The Evening Star TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 27, 1872

Evening Star, Issue 2816, 27 February 1872, Page 2

The Evening Star TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 27, 1872

It is a sad pity that a good cause does not at once so commend itself as to lead all men and women to seek to forward it. From time to time complaints arise from persons employed in the grocery and drapery trades of being kept prisoners behind counters bn Saturday nights, waiting to serve those who through one cause or another have delayed making purchases earlier in the week. They say, and with reason, that this ought nob to be ; although we are inclined to think that when they blame their dawdling customers for thoughtless family arrangements, they condemn many who are more sinned against than sinners. Very few rich, very few well to do folk are to be seen in the shops on Saturday night. They are mostly people dependent upon receipt of weekly wages, who have planned beforehand how much they can spend in necessaries and how much in adornments. Many of them are equally to be pitied with those whose time and health they tax in waiting upon them. In almost every household where there is a family, Saturday is a heavy day. The house is to be made clean and tidy for enjoyment of the day of rest. There is extra washing, and rubbing, and scrubbing to be done. -The children have to be overhauled and started afresh clean and tidy for another week’s run ; and tired and almost worn out when evening comes, the mother has to go out and make the needful purchases from the wages handed to her an hour before. For their sakes, .is well as lor those whose health and time are wasted in waiting upon them, it is time this system should be changed. It is scarcely possible to imagine anything more wearisome and exhausting than these late Saturday nights. From eight or nine in the morning till eleven or twelve at night is too much lor any man to be expected to work or to wait. Man has a right to expect some time for relaxation and amusement. The Sunday differs from the six working days by a change : but what is the nature of it I If spent in the orthodox manner, it is an alternation from wearying idleness to mental effort, for which the active duties of life wholly unlit the hardworked shopman. The chances are that he seeks relief from the exhaustion of long hours, rendered more hurtful by having to breathe air deprived of its oxygen by many gaslights, by spending his Sunday in bed. As a question of profit and loss these long hours must entail heavy expense to employers. It is very evident that whether shops are closed at one or two o’clock on a Saturday, or kept open until midnight, consumption is not altered. People do not buy because a shop is open, but because they want goods, and us shops cannot be kept open at night’s without extra expense, it needs no abstruse calculation to shew that as no more than a certain amount ol business can be done, every hour beyond what is needful to do it entails so much loss. But here we are met by the great obstacle to change competition. Every tradesmen sees at once the truth of what we have said, and would be very willing for his own sake and saving to close his shop, if the man in the same trade a few doors from him, or in the next street, would do so too. But strange to say, they agree to run each other into heavy expenses, by keeping their shops open although they cannot agree to large mutual savings by closing them. J usfc like two men who have begun lighting: each would be very glad to give up if only the other would let him. The difficulty in such cases is, Who shall first propose to give in. Luckily the cases differ on two very important points : this early closing movement commends itself to the reason and to the pocket, and the “ Half-Holiday Association ” saves the trouble of any sacrifice of dignity. It steps in as a mediator, and shows how the present competition can be maintained, and both masters and servants very materially relieved. It is plain, however, that public co-operation is required to give effect to the movement if those who mainly supply themselves with groceries and draperies on the Saturday afternoon and night are to be considered : and clearly they must not be overlooked. We do not think that in the colonies, there is the same hand-to-mouth style of living as amongst the arti/.aus and laborers at Home. In certain localities in London and the large towns of England and Scotland, wages are paid so late on the Saturday, and are so scanty, that had not the receivers shops to go to for obtaining necessaries, they would go suppcrlcss to byd, and diuuerlcss on the Sun-

day. In the colonies this is not an alternative, for, as a rule, there is a surplus over the week’s earnings that would, by a little thrift, put house- ] keepers a week in advance. At any rate, the matter could easily be arranged by employers making it a rule to pay on a Friday, when it was tiesired. We have known this plan adopted with the very best results in large establishments at Home, and we believe the system is on the increase there. Carefully looked into, it is very plain that the plan of Saturday’s marketing is a thing of custom more than of necessity. It has been imported with our trade notions from Home, and has been allowed to become a Colonial institution through sheer neglect to adapt our habits to altered circumstances. In its moral ell'ccts it is bad—bad for those who buy, bad for those who sell ; for it is a waste of time and health to both, it is morally bad, for it deprives the employed of necessary relaxation that might bo devoted to intellectual and physical improvement. It induces weariness of the flesh and mind, which too often finds fitful relief by resort to ardent spirits. It is bad for the master, because it renders necessary, needless expense in conducting business : in the aggregate a large national loss. And it is bad religiously, because men, however willing, cannot by an effort of the will at once turn their attention from subjects that have occupied tlicir every thought during the week to abstract theology on the Sunday. Like a change of key in music, to render it palatable there must be an intermediate chord—and that chord is the halt holiday on Saturday. Wc trust ttie Association will have the support they deserve. The movement only requires to be understood to obtain it.