The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1865-12-12 00:00:00

that in highly-cultivated distlicts where agricultural
labour oasts 14s. and 16s. a week, the work is for quantity,
as cheap as in districts where agriculture is lower, and
where wages are only S. or Ps. a week. Nay !
we have in my county, Lancashire, a class of workmen,
strangely called navigators or IlitViieg—it i 8 supposed
frotu having been originally employed in digging canals
and works for serving inland navigation. These Lan-
cashire men work in gangs of five, and admit no men
Into their gauge who cannot, as their minimum task,
load twenty cubic yards, or twenty atingle cart-loads in a
day. I have known instance% of men of this class, as a
feat, doing even double that quantity. A mile of road
made by labourers of this superior clue, earning 3.1.,
3s. 61., or ss. 63. per day, hes been executed M a much
shorter time, and has been finished as cheaply as a mile
of precisely the same sort of road done in Irelend by
pauper labourers whose wages were only is. per day.
Common agricultnral labourers, when they have been
alliwed to join these gangs of navvies, and have been
alimented and seasoned to their tremendous discipline,
on their return have astonished the farmers by doing an
ordinary day's agricultural work before noon, and by
Putting their spades on their shoulders and going away
for the rest of the day. My noble friend Lord Shaftes-
bury, brought down to hie estate in Dorset, a foreman
meaustomed to superior labour at pieoe-work. Judging
of what would be his answer, I said to this foreman,
Will you not get this work done cheaply? Here the
labourers are got for only So. per week." "But they
would be dear at 6+.," was the reply. "How is it here
with your other classes of artisans," I enquired, " your
journeymen bricklayers for example." "Such as from
their wages, you, sir, would expect," was the answer.
"And what wages are those?" " About 12s. per week.
"And how many bricks do they lay in a day ?" "Not
more than between three and four hundred." "And
how many do your town bricklayers lay to whom you
pay double wages?" "More than a thousand a day,"
was the answer. I need only refer you to the immense
amount of work oar navvies did in the Crimea ea a
proof of this. You all remember how goon the railway
was conetructed there, but the navvies had 20oz. of
bread, 20oz. of meat, 2oz. of peas, 2oz. of rice, lies.
of coffee, and dos. of rum each per day—mush more
than the soldiers had, or could consume; but these men
could do singly as much as two soldiers, though the
soldiers came from the same locality, and some were
, brothers of the navvies. The thing stands by reason, if
you want labourers to work well they must live well.
I Would you allow your horses, if you wanted them to
work well, to get in bad condition? By no means! It
would be suicidal policy if you did. And so it is with
I Your workpeople ; the well-fed, hearty people will do
twice the work the ill-fed, weakly one can possibly have
either the heart or the power to do, and ho*. in the
name of common sense, can these people be well fed on
low wages. I say it matters little to • farmer how high
a salary he pays his men provided they earn what he
I pays, and therefore if a man ta,es now-a-day to do a
certain amount of work for which you pay him 21.,
and if by extra activity and intelligence he can do it in
, half-a-day, he is equally entitled to the 25., and should'
as cheerfully be paid. Mr. Fiuney, who wrote the ex- ,
cellent work "klMts on Agriculture for Landlords and
, Tenants," says, "Ten good, sturdy, well-fed, thinking
men about a farm are mush cheaper to a master, at the
name amount of money, than fifteen half-starved,
drawling, loutish, stupid fellows," and I believe him.
The same writers says "As for the men being masters,
or you their masters, it is all nonsense. Introduce
piece-work for everything, nothing is easier if the master
knows his work and the labourer his ; but, unfortunately,
very few know what an able-bodied labourer can do,
because they never have them about them; nor do the
labourers themselves know what they are capable of
doing under their present low diet. Pay them better,
that will bring them more and better food—better food
will give them more strength, and infuse into the man
a greater feeling of independence, and then he will begin
to appreciate higher wages ; that once obtained you will
soon get your labour better done and more of it at a less
cost though you pay more wages," I trust I have said
sufficient to prove that the payment of low wages is false
economy. What wages you really do pay I leave
you to say. I believe there are various sums paid
,in this county. Some farmers have already learnt
that it is to their advantage to have comfortable,
well-paid, happy servants about them, and they never
change. We have an example in many of my worthy
friends present, whose servants,hale, comfortable-looking
old souls, have come forward at our meetings and taken
capital prizes for long and faithful servitude. It is the
avaricious, grinding fellow, that is never satisfied with
the workpeople—is always changing and never improve-
ing—that has given Dorset the bad name; he is a fool
to himself, a persecutor to his labourer, soda dishonour
to the eounty of which he is an unworthy inhabitant.
Gentlemen, I have gone onto a great extent, but I have
more subjects yet. I am sorry to say I have only
scanned those on which I have already dwelt. I had
written some statistics respecting the price of labour
compared with agricultural produce, from the middle of
the fourteenth century to the present, but I must omit
this altogether to speak on two more subjects,! viz.,
paying your men in gristing, and giving cider as a por-
tion of wages. I should like to have added also some-
thing on allotment gardens, potato land, Friendly
Societies, and labourers' duties, but as I know I have
tired you already, I will cut my paper as short as
gossibly I can.