The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1878-03-12 00:00:00

THE LAND AND THE PEOPLE

A "Free Fume,- write, in the Heits:—The Indifference
of the masa of tlie pie•ple, and especially tl.e inhabitant,
of our town• and cities to that group of problems emu-
ninety referred to under the generic term the "Lind
Qitostioo," is roamellou. to those who duly appreciate the
velum. of the interest Involved therein. Subjects of
romit troth'. in.igniticance, such AA • proposed addition
of • penny to the income-tax. excite interest enough to
torn, I lection, when .li:edit.. relating to what
1., after all, the food important of our national industries,
do not decisivel) .bet • more of elections. Or, to take
another illustration, if we remove the feeling excited by
It.- Burials queation with that which exi•ta In relation t
land tenure, we might almost tome to the conclumi in that
pe.ple care more bow they are buried than how they live.
Yet there hare not been wanting utteranom by men of
which are well ealculstel to strike prhlie attention.
and which, Indeed, Imre been quoted repeatedly, not I
.rom their very triteness they have ceased to attract
notire, Itch ea. the declaration of one of our most
•nottoos Generitatire statesmen, to the effect that the
land of this country might he made to yield double it.
present produce in food: and such is Mr. Medd's oft.
repeated egtimate, that if all the farmed land of the
country produced es much human food as his naturally
pee farm does the preent quantity would he multiphed
by three. Lord Derby's st dement I folly endorse. and I
am by no t•••ns menaced to say that Mr.
estimate is examteratel. But a greater than Lord Derby
• .1. Mr. Mechi—one a the moot fiagelou. politician• that
.land ever produced —has left on record word• if
eloquence and p "Ver. eapreesive of the rest importance
attached or Mtn to the lunation of lan.l tenure which are
sell calculate I t stir up public att.nti upon the subs
led. In a speech .fellsoteed Its Mr. Coblen at Rooliale, on
the 13-d of November. 1881. the following panaire, which
tim been often referred to, hut eel lout quoted in full,
ue-airs ;—" If I were firennd•terenty or thirty, inquiet of,
nnhappilv, twice that Danaher of year., I would
take Adam Smith in hand I would not go
l•iyolati him, I would have no politics in it
—1( would take Adam Smith in hand, and I would have
A LO•Cla for Free Tad. in Land jun aa we have had a
Limo. for Free Trade in Corn. Y.. will find Just the
same authority In Adam Smith for the .tits as the other;
and if it only were taken spas it must he taken up to
succeed, not in • Political. revolutionary, Radical. Cher.
tiat notion, but taken lip on police-eemoluic grounds, the
agitation would be certain to succeed ; and if you can
apoly Free Trade to land and labour too—that Lia,lll
getting rid of there &howdah'e restrictions in your
settletnents and the like—then, I my, the men who do
that will hays done for Ragland probably lunge than we
have been able to do by making Free Trade in Corn."
This is only one of very many ”•11148•4 of like purport
that are to be found amongst the collected speeches of
Mr. Cobden in that valuable volume, published by
Mcmillsn, which iii., in than time., mere desirable them
over, perhaps. that his countrymen .hould read. Having
thus referred to Mr. Cbdeu and his strong opinions on
questions of land tenure, it will at first appear strange
when I insert that, had it not been for him and his co-
worker., that collection of abominations, known WI the
Land Laws, must have been dealt with in • very drastic
meaner long ago. lithe Corn Laws had not been repealed,
a starving anticn would have risen in overwhelming
Indignation to sweep /may those legal renrictions which
the load of the country in the hands of • few, who have
neither the capital to develop its resources themselves,
nor the gram to grant their tenants such security as
would induce the latter to do what they themselves
cannot do. Through the repeal of the Corn Laws the
