Morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven [Conn.]) 1848-1894, 1892-08-22

he1T " oIhS '" "AScH anu
est Hodge Gets what Clothing He
Needs Primarily by Not Needing
Very Much.
LONDON, Aug. 10.
To the Editor of the JOURNAL AND COURIER:
"Honest Hodge" is what the townsfolk
call him, and this quaint parsonage has
shot recently into remarkable degree of
prominence over here. For long years the
agricultural laborers of Great Britain oc-
oupied position not far removed from
absolute serfdom. They were mere ap-
pendsges of the soil, the natural and in
alienable servants of farmers and 1andown-
ers, their chief function in life, outside
the drudgery of that daily toll which
brought them scarcely more than a crust,
being to go to church on Sunday and to
worship their "betters" during the week.
Of education they were afforded hardly
any, and as to the functions of citizenship,
they were held to be entirely incompetent
for such things. The only duties which
were not beneath them were those of sub
mission and accomplishing docility, and
the charter of their privileges may be said
to have consisted solety in the bare per-
mission to subsist. This is how it Jared
with Honest Hodge in years gone by.
To-day, however, his situation is quite
different. The last half century has been
a period of remarkable progress in Eng
land, and 1t was only natural, while the
country generally was receiving such
foods of enlightenment, that few strag-
Cling beams should find their way into
the obscure abode of the agricultural la
borer. A little knowledge creates a thirst
for more, and in 1870 this was met BY a
universal diffusion throughout town and
country alike of the advantages flowing
from tho common school. Then, after
fifteen years more, when Parliament,
having enfranchised every other class of
British labor, could brook no longer the
scandal of refusing the ballot to only
this class, Honest Hodge was exalted at
last to the full dignity of a voting citi'
zen. This occurred in 1858, since which
time, as q matter of course, he has been
much thought OF by many of those who
Il
The truth is, indeed, that this modern
arbiter of elections, who has twice turned
the scale against his former masters, is
lust now one of the greatest personsges
| In the realm. None are too rich to dc
him homage, so far as fattering expires.
sions may serve that end, and 30 wisely,
from the standpoint of Number One, has
he used his newly acquired privileges as
a voter, that 1t has become q serious
questionable real question of the houl
with the Liberals-if some additional soI
must not be thrown to this cunning old
whale before the Irish question can be
safely tackled.
| Politically the agricultural laborers are
on top in this country, and we may well
believe that 1t is only question of time
until Justice will be done to them in Other
proyement in the social and material stu
alton of this worthy but down-trodder
class of her majesty's subjects is 30 fla
orantly apparent on all hands that one
Who ia familiar with the better conditions
of American life hardly knows, while
stud wing the problem. which of two feel
inos is the stronger within him, q sense o,
compassion towards those 30 odiously dis
criminated against, OF q sensation of uttel
disgust with the institutions and people
which make such things possible. To say
that the agricultural laborers of England
as q class, are in state of abject depen
dence does not express the whole sad truth
of the case. They are, generally speak
ing. little better than out and out paupers
Their meagre pay has never sufdced Il
meet even the most rudimentary of thei
wants, and the result has been that the,
have had to depend in large measure upoI
the aims doled out to them by public ant
private benevolence. 1t does not reliev
this dark picture to say that their master
and so-called supeyiors have been willinl
| 10 bslp them when the pinch has come