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diff --git a/old/69002-0.txt b/old/69002-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 87d855a..0000000 --- a/old/69002-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,21353 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg eBook of The village labourer 1760-1832, by J. -L. Hammond - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you -will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before -using this eBook. - -Title: The village labourer 1760-1832 - A study in the government of England before the Reform Bill - -Authors: J. L. Hammond - Barbara Hammond - -Release Date: September 17, 2022 [eBook #69002] - -Language: English - -Produced by: Henry Flower and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team - at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images - generously made available by The Internet Archive/Canadian - Libraries) - -*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE VILLAGE LABOURER -1760-1832 *** - - - - - - THE VILLAGE LABOURER - 1760-1832 - - - - - THE VILLAGE LABOURER - - 1760-1832 - - A Study in the Government of England - before the Reform Bill - - BY - J. L. HAMMOND AND BARBARA HAMMOND - - ... The men who pay wages ought not to be the political masters of - those who earn them (because laws should be adapted to those who have - the heaviest stake in the country, for whom misgovernment means not - mortified pride or stinted luxury, but want and pain, and degradation - and risk to their own lives and to their children’s souls).... - - LORD ACTON. - - SECOND IMPRESSION - - - LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. - 39 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON - NEW YORK, BOMBAY, AND CALCUTTA - 1912 - - - - - TO - GILBERT AND MARY MURRAY - - - - -PREFACE - - -Many histories have been written of the governing class that ruled -England with such absolute power during the last century of the old -régime. Those histories have shown how that class conducted war, how -it governed its colonies, how it behaved to the continental Powers, -how it managed the first critical chapters of our relations with -India, how it treated Ireland, how it developed the Parliamentary -system, how it saved Europe from Napoleon. One history has only been -sketched in outline: it is the history of the way in which this class -governed England. The writers of this book have here attempted to -describe the life of the poor during this period. It is their object -to show what was in fact happening to the working classes under a -government in which they had no share. They found, on searching through -the material for such a study, that the subject was too large for a -single book; they have accordingly confined themselves in this volume -to the treatment of the village poor, leaving the town worker for -separate treatment. It is necessary to mention this, for it helps to -explain certain omissions that may strike the reader. The growth and -direction of economic opinion, for example, are an important part of -any examination of this question, but the writers have been obliged -to reserve the consideration of that subject for their later volume, -to which it seems more appropriate. The writers have also found it -necessary to leave entirely on one side for the present the movement -for Parliamentary Reform which was alive throughout this period, and -very active, of course, during its later stages. - -Two subjects are discussed fully in this volume, they believe, for the -first time. One is the actual method and procedure of Parliamentary -Enclosure; the other the labourers’ rising of 1830. More than one -important book has been written on enclosures during the last few -years, but nowhere can the student find a full analysis of the -procedure and stages by which the old village was destroyed. The rising -of 1830 has only been mentioned incidentally in general histories: it -has nowhere been treated as a definite demand for better conditions, -and its course, scope, significance, and punishment have received -little attention. The writers of this book have treated it fully, using -for that purpose the Home Office Papers lately made accessible to -students in the Record Office. They wish to express their gratitude to -Mr. Hubert Hall for his help and guidance in this part of their work. - -The obligations of the writers to the important books published in -recent years on eighteenth-century local government are manifest, and -they are acknowledged in the text, but the writers desire to mention -specially their great debt to Mr. Hobson’s _Industrial System_, a work -that seems to them to throw a new and most illuminating light on the -economic significance of the history of the early years of the last -century. - -Mr. and Mrs. Arthur Ponsonby and Miss M. K. Bradby have done the -writers the great service of reading the entire book and suggesting -many important improvements. Mr. and Mrs. C. R. Buxton, Mr. A. Clutton -Brock, Professor L. T. Hobhouse, and Mr. H. W. Massingham have given -them valuable help and advice on various parts of the work. - - HAMPSTEAD, _August 1911_ - - - - -CONTENTS - - - CHAP. PAGE - - I. THE CONCENTRATION OF POWER, 1 - - Comparison between English and French Aristocracy--Control - of English Aristocracy over (1) Parliament; (2) Local - Government--The Justices--Family Settlements--Feudal Dues. - - II. THE VILLAGE BEFORE ENCLOSURE, 26 - - The Common-field System--Classes in the Village--Motives - for Enclosure--Agricultural Considerations--Moral - Considerations--Extent of Parliamentary Enclosure. - - III. ENCLOSURE (I), 43 - - Procedure in Parliament--Composition of Private Bill - Committees--Proportion of Consents required--Helplessness - of Small Men--Indifference of Parliament to Local - Opinion--Appointment and Powers of Enclosure - Commissioners--Story of Sedgmoor. - - IV. ENCLOSURE (II), 71 - - Standing Orders--General Enclosure Bills--Consolidating Act of - 1801--Popular Feeling against Enclosure--Proposals for Amending - Procedure--Arthur Young’s Protest--Story of Otmoor. - - V. THE VILLAGE AFTER ENCLOSURE, 97 - - Effects of Enclosure on (1) Small Farmers; (2) Cottagers; - (3) Squatters--Expenses--Loss of Common Rights--Village - Officials--Changed Outlook of Labourer. - - VI. THE LABOURER IN 1795, 106 - - Loss of Auxiliary Resources--Fuel--Gleaning--Rise in - Prices--Effect of Settlement Laws--Food Riots of 1795. - - VII. THE REMEDIES OF 1795, 123 - - The Remedies proposed but not adopted: (1) _Change of - Diet_--Cheap Cereals--Soup; (2) _Minimum Wage_--Demand from - Norfolk Labourers--Whitbread’s Bills, 1795 and 1800; (3) _Poor - Law Reform_--Pitt’s Poor Law Bill---Amendments of Settlement - Laws; (4) _Allotments_--Success of Experiments--Hostility - of Farmers--The Remedy adopted: Speenhamland System of - supplementing Wages from Rates--Account of Speenhamland - Meeting--Scale of Relief drawn up. - - VIII. AFTER SPEENHAMLAND, 166 - - Prosperity of Agriculture during French War--Labourers - not benefited--Heavy Taxation--Agricultural Depression at - Peace--Labourers’ Rising in 1816--Poor Law Legislation of - 1818, 1819 to relieve Ratepayers, compared with Whitbread’s - Scheme in 1807--Salaried Overseers--Parish Carts--Drop in - Scale of Relief for Labourers after Waterloo--New Auxiliary - Resources--Poaching--Game Laws--Distress and Crime--Criminal - Justice--Transportation. - - IX. THE ISOLATION OF THE POOR, 207 - - Attitude of Governing Class towards the Poor--An Ideal Poor - Woman--Gulf between Farmers and Labourers due to Large - Farms--Bailiffs--Lawyers and the Poor--The Church and the - Poor--Gloom of the Village. - - X. THE VILLAGE IN 1830, 225 - - Poor Law Commission Report of 1834--Effects of Speenhamland - System: Degradation of Labourer; Demoralisation of Middle - Classes--Possible Success of Alternative Policies--Minimum - Wage--Cobbett’s Position. - - XI. THE LAST LABOURERS’ REVOLT (I), 240 - - Rising in Kent--Threshing Machines--Sussex Rising: Brede--Spread - of Rising Westwards--Description of Outbreak in Hampshire, - Wiltshire, Berkshire--Alarm of Upper Classes--Melbourne’s - Circular--Repressive Measures--Archbishop’s Prayer. - - XII. THE LAST LABOURERS’ REVOLT (II), 272 - - Special Commissions--Temper of Judges--Treatment of - Prisoners--Trials at Winchester, Salisbury, Dorchester, - Reading, Abingdon, Aylesbury--Cases of Arson--Position of Whig - Government--Trials of Carlile and Cobbett--Proposals for helping - Labourers--Lord King--Lord Suffield--Collapse of Proposals. - - XIII. CONCLUSION, 325 - - INDEX, 405 - - - - -CHAPTER I - -THE CONCENTRATION OF POWER - - -‘Là l’aristocratie a pris pour elle les charges publiques les plus -lourdes afin qu’on lui permît de gouverner; ici elle a retenu -jusqu’à la fin l’immunité d’impôt pour se consoler d’avoir perdu le -gouvernement.’ - -De Tocqueville has set out in this antithesis the main argument that -runs through his analysis of the institutions of ancient France. In -England the aristocracy had power and no privileges: in France the -aristocracy had privileges and no power. The one condition produced, -as he read history, the blending of classes, a strong and vigorous -public spirit, the calm of liberty and order: the other a society -lacking vitality and leadership, classes estranged and isolated, a -concentration of power and responsibility that impoverished private -effort and initiative without creating public energy or public wealth. - -De Tocqueville’s description of the actual state of France during -the eighteenth century has, of course, been disputed by later French -writers, and notably by Babeau. Their differences are important, but -for the moment we are concerned to note that in one particular they -are in complete agreement. Neither Babeau, nor any other historian, -has questioned the accuracy of De Tocqueville’s description of the -position of the French nobles, from the day when the great cardinals -crushed their conspiracies to the day when the Revolution destroyed -the monarchy, whose heart and pulse had almost ceased to beat. The -great scheme of unity and discipline in which Richelieu had stitched -together the discords of France left no place for aristocracy. From -that danger, at any rate, the French monarchy was safe. Other dangers -were to overwhelm it, for Richelieu, in giving to it its final form, -had secured it from the aggressions of nobles but not from the follies -of kings. _Tout marche, et le hasard corrige le hasard._ The soliloquy -of Don Carlos in _Hernani_ contains an element of truth and hope for -democracy which is wanting in all systems of personal government, where -the chances of recovery all depend on a single caprice. It was the -single caprice that Versailles represented. It was the single caprice -that destroyed Richelieu’s great creation. When Louis XIV. took to -piety and to Madame de Maintenon, he rescinded in one hour of fatal -zeal the religious settlement that had given her prosperity to France. -Her finance and her resources foundered in his hurricanes of temper and -of arrogance. Louis XV. was known in boyhood as ‘the beloved.’ When -he fell ill in the campaign of 1744 in Flanders, all France wept and -prayed for him. It would have been not less happy for him than it would -have been for Pompey if the intercessions of the world had died on -the breeze and never ascended to the ear of Heaven. When thirty years -later his scarred body passed to the royal peace of St. Denis, amid the -brutal jeers and jests of Paris, the history of the French monarchy -was the richer for a career as sensual and selfish and gross as that -of a Commodus, and the throne which Richelieu had placed absolute and -omnipotent above the tempests of faction and civil war had begun to -rock in the tempests of two sovereigns’ passions. - -One half-hearted attempt had indeed been made to change the form and -character of the monarchy. When he became regent in 1715, Orleans -played with the ideas of St. Simon and substituted for the government -of secretaries a series of councils, on which the great nobles sat, -with a supreme Council of Regency. As a departure from the Versailles -system, the experiment at first excited enthusiasm, but it soon -perished of indifference. The bureaucrats, whom Orleans could not -afford to put on one side, quarrelled with the nobles: the nobles -found the business tedious and uninteresting: the public soon tired of -a scheme that left all the abuses untouched: and the regent, at the -best a lukewarm friend to his own innovation, had his mind poisoned -against it by the artful imagination of Dubois. One by one the councils -flickered out; the Council of the Regency itself disappeared in 1728, -and the monarchy fell back into its old ways and habits. - -As at Versailles, so in France. If the noble had been reduced to a -trifling but expensive cypher at the Court, the position of seigneur -in the village was not very different. In the sixteenth century he -had been a little king. His relations with the peasants, with whom -his boyhood was often spent in the village school, were close and -not seldom affectionate. But though he was in many cases a gentle -ruler, a ruler he undoubtedly was, and royal ordinances had been found -necessary to curb his power. By the eighteenth century his situation -had been changed. There were survivals of feudal justice and feudal -administration that had escaped the searching eye of Richelieu, but -the seigneur had been pushed from the helm, and the government of the -village had passed into other hands. It was the middle-class intendant -and not the seigneur who was the master. The seigneur who still -resided was become a mere rent receiver, and the people called him the -‘_Hobereau_.’ But the seigneur rarely lived in the village, for the -Court, which had destroyed his local power, had drawn him to Paris to -keep him out of mischief, and when later the Court wished to change its -policy, the seigneur refused to change his habits. The new character of -the French nobility found its expression in its new homes. Just as the -tedious splendour of Versailles, built out of the lives and substance -of an exhausted nation, recorded the decadence and the isolation of the -French monarchy, so in the countryside the new palaces of the nobles -revealed the tastes and the life of a class that was allowed no duties -and forbidden no pleasures. The class that had once found its warlike -energy reflected in the castles of Chinon and Loches was now only at -home in the agreeable indolence of Azay le Rideau or the delicious -extravagance of Chenonceaux. The nobles, unable to feed their pride on -an authority no longer theirs, refused no stimulant to their vanity -and no sop to their avarice. Their powers had passed to the intendant; -their land was passing to the bourgeois or the peasant; but their -privileges increased. Distinctions of rank were sharper edged. It was -harder for a plebeian to become an officer under Louis XVI. than it -had been under Louis XIV., and the exemptions from taxation became a -more considerable and invidious privilege as the general burdens grew -steadily more oppressive. Nature had made the French nobleman less, but -circumstances made him more haughty than the English. Arthur Young, -accustomed to the bearing of English landlords, was struck by the -very distant condescension with which the French seigneur treated the -farmer. The seigneur was thus on the eve of the Revolution a privileged -member of the community, very jealous of his precedence, quarrelsome -about trifles, with none of the responsibilities of a ruler, and with -few of the obligations of a citizen. It was an unenviable and an -uninspiring position. It is not surprising that Fénelon, living in -the frivolous prison of Versailles, should have inspired the young -Duke of Burgundy with his dream of a governing aristocracy, or that -Mademoiselle de Lespinasse should have described the public-spirited -members of this class as caged lions, or that a nobleman of the fierce -energy of the Marquis de Mirabeau should have been driven to divide -his time between the public prosecution of his noisy and interminable -quarrels with his wife and his sons, and the composition of his feeling -treatise on _L’Ami des Hommes_. - -For in the France whose king had no thought save for hunting, women -and morbid disease, there was endless energy and intellectual life. -France sparkled with ideas. The enthusiasms of the economists and -philosophers filled the minds of nobles who in England would have been -immersed in the practical duties of administration. The atmosphere of -social sensibility melted the dry language of official reports, and -the intendants themselves dropped a graceful tear over the miseries of -the peasants. Amid the decadence of the monarchy and the uncivilised -and untamed license of Louis XV., there flourished the emancipating -minds of Voltaire, Montesquieu, Diderot and Quesnai, as well as -Rousseau, the passion and the spirit of the Revolution. On the one -side is Versailles, abandoned to gross and shameless pleasures, on -the other a society pursuing here a warm light of reason and science -with a noble rage for progress and improvement, bewitched there by the -Nouvelle Héloïse and Clarissa, delighting in those storms of the senses -that were sweeping over France. The memoirs, the art, the literature -of the time are full of these worlds, ruled, one by philosophy and -illumination, the