mother who was a tchinóvnitsa, and did not want to live with peasant girls; the third had a drunken father. These only made use of the agency just the same as those seamstresses did who were not girls, but married women. But, apart from these three, all the other girls who had relatives to support lived in the general apartment. They lived by themselves in one suite, two or three in one room; but their male or female relatives were given rooms according to circumstances. Two old ones had separate rooms; all the other old women lived together. For the little boys there was a separate room, and two others for the little girls. It was decided that the little boys could stay until they were eight years old; those above that age would be put out to learn a trade.
There was an accurate account kept of everything, in order that the whole association might get used to the idea that no one was getting any advantage over anybody else, that they were not doing each other any harm. The accounts of the single girls in the apartment for rooms and board were very simple. After some hesitation, they decided to charge for a brother or sister, under eight years of age, the fourth part of the expenses of a grown-up girl, and that then the support of a girl until she was twelve was to be reckoned at one-third; after she was twelve, the price should be one-half of that of her sister. When the little girls should reach the age of thirteen, they should enter the shop as apprentices, if they did not succeed in establishing themselves otherwise; and it was decided that from sixteen and upwards they should enter as full members of the union, provided they were found to be skilful seamstresses. For the support of the grown-up relatives, as much, of course, was charged as for that of the seamstresses: for separate rooms there was an extra charge. Almost all the old women, and the three old men, who lived in the union apartment, busied themselves in the kitchen and in other domestic duties, and for this, of course, they were paid.
All this can be told very quickly in words, and in reality it seemed very easy, simple, and natural, when it was once accomplished. But everything was done very deliberately, and every new step cost a great many arguments, and every change was the result of a whole series of experiments. It would be very tedious and dry to describe the other details of the shop as particularly as we have told about the division of the profits. In regard to many points it is not necessary
