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SEX IX INDUSTRY.
plastic and undeveloped forms and powers of these girls of tender years whose vital functions are as yet incomplete.
By far the greater majority of those who are engaged in the lighter labors of manufacturing and commercial interests in our larger cities and towns have not arrived at the age when the law governing such employment releases them from its control; and yet the provisions of the statute in this regard are in large measure utterly ignored, anti every section of the State supports industries in the processes of which the law is daily and with unconcern infracted. Probably the first requirement of the law—that “ no child under the age of ten years shall be employed in any manufacturing or mechanical establishment within this Commonwealth” — is violated with comparative rarity ; but its second and quite as important proviso — “ that no child between the ages of ten and fifteen shall be so employed unless he or she has attended some public or private school, under teachers approved by the school com-