By  2  Hen.  IV,  c.  14  (1402),  it  was  provided  that;

No  Labourers,  Carpenters,  Masons,  Tilers,  Plaisterers,  Daubers,
Coverers  of  Houses,  nor  none  other  Labourers,  shall  take  any  Hire
for  the  Holy  days  [holidays],  nor  for  the  Evens  of  Feasts,  where
they  do  not  labour  but  till  the  hour  of  Noon,  but  only  for  the  half-
day.
And,  as  we  have  seen,  the  period  of  work  of  a  caulker
labouring  by  the  tide  was  laid  down  by  an  Act  of  Henry
VII's  reign.  The  most  elaborate  rules  relative  to  hours
are  to  be  found,  however,  in  another  section  of  the
1 1  Hen.  VII,  c.  22,  which  enacts  as  follows:

Whereas  divers  artificers  and  labourers  retained  to  work  and
serve  waste  much  part  of  the  day  and  deserve  not  their  wages,
sometime  in  late  coming  unto  their  work,  early  departing  there-
from, long  sitting  at  their  breakfast,  at  their  dinner  and  nonemete,
and  long  time  of  sleeping  at  afternoon  ...  it  is  therefore
established,  enacted,  and  ordained  .  .  .  that  every  artificer  and
labourer  be  at  his  work  between  the  middle  of  the  month  of
March  and  the  middle  of  the  month  of  September  by  five  of  the
clock  in  the  morning,  and  that  he  have  but  half  an  hour  for
his  breakfast,  and  an  hour  and  a  half  for  his  dinner  at  such  time
as  he  hath  season  for  sleep  to  him  appointed  by  this  statute,  and
at  such  time  as  is  herein  appointed  that  he  shall  not  sleep  then
he  to  have  but  an  hour  for  his  dinner  and  half  an  hour  for  his
nonemete  ;  and  that  he  depart  not  from  his  work  between  the
middle  of  the  said  months  of  March  and  September  till  between
seven  and  eight  of  the  clock  in  the  evening.
