Page:Irish In America.djvu/229

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INTELLIGENCE AND LABOUR DEPARTMENT.
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thought he must be the head of all the Pellice. So we made bould to tell that your honour tould us to ax him which was the way to the third Avany cars, and sure he tould us to " go to the Divil "so we kem straight back to your honour. The clerk, who was a good judge of a joke, looked steadily at the speaker ; but she seemed utterly unconscious of having perpetrated a bon mot. There is another department at Castle Garden, which has proved of immense advantage to emigrants of both sexes an Intelligence Office and Labour Exchange. For tunately for the interests of those who desire to employ and to be employed, this is becoming every day better known, and consequently more generally availed of ; and through its operation employment is obtained for all kinds of labour, agricultural, manufacturing, and domestic. There are two such offices in the building, one for men and the other for women. A register, which I had the opportunity of examining, is carefully kept, in which the names of persons requiring employment, or wanting to employ hands, are entered ; and in which, in case of hiring, all necessary particulars are likewise set down. This register is thus not only a means of affording useful information respecting individuals to friends who seek intelligence of them, but also of protection to the parties employed ; inas much as if the employer violates his contract which is embodied in his proposal he may be sued on the part of the Commissioners, to whom the emigrant is an object of official care for five years after his or her landing at New York. It frequently happens that, through the operation of this bureau, persons are enabled to procure employment on landing, and go off at once to those who hired them by anticipation. But it must be understood that the chances of employment are generally more in favour of females than of males ; and that they are terribly against the latter, if they come out at a wrong season which is towards the Autumn, and all through the Winter. The girl or