people have cheap Mead, and this keep. them quiet, and
unhappily, renders them indifferent to the enormous
waste of national wealth invovled in paring annually to
foreign countries upward. of C 125,000,000 for agricultural
Produce that might be produced at h toe—to. say nothing
of such estiOlVes as that of Mr. Me.tht to the effect dint
if the United Kingdom were one •ait T ptree.hall Farm,
the produce • ...Id he brevetted to the enormoiss extent
•.1 1.111.000.0n0 But if bre .1 is cheap, meat Is
not, aud there Is no kind of agrinaltoral produce
the increase of which d”ends so materially upon the
amount of capital invested in farming as that of meat.
Just now much public intense it excited in relation to •
Bill which proposes to enact restrictions which It is sop-
Posed will reduce our supply of foreign cattle. I will not
in. into that question—upon which I am entirely with the
Government, as far they go—ant I only allude to it in
order to remark that our meat supply would he increased
to en immense], greater extent by such reforms of our
system of land tenure as would attract espial to the
land, than it would if our port. were opened to the on-
ntetrictel Importation of cattle and Amp from all
countrin, even if these foreign animals, area if dune
foreign animals did not—as I am coining d they do now
—in elect, destroy aal prevent the production of more
meet than they being. Why are not such c antiderations
a. them more freqoently brought before the peddle by
our Liberal Leaders! lam very smash afraid that in too
many butanes it is •elf.intereitt —imaginer, self.intereet,
that is—that stops their mouths. Ain tjority of our tette
Lunn even Littorals or, lanilivners, sod most of Mom
oho are not retired to, or friendly with, throe who are,
and who have Milano.) over them_ Thu. even the pro-
probed followers of Cobden hung hack from the cru.ade
1.. sthith, In the einoent word, above quoted, he incited
them After a visit ti Lord Broallands, on whose
...tato they found more game than corn or stock, they
it.. not like to suggest that It would he bettor if their
noble friend bed fewer agree, ant that the Laws wit eh
render it directly contrary to Ma owo intoning to hm-
. proee what he kept, should '.e doom away with. Still len
as they have probably been shooting, can they point out
the er/le of game preeervation. Depend upon it,
until a •817 different set of men from thine who are
there now are end to the Hones of Commons we shall
not have an effeztual refor. of our abominable Land
Law. Row, then, are the people to be roused to •dm
appreciation of the great Importance of land tenure
rei If their leaders in Parliament will not lead
them on this question, who shalll I sae that the press
might, could, and ought to hind them. But, apart from
a few journals which CAO almost be counted on oneX
Angers, what ham the press of this country done to
promote land tenure reform "Present company
excepted," what have the great London dailies done! I
say that this great question has been disgracefully
neglected by the Liberal press. In relation to the
greatest of all reforms now needed in the interest of this
Country. %ma wears to this quandarr —the Conservatives
are traditionally against it; the bilk of the recognised
Liberal lenders we evens from, or fearful of, touching
It: the preen as • rule, a/selects it the farmers, many
of whom are strongly In favour of it, are afraid to meddle
I with it • and the people of the towns care nothing about
It. Udine the penas wakes to a tense of fts duty in
! relation ti the misetioe, the townspeople are not likely
to he moved from their indifference, and the only hope
t will be in the acquisition of the franchise by the farm
labourers. Not tbsd I think—fort wish to he frank and
honest la all my &remnants—that the majority of the
, labourers know or care much about the land question.
The, do not core because they do not know. But their
leaders both know and care, and they have no expecta-
tions from Lord Woodlands.

