Hours and Fatigue.

While in general hours worked by students were not unreasonable, a minority had to work, or at any rate did work, excessive hours. 56 hours a week can be taken as a rough guide to the upper desirable limit for continuous working. The most serious cases occurred in domestic work. Some girls were working up to 91 hours a week. One third of the girls engaged in domestic work were either completely exhausted or very fatigued by the work. The close personal relationship to the employer in domestic work, and the fact that the employer may herself be working Just as hard, makes it difficult or a girl to say "no" when she is asked to carry on long after she has done a reasonable day's work. Domestic work in hospitals did not entail such long hours (up to 50 hours only), but the work was hard and three-quarters of the girls were more than slightly or temporarily fatigued.

Hours of work on farms were sometimes long—occasionally reaching 72-80 hours a week. But very few of those employed on farms, either men or women, were unduly fatigued. Work in gardens and orchards was different, and particularly the women seemed to find it somewhat strenuous, though apparently in only one case was health adversely affected.