Before proceeding to study the manufacture of cocoa essence and
chocolate from the bean as it is imported, it will be interesting to
see the careful provision that is made for the health and cleanliness
of the workers, for in connection with any food nothing is of greater
importance than the circumstances attending its preparation. A
gratuitous sick club is provided by the firm for the employees,
including the services of a doctor and three trained nurses. A special
retiring room, comfortably furnished, is provided for girls needing a
quiet hour's rest.

We are taken into the girls' dining-hall, capable of seating over two
thousand at a time, fitted with benches, the backs of which are
convertible into table tops. The far end of the dining-hall leads into
the huge kitchen, to which the girls can bring their own dinners to be
cooked, or where they can buy a large variety of things at
coffee-house prices. Here again the health of the workers is carefully
studied. Fruit is made a speciality, an experienced buyer being
employed to insure its better supply. A private dining-room is
provided for the forewomen.

Returning to the dining-hall, we descend a flight of steps into the
spacious dressing-rooms, with vistas of wooden screens, filled on each
side with numbered hooks. Here every morning the thousands of girls
not only divest themselves of their outer garments, but change their
dresses for washing frocks of white holland. The material for these is
provided by the firm, free for the first, and afterwards at less than
cost price, and the girls are required to start work in a clean frock
every Monday morning. It will be seen at once how this helps them to
keep neat and respectable; their strong white washing frocks only