Sti-myrrovi sag Ulm —The &hum. at Um Mediae
Mimw bag call.l the uotice of cha medical prof ali"e
to Cadbury's Cocoa Howence. wallah he calk Caab.ire.
Cosesstratad Vegetsble Milk, and remark+ : "The
mem of fatty comber how beim carroully oliminatied
and Wm • compound commin• which convoys la a
=aimelm mood el auldmost.
fts WI
II as • AM fre li"

THE 7ARK LABOURER.
I An honest enquire, into the condition of the
English farm labourer, ends but little to c insole
thet hard-working individual for the luxuries of his
1 lot._

He finds that the average rate of wages paid in the
districts whi.-11 he h rs investi,mted is 13t. • week; and
that before the lace Union agitation, it was Ha. a
week. This confirm, reports that have reached us
from other qu.rtere, to the effect that. althotub the
I Union movement wee apparently • failure, it had
I induced the farmers in • great many places to raise
the wages of their labourers. The fanners have •
olesop-seatol dread of Unions. Their profits, in the
' mejority of Enzlish *mode.. are not large; and they
fear that the force which
Might be brought to bear on
them by a powerful combined on would utterly destroy
their chances of living. What the labourer gains
front them in in wages, they must withdraw
from the landlonl in decreaaed rant. The mere fact
that the labourers have shown this disposition to
combine and demand more pay has induced the
farmers to rides wages in some proportion- while the
labourers are said to have gained from this concession
some consciousness of their strewth, and some hope
of still better things to come. The men are hired, In
many cases, by the day, not by the week—indeed,
this is " gsnardlly" the oase—so that three wet days
in • week would reduce the labourer's wages for that
week to 6.. 6d.. while be may earn nothing at all
simply the-ugh the fanner not reviring him for that
On the other bawl, th labourer on some
farms is given 15.. a week in summer, and 14.. in
winter, getting constant employment all the Year
round, however gre.t may be the farmer's difficulty
In finding anything f,r him to do. Then there comes
in the extra in mei which the labourer earns in
harvest end hoield Id ; awl here we cannot help
esooresain.; our regret that th • farmers should not give
the tow, in money at I ast • consi,lerable portion of
which I. lavishly drunk at such times. On some
farm., indeed during the busiest time .1 the harvest,
It may safely be Rani that the labourer is kept in a
constan• lode of moni-intoxiciti on. He has no time
to sleep off et•-cts of the beer; In the morning he
goes into the field in • bemused state, &not forthwith
seeks to pull himself together by further draughts.
Fortunately. Sunday comes in to give him a long
sleep; during the rest .1 the week In some farms in
certain parts ,1 the country he cannot be said ever to
be sober. But taking matters a/ they are, one arrives
at the conclusion that an able-bodied labourer, who
gets constant employment and who works indu.triou.ly,
does not earn Ha a week on the average, including
his extra pay at harvest and hop-picking.
There are, it is true, certain alleviations which are
the result of the kindness, mistaken or otherwise, of
his well-to-do neighbours. The farmers themselves, I
when they happen to be of a charitable turn are in I
the habit of presenting their labourers with • Piece of
I beet or a leg of pork at particular seasons of the year;
while at the critical time of the harvest wee= many
farm-kitchens are practically thrown open, with but
slight deduction on that account made from the
wages. Again. In very many districts the wives of the
parson, the doctor, the lawyer, and similar notable
people in the neighbourhood, combine to form
benevolent societies for the purpose of helping the
poorer people annuli them. Tbe charitable intention
of these ladies ia worthy of all esteem; but the result
of their labours cannot be sail to promote the self-
respect of the people whom they wish to benefit.
These institutions, of course, are said to be self-sup-
porting. Their osiensible object is only to cultivate
economical and thimotrious habits; the labourer has
to pay so muc o a week, and at Christmas hi. wife is
weeented with • pair of blankets ny scene clothing for I
her children. But as • matter of fact, they usually
become institutions for the covert dispensing of I
charity; and in this direction it is to be feared that
their influence is only miechieyous. The sneaking and
lazy labourer will resort to all sorts of devices to get
from the squire's wife • weekly allowance of butcher's
meet, together with an occasional bottle of port wine
or brandy for his sick wife or chili; while the
Wrist-nous labourer, who manages with a hard
stywde to pay his own way, grows sweiews of
the benefits enjoyed by the other, and is
newels temnted to forget his self-respect and
become a beggar likewise. It is not to any such
mean/ that the labourer mud look for the ;morose. I
merit of his condition. He won+ endeavour to .41 his
heat work In the hest market The farmers say that I
the hard life led by the agricultural lab-on-ea is no
tank of theirs. Thev point to the extraordinary
plowinn for fee-mint which onsee..e, so many English-
men; to the fancy priors which ow a noose:an crews
gnome... f oyn. wi'l fetch; and to the imnossidoility of
their paying ins more for •gri ailtrwol labour so long
a• their MVOs Martin as hizli as they are at present.
Of comma, that ic the onewion. Boit there is non/won
why rents thonl-1 reined, wo hloh as they are a. lament,
OPT that fancy prices ehonld be nail that firming
may he practised an an atou-ement by those to whom
It should he a liminess. The labourers have a
inomicion that the fawner conli pay a little more and
still retain • comfronahle profit for themeelvm ; and we
may he quite seers that the Union movement, though
It ha. apparenly oiroroped dead, will be revived in
order to proms this queetion to a solution. That
solution, which may not arrive at once. in to he found
in the word rent In the meantime, much is hoperl
from the emiesvonr to get lahrowere to migrate from
the more poorly paid districts in England to three in
which better wages can he otained ; intl ranch in being
done by et:Di:ration. In whatever the lahmorer may
fairly and honestly do to better his hit in life, he ought
to have the full sympathy awl encouragement of his
countrymen; for it cannot be said that his condition at
present i °fleets much credit After on them or on him-
self.