to a certain amount, or for a time or for an amount uncertain, shall be deemed and taken to be the wages of such labour; and, within the meaning and for the purposes aforesaid, any agreement, understanding, device, contrivance, collusion, or arrangement whatsoever on the subject of wages, whether written or oral, whether direct or indirect, to which the employer and artificers are parties, or are assenting, or by which they are mutually bound to each other, or whereby either of them shall have endeavoured to impose an obligation on the other of them, shall be and be deemed a "contract." 8. This Act shall not commence or take effect till the expiration of three calendar months next after the day of passing the same. 9. This Act may be cited for all purposes as "The Hosiery Manufacture (Wages) Act, 1874" (a).

(a) Willis v. Thorp (1875), L. R. 10 Q. B. 383; 44 L. J. Q. B. 137. (Plaintiff, a hand frame worker in the employment of defendants, hosiery manufacturers; by the regulations of the factory, he was liable to a fine of 8d. a day for staying away from work

without permission; plaintiff was fined for so staying away; such deduction of wages not within section 3, and defendants not liable to a fine). See section 11 of the Employers' and Workmen Act, 1875, 38 & 39 Vict. c. 90.

CHAPTER V.

ACTS RELATING TO CHIMNEY SWEEPERS.

3 & 4 VICT. c. 85 (1840).

An Act for the Regulation of Chimney Sweepers and Chimneys (a).

1. [Continuance of 4 & 5 W. 4, c. 35, till 1st day of July, 1842.] 2. That from and after the 1st day of July, 1842 (b), any person who shall compel or knowingly allow any child or young person under the age of twenty-one years to ascend or descend a chimney, or enter a flue, for extinguishing fire therein, shall be liable to a penalty of not more than ten pounds [or less than five pounds (c)].

3. That from and after the passing of this Act it shall not be lawful to apprentice to any person using the trade or business of a chimneysweeper any child under the age of sixteen years, and that every indenture of such apprenticeship which may be entered into on and after such date shall be null and void.

4. [Power to justice of the peace at any time between the 1st July, 1841, and 1st July, 1842, to discharge from his or her apprenticeship any child apprenticed to any person using the trade or business of a chimney sweeper.-Repealed by Stat. Law Rev. Act, 1874, No. 2.]

5. [That from and after the 1st day of July, 1842, all existing indentures of apprenticeship to the trade or business of a chimney sweeper of any child who shall then be under the age of sixteen years shall be null and void.-Repealed by Stat. Law Rev. Act, 1874, No. 2.]

6. And whereas it is expedient, for the better security from accidents from fire or otherwise, the improved construction of chimneys and flues provided by the said Act be continued: Be it enacted, that all withs and partitions between any chimney or flue, which at any time after the passing of this Act shall be built or rebuilt, shall be of brick or stone, and at least equal to half a brick in thickness; and every breast-back and with or partition of any chimney or flue hereafter to be built or rebuilt shall be built of sound materials, and the joints of the work well filled in with good mortar or cement, and rendered or stuccoed within; and also that every chimney or flue hereafter to be built or rebuilt in

(a) See 37 & 38 Vict. c. 96. (b) See note (a).

(c) See 37 & 38 Vict. c. 96.

C C

any wall, or of greater length than four feet out of the wall, not being a circular chimney or flue twelve inches in diameter, shall be in every section of the same not less than fourteen inches by nine inches; and no chimney or flue shall be constructed with any angle therein which shall be less obtuse than an angle of one hundred and twenty degrees, except as is hereinafter excepted; and every salient or projecting angle in any chimney or flue shall be rounded off four inches at the least, upon pain of forfeiture, by every master builder or other master workman who shall make or cause to be made such chimney of flue, of any sum of not less than ten pounds nor exceeding fifty pounds: Provided, nevertheless, that, notwithstanding this Act, chimneys or flues may be built at angles with each other of ninety degrees and more, such chimneys or flues having therein proper doors or openings not less than six inches square (d).

7. That all convictions for penalties for any offence against this Act may be had before two or more justices of the peace acting for the county, riding, city, borough, division, or place where the offence shall happen, or before the sheriff or stewart of any county or stewartry in Scotland; and such penalties, and the costs and charges attending the recovery thereof, shall be levied by distress and sale of the goods and chattels of the offender or person liable or ordered to pay the same respectively, by warrant under the hands and seals of two or more of the said justices, or under the hand of any such sheriff or stewart, rendering the overplus of such distress and sale (if any) to the party or parties, after deducting the charge of making the same, which warrant such justices or sheriffs or stewarts are hereby empowered and required to grant, upon conviction of the offender by confession, or oath of one or more credible witness or witnesses; and the penalties, costs, and charges, when so levied, shall be paid, the one half to the informer, and the other half to the overseers or managers of the poor of the parish, township, or place where the offender shall dwell and inhabit, to be by such overseers or managers applied in aid of the rate or assessment raised for the relief of the poor of such parish, township, or place, and in Scotland, in parishes where there shall be no assessment for the relief of the poor, as the said managers shall direct, or to her Majesty in case there shall be no such overseer or manager.

8. That the justices of the peace or sheriffs or stewarts by whom any person shall be convicted and adjudged to pay any sum of money for any offence against this Act may adjudge that such person shall pay the same, together with costs, either immediately, or within such period as the said justices shall think fit; and that, in default of payment at the time appointed, such person shall be imprisoned in the common gaol or house of correction (with or without hard labour), as to the said justices or sheriffs or stewarts shall seem meet, for any time not

(d) See 7 & 8 Vict. c. 84, s. 1, and 18 & 19 Vict. c. 122, s. 109.