there had been two more who had died.  When asked why they had died, the poor mother shrugged her shoulders listlessly, and replied, “Don’t know.”  In addition to bearing and rearing these children, her work would sap the vitality of any ordinary person.  “She got home soon after four in the morning, cooked breakfast for the family and ate hastily herself.  At 4.30 she was in bed, staying there until eight.  But part of that time was disturbed for the children were noisy and the apartment was a tiny, dingy place in a basement.  At eight she started the three oldest boys to school, and cleaned up the debris of breakfast and of supper the night before.  At twelve she carried a hot lunch to her husband and had dinner ready for the three school children.  In the afternoon, there were again dishes and cooking, and caring for three babies aged five, three years, and six months.  At five, supper was ready for the family.  The mother ate by herself and was off to work at 5:45.”

Another of the night-working mothers was a frail looking Frenchwoman of twenty-seven years, with a husband and five children ranging from eight years to fourteen months.  Three other children had died.  When visited, she was doing a huge washing.  She was forced into night work to meet the expenses of the family.  She estimated that she succeeded in getting five hours’ sleep during the day.  “I take my baby to bed with me, but he cries, and my little four-year-old boy cries, too, and comes in to make me get up, so you can’t call that a very good sleep.”

The problem among unmarried women or those without family is not the same, this investigator points out.  “They sleep longer by day than they normally would by night.”  We are also informed that pregnant women work at night in the mills, sometimes up to the very hour of delivery.  “It’s queer,” exclaimed a woman supervisor of one of the Rhode Island mills, “but some women, both on the day and the night shift, will stick to their work right up to the last minute, and will use every means to deceive you about their condition.  I go around and talk to them, but make little impression.  We have had several narrow escapes....  A Polish mother with five children had worked in a mill by day or by night, ever since her marriage, stopping only to have her babies.  One little girl had died several years ago, and the youngest child, says Mrs. Kelley, did not look promising.  It had none of the charm of babyhood; its body and clothing were filthy; and its lower lip and chin covered with repulsive black sores.”

It should be remembered that the Consumers’ League, which publishes these reports on women in industry, is not advocating Birth Control education, but is aiming “to awaken responsibility for conditions under which goods are produced, and through investigation, education and legislation, to mobilize public opinion in behalf of enlightened standards for workers and honest products for all.”  Nevertheless,