WHITE CHILD SLAVERY.

Marlborough Express, Volume XLII, Issue 5, 7 January 1908, Page 6

WHITE CHILD SLAVERY.

TEACHERS' REVELATIONS

During the proceedings of the annual conference of school teachers (says the Sydney Morning Herald), Acting Inspector Bluiner, who has had many years of experience in, the teaching profession, both in the city and in i the country districts of New South Wales, referred to the trials and vicissitudes of the school days of the little ones in the farming areas of this State. As an illustration of his remarks he related a case which had but recently come under his notice in one of the prosperous dairy districts, and which he indicated was only typical of many hundreds of others. He found a bright little girl, he told his: interested auditors, scarcely eight years of age, who was required by her parents to milk j.3 cows every morning, preparatory to walking four miles along a bush track to school. Tired and weary with her day's ! exertions, she was compelled to return, home again on foot, only to repeat the milking operations before being allowed to retire. Cries of "Shame!" came from all parts of the hall as the inspector told the gathering that this was the child's daily round of duties in a glorious country like Australia. Waxing wrath as he meditated on his experiences, Acting Inspector Blumer declared that "the way some people sacrifice their own flesh and blood for.a few paltry pounds verges on savage brutality"—a sentiment which was cheered to the echo. Apart altogether from the question of regular attendance, Acting Inspector Blumer asserted —and his remarks were generally endorsed by his colleagues—it would be better for a child to rest a little rather than to be sent to school to fall fast asleep on the forms. "I have had experience," he said in concluding, "with the waifs of the city streets^ who have many good points, and enjoy at anyrate some amount of freedom, but their lot is nothing compared with the little white slaves that one meets in the country districts of this State."