of this rule. The carefully devised scheme for technical training of apprentices embodied to a considerable extent the methods and experiences of the craft guilds. Hours of labour were as follows: "All artificers and labourers being hired for wages by the day or week shall, betwixt the midst of the months of March and September, be and continue at their work at or before 5 o'clock in the morning and continue at work and not depart until betwixt 7 and 8 o'clock at night, except it be in the time of breakfast, dinner or drinking, the which time at the most shall not exceed two hours and a half in a day, that is to say, at every drinking half an hour, for his dinner one hour and for his sleep when he is allowed to sleep, the which is from the midst of May to the midst of August, half an hour; and all the said artificers and labourers betwixt the midst of September and the midst of March shall be and continue at their work from the spring of the day in the morning until the night of the same day, except it be in time afore appointed for breakfast and dinner, upon pain to lose and forfeit one penny for every hour's absence, to be deducted and defaulted out of his wages that shall so offend." Although the standpoint of the Factory Act and Truck Act in force at the beginning of the 20th century as regards hours of labour or regulation of fines deducted from wages is completely reversed, yet the difference is not great between the average length of hours of labour permissible under the present law for women and those hours imposed upon the adult labourer in Elizabeth's statute. Apart from the standpoint of compulsory imposition of fines, one advantage in the definiteness of amount deductible from wages would appear to lie on the side of the earlier statute. Three points remain to be touched on in connection with the Elizabethan poor law. In addition to (a) consolidation of measures for setting vagrants to work, we find the first compulsory contributions from the well-to-do towards poor relief there provided for, (b) at least a theoretical recognition of a right as well as an obligation on the part of the labourer to be hired, (c) careful provision for the apprenticing of destitute children and orphans