other by the gospel of sensibility and tender -feeling, the two mingling in a single atmosphere in such a salon as -that of Julie de Lespinasse, or in such a mind as that of Diderot. -A kind of public life tries, too, to break out of its prison in the -zealous, if somewhat mistaken exertions of agricultural societies and -benevolent landowners. But amid all this vitality and inspiration and -energy of mind and taste, the government and the fortunes of the race -depend ultimately on Versailles, who lives apart, her voluptuous sleep -undisturbed by the play of thought and hope and eager curiosity, wrapt -and isolated in her scarlet sins. - -When Louis XVI. called to office Turgot, fresh from his reforms at -Limoges, it looked as if the intellect of France might be harnessed to -the monarchy. The philosophers believed that their radiant dreams were -about to come gloriously true. Richelieu had planned his system for an -energetic minister and a docile king; Turgot had not less energy than -Richelieu, and Turgot’s master was not more ambitious than Louis XIII. -But the new régime lasted less than two years, for Louis XVI., cowed by -courtiers and ruled by a queen who could not sacrifice her pleasures to -the peace of France, dismissed his minister, the hopes of the reformers -were destroyed, and France settled down to the unrolling of events. -The monarchy was almost dead. It went out in a splendid catastrophe, -but it was already spent and exhausted before the States-General were -summoned. This vast, centralised scheme was run down, exhausted by the -extravagance of the Court, unable to discharge its functions, causing -widespread misery by its portentous failure. The monarchy that the -Revolution destroyed was anarchy. Spenser talks in the _Faerie Queene_ -of a little sucking-fish called the remora, which collects on the -bottom of a ship and slowly and invisibly, but surely, arrests its -progress. The last kings were like the remora, fastening themselves on -Richelieu’s creation and steadily and gradually depriving it of power -and life. - -It was natural that De Tocqueville, surveying these two centuries of -national life, so full of mischief, misdirection and waste, seeing, -too, in the new régime the survival of many features that he condemned -in the old, should have traced all the calamities of France to the -absence of a ruling aristocracy. It was natural that in such a temper -and with such preoccupations he should have turned wistfully and not -critically to England, for if France was the State in which the nobles -had least power, England was the State in which they had most. The -Revolution of 1688 established Parliamentary Government. The manners -and the blunders of James II. had stripped the Crown of the power that -his predecessor had gained by his seductive and unscrupulous politics, -and when the great families settled with the sovereign of their -choice, their memories of James were too recent and vivid to allow -them to concede more than they could help to William. The Revolution -put the law of the land over the will of the sovereign: it abolished -his suspending and dispensing powers, and it obliged him to summon -Parliament every year. It set up a limited monarchy with Parliament -controlling the Crown. But though the Revolution gave England a -constitutional Parliamentary government, that government had no -homogeneous leadership, and it looked as if its effective force might -be dissipated in the chaos and confusion of ministries. In such a -situation one observer at least turned his eyes to France. There exists -in the British Museum a paper by Daniel Defoe, written apparently for -the guidance of Harley, who was Secretary of State in 1704. In this -paper Defoe dwelt on the evils of divided and dilatory government, and -sketched a scheme by which his patron might contrive to build up for -himself a position like that once enjoyed by Richelieu and Mazarin. -Defoe saw that the experiment meant a breach with English tradition, -but he does not seem to have seen, what was equally true, that success -was forbidden by the conditions of Parliamentary government and the -strength of the aristocracy. The scheme demanded among other things the -destruction of the new Cabinet system. As it happened, this mischievous -condition of heterogeneous administration, in which one minister -counterworked and counteracted another, came to an end in Defoe’s -lifetime, and it came to an end by the consolidation of the system -which he wished to see destroyed. - -This was the work of Walpole, whose career, so uninviting to those who -ask for the sublime or the heroic in politics, for it is as unromantic -a story as can be desired of perseverance, and coarse method, and art -without grace, and fruits without flowers, is one of the capital facts -of English history. Walpole took advantage of the fortunate accident -that had placed on the throne a foreigner, who took no interest in -England and did not speak her language, and laid the foundations of -Cabinet government. Walpole saw that if Parliamentary supremacy was to -be a reality, it was essential that ministers should be collectively -responsible, and that they should severally recognise a common aim and -interest; otherwise, by choosing incompatible ministers, the king could -make himself stronger than the Cabinet and stronger than Parliament. It -is true that George III., disdaining the docility of his predecessors, -disputed later the Parliamentary supremacy which Walpole had thus -established, and disputed it by Walpole’s own methods of corruption -and intrigue. But George III., though he assailed the liberal ideas of -his time, and assailed them with an unhappy success, did not threaten -the power of the aristocracy. He wanted ministers to be eclectic and -incoherent, because he wanted them to obey him rather than Parliament, -but his impulse was mere love of authority and not any sense or feeling -for a State released from this monopoly of class. Self-willed without -originality, ambitious without imagination, he wanted to cut the knot -that tethered the Crown to the Cabinet, but he had neither the will -nor the power to put a knife in the system of aristocracy itself. He -wished to set back the clock, but only by half a century, to the days -when kings could play minister against minister, and party against -party, and not to the days of the more resolute and daring dreams of -the Stuart fancy. The large ideas of a sovereign like Henry of Navarre -were still further from his petty and dusty vision. He was so far -successful in his intrigues as to check and defeat the better mind of -his generation, but if he had won outright, England would have been -ruled less wisely indeed, but not less deliberately in the interests of -the governing families. Thus it comes that though his interventions are -an important and demoralising chapter in the history of the century, -they do not disturb or qualify the general progress of aristocratic -power. - -In France there was no institution, central or local, in which the -aristocracy held power: in England there was no institution, central -or local, which the aristocracy did not control. This is clear from a -slight survey of Parliament and of local administration. - -The extent to which this is true had probably not been generally -grasped before the publication of the studies of Messrs. Redlich and -Hirst, and Mr. and Mrs. Webb, on the history of local government or -the recent works of Dr. Slater and Professor Hasbach on the great -enclosures. Most persons were aware of the enormous power of the -aristocracy, but many did not know that that power was greater at the -end than at the beginning of the century. England was, in fact, less -like a democracy, and more remote from the promise of democracy when -the French Revolution broke out, than it had been when the governing -families and the governing Church, whose cautions and compromises and -restraint Burke solemnly commended to the impatient idealists of 1789, -settled their account with the Crown in the Revolution of 1688. - -The corruptions that turned Parliamentary representation into the -web of picturesque paradoxes that fascinated Burke, were not new in -the eighteenth century. As soon as a seat in the House of Commons -came to be considered a prize, which was at least as early as the -beginning of the sixteenth century, the avarice and ambition of -powerful interests began to eat away the democratic simplicity of the -old English franchise. Thus, by the time of James I., England had -travelled far from the days when there was a uniform franchise, when -every householder who did watch and ward could vote at a Parliamentary -election, and when the practice of throwing the provision of the -Members’ wages upon the electorate discouraged the attempt to restrict -the franchise, and thereby increase the burden of the voters. Indeed, -when the Whig families took over the government of England, the case -for Parliamentary Reform was already pressing. It had been admitted by -sovereigns like Elizabeth and James I., and it had been temporarily -and partially achieved by Cromwell. But the monopolies which had been -created and the abuses which had been introduced had nothing to fear -from the great governing families, and the first acts of the Revolution -Parliament, so far from threatening them, tended to give them sanction -and permanence. Down to this time there had been a constant conflict -within the boroughs between those who had been excluded from the -franchise and the minorities, consisting of burgage-holders or corrupt -corporations or freemen, who had appropriated it. These conflicts, -which were carried to Parliament, were extinguished by two Acts, one -of 1696, the other of 1729, which declared that the last determination -in each case was final and irrevocable. No borough whose fate had been -so decided by a Parliamentary committee could ever hope to recover its -stolen franchise, and all these local reform movements settled down to -their undisturbed euthanasia. These Acts were modified by a later Act -of 1784, which allowed a determination to be disputed within twelve -months, but by that time 127 boroughs had already received their final -verdict: in the others, where the franchise was determined after 1784, -there was some revival of local agitation. - -The boroughs that were represented in Parliament in the eighteenth -century have been classified by Mr. Porritt, in his learned work, in -four categories. They were (1) Scot and lot and potwalloper boroughs, -(2) Burgage boroughs, (3) Corporation boroughs, and (4) Freemen -boroughs. - -The Scot and lot boroughs, of which there were 59, ranged from Gatton, -with 135 inhabitants, to Westminster and Northampton. On paper they -approached most nearly to the old conditions as to the franchise. A -uniform qualification of six months residence was established in 1786. -In other respects the qualifications in these boroughs varied. In some -the franchise depended on the payment of poor rate or church rate: in -others the only condition was that the voter had not been a charge on -the poor rate. The boroughs of the second of these classes were called -potwalloper, because the voter had to prove that he was an inhabitant -in the borough, had a family, and boiled a pot there. This potwalloper -franchise was a survival from the days when freemen took their meals -in public to prove that they did not depend on the table of a lord. -In the eighteenth century the potwalloper sometimes put his table in -the street to show that he had a vote. But these boroughs, in spite of -their wide franchise, fell under the control of the aristocracy almost -as completely as the others, for the reason that when the borough -itself developed, the Parliamentary borough stood still, and in many -cases the inhabitant householders who had the right to vote were the -inhabitants of a small and ancient area of the town. All that was -necessary in such circumstances in order to acquire the representation -of the borough, was to buy the larger part of the property within this -area. This was done, for example, at Aldborough and at Steyning. - -The Burgage boroughs were 39. They were Parliamentary boroughs in which -the right to vote attached exclusively to the possession of burgage -properties. The burgage tenants were the owners of land, houses, shops -or gardens in certain ancient boroughs. The holders of these sites -were originally tenants who discharged their feudal obligations by a -money payment, corresponding to the freeholder in the country, who held -by soccage. They thus became the men of the township who met in the -churchyard or town hall. In many cases residence was unnecessary to the -enjoyment of the franchise. The only qualification was the possession -of title-deeds to particular parcels of land, or registration in the -records of a manor. These title-deeds were called ‘snatch papers,’ from -the celerity with which they were transferred at times of election. -The burgage property that enfranchised the elector of Old Sarum was -a ploughed field. Lord Radnor explained that at Downton he held 99 -out of the 100 burgage tenures, and that one of the properties was in -the middle of a watercourse. At Richmond, pigeon-lofts and pig-styes -conferred the franchise. In some cases, on the other hand, residence -was required; at Haslemere, for example, Lord Lonsdale settled a colony -of Cumberland miners in order to satisfy this condition. Sometimes the -owner of a burgage property had to show that the house was occupied, -and one proof of this was the existence of a chimney. In all of these -boroughs the aristocracy and other controllers of boroughs worked -hard, through the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, to restrict -the number of properties that carried the right to vote. The holder -of burgage property and the borough patron had a common interest in -these restrictions. The burgage boroughs provided a great many cases -for the decision of Parliamentary committees, and the borough owners -mortgaged their estates under the strain of litigation of this kind. -Parliamentary committees had to determine for example whether the -Widows’ Row at Petersfield really stood on the foundation of the house -which conferred the franchise in the reign of William III. The most -successful borough-monger was the patron who had contrived to exclude -first the non-burgage owners, and then the majority of the burgage -owners, thus reducing his expenses within the narrowest compass. - -The Corporation boroughs, or boroughs in which the corporation had -acquired by custom the right to elect, independently of the burgesses, -were 43. In days when Parliamentary elections were frequent, the -inhabitants of many boroughs waived their right of election and -delegated it to the corporations. When seats in the House of Commons -became more valuable, the corporations were tenacious of this customary -monopoly, and frequently sought to have it established by charter. -These claims were contested in the seventeenth century, but without -much success, and the charters bestowed at this time restricted the -franchise to the corporations in order to prevent ‘popular tumult, -and to render the elections and other things and the public business -of the said borough into certainty and constant order.’ It is easy to -trace in these transactions, besides the rapacity of the corporations -themselves, the influence of the landed aristocracy who were already -beginning to finger these boroughs. There was, indeed, an interval -during which the popular attacks met with some success. When Eliot and -Hampden were on the Committee of Privileges, some towns, including -Warwick, Colchester, and Boston, regained their rights. But the -Restoration was fatal to the movement for open boroughs, and though it -was hoped that the Revolution, which had been in part provoked by the -tricks the Stuarts had played with the boroughs, would bring a more -favourable atmosphere, this expectation was defeated. All of these -boroughs fell under the rule of a patron, who bribed the members of -the corporation with money, with livings or clerkships in the state -departments, cadetships in the navy and in India. Croker complained -that he had further to dance with the wives and daughters of the -corporation at ‘tiresome and foolish’ balls. There was no disguise or -mistake about the position. The patron spoke not of ‘my constituents’ -but of ‘my corporation.’ The inhabitants outside this little group -had no share at all in Parliamentary representation, and neither the -patron nor his nominee gave them a single thought. The members of the -corporation themselves were often non-resident, and the mayor sometimes -never went near the borough from the first day of his magistracy to the -last. His office was important, not because it made him responsible for -municipal government, but because it made him returning officer. He had -to manage the formalities of an election for his patron. - -The Freemen boroughs, of which there were 62, represent in Mr. -Porritt’s opinion the extreme divergence from the old franchise. -In these boroughs restrictions of different kinds had crept in, a -common restriction being that in force at Carlisle, which limited -the franchise to the inhabitants who belonged to the trade guild. -For some time these restrictions, though they destroyed the ancient -significance of ‘freeman’ as a person to be distinguished from the -‘villein,’ did not really destroy the representative character of the -electorate. But these boroughs suffered like the others, and even more -than the others, from the demoralising effects of the appreciation -of the value of seats in Parliament, and as soon as votes commanded -money, the corporations had every inducement to keep down the number of -voters. In many boroughs there set in a further development that was -fatal to the elementary principles of representation: the practice of -selling the freedom of the borough to non-residents. There were three -classes of buyers: men who wanted to become patrons, men who wanted -to become members, and men who wanted to become voters. The making of -honorary freemen became a favourite process for securing the control -of a borough to the corporation or to a patron. Dunwich, which was a -wealthy and famous seaport in the time of Henry II., gradually crumbled -into the German Ocean, and in 1816 it was described by Oldfield -as consisting of forty-two houses and half a church. This little -borough contained in 1670 forty resident freemen, and in that year it -largessed its freedom on four hundred non-residents. The same methods -were applied at Carlisle, King’s Lynn, East Grinstead, Nottingham, -Liverpool, and in many other places. A particularly flagrant case -at Durham in 1762, when 215 freemen were made in order to turn an -election, after the issue of the writ, led to a petition which resulted -in the unseating of the member and the passing of an Act of Parliament -in the following year. This Act excluded from the franchise honorary -freemen who had been admitted within twelve months of the first day -of an election, but it did not touch the rights of ordinary freemen -admitted by the corporation. Consequently, when a Parliamentary -election was impending or proceeding, new freemen used to swarm into -the electorate whenever the corporation or the patron had need of -them. At Bristol in 1812 seventeen hundred and twenty freemen, and at -Maldon in 1826 a thousand freemen, were so admitted and enfranchised. -Generally speaking, corporations seem to have preferred the method of -exclusion to that of flooding the electorate with outside creations. -On the eve of the Reform Bill, there were six electors at Rye and -fourteen at Dunwich. At Launceston, early in the eighteenth century, -the members of the corporation systematically refused freedom to all -but members of their own party, and the same practices were adopted -at East Retford, Ludlow, Plympton, Hastings, and other places. Legal -remedies were generally out of reach of the excluded freemen. There -were some exceptions to the abuses which prevailed in most of these -boroughs, notably the case of the City of London. A special Act of -Parliament (1774) made it a condition of the enjoyment of the freemen’s -franchise there, that the freeman had not received alms, and that he -had been a freeman for twelve calendar months. But in most of these -boroughs, by the end of the eighteenth century, the electorate was -entirely under the influence of the corporations. Nor was the device of -withholding freedom from those qualified by custom, and of bestowing -it on those who were only qualified by subservience, the only resource -at the command of the borough-mongers. Charities were administered -in an electioneering spirit, and recalcitrant voters were sometimes -threatened with impressment. - -Of the 513 members representing England and Wales in 1832, 415 sat for -cities and boroughs. Fifty members were returned by 24 cities, 332 by -166 English boroughs, 5 by single-member boroughs, 16 by the Cinque -Ports, and 12 by as many Welsh boroughs. The twelve Welsh counties -returned 12 members, and the forty English counties 82, the remaining 4 -members being representatives of the Universities. - -The county franchise had a much less chequered history than the -various franchises in boroughs. Before the reign of Henry VI., every -free inhabitant householder, freeholder or non-freeholder, could vote -at elections of Knights of the Shire. The Act of 1430 limited the -franchise to forty-shilling freeholders. Many controversies raged -round this definition, and by the eighteenth century, men were voting -in respect of annuities, rent-charges, the dowries of their wives and -pews in church. Mr. Porritt traces the faggot voter to the early days -of Charles I. Two changes were made in the county franchise between -1430 and 1832. The residential qualification disappears by 1620: in -1702 a tax-paying qualification was introduced under which a property -did not carry a vote unless it had been taxed for a year. In 1781 the -year was cut down to six months. Great difficulties and irregularities -occurred with regard to registration, and a Bill was passed into law in -1784 to establish a public system of registration. The Act, however, -was repealed in the next year, in consequence of the agitation against -the expense. The county franchise had a democratic appearance but -the county constituencies were very largely under territorial sway, -and by the middle of the fifteenth century Jack Cade had complained -of the pressure of the great families on their tenants. Fox declared -that down to 1780 one of the members for Yorkshire had always been -elected in Lord Rockingham’s dining-room, and from that time onwards -the representation of that county seems to have been a battle of bribes -between the Rockinghams, the Fitzwilliams and the Harewoods. - -It is easy to see from this sketch of the manner in which the -Parliamentary franchise had been drawn into the hands of patrons and -corporations, that the aristocracy had supreme command of Parliament. -Control by patrons was growing steadily throughout the eighteenth -century. The Society of Friends of the People presented a petition to -the House of Commons in 1793, in which it was stated that 157 members -were sent to Parliament by 84 individuals, and 150 other members -were returned by the recommendation of 70 powerful individuals. The -relations of such members to their patrons were described by Fox in -1797, ‘When Gentlemen represent populous towns and cities, then it is -a disputed point whether they ought to obey their voice or follow the -dictates of their own conscience. But if they represent a noble lord or -a noble duke then it becomes no longer a question of doubt, and he is -not considered a man of honour who does not implicitly obey the orders -of a single constituent.’[1] The petition of the Society of Friends -of the People contained some interesting information as to the number -of electors in certain constituencies: 90 members were returned by 46 -places, in none of which the number of voters exceeded 50, 37 ‘by 19 -places in none of which the number of voters exceeds 100, and 52 by -26 in none of which the number of voters exceeded 200. Seventy-five -members were returned for 35 places in which it would be to trifle with -the patience of your Honourable House to mention any number of voters -at all,’ the elections at the places alluded to being notoriously a -matter of form. - -If the qualifications of voters had changed, so had the qualifications -of members. A power that reposed on this basis would have seemed -reasonably complete, but the aristocracy took further measures to -consolidate its monopoly. In 1710 Parliament passed an Act, to which -it gave the prepossessing title ‘An Act for securing the freedom of -Parliament, by further qualifying the Members to sit in the House of -Commons,’ to exclude all persons who had not a certain estate of land, -worth in the case of knights of the shire, £500, and in the case of -burgesses, £300. This Act was often evaded by various devices, and -the most famous of the statesmen of the eighteenth century sat in -Parliament by means of fictitious qualifications, among others Pitt, -Burke, Fox and Sheridan. But the Act gave a tone to Parliament, and -it was not a dead letter.[2] It had, too, the effect of throwing the -ambitious merchant into the landlord class, and of enveloping him in -the landlord atmosphere. Selection and assimilation, as De Tocqueville -saw, and not exclusion, are the true means of preserving a class -monopoly of power. We might, indeed, sum up the contrast between the -English and French aristocracy by saying that the English aristocracy -understood the advantages of a scientific social frontier, whereas -the French were tenacious of a traditional frontier. More effectual -in practice than this imposition of a property qualification was the -growing practice of throwing on candidates the official expenses of -elections. During the eighteenth century these expenses grew rapidly, -and various Acts of Parliament, in particular that of 1745, fixed these -charges on candidates. - -It followed naturally, from a system which made all municipal -government merely one aspect of Parliamentary electioneering, that the -English towns fell absolutely into the hands of corrupt oligarchies -and the patrons on whom they lived. The Tudor kings had conceived -the policy of extinguishing their independent life and energies by -committing their government to select bodies with power to perpetuate -themselves by co-opting new members. The English aristocracy found -in the boroughs--with the mass of inhabitants disinherited and all -government and power vested in a small body--a state of things not -less convenient and accommodating to the new masters of the machine -than it had been to the old. The English towns, which three centuries -earlier had enjoyed a brisk and vigorous public life, were now in a -state of stagnant misgovernment: as the century advanced, they only -sank deeper into the slough, and the Report of the Commission of 1835 -showed that the number of inhabitants who were allowed any share in -public life or government was infinitesimal. In Plymouth, for example, -with a population of 75,000, the number of resident freemen was under -300: in Ipswich, with more than 20,000 inhabitants, there were 350 -freemen of whom more than 100 were not rated, and some forty were -paupers. Municipal government throughout the century was a system not -of government but of property. It did not matter to the patron whether -Winchester or Colchester had any drains or constables: the patron -had to humour the corporation or the freemen, the corporation or the -freemen had to keep their bargain with the patron. The patron gave -the corporation money and other considerations: the corporation gave -the patron control over a seat in Parliament. Neither had to consider -the interests or the property of the mass of burgesses. Pitt so far -recognised the ownership of Parliamentary boroughs as property, that he -proposed in 1785 to compensate the patrons of the boroughs he wished to -disenfranchise. Every municipal office was regarded in the same spirit. -The endowments and the charities that belonged to the town belonged to -a small oligarchy which acknowledged no responsibility to the citizens -for its proceedings, and conducted its business in secret. The whole -system depended on the patron, who for his part represented the -absolute supremacy of the territorial aristocracy to which he belonged. -Civic life there was none. - -If we turn to local government outside the towns there is the same -decay of self-government. - -One way of describing the changes that came over English society after -the break-up of feudalism would be to say that as in France everything -drifted into the hands of the intendant, in England everything drifted -into the hands of the Justice of the Peace. This office, created in -the first year of Edward III., had grown during his reign to very -great importance and power. Originally the Justices of the Peace were -appointed by the state to carry out certain of its precepts, and -generally to keep the peace in the counties in which they served. -In their quarterly sittings they had the assistance of a jury, and -exercised a criminal jurisdiction concurrent with that which the king’s -judges exercised when on circuit. But from early days they developed -an administrative power which gradually drew to itself almost all the -functions and properties of government. Its quasi-judicial origin is -seen in the judicial form under which it conducted such business as -the supervision of roads and bridges. Delinquencies and deficiencies -were ‘presented’ to the magistrates in court. It became the habit, -very early in the history of the Justices of the Peace, to entrust to -them duties that were new, or duties to which existing authorities -were conspicuously inadequate. In the social convulsions that followed -the Black Death, it was the Justice of the Peace who was called in to -administer the elaborate legislation by which the capitalist classes -sought to cage the new ambitions of the labourer. Under the Elizabethan -Poor Law, it was the Justice of the Peace who appointed the parish -overseers and approved their poor rate, and it was the Justice of the -Peace who held in his hand the meshes of the law of Settlement. In -other words, the social order that emerged from mediæval feudalism -centred round the Justice of the Peace in England as conspicuously -as it centred round the bureaucracy in France. During the eighteenth -century, the power of the Justice of the Peace reached its zenith, -whilst his government acquired certain attributes that gave it a -special significance. - -At the beginning of the eighteenth century there were still many -small men taking some part in the affairs of the village. The old -manorial civilisation was disappearing, but Mr. and Mrs. Webb have -shown that manor courts of one kind or another were far more numerous -and had far more to do at the beginning of the eighteenth century -than has been commonly supposed. Such records as survive, those, -_e.g._ of Godmanchester and Great Tew, prove that the conduct and -arrangement of the business of the common fields--and England was -still, at the beginning of this period, very largely a country of -common fields--required and received very full and careful attention. -Those courts crumble away as the common fields vanish, and with them -there disappears an institution in which, as Professor Vinogradoff has -shown, the small man counted and had recognised rights. By the time of -the Reform Bill, a manor court was more or less of a local curiosity. -The village vestries again, which represented another successor to the -manorial organisation, democratic in form, were losing their vitality -and functions, and coming more and more under the shadow of the -Justices of the Peace. Parochial government was declining throughout -the century, and though Professor Lowell in his recent book speaks of -village government as still democratic in 1832, few of those who have -examined the history of the vestry believe that much was left of its -democratic character. By the end of the eighteenth century, the entire -administration of county affairs, as well as the ultimate authority in -parish business, was in the hands of the Justice of the Peace, the High -Sheriff, and the Lord-Lieutenant. - -The significance of this development was increased by the manner -in which the administration of the justices was conducted. The -transactions of business fell, as the century advanced, into fewer and -fewer hands, and became less and less public in form and method. The -great administrative court, Quarter Sessions, remained open as a court -of justice, but it ceased to conduct its county business in public. -Its procedure, too, was gradually transformed. Originally the court -received ‘presentments’ or complaints from many different sources--the -grand juries, the juries from the Hundreds, the liberties and the -boroughs, and from constable juries. The grand juries presented county -bridges, highways or gaols that needed repair: the Hundred juries -presented delinquencies in their divisions: constable juries presented -such minor anti-social practices as the keeping of pigs. Each of these -juries represented some area of public opinion. The Grand Jury, besides -giving its verdict on all these presentments, was in other ways a very -formidable body, and acted as a kind of consultative committee, and -perhaps as a finance committee. Now all this elaborate machinery was -simplified in the eighteenth century, and it was simplified by the -abandonment of all the quasi-democratic characteristics and methods. -Presentments by individual justices gradually superseded presentments -by juries. By 1835 the Hundred Jury and Jury of Constables had -disappeared: the Grand Jury had almost ceased to concern itself with -local government, and the administrative business of Quarter Sessions -was no longer discussed in open court. - -Even more significant in some respects was the delegation of a great -part of county business, including the protection of footpaths, from -Quarter Sessions to Petty Sessions or to single justices out of -sessions. Magistrates could administer in this uncontrolled capacity a -drastic code for the punishment of vagrants and poachers without jury -or publicity. The single justice himself determined all questions of -law and of fact, and could please himself as to the evidence he chose -to hear. In 1822 the Duke of Buckingham tried and convicted a man of -coursing on his estate. The trial took place in the duke’s kitchen: the -witnesses were the duke’s keepers. The defendant was in this case not -a poacher, who was _fera naturæ_, but a farmer, who was in comparison -a person of substance and standing. The office of magistrate possessed -a special importance for the class that preserved game, and readers of -_Rob Roy_ will remember that Mr. Justice Inglewood had to swallow his -prejudices against the Hanoverian succession and take the oaths as a -Justice of the Peace, because the refusal of most of the Northumberland -magistrates, being Jacobites, to serve on the bench, had endangered -the strict administration of the Game Laws. We know from the novels of -Richardson and Fielding and Smollett how this power enveloped village -life. Richardson has no venom against the justices. In _Pamela_ he -merely records the fact that Mr. B. was a magistrate for two counties, -and that therefore it was hopeless for Pamela, whom he wished to -seduce, to elude his pursuit, even if she escaped from her duress in -his country house. - -Fielding, who saw the servitude of the poor with less patience and -composure, wrote of country life with knowledge and experience. -In _Joseph Andrews_ he describes the young squire who forbids the -villagers to keep dogs, and kills any dog that he finds, and the lawyer -who assures Lady Booby that ‘the laws of the land are not so vulgar to -permit a mean fellow to contend with one of your ladyship’s fortune. We -have one sure card, which is to carry him before Justice Frolic, who -upon hearing your ladyship’s name, will commit him without any further -question.’ Mr. Justice Frolic was as good as his reputation, and at -the moment of their rescue Joseph and Fanny were on the point of being -sent to Bridewell on the charge of taking a twig from a hedge. Fielding -and Richardson wrote in the middle of the eighteenth century. In 1831 -Denman, the Attorney-General in Grey’s Government, commented on the -difference between the punishments administered by judges at Assize and -those administered by justices at Quarter Sessions, in the defence of -their game preserves, observing that the contrast ‘had a very material -effect in confusing in the minds of the people the notions of right -and wrong.’ This territorial power was in fact absolute. In France the -peasant was in some cases shielded from the caprice of the seigneur by -the Crown, the Parlements and the intendants. Both Henry IV. and Louis -XIII. intervened to protect the communities in the possession of their -goods from the encroachments of seigneurs, while Louis XIV. published -an edict in 1667 restoring to the communities all the property they had -alienated since 1620. In England he was at the landlord’s mercy: he -stood unprotected beneath the canopy of this universal power. - -Nor was the actual authority, administrative or judicial, of the -magistrates and their surveillance of the village the full measure of -their influence. They became, as Mr. and Mrs. Webb have shown, the -domestic legislature. The most striking example of their legislation -was the Berkshire Bread Act. In 1795 the Berkshire Court of Quarter -Sessions summoned justices and ‘several discreet persons’ to meet at -Speenhamland for the purpose of rating husbandry wages. This meeting -passed the famous resolution providing for the supplementing of wages -out of the rates, on a certain fixed scale, according to the price -of flour. The example of these seven clergymen and eleven squires -was quickly followed in other counties, and Quarter Sessions used to -have tables drawn up and printed, giving the justices’ scale, to be -issued by the Clerk of the Peace to every acting magistrate and to -the churchwardens and overseers of every parish. It was a handful of -magistrates in the different counties, acting on their own initiative, -without any direction from Parliament, that set loose this social -avalanche in England. Parliament, indeed, had developed the habit of -taking the opinion of the magistrates as conclusive on all social -questions, and whereas a modern elected local authority has to submit -to the control of a department subject to Parliament, in the eighteenth -century a non-elected local authority, not content with its own -unchecked authority, virtually controlled the decisions of Parliament -as well. The opposition of the magistrates to Whitbread’s Bill in 1807, -for example, was accepted as fatal and final. - -Now if the Crown had been more powerful or had followed a different -policy, the Justices of the Peace, instead of developing into -autonomous local oligarchies, might have become its representatives. -When feudal rights disappeared with the Wars of the Roses, the -authority of the Justice of the Peace, an officer of the Crown, -superseded that of the local lord. Mr. Jenks[3] is therefore justified -in saying that ‘the governing caste in English country life since the -Reformation has not been a feudal but an official caste.’ But this -official caste is, so to speak, only another aspect of the feudal -caste, for though on paper the representatives of the central power, -the county magistrates were in practice, by the end of the eighteenth -century, simply the local squires putting into force their own ideas -and policy. Down to the Rebellion, the Privy Council expected judges -of assize to choose suitable persons for appointment as magistrates. -Magistrates were made and unmade until the reign of George I., -according to the political prepossessions of governments. But by the -end of the eighteenth century the Lord Lieutenant’s recommendations -were virtually decisive for appointment, and dismissal from the bench -became unknown. Thus though the system of the magistracy, as Redlich -and Hirst pointed out, enabled the English constitution to rid itself -of feudalism a century earlier than the continent, it ultimately gave -back to the landlords in another form the power that they lost when -feudalism disappeared. - -Another distinctive feature of the English magistracy contributed to -this result. The Justice of the Peace was unpaid. The statutes of -Edward III. and Richard II. prescribed wages at the handsome rate of -four shillings a day, but it seems to be clear, though the actual -practice of benches is not very easy to ascertain, that the wages in -the rare instances when they were claimed were spent on hospitality, -and did not go into the pockets of the individual justices. Lord Eldon -gave this as a reason for refusing to strike magistrates off the list -in cases of private misconduct. ‘As the magistrates gave their services -gratis they ought to be protected.’ When it was first proposed in 1785 -to establish salaried police commissioners for Middlesex, many Whigs -drew a contrast between the magistrates who were under no particular -obligation to the executive power and the officials proposed to be -appointed who would receive salaries, and might be expected to take -their orders from the Government. - -The aristocracy was thus paramount both in local government and in -Parliament. But to understand the full significance of its absolutism -we must notice two important social events--the introduction of family -settlements and the abolition of military tenures. - -A class that wishes to preserve its special powers and privileges has -to discover some way of protecting its corporate interests from the -misdemeanours and follies of individual members. The great landlords -found such a device in the system of entail which gave to each -successive generation merely a life interest in the estates, and kept -the estates themselves as the permanent possession of the family. But -the lawyers managed to elude this device of the landowners by the -invention of sham law-suits, an arrangement by which a stranger brought -a claim for the estate against the limited owner in possession, and got -a judgment by his connivance. The stranger was in truth the agent of -the limited owner, who was converted by this procedure into an absolute -owner. The famous case known as Taltarums case in 1472, established -the validity of these lawsuits, and for the next two hundred years -‘Family Law’ no longer controlled the actions of the landowners and the -market for their estates. During this time Courts of Law and Parliament -set their faces against all attempts to reintroduce the system of -entails. As a consequence estates were sometimes melted down, and the -inheritances of ancient families passed into the possession of yeomen -and merchants. The landowners had never accepted their defeat. In -the reign of Elizabeth they tried to devise family settlements that -would answer their purpose as effectually as the old law of entail, -but they were foiled by the great judges, Popham and Coke. After the -Restoration, unhappily, conditions were more propitious. In the first -place, the risks of the Civil War had made it specially important -for rich men to save their estates from forfeiture by means of such -settlements, and in the second place the landowning class was now -all-powerful. Consequently the attempt which Coke had crushed now -succeeded, and rich families were enabled to tie up their wealth.[4] -Family settlements have ever since been a very important part of our -social system. The merchants who became landowners bought up the -estates of yeomen, whereas in eighteenth-century France it was the land -of noblemen that passed to the _nouveaux riches_. - -The second point to be noticed in the history of this landlord class -is the abolition of the military tenures in 1660. The form and the -method of this abolition are both significant. The military dues were -the last remaining feudal liability of the landlords to the Crown. They -were money payments that had taken the place of old feudal services. -The landlords, who found them vexatious and capricious, had been trying -to get rid of them ever since the reign of James I. In 1660 they -succeeded, and the Restoration Parliament revived the Act of Cromwell’s -Parliament four years earlier which abolished military tenures. The -bargain which the landlords made with the Crown on this occasion was -ingenious and characteristic; it was something like the Concordat -between Francis I. and Leo X., which abolished the Pragmatic sanction -at the expense of the Gallican Church; for the landowners simply -transferred their liability to the general taxpayer. The Crown forgave -the landlords their dues in consideration of receiving a grant from the -taxation of the food of the nation. An Excise tax was the substitute. - -Now the logical corollary of the abolition of the feudal dues that -vexed the large landowners would have been the abolition of the feudal -dues that vexed the small landowners. If the great landlords were no -longer to be subject to their dues in their relation to the Crown, why -should the small copyholder continue to owe feudal dues to the lord? -The injustice of abolishing the one set of liabilities and retaining -the other struck one observer very forcibly, and he was an observer -who knew something, unlike most of the governing class, from intimate -experience of the grievances of the small landowner under this feudal -survival. This was Francis North (1637-1685), the first Lord Guildford, -the famous lawyer and Lord Chancellor. North had begun his career by -acting as the steward of various manors, thinking that he would gain -an insight into human nature which would be of great value to him in -his practice at the bar. His experience in this capacity, as we know -from Roger North’s book _The Lives of the Norths_, disclosed to him an -aspect of feudalism which escaped the large landowners--the hardships -of their dependants. He used to describe the copyhold exactions, and -to say that in many cases that came under his notice small tenements -and pieces of land which had been in a poor family for generations were -swallowed up in the monstrous fines imposed on copyholders. He said he -had often found himself the executioner of the cruelty of the lords -and ladies of manors upon poor men, and he remarked the inconsistency -that left all these oppressions untouched in emancipating the large -landowners. Maine, in discussing this system, pointed out that these -signorial dues were of the kind that provoked the French Revolution. -There were two reasons why a state of things which produced a -revolution in France remained disregarded in England. One was that the -English copyholders were a much smaller class: the other that, as small -proprietors were disappearing in England, the English copyholder was -apt to contrast his position with the status of the landless labourer, -and to congratulate himself on the possession of a property, whereas -in France the copyholder contrasted his position with the status of -the freeholder and complained of his services. The copyholders were -thus not in a condition to raise a violent or dangerous discontent, -and their grievances were left unredressed. It is sometimes said that -England got rid of feudalism a century earlier than the continent. That -is true of the English State, but to understand the agrarian history of -the eighteenth century we must remember that, as it has been well said, -‘whereas the English State is less feudal, the English land law is more -feudal than that of any other country in Europe.’[5] - -Lastly, the class that is armed with all these social and political -powers dominates the universities and the public schools. The story of -how the colleges changed from communities of poor men into societies of -rich men, and then gradually swallowed up the university, has been told -in the Reports of University Commissions. By the eighteenth century the -transformation was complete, and both the ancient universities were the -universities of the rich. There is a passage in Macaulay describing the -state and pomp of Oxford at the end of the seventeenth century, ‘when -her Chancellor, the venerable Duke of Ormonde, sat in his embroidered -mantle on his throne under the painted ceiling of the Sheldonian -theatre, surrounded by hundreds of graduates robed according to their -rank, while the noblest youths of England were solemnly presented to -him as candidates for academical honours.’ The university was a power, -not in the sense in which that could be said of a university like the -old university of Paris, whose learning could make popes tremble, but -in the sense that the university was part of the recognised machinery -of aristocracy. What was true of the universities was true of the -public schools. Education was the nursery not of a society, but of an -order; not of a state, but of a race of rulers. - -Thus on every side this class is omnipotent. In Parliament with its -ludicrous representation, in the towns with their decayed government, -in the country, sleeping under the absolute rule of the Justice of -the Peace, there is no rival power. The Crown is for all purposes its -accomplice rather than its competitor. It controls the universities, -the Church, the law, and all the springs of life and discussion. Its -own influence is consolidated by the strong social discipline embodied -in the family settlements. Its supremacy is complete and unquestioned. -Whereas in France the fermentation of ideas was an intellectual revolt -against the governing system and all literature spoke treason, in -England the existing régime was accepted, we might say assumed, by -the world of letters and art, by the England that admired Reynolds -and Gibbon, or listened to Johnson and Goldsmith, or laughed with -Sheridan and Sterne. To the reason of France, the government under -which France lived was an expensive paradox: to the reason of England, -any other government than the government under which England lived was -unthinkable. Hence De Tocqueville saw only a homogeneous society, a -society revering its institutions in the spirit of Burke in contrast -with a society that mocked at its institutions in the spirit of -Voltaire. - -‘You people of great families and hereditary trusts and fortunes,’ -wrote Burke to the Duke of Richmond in 1772, ‘are not like such as I -am, who, whatever we may be by the rapidity of our growth and even -by the fruit we bear, flatter ourselves that, while we creep on the -ground, we belly into melons that are exquisite for size and flavour, -yet still we are but annual plants that perish with our season, and -leave no sort of traces behind us. You, if you are what you ought to -be, are in my eye the great oaks that shade a country, and perpetuate -your benefits from generation to generation.’ We propose in this book -to examine the social history of England in the days when the great -oaks were in the fulness of their vigour and strength, and to see what -happened to some of the classes that found shelter in their shade. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[1] House of Commons, May 26, 1797, on Grey’s motion for Parliamentary -Reform. - -[2] The only person who is known to have declined to sit on this -account is Southey. - -[3] _Outline of English Local Government_, p. 152. - -[4] A clear and concise account of these developments is given by Lord -Hobhouse, _Contemporary Review_, February and March 1886. - -[5] Holdsworth’s _History of English Law_. - - - - -CHAPTER II - -THE VILLAGE BEFORE ENCLOSURE - - To elucidate these chapters, and to supply further information for - those who are interested in the subject, we publish an Appendix - containing the history, and tolerably full particulars, of twelve - separate enclosures. These instances have not been chosen on any - plan. They are taken from different parts of the country, and are of - various dates; some are enclosures of common fields, some enclosures - of commons and waste, and some include enclosures of both kinds. - - -At the time of the great Whig Revolution, England was in the main a -country of commons and of common fields[6]; at the time of the Reform -Bill, England was in the main a country of individualist agriculture -and of large enclosed farms. There has probably been no change in -Europe in the last two centuries comparable to this in importance of -which so little is known to-day, or of which so little is to be learnt -from the general histories of the time. The accepted view is that this -change marks a great national advance, and that the hardships which -incidentally followed could not have been avoided: that it meant a -vast increase in the food resources of England in comparison with -which the sufferings of individuals counted for little: and that the -great estates which then came into existence were rather the gift of -economic forces than the deliberate acquisitions of powerful men. We -are not concerned to corroborate or to dispute the contention that -enclosure made England more productive,[7] or to discuss the merits of -enclosure itself as a public policy or a means to agricultural progress -in the eighteenth century. Our business is with the changes that the -enclosures caused in the social structure of England, from the manner -in which they were in practice carried out. We propose, therefore, to -describe the actual operations by which society passed through this -revolution, the old village vanished, and rural life assumed its modern -form and character. - -It is difficult for us, who think of a common as a wild sweep of -heather and beauty and freedom, saved for the enjoyment of the world -in the midst of guarded parks and forbidden meadows, to realise that -the commons that disappeared from so many an English village in the -eighteenth century belonged to a very elaborate, complex, and ancient -economy. The antiquity of that elaborate economy has been the subject -of fierce contention, and the controversies that rage round the -nursery of the English village recall the controversies that raged -round the nursery of Homer. The main subject of contention has been -this. Was the manor or the township, or whatever name we like to give -to the primitive unit of agricultural life, an organisation imposed -by a despotic landowner on his dependents, or was it created by the -co-operation of a group of free tribesmen, afterwards dominated by a -military overlord? Did it owe more to Roman tradition or to Teutonic -tendencies? Professor Vinogradoff, the latest historian, inclines to -a compromise between these conflicting theories. He thinks that it -is impossible to trace the open-field system of cultivation to any -exclusive right of ownership or to the power of coercion, and that -the communal organisation of the peasantry, a village community of -shareholders who cultivated the land on the open-field system and -treated the other requisites of rural life as appendant to it, is -more ancient than the manorial order. It derives, in his view, from -the old English society. The manor itself, an institution which -partakes at once of the character of an estate and of a unit of local -government, was produced by the needs of government and the development -of individualist husbandry, side by side with this communal village. -These conditions lead to the creation of lordships, and after the -Conquest they take form in the manor. The manorial element, in fact, -is superimposed on the communal, and is not the foundation of it: the -mediæval village is a free village gradually feudalised. Fortunately it -is not incumbent on us to do more than touch on this fascinating study, -as it is enough for our purposes to note that the greater part of -England in cultivation at the beginning of the eighteenth century was -cultivated on a system which, with certain local variations, belonged -to a common type, representing this common ancestry. - -The term ‘common’ was used of three kinds of land in the -eighteenth-century village, and the three were intimately connected -with each other. There were (1) the arable fields, (2) the common -meadowland, and (3) the common or waste. The arable fields were divided -into strips, with different owners, some of whom owned few strips, -and some many. The various strips that belonged to a particular owner -were scattered among the fields. Strips were divided from each other, -sometimes by a grass band called a balk, sometimes by a furrow. They -were cultivated on a uniform system by agreement, and after harvest -they were thrown open to pasturage. The common meadow land was divided -up by lot, pegged out, and distributed among the owners of the strips; -after the hay was carried, these meadows, like the arable fields, were -used for pasture. The common or waste, which was used as a common -pasture at all times of the year, consisted sometimes of woodland, -sometimes of roadside strips, and sometimes of commons in the modern -sense.[8] - -Such, roughly, was the map of the old English village. What were the -classes that lived in it, and what were their several rights? In a -normal village there would be (1) a Lord of the Manor, (2) Freeholders, -some of whom might be large proprietors, and many small, both classes -going by the general name of Yeomanry, (3) Copyholders, (4) Tenant -Farmers, holding by various sorts of tenure, from tenants at will to -farmers with leases for three lives, (5) Cottagers, (6) Squatters, and -(7) Farm Servants, living in their employers’ houses. The proportions -of these classes varied greatly, no doubt, in different villages, -but we have an estimate of the total agricultural population in the -table prepared by Gregory King in 1688, from which it appears that in -addition to the Esquires and Gentlemen, there were 40,000 families of -freeholders of the better sort, 120,000 families of freeholders of the -lesser sort, and 150,000 farmers. Adam Smith, it will be remembered, -writing nearly a century later, said that the large number of yeomen -was at once the strength and the distinction of English agriculture. - -Let us now describe rather more fully the different people represented -in these different categories, and the different rights that they -enjoyed. We have seen in the first chapter that the manorial courts -had lost many of their powers by this time, and that part of the -jurisdiction that the Lord of the Manor had originally exercised had -passed to the Justice of the Peace. No such change had taken place -in his relation to the economic life of the village. He might or he -might not still own a demesne land. So far as the common arable or -common meadow was concerned, he was in the same position as any other -proprietor: he might own many strips or few strips or no strips at all. -His position with regard to the waste was different, the difference -being expressed by Blackstone ‘in those waste grounds, which are -usually called commons, the property of the soil is generally in the -Lord of the Manor, as in the common fields it is in the particular -tenant.’ The feudal lawyers had developed a doctrine that the soil of -the waste was vested in the Lord of the Manor, and that originally it -had all belonged to him. But feudal law acknowledged certain definite -limitations to his rights over the waste. The Statute of Merton, 1235, -allowed him to make enclosures on the waste, but only on certain terms; -he was obliged to leave enough of the waste for the needs of his -tenants. Moreover, his powers were limited, not only by the concurrent -rights of freeholders and copyholders thus recognised by this ancient -law, but also by certain common rights of pasture and turbary enjoyed -by persons who were neither freeholders nor copyholders, namely -cottagers. These rights were explained by the lawyers of the time as -being concessions made by the Lord of the Manor in remote antiquity. -The Lord of the Manor was regarded as the owner of the waste, subject -to these common rights: that is, he was regarded as owning the minerals -and the surface rights (sand and gravel) as well as sporting rights. - -Every grade of property and status was represented in the ranks of the -freeholders, the copyholders and the tenant farmers, from the man who -employed others to work for him to the man who was sometimes employed -in working for others. No distinct line, in fact, can be drawn between -the small farmer, whether freeholder, copyholder or tenant, and the -cottager, for the cottager might either own or rent a few strips; the -best dividing-line can be drawn between those who made their living -mainly as farmers, and those who made their living mainly as labourers. - -It is important to remember that no farmer, however large his holdings -or property, or however important his social position, was at liberty -to cultivate his strips as he pleased. The system of cultivation would -be settled for him by the Jury of the Manor Court, a court that had -different names in different places. By the eighteenth century the -various courts of the manorial jurisdiction had been merged in a single -court, called indifferently the View of Frankpledge, the Court Leet, -the Court Baron, the Great Court or the Little Court, which transacted -so much of the business hitherto confided to various courts as had -not been assigned to the Justices of the Peace.[9] Most of the men of -the village, freeholders, copyholders, leaseholders, or cottagers, -attended the court, but the constitution of the Jury or Homage seems -to have varied in different manors. Sometimes the tenants of the manor -were taken haphazard in rotation: sometimes the steward controlled -the choice, sometimes a nominee of the steward or a nominee of the -tenants selected the Jury: sometimes the steward took no part in the -selection at all. The chief part of the business of these courts in the -eighteenth century was the management of the common fields and common -pastures, and the appointment of the village officers. These courts -decided which seed should be sown in the different fields, and the -dates at which they were to be opened and closed to common pasture. -Under the most primitive system of rotation the arable land was divided -into three fields, of which one was sown with wheat, another with -spring corn, and the third lay fallow: but by the end of the eighteenth -century there was a great variety of cultivation, and we find a -nine years’ course at Great Tew in Oxfordshire, a six years’ course -in Berkshire, while the Battersea common fields were sown with one -uniform round of grain without intermission, and consequently without -fallowing.[10] - -By Sir Richard Sutton’s Act[11] for the cultivation of common fields, -passed in 1773, a majority of three-fourths in number and value of the -occupiers, with the consent of the owner and titheholder, was empowered -to decide on the course of husbandry, to regulate stinted commons, and, -with the consent of the Lord of the Manor, to let off a twelfth of the -common, applying the rent to draining or improving the rest of it.[12] -Before this Act, a universal consent to any change of system was -necessary.[13] The cultivation of strips in the arable fields carried -with it rights of common over the waste and also over the common -fields when they were thrown open. These rights were known as ‘common -appendant’ and they are thus defined by Blackstone: ‘Common appendant -is a right belonging to the owners or occupiers of arable land to put -commonable beasts upon the Lord’s waste and upon the lands of other -persons within the same manor.’ - -The classes making their living mainly as labourers were the cottagers, -farm servants, and squatters. The cottagers either owned or occupied -cottages and had rights of common on the waste, and in some cases -over the common fields. These rights were of various kinds: they -generally included the right to pasture certain animals, to cut turf -and to get fuel. The cottagers, as we have already said, often owned -or rented land. This is spoken of as a common practice by Addington, -who knew the Midland counties well; Arthur Young gives instances from -Lincolnshire and Oxfordshire, and Eden from Leicestershire and Surrey. -The squatters or borderers were, by origin, a separate class, though -in time they merged into the cottagers. They were settlers who built -themselves huts and cleared a piece of land in the commons or woods, -at some distance from the village. These encroachments were generally -sanctioned. A common rule in one part of the country was that the right -was established if the settler could build his cottage in the night -and send out smoke from his chimney in the morning.[14] The squatters -also often went out as day labourers. The farm servants were usually -the children of the small farmers or cottagers; they lived in their -masters’ houses until they had saved enough money to marry and take a -cottage of their own. - -Were there any day labourers without either land or common rights in -the old village? It is difficult to suppose that there were many.[15] -Blackstone said of common appurtenant that it was not a general right -‘but can only be claimed by special grant or by prescription, which the -law esteems sufficient proof of a special grant or agreement for this -purpose.’ Prescription covers a multitude of encroachments. Indeed, it -was only by the ingenuity of the feudal lawyers that these rights did -not attach to the inhabitants of the village at large. These lawyers -had decided in Gateward’s case, 1603, that ‘inhabitants’ were too -vague a body to enjoy a right, and on this ground they had deprived -the inhabitants of the village of Stixswold in Lincolnshire of their -customary right of turning out cattle on the waste.[16] From that time -a charter of incorporation was necessary to enable the inhabitants at -large to prove a legal claim to common rights. But rights that were -enjoyed by the occupiers of small holdings or of cottages by long -prescription, or by encroachments tacitly sanctioned, must have been -very widely scattered. - -Such were the classes inhabiting the eighteenth-century village. As -the holdings in the common fields could be sold, the property might -change hands, though it remained subject to common rights and to the -general regulations of the manor court. Consequently the villages -exhibited great varieties of character. In one village it might happen -that strip after strip had been bought up by the Lord of the Manor or -some proprietor, until the greater part of the arable fields had come -into the possession of a single owner. In such cases, however, the land -so purchased was still let out as a rule to a number of small men, -for the engrossing of farms as a practice comes into fashion after -enclosure. Sometimes such purchase was a preliminary to enclosure. The -Bedfordshire reporter gives an example in the village of Bolnhurst, in -that county. Three land speculators bought up as much of the land as -they could with a view to enclosing the common fields and then selling -at a large profit. But the land turned out to be much less valuable -than they had supposed, and they could not get it off their hands: all -improvements were at a standstill, for the speculators only let from -year to year, hoping still to find a market.[17] In other villages, -land might have changed hands in just the opposite direction. The Lord -of the Manor might sell his property in the common fields, and sell it -not to some capitalist or merchant, but to a number of small farmers. -We learn from the evidence of the Committee of 1844 on enclosures that -sometimes the Lord of the Manor sold his property in the waste to the -commoners. Thus there were villages with few owners, as there were -villages with many owners. The writer of the _Report on Middlesex_, -which was published in 1798 says, ‘I have known thirty landlords in -a field of 200 acres, and the property of each so divided as to lie -in ten or twenty places, containing from an acre or two downwards to -fifteen perches; and in a field of 300 acres I have met with patches -of arable land, containing eight perches each. In this instance the -average size of all the pieces in the field was under an acre. In all -cases they lie in long, narrow, winding or worm-like slips.’[18] - -The same writer states that at the time his book was written (1798) -20,000 out of the 23,000 arable acres in Middlesex were cultivated on -the common-field system.[19] Perhaps the parish of Stanwell, of which -we describe the enclosure in detail elsewhere, may be taken as a fair -example of an eighteenth-century village. In this parish there were, -according to the enclosure award, four large proprietors, twenty-four -moderate proprietors, twenty-four small proprietors, and sixty-six -cottagers with common rights. - -The most important social fact about this system is that it provided -opportunities for the humblest and poorest labourer to rise in the -village. Population seems to have moved slowly, and thus there was no -feverish competition for land. The farm servant could save up his wages -and begin his married life by hiring a cottage which carried rights of -common, and gradually buy or hire strips of land. Every village, as -Hasbach has put it, had its ladder, and nobody was doomed to stay on -the lowest rung. This is the distinguishing mark of the old village. It -would be easy, looking only at this feature, to idealise the society -that we have described, and to paint this age as an age of gold. But -no reader of Fielding or of Richardson would fall into this mistake, -or persuade himself that this community was a society of free and -equal men, in which tyranny was impossible. The old village was under -the shadow of the squire and the parson, and there were many ways in -which these powers controlled and hampered its pleasures and habits: -there were quarrels, too, between farmers and cottagers, and there are -many complaints that the farmers tried to take the lion’s share of the -commons: but, whatever the pressure outside and whatever the bickerings -within, it remains true that the common-field system formed a world in -which the villagers lived their own lives and cultivated the soil on a -basis of independence. - -It was this community that now passed under the unqualified rule of -the oligarchy. Under that rule it was to disappear. Enclosure was -no new menace to the poor. English literature before the eighteenth -century echoes the dismay and lamentations of preachers and prophets -who witnessed the havoc that it spread. Stubbes had written in 1553 his -bitter protest against the enclosures which enabled rich men to eat up -poor men, and twenty years later a writer had given a sombre landscape -of the new farming: ‘We may see many of their houses built alone like -ravens’ nests, no birds building near them.’ The Midlands had been -the chief scene of these changes, and there the conversion of arable -land into pasture had swallowed up great tracts of common agriculture, -provoking in some cases an armed resistance. The enclosures of this -century were the second and the greater of two waves.[20] In one -respect enclosure was in form more difficult now than in earlier -periods, for it was generally understood at this time that an Act -of Parliament was necessary. In reality there was less check on the -process. For hitherto the enclosing class had had to reckon with the -occasional panic or ill-temper of the Crown. No English king, it is -true, had intervened in the interests of the poor so dramatically as -did the earlier and unspoilt Louis XIV., who restored to the French -village assemblies the public lands they had alienated within a certain -period. But the Crown had not altogether overlooked the interests of -the classes who were ruined by enclosure, and in different ways it -had tried to modify the worst consequences of this policy. From 1490 -to 1601 there were various Acts and proclamations designed for this -purpose. Charles I. had actually annulled the enclosures of two years -in certain midland counties, several Commissions had been issued, and -the Star Chamber had instituted proceedings against enclosures on the -ground that depopulation was an offence against the Common Law. Mr. -Firth holds that Cromwell’s influence in the eastern counties was due -to his championship of the commoners in the fens. Throughout this time, -however ineffectual the intervention of the Crown, the interests of the -classes to whom enclosures brought wealth and power were not allowed to -obliterate all other considerations. - -From the beginning of the eighteenth century the reins are thrown to -the enclosure movement, and the policy of enclosure is emancipated from -all these checks and afterthoughts. One interest is supreme throughout -England, supreme in Parliament, supreme in the country; the Crown -follows, the nation obeys. - -The agricultural community which was taken to pieces in the eighteenth -century and reconstructed in the manner in which a dictator -reconstructs a free government, was threatened from many points. It was -not killed by avarice alone. Cobbett used to attribute the enclosure -movement entirely to the greed of the landowners, but, if greed was a -sufficient motive, greed was in this case clothed and almost enveloped -in public spirit. Let us remember what this community looked like to -men with the mind of the landlord class. The English landowners have -always believed that order would be resolved into its original chaos, -if they ceased to control the lives and destinies of their neighbours. -‘A great responsibility rests on us landlords; if we go, the whole -thing goes.’ So says the landlord in Mr. Galsworthy’s novel, and so -said the landlords in the eighteenth century. The English aristocracy -always thinking of this class as the pillars of society, as the -Atlas that bears the burden of the world, very naturally concluded -that this old peasant community, with its troublesome rights, was a -public encumbrance. This view received a special impetus from all the -circumstances of the age. The landlord class was constantly being -recruited from the ranks of the manufacturers, and the new landlords, -bringing into this charmed circle an energy of their own, caught at -once its taste for power, for direction, for authority, for imposing -its will. Readers of _Shirley_ will remember that when Robert Moore -pictures to himself a future of usefulness and success, he says that -he will obtain an Act for enclosing Nunnely Common, that his brother -will be put on the bench, and that between them they will dominate the -parish. The book ends in this dream of triumph. Signorial position -owes its special lustre for English minds to the association of social -distinction with power over the life and ways of groups of men and -women. When Bagehot sneered at the sudden millionaires of his day, who -hoped to disguise their social defects by buying old places and hiding -among aristocratic furniture, he was remarking on a feature of English -life that was very far from being peculiar to his time. Did not Adam -Smith observe that merchants were very commonly ambitious of becoming -country gentlemen? This kind of ambition was the form that public -spirit often took in successful Englishmen, and it was a very powerful -menace to the old village and its traditions of collective life. - -Now this passion received at this time a special momentum from the -condition of agriculture. A dictatorship lends itself more readily -than any other form of government to the quick introduction of -revolutionary ideas, and new ideas were in the air. Thus, in addition -to the desire for social power, there was behind the enclosure -movement a zeal for economic progress seconding and almost concealing -the direct inspiration of self-interest. Many an enclosing landlord -thought only of the satisfaction of doubling or trebling his rent: -that is unquestionable. If we are to trust so warm a champion of -enclosure as William Marshall, this was the state of mind of the great -majority. But there were many whose eyes glistened as they thought of -the prosperity they were to bring to English agriculture, applying -to a wider and wider domain the lessons that were to be learnt from -the processes of scientific farming. A man who had caught the large -ideas of a Coke, or mastered the discoveries of a Bakewell, chafed -under the restraints that the system of common agriculture placed on -improvement and experiment. It was maddening to have to set your pace -by the slow bucolic temperament of small farmers, nursed in a simple -and old-fashioned routine, who looked with suspicion on any proposal -that was strange to them. In this tiresome partnership the swift were -put between the shafts with the slow, and the temptation to think that -what was wanted was to get rid of the partnership altogether, was -almost irresistible. From such a state the mind passed rapidly and -naturally to the conclusion that the wider the sphere brought into the -absolute possession of the enlightened class, the greater would be the -public gain. The spirit in which the Board of Agriculture approached -the subject found appropriate expression in Sir John Sinclair’s -high-sounding language. ‘The idea of having lands in common, it has -been justly remarked, is to be derived from that barbarous state of -society, when men were strangers to any higher occupation than those -of hunters or shepherds, or had only just tasted the advantages to -be reaped from the cultivation of the earth.’[21] Arthur Young[22] -compared the open-field system, with its inconveniences ‘which the -barbarity of their ancestors had neither knowledge to discover nor -government to remedy’ to the Tartar policy of the shepherd state. - -It is not surprising that men under the influence of these set ideas -could find no virtue at all in the old system, and that they soon -began to persuade themselves that that system was at the bottom of -all the evils of society. It was harmful to the morals and useless to -the pockets of the poor. ‘The benefit,’ wrote Arbuthnot,[23] ‘which -they are supposed to reap from commons, in their present state, I -know to be merely nominal; nay, indeed, what is worse, I know, that, -in many instances, it is an essential injury to them, by being made -a plea for their idleness; for, some few excepted, if you offer them -work, they will tell you, that they must go to look up their sheep, -cut furzes, get their cow out of the pound, or, perhaps, say they must -take their horse to be shod, that he may carry them to a horse-race or -cricket-match.’ Lord Sheffield, in the course of one of the debates in -Parliament, described the commoners as a ‘nuisance,’ and most people of -his class thought of them as something worse. Mr. John Billingsley, who -wrote the _Report on Somerset_ for the Board of Agriculture in 1795, -describes in some detail the enervating atmosphere of the commoners’ -life. ‘Besides, moral effects of an injurious tendency accrue to the -cottager, from a reliance on the imaginary benefits of stocking a -common. The possession of a cow or two, with a hog, and a few geese, -naturally exalts the peasant, in his own conception, above his brethren -in the same rank of society. It inspires some degree of confidence in -a property, inadequate to his support. In sauntering after his cattle, -he acquires a habit of indolence. Quarter, half, and occasionally -whole days are imperceptibly lost. Day labour becomes disgusting; -the aversion increases by indulgence; and at length the sale of a -half-fed calf, or hog, furnishes the means of adding intemperance to -idleness.’[24] Mr. Bishton, who wrote the _Report on Shropshire_ in -1794, gives a still more interesting glimpse into the mind of the -enclosing class: ‘The use of common land by labourers operates upon the -mind as a sort of independence.’ When the commons are enclosed ‘the -labourers will work every day in the year, their children will be put -out to labour early,’ and ‘that subordination of the lower ranks of -society which in the present times is so much wanted, would be thereby -considerably secured.’ - -A similar view was taken of the moral effects of commons by Middleton, -the writer of the _Report on Middlesex_.[25] ‘On the other hand, they -are, in many instances, of real injury to the public; by holding out -a lure to the poor man--I mean of materials wherewith to build his -cottage, and ground to erect it upon: together with firing and the -run of his poultry and pigs for nothing. This is of course temptation -sufficient to induce a great number of poor persons to settle upon the -borders of such commons. But the mischief does not end here: for having -gained these trifling advantages, through the neglect or connivance of -the lord of the manor, it unfortunately gives their minds an improper -bias, and inculcates a desire to live, from that time forward, without -labour, or at least with as little as possible.’ - -One of the witnesses before the Select Committee on Commons Inclosure -in 1844 was Mr. Carus Wilson, who is interesting as the original of -the character of Mr. Brocklehurst in _Jane Eyre_. We know how that -zealous Christian would regard the commoners from the speech in which -he reproved Miss Temple for giving the pupils at Lowood a lunch of -bread and cheese on one occasion when their meagre breakfast had been -uneatable. ‘Oh, madam, when you put bread and cheese, instead of burnt -porridge, into these children’s mouths, you may indeed feed their vile -bodies, but you little think how you starve their immortal souls!’ We -are not surprised to learn that Mr. Carus Wilson found the commoners -‘hardened and unpromising,’ and that he was obliged to inform the -committee that the misconduct which the system encouraged ‘hardens the -heart, and causes a good deal of mischief, and at the same time puts -the person in an unfavourable position for the approach of what might -be serviceable to him in a moral and religious point of view.’[26] - -It is interesting, after reading all these confident generalisations -about the influence of this kind of life upon the character of the -poor, to learn what the commoners themselves thought of its moral -atmosphere. This we can do from such a petition as that sent by the -small proprietors and persons entitled to rights of common at Raunds, -in Northamptonshire. These unfortunate people lost their rights by -an Enclosure Act in 1797, and during the progress of the Bill they -petitioned Parliament against it, in these terms: ‘That the Petitioners -beg Leave to represent to the House that, under Pretence of improving -Lands in the said Parish, the Cottagers and other Persons entitled to -Right of Common on the Lands intended to be inclosed, will be deprived -of an inestimable Privilege, which they now enjoy, of turning a certain -Number of their Cows, Calves, and Sheep, on and over the said Lands; a -Privilege that enables them not only to maintain themselves and their -Families in the Depth of Winter, when they cannot, even for their -Money, obtain from the Occupiers of other Lands the smallest Portion of -Milk or Whey for such necessary Purpose, but, in addition to this, they -can now supply the Grazier with young or lean Stock at a reasonable -Price, to fatten and bring to Market at a more moderate Rate for -general Consumption, which they conceive to be the most rational and -effectual Way of establishing Public Plenty and Cheapness of Provision; -and they further conceive, that a more ruinous Effect of this Inclosure -will be the almost total Depopulation of their Town, now filled with -bold and hardy Husbandmen, from among whom, and the Inhabitants of -other open Parishes, the Nation has hitherto derived its greatest -Strength and Glory, in the Supply of its Fleets and Armies, and -driving them, from Necessity and Want of Employ, in vast Crowds, into -manufacturing Towns, where the very Nature of their Employment, over -the Loom or the Forge, soon may waste their Strength, and consequently -debilitate their Posterity, and by imperceptible Degrees obliterate -that great Principle of Obedience to the Laws of God and their Country, -which forms the Character of the simple and artless Villagers, more -equally distributed through the Open Countries, and on which so much -depends the good Order and Government of the State: These are some of -the Injuries to themselves as Individuals, and of the ill Consequences -to the Public, which the Petitioners conceive will follow from this, -as they have already done from many Inclosures, but which they did not -think they were entitled to lay before the House (the Constitutional -Patron and Protector of the Poor) until it unhappily came to their own -Lot to be exposed to them through the Bill now pending.’[27] - -When we remember that the enterprise of the age was under the spell -of the most seductive economic teaching of the time, and that the old -peasant society, wearing as it did the look of confusion and weakness, -had to fear not only the simplifying appetites of the landlords, but -the simplifying philosophy, in England of an Adam Smith, in France of -the Physiocrats, we can realise that a ruling class has seldom found so -plausible an atmosphere for the free play of its interests and ideas. -_Des crimes sont flattés d’être présidés d’une vertu._ Bentham himself -thought the spectacle of an enclosure one of the most reassuring of all -the evidences of improvement and happiness. Indeed, all the elements -seemed to have conspired against the peasant, for æsthetic taste, -which might at other times have restrained, in the eighteenth century -encouraged the destruction of the commons and their rough beauty. The -rage for order and symmetry and neat cultivation was universal. It -found expression in Burnet, who said of the Alps and Appenines that -they had neither form nor beauty, neither shape nor order, any more -than the clouds of the air: in Johnson, who said of the Highlands that -‘the uniformity of barrenness can afford very little amusement to the -traveller’: and in Cobbett, who said of the Cotswolds, ‘this is a sort -of country having less to please the eye than any other that I have -ever seen, always save and except the heaths like those of Bagshot -and Hindhead.’ The enjoyment of wild nature was a lost sense, to be -rediscovered one day by the Romanticists and the Revolution, but too -late to help the English village. In France, owing to various causes, -part economic, part political, on which we shall touch later, the -peasant persisted in his ancient and ridiculous tenure, and survived to -become the envy of English observers: it was only in England that he -lost his footing, and that his ancient patrimony slipped away from him. - -We are not concerned at this juncture to inquire into the truth of the -view that the sweeping policy of enclosure increased the productivity -and resources of the State: we are concerned only to inquire into -the way in which the aristocracy gave shape and effect to it. This -movement, assumed by the enlightened opinion of the day to be -beneficent and progressive, was none the less a gigantic disturbance; -it broke up the old village life; it transferred a great body of -property; it touched a vast mass of interests at a hundred points. A -governing class that cared for its reputation for justice would clearly -regard it as of sovereign importance that this delicate network of -rights and claims should not be roughly disentangled by the sheer power -of the stronger: a governing class that recognised its responsibility -for the happiness and order of the State would clearly regard it as -of sovereign importance that this ancient community should not be -dissolved in such a manner as to plunge great numbers of contented men -into permanent poverty and despair. To decide how far the aristocracy -that presided over these changes displayed insight or foresight, -sympathy or imagination, and how far it acted with a controlling -sense of integrity and public spirit, we must analyse the methods and -procedure of Parliamentary enclosure. - -Before entering on a discussion of the methods by which Parliamentary -enclosure was effected, it is necessary to realise the extent of its -operations. Precise statistics, of course, are not to be had, but -there are various estimates based on careful study of such evidence as -we possess. Mr. Levy says that between 1702 and 1760 there were only -246 Acts, affecting about 400,000 acres, and that in the next fifty -years the Acts had reached a total of 2438, affecting almost five -million acres.[28] Mr. Johnson gives the following table for the years -1700-1844, founded on Dr. Slater’s detailed estimate[29]-- - - +-----------+-----------------------+-----------------------+ - | | Common Field and | Waste only. | - | | some Waste. | | - | Years. +---------+-------------+---------+-------------+ - | | Acts. | Acreage. | Acts. | Acreage. | - +-----------+---------+-------------+---------+-------------+ - | 1700-1760 | 152 | 237,845 | 56 | 74,518 | - | | | | | | - | 1761-1801 | 1,479 | 2,428,721 | 521 | 752,150 | - | | | | | | - | 1802-1844 | 1,075 | 1,610,302 | 808 | 939,043 | - +-----------+---------+-------------+---------+-------------+ - | Total, | 2,706 | 4,276,868 | 1,385 | 1,765,711 | - +-----------+---------+-------------+---------+-------------+ - -This roughly corresponds with the estimate given before the Select -Committee on Enclosures in 1844, that there were some one thousand -seven hundred private Acts before 1800, and some two thousand between -1800 and 1844. The General Report of the Board of Agriculture on -Enclosures gives the acreage enclosed from the time of Queen Anne -down to 1805 as 4,187,056. Mr. Johnson’s conclusion is that nearly 20 -per cent. of the total acreage of England has been enclosed during -the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, though Mr. Prothero puts the -percentage still higher. But we should miss the significance of these -proportions if we were to look at England at the beginning of the -eighteenth century as a map of which a large block was already shaded, -and of which another block, say a fifth or a sixth part, was to be -shaded by the enclosure of this period. The truth is that the life of -the common-field system was still the normal village life of England, -and that the land which was already enclosed consisted largely of old -enclosures or the lord’s demesne land lying side by side with the -open fields. This was put quite clearly by the Bishop of St. Davids -in the House of Lords in 1781. ‘Parishes of any considerable extent -consisted partly of old inclosures and partly of common fields.’[30] If -a village living on the common-field system contained old enclosures, -effected some time or other without Act of Parliament, it suffered -just as violent a catastrophe when the common fields or the waste were -enclosed, as if there had been no previous enclosure in the parish. -The number of Acts passed in this period varies of course with the -different counties,[31] but speaking generally, we may say that the -events described in the next two chapters are not confined to any -one part of the country, and that they mark a national revolution, -making sweeping and profound changes in the form and the character of -agricultural society throughout England.[32] - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[6] Gregory King and Davenant estimated that the whole of the -cultivated land in England in 1685 did not amount to much more than -half the total area, and of this cultivated portion three-fifths was -still farmed on the old common-field system. - -[7] For a full discussion, in which the ordinary view is vigorously -combated in an interesting analysis, see Hasbach, _History of the -Agricultural Labourer_: on the other side, Levy, _Large and Small -Holdings_. - -[8] This was the general structure of the village that was dissolved -in the eighteenth century. It is distinguished from the Keltic type -of communal agriculture, known as run-rig, in two important respects. -In the run-rig village the soil is periodically redivided, and the -tenant’s holding is compact. Dr. Slater (_Geographical Journal_, Jan. -1907) has shown that in those parts of England where the Keltic type -predominated, _e.g._ in Devon and Cornwall, enclosure took place -early, and he argues with good reason that it was easier to enclose by -voluntary agreement where the holdings were compact than it was where -they were scattered in strips. But gradual enclosure by voluntary -agreement had a different effect from the cataclysm-like enclosure of -the eighteenth century, as is evident from the large number of small -farmers in Devonshire. - -[9] See Webb, _Manor and Borough_, vol. i. p. 66 _seq._ - -[10] Slater, _The English Peasantry and the Enclosure of Common -Fields_, p. 77. - -[11] 13 George III. c. 81. - -[12] This was done at Barnes Common; see for whole subject, _Annals of -Agriculture_, vol. xvii. p. 516. - -[13] For cases where changes in the system of cultivation of common -fields had been made, see _Annals of Agriculture_, vol. xvi. p. 606: -‘To Peterborough, crossing an open field, but sown by agreement with -turnips.’ Cf. _Report on Bedfordshire_: ‘Clover is sown in some of -the open clay-fields by common consent’ (p. 339), and ‘Turnips are -sometimes cultivated, both on the sands and gravels, by mutual consent’ -(p. 340). - -[14] Slater, p. 119. - -[15] Dr. Slater’s conclusion is that ‘in the open field village the -entirely landless labourer was scarcely to be found,’ p. 130. - -[16] See _Commons, Forests, and Footpaths_, by Lord Eversley, p. 11. - -[17] _Bedfordshire Report_, 1808, p. 223, quoting from Arthur Young. - -[18] P. 114. - -[19] P. 138. - -[20] See on this point, Levy, _Large and Small Holdings_, p. 1. - -[21] _Report of Select Committee on Waste Lands_, 1795, p. 15, Appendix -B. - -[22] _Annals of Agriculture_, vol. i. p. 72. - -[23] _An Inquiry into the Connection between the present Price of -Provisions and the Size of Farms_, 1773, p. 81. - -[24] _Report on Somerset_, reprinted 1797, p. 52; compare Report on -Commons in Brecknock, _Annals of Agriculture_, vol. xxii. p. 632, -where commons are denounced as ‘hurtful to society by holding forth a -temptation to idleness, that fell parent to vice and immorality’; also -compare _Ibid._, vol. xx. p. 145, where they are said to encourage the -commoners to be ‘hedge breakers, pilferers, nightly trespassers ... -poultry and rabbit stealers, or such like.’ - -[25] P. 103. - -[26] _Committee on Inclosures_, 1844, p. 135. - -[27] _House of Commons Journal_, June 19, 1797. - -[28] _Large and Small Holdings_, p. 24. - -[29] _Disappearance of Small Landowner_, p. 90; Slater’s _English -Peasantry and the Enclosure of Common Fields_, Appendix B. - -[30] _Parliamentary Register_, March 30, 1781. - -[31] See Dr. Slater’s detailed estimate. - -[32] There were probably many enclosures that had not the authority -either of a special Act or of the Act of 1756, particularly in the more -distant counties. The evidence of Mr. Carus Wilson upon the committee -of 1844 shows that the stronger classes interpreted their rights and -powers in a liberal spirit. Mr. Carus Wilson had arranged with the -other large proprietors to let out the only common which remained -open in the thirteen parishes in which his father was interested as a -large landowner, and to pay the rent into the poor rates. Some members -of the committee asked whether the minority who dissented from this -arrangement could be excluded, and Mr. Wilson explained that he and his -confederates believed that the minority were bound by their action, -and that by this simple plan they could shut out all cattle from the -common, except the cattle of their joint tenants.--_Committee on -Inclosures_, 1844, p. 127. - - - - -CHAPTER III - -ENCLOSURE (1) - - -An enclosure, like most Parliamentary operations, began with a petition -from a local person or persons, setting forth the inconveniencies of -the present system and the advantages of such a measure. Parliament, -having received the petition, would give leave for a Bill to be -introduced. The Bill would be read a first and a second time, and -would then be referred to a Committee, which, after considering such -petitions against the enclosure as the House of Commons referred to it, -would present its report. The Bill would then be passed, sent to the -Lords, and receive the Royal Assent. Finally, the Commissioners named -in the Bill would descend on the district and distribute the land. That -is, in brief, the history of a successful enclosure agitation. We will -now proceed to explore its different stages in detail. - -The original petition was often the act of a big landowner, whose -solitary signature was enough to set an enclosure process in train.[33] -Before 1774 it was not even incumbent on this single individual to -let his neighbours know that he was asking Parliament for leave to -redistribute their property. In that year the House of Commons made -a Standing Order providing that notice of any such petition should -be affixed to the church door in each of the parishes affected, for -three Sundays in the month of August or the month of September. This -provision was laid down, as we learn from the Report of the Committee -that considered the Standing Orders in 1775, because it had often -happened that those whose land was to be enclosed knew nothing whatever -of transactions in which they were rather intimately concerned, until -they were virtually completed.[34] - -But the publicity that was secured by this Standing Order, though it -prevented the process of enclosure from being completed in the dark, -did not in practice give the village any kind of voice in its own -destiny. The promoters laid all their plans before they took their -neighbours into the secret. When their arrangements were mature, they -gave notice to the parish in accordance with the requirements of the -Standing Order, or they first took their petition to the various -proprietors for signature, or in some cases they called a public -meeting. The facts set out in the petition against the Enclosure Bill -for Haute Huntre, show that the promoters did not think that they were -bound to accept the opinion of a meeting. In that case ‘the great -majority’ were hostile, but the promoters proceeded with their petition -notwithstanding.[35] Whatever the precise method, unless some large -proprietor stood out against the scheme, the promoters were masters of -the situation. This we know from the evidence of witnesses favourable -to enclosure. ‘The proprietors of large estates,’ said Arthur Young, -‘generally agree upon the measure, adjust the principal points among -themselves, and fix upon their attorney before they appoint any general -meeting of the proprietors.’[36] Addington, in his _Inquiry into the -Reasons for and against Inclosing_, quoting another writer, says, ‘the -whole plan is generally settled between the solicitor and two or three -principal proprietors without ever letting the rest of them into the -secret till they are called upon to sign the petition.’[37] What stand -could the small proprietor hope to make against such forces? The matter -was a _chose jugée_, and his assent a mere formality. If he tried to -resist, he could be warned that the success of the enclosure petition -was certain, and that those who obstructed it would suffer, as those -who assisted it would gain, in the final award. His only prospect of -successful opposition to the lord of the manor, the magistrate, the -impropriator of the tithes, the powers that enveloped his life, the -powers that appointed the commissioner who was to make the ultimate -award, lay in his ability to move a dim and distant Parliament of -great landlords to come to his rescue. It needs no very penetrating -imagination to picture what would have happened in a village in which a -landowner of the type of Richardson’s hero in _Pamela_ was bent on an -enclosure, and the inhabitants, being men like Goodman Andrews, knew -that enclosure meant their ruin. What, in point of fact, could the poor -do to declare their opposition? They could tear down the notices from -the church doors:[38] they could break up a public meeting, if one -were held: but the only way in which they could protest was by violent -and disorderly proceedings, which made no impression at all upon -Parliament, and which the forces of law and order could, if necessary, -be summoned to quell. - -The scene now shifts to Parliament, the High Court of Justice, the -stronghold of the liberties of Englishmen. Parliament hears the -petition, and, almost as a matter of course, grants it, giving leave -for the introduction of a Bill, and instructing the member who -presents the petition to prepare it. This is not a very long business, -for the promoters have generally taken the trouble to prepare their -Bill in advance. The Bill is submitted, read a first and second -time, and then referred to a Committee. Now a modern Parliamentary -Private Bill Committee is regarded as a tribunal whose integrity and -impartiality are beyond question, and justly, for the most elaborate -precautions are taken to secure that it shall deserve this character. -The eighteenth-century Parliament treated its Committee with just as -much respect, but took no precautions at all to obtain a disinterested -court. Indeed, the committee that considered an enclosure was chosen -on the very contrary principle. This we know, not from the evidence of -unkind and prejudiced outsiders, but from the Report of the Committee -of the House of Commons, which inquired in 1825 into the constitution -of Committees on Private Bills. ‘Under the present system each Bill -is committed to the Member who is charged with its management and -such other Members as he may choose to name in the House, and the -Members serving for a particular County (usually the County immediately -connected with the object of the Bill) _and the adjoining Counties_, -and consequently it has been practically found that the Members to whom -Bills have been committed have been generally those who have been most -interested in the result.’ - -During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries there developed the -practice of opening the committees. This was the system of applying to -Private Bills the procedure followed in the case of Public Bills, and -proposing a resolution in the House of Commons that ‘all who attend -shall have voices,’ _i.e._ that any member of the House who cared -to attend the committee should be able to vote. We can see how this -arrangement acted. It might happen that some of the county members were -hostile to a particular enclosure scheme; in that case the promoters -could call for an open committee and mass their friends upon it. It -might happen, on the other hand, that the committee was solid in -supporting an enclosure, and that some powerful person in the House -considered that his interests, or the interests of his friend, had -not been duly consulted in the division of the spoil. In such a case -he would call for all to ‘have voices’ and so compel the promoters to -satisfy his claims. This system then secured some sort of rough justice -as between the powerful interests represented in Parliament, but it -left the small proprietors and the cottagers, who were unrepresented in -this mêlée, absolutely at the mercy of these conflicting forces. - -It is difficult, for example, to imagine that a committee in which -the small men were represented would have sanctioned the amazing -clause in the Ashelworth Act[39] which provided ‘that all fields or -inclosures containing the Property of Two or more Persons within one -fence, and also all inclosures containing the property of one Person -only, if the same be held by or under different Tenures or Interests, -shall be considered as commonable land and be divided and allotted -accordingly.’ This clause, taken with the clause that follows, simply -meant that some big landowner had his eye on some particular piece of -enclosed property, which in the ordinary way would not have gone into -the melting-pot at all. The arrangements of the Wakefield Act would -hardly have survived the scrutiny of a committee on which the Duke of -Leeds’ class was not paramount. Under that Act[40] the duke was to have -full power to work mines and get minerals, and those proprietors whose -premises suffered in consequence were to have reasonable satisfaction, -not from the duke who was enriched by the disturbing cause, but -from all the allottees, including presumably those whose property -was damaged. Further, to save himself inconvenience, the duke could -forbid allottees on Westgate Moor to build a house for sixty years. A -different kind of House of Commons would have looked closely at the Act -at Moreton Corbet which gave the lord of the manor all enclosures and -encroachments more than twenty years old, and also at the not uncommon -provision which exempted the tithe-owner from paying for his own -fencing. - -The Report of the 1825 Committee describes the system as ‘inviting all -the interested parties in the House to take part in the business of -the committee, which necessarily terminates in the prevalence of the -strongest part, for they who have no interest of their own to serve -will not be prevailed upon to take part in a struggle in which their -unbiassed judgment can have no effect.’ The chairman of the committee -was generally the member who had moved to introduce the Bill. The -unreformed Parliament of landowners that passed the excellent Act -of 1782, forbidding Members of Parliament to have an interest in -Government contracts, never thought until the eve of the Reform Bill -that there was anything remarkable in this habit of referring Enclosure -Bills to the judgment of the very landowners who were to profit by -them. And in 1825 it was not the Enclosure Bills, in which the rich -took and the poor suffered, but the Railway Bills, in which rich men -were pitted against rich men, that drew the attention of the House of -Commons to the disadvantages and risks of this procedure. - -The committee so composed sets to work on the Bill, and meanwhile, -perhaps, some of the persons affected by the enclosure send petitions -against it to the House of Commons. Difficulties of time and space -would as a rule deter all but the rich dissentients, unless the -enclosure was near London. These petitions are differently treated -according to their origin. If they emanate from a lord of the manor, -or from a tithe-owner, who for some reason or other is dissatisfied -with the contemplated arrangements, they receive some attention. In -such a case the petitioner probably has some friend in Parliament, and -his point of view is understood. He can, if necessary, get this friend -to attend the committee and introduce amendments. He is therefore a -force to be reckoned with; the Bill is perhaps altered to suit him; the -petition is at any rate referred to the committee. On the other hand, -if the petition comes from cottagers or small proprietors, it is safe, -as a rule, to neglect it. - -The enclosure histories set out in the Appendix supply some good -examples of this differential treatment. Lord Strafford sends a -petition against the Bill for enclosing Wakefield with the result that -he is allowed to appoint a commissioner, and also that his dispute with -the Duke of Leeds is exempted from the jurisdiction of the Enclosure -Commissioners. On the other hand, the unfortunate persons who petition -against the monstrous provision that forbade them to erect any building -for twenty, forty or sixty years, get no kind of redress. In the case -of Croydon, James Trecothick, Esq., who is dissatisfied with the -Bill, is strong enough to demand special consideration. Accordingly a -special provision is made that the commissioners are obliged to sell -Mr. Trecothick, by private contract, part of Addington Hills, if he so -wishes. But when the various freeholders, copyholders, leaseholders and -inhabitant householders of Croydon, who complain that the promoters -of the Bill have named commissioners without consulting the persons -interested, ask leave to nominate a third commissioner, only four -members of the House of Commons support Lord William Russell’s proposal -to consider this petition, and fifty-one vote the other way. Another -example of the spirit in which Parliament received petitions from -unimportant persons is furnished by the case of the enclosure of Holy -Island. In 1791 (Feb. 23)[41] a petition was presented to Parliament -for the enclosure of Holy Island, asking for the division of a stinted -pasture, and the extinction of the rights of common or ‘eatage’ over -certain infield lands. Leave was given, and the Bill was prepared and -read a first time on 28th February. The same day Parliament received -a petition from freeholders and stallingers, who ask to be heard by -themselves or by counsel against the Bill. From Eden[42] we learn that -there were 26 freeholders and 31 stallingers, and that the latter were -in the strict sense of the term as much freeholders as the former. -Whilst, however, a freeholder had the right to put 30 sheep, 4 black -cattle and 3 horses on the stinted common, a stallinger had a right -of common for one horse and one cow only. The House ordered that this -petition should lie on the table till the second reading, and that -the petitioners should then be heard. The second reading, which had -been fixed for 2nd April, was deferred till 20th April, a change which -probably put the petitioners to considerable expense. On 20th April the -Bill was read a second time, and the House was informed that Counsel -attended, and a motion was made that Counsel be now called in. But the -motion was opposed, and on a division was defeated by 47 votes to 12. -The Bill passed the House of Commons on 10th May, and received the -Royal Assent on 9th June.[43] In this case the House of Commons broke -faith with the petitioners, and refused the hearing it had promised. -Such experience was not likely to encourage dissentients to waste their -money on an appeal to Parliament against a Bill that was promoted by -powerful politicians. It will be observed that at Armley and Ashelworth -the petitioners did not think that it was worth the trouble and expense -to be heard on Second Reading. - -The Report of the Committee followed a stereotyped formula: ‘That the -Standing Orders had been complied with: and that the Committee had -examined the Allegations of the Bill and found the same to be true; and -that the Parties concerned had given their Consent to the Bill, to the -Satisfaction of the Committee, except....’ - -Now what did this mean? What consents were necessary to satisfy the -committee? The Parliamentary Committee that reported on the cost of -enclosures in 1800[44] said that there was no fixed rule, that in -some cases the consent of three-fourths was required, in others the -consent of four-fifths. This proportion has a look of fairness until we -discover that we are dealing in terms, not of persons, but of property, -and that the suffrages were not counted but weighed. The method by -which the proportions were reckoned varied, as a glance at the cases -described in the Appendix will show. Value is calculated sometimes -in acres, sometimes in annual value, sometimes in assessment to the -land tax, sometimes in assessment to the poor rate. It is important to -remember that it was the property interested that counted, and that in -a case where there was common or waste to be divided as well as open -fields, one large proprietor, who owned a considerable property in old -enclosures, could swamp the entire community of smaller proprietors -and cottagers. If Squire Western owned an enclosed estate with parks, -gardens and farms of 800 acres, and the rest of the parish consisted of -a common or waste of 1000 acres and open fields of 200 acres, and the -village population consisted of 100 cottagers and small farmers, each -with a strip of land in the common fields, and a right of common on the -waste, Squire Western would have a four-fifths majority in determining -whether the open fields and the waste should be enclosed or not, and -the whole matter would be in his hands. This is an extreme example of -the way in which the system worked. The case of Ashelworth shows that -a common might be cut up, on the votes of persons holding enclosed -property, against the wishes of the great majority of the commoners. -At Laleham the petitioners against the Bill claimed that they were -‘a great majority of the real Owners and Proprietors of or Persons -interested in, the Lands and Grounds intended to be enclosed.’ At -Simpson, where common fields were to be enclosed, the Major Part of the -Owners and Proprietors petitioned against the Bill, stating that they -were ‘very well satisfied with the Situation and Convenience of their -respective Lands and Properties in their present uninclosed State.’[45] - -Even a majority of three-fourths in value was not always required; for -example, the Report of the Committee on the enclosure of Cartmel in -Lancashire in 1796 gave particulars showing that the whole property -belonging to persons interested in the enclosure was assessed at £150, -and that the property of those actually consenting to the enclosure was -just under £110.[46] Yet the enclosure was recommended and carried. -Another illustration is supplied by the Report of the Committee on -the enclosure of Histon and Impington in 1801, where the parties -concerned are reported to have consented except the proprietors of 1020 -acres, out of a total acreage of 3680.[47] In this case the Bill was -recommitted, and on its next appearance the committee gave the consents -in terms of assessment to the Land Tax instead, putting the total -figure at £304, and the assessment of the consenting parties at £188. -This seems to have satisfied the House of Commons.[48] Further, the -particulars given in the case of the enclosure of Bishopstone in Wilts -(enclosed in 1809) show that the votes of copyholders were heavily -discounted. In this case the copyholders who dissented held 1079 acres, -the copyholders who were neuter 81 acres, and the total area to be -divided was 2602 acres. But by some ingenious actuarial calculation of -the reversionary interest of the lord of the manor and the interest -of the tithe-owner, the 1079 acres held by copyholders are written -down to 474 acres.[49] In the cases of Simpson and Louth, as readers -who consult the Appendix will see, the committees were satisfied with -majorities just above three-fifths in value. At Raunds (see p. 39), -where 4963 acres were ‘interested,’ the owners of 570 are stated to be -against, and of 721 neuter.[50] An interesting illustration of the lax -practice of the committees is provided in the history of an attempted -enclosure at Quainton (1801).[51] In any case the signatures were a -doubtful evidence of consent. ‘It is easy,’ wrote an acute observer, -‘for the large proprietors to overcome opposition. Coaxing, bribing, -threatening, together with many other acts which superiors will make -use of, often induce the inferiors to consent to things which they -think will be to their future disadvantage.’[52] We hear echoes of such -proceedings in the petition from various owners and proprietors at -Armley, who ‘at the instance of several other owners of land,’ signed -a petition for enclosure and wish to be heard against it, and also in -the unavailing petition of some of the proprietors and freeholders of -Winfrith Newburgh in Dorsetshire, in 1768,[53] who declared that if the -Bill passed into law, their ‘Estates must be totally ruined thereby, -and that some of the Petitioners by Threats and Menaces were prevailed -upon to sign the Petition for the said Bill: but upon Recollection, -and considering the impending Ruin,’ they prayed to ‘have Liberty to -retract from their seeming Acquiescence.’ From the same case we learn -that it was the practice sometimes to grant copyholds on the condition -that the tenant would undertake not to oppose enclosure. Sometimes, as -in the case of the Sedgmoor Enclosure, which we shall discuss later, -actual fraud was employed. But even if the promoters employed no unfair -methods they had one argument powerful enough to be a deterrent in many -minds. For an opposed Enclosure Bill was much more expensive than an -unopposed Bill, and as the small men felt the burden of the costs much -more than the large proprietors, they would naturally be shy of adding -to the very heavy expenses unless they stood a very good chance of -defeating the scheme. - -It is of capital importance to remember in this connection that the -enumeration of ‘consents’ took account only of proprietors. It ignored -entirely two large classes to whom enclosure meant, not a greater or -less degree of wealth, but actual ruin. These were such cottagers as -enjoyed their rights of common in virtue of renting cottages to which -such rights were attached, and those cottagers and squatters who either -had no strict legal right, or whose rights were difficult of proof. -Neither of these classes was treated even outwardly and formally as -having any claim to be consulted before an enclosure was sanctioned. - -It is clear, then, that it was only the pressure of the powerful -interests that decided whether a committee should approve or disapprove -of an Enclosure Bill. It was the same pressure that determined the -form in which a Bill became law. For a procedure that enabled rich men -to fight out their rival claims at Westminster left the classes that -could not send counsel to Parliament without a weapon or a voice. And -if there was no lawyer there to put his case, what prospect was there -that the obscure cottager, who was to be turned adrift with his family -by an Enclosure Bill promoted by a Member or group of Members, would -ever trouble the conscience of a committee of landowners? We have seen -already how this class was regarded by the landowners and the champions -of enclosure. No cottagers had votes or the means of influencing a -single vote at a single election. To Parliament, if they had any -existence at all, they were merely dim shadows in the very background -of the enclosure scheme. It would require a considerable effort of the -imagination to suppose that the Parliamentary Committee spent very much -time or energy on the attempt to give body and form to this hazy and -remote society, and to treat these shadows as living men and women, -about to be tossed by this revolution from their ancestral homes. As it -happens, we need not put ourselves to the trouble of such speculation, -for we have the evidence of a witness who will not be suspected -of injustice to his class. ‘This I know,’ said Lord Lincoln[54] -introducing the General Enclosure Bill of 1845, ‘that in nineteen -cases out of twenty, Committees of this House sitting on private Bills -neglected the rights of the poor. I do not say that they wilfully -neglected those rights--far from it: but this I affirm, that they were -neglected in consequence of the Committees being permitted to remain -in ignorance of the claims of the poor man, because by reason of his -very poverty he is unable to come up to London for counsel, to produce -witnesses, and to urge his claims before a Committee of this House.’ -Another Member[55] had described a year earlier the character of this -private Bill procedure. ‘Inclosure Bills had been introduced heretofore -and passed without discussion, and no one could tell how many persons -had suffered in their interests and rights by the interference of these -Bills. Certainly these Bills had been referred to Committees upstairs, -but everyone knew how these Committees were generally conducted. They -were attended only by honourable Members who were interested in them, -being Lords of Manor, and the rights of the poor, though they might be -talked about, had frequently been taken away under that system.’ - -These statements were made by politicians who remembered well the -system they were describing. There is another witness whose authority -is even greater. In 1781 Lord Thurlow, then at the beginning of his -long life of office as Lord Chancellor,[56] spoke for an hour and three -quarters in favour of recommitting the Bill for enclosing Ilmington -in Warwickshire. If the speech had been fully reported it would be -a contribution of infinite value to students of the social history -of eighteenth-century England, for we are told that ‘he proceeded -to examine, paragraph by paragraph, every provision of the Bill, -animadverting and pointing out some acts of injustice, partiality, -obscurity or cause of confusion in each.’[57] Unfortunately this part -of his speech was omitted in the report as being ‘irrelative to the -debate,’ which was concerned with the question of the propriety of -commuting tithes. But the report, incomplete as it is, contains an -illuminating passage on the conduct of Private Bill Committees. ‘His -Lordship ... next turned his attention to the mode in which private -bills were permitted to make their way through both Houses, and that in -matters in which property was concerned, to the great injury of many, -if not the total ruin of some private families: many proofs of this -evil had come to his knowledge as a member of the other House, not a -few in his professional character, before he had the honour of a seat -in that House, nor had he been a total stranger to such evils since he -was called upon to preside in another place.’ Going on to speak of the -committees of the House of Commons and ‘the rapidity with which