INTRODUCTORY.
15
of the function, and consequent sterility.” *
While pointing out the commonality of effect of “constrained positions, muscular effort, brain-work, and all forms of mental or physical excitement,” upon students and operatives in the direction indicated, the same author urges two reasons why female operatives of all sorts are likely to suffer less from persistent work than female students. The first is, that “ the female operative of whatever sort has, as a rule, passed through the first critical epoch of woman’s life: she has got fairly by it.” The second is, “because the operative works her brain less.” Though I believe statistics f will warrant the expression that this first conclusion is too inclusive,
* Sex in Education, p. 47.
t The United-States census of 1870 gives the total number of females employed in industry between the ages of ten and fifteen as 191,100 ; total number (of these ages) in manufacturing and mechanical industries, 25,0C4, or about 13.4 per cent of the whole ; total number females (all ages) employed in all industries, 1,830,288 : showing that 10.4 per cent — i.e. 191,000 — of the whole number is under the age of fifteen.
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