The Democratic press. [volume] (Ravenna, O. [Ohio]) 1868-1901, 1890-07-23
ENGLISH FARM LIFE.
a Wayfaring Gossip Tells What He Saw
in Lincolnshire.

have recently had occasion to be
moving about in the agricultural dis
tricts of Lincolnshire, says writer III
the London Daily Nea0s, and l am in
clined to think that nobody could do
that, with eyes and ears open, without
now and again stopping to ask him
self: ''What is going to be the end OF
all thisp"
s'Just look round this neighborhood,"
said particularly well-informed resi-
dent in the country. "Over yonder, at
such village, is an unoccupied farm
of 700 acres; over yonder is another of
600 acres, and little further off is an
other of perhaps 200 acres, which has
attached to it 400 or 500 acres else
where At another village" men
tioning the name of it, 'a farm of 400
or 500 acres lies vacant, another of 800
or 400, and another of 400 acres. All
these are on one estate. There is an
other estate lying away yonder in an
other direction which has unoccupied
farms of total extent of about two
thousand one hundred acres and an
other of 600 acres" and so the speaker
proceeded with list which apparently
he could have continued almost in
definitely. Not, he was careful to have
me understand, that the land was going
out of cultivation, but that farmers
were giving it up, and the great land
owners were themselves cultivating it
under the management of bailltfs. One
very general effect of this is to reduce
the number of hands employed upon
the land, and, as rule, bailiffs are
harder taskmasters than farmers.
Moreover as the number of employers
diminishes the independence of the
laborers diminishes also. A man has
a smaller choice of masters, and is
more completely under the thumb OF
any one who will give him work. If
under such circumstances wages do not
tend downward it is partly because they
stand at point at which it is scarcely
possible for men to exist at all at a
lower rate, and partly because there is
continual depletion of the country in.
to the towns. Throughout the county
of Lincoln wages stand at II shillings a
| week. There are some exceptional
cases in which they are less, and there
are other cases in which they are q
trife more; but II shillings a week ap-
pears to be the usual rate of pay nomi-
nally. The real pay is something less,
! because whenever the weather does not
permit of their working in the fields,
and nothing can be found to do indoors,
shillings a day is stopped; and, Of
course, it often happens that work is
not to be had in any weather.
Il assure you, sir" said one dapper
little woman, with round. rosy face
and pair of laughing gray eyes that
seemed to give the contradiction to all
her statements of trouble and anxiety,
Il assure you, sir, my ole man many
a week in the winter ha' made only s
or 10 shillings week, and it's the win
ter-time as you seems to want it most. ,
You may hear any number of such
ditties in almost any village of Lincoln
shire, which, l suppose, is not con
spicuously worse than other agricul
tural countries. All being well, how
ever, the people make pounds or Sc
at harvest, and this may be taken tt
make up losses at other times; so tha
II shillings may be taken, perhaps
fairly to represent the weekly wage
of agricultural laborers. House ren
may, perhaps, be reckoned at Is pence
a week, and we have 10 and 6 penc
for the keep of a man and wife ant
family in food, firing, clothing, school
ing, and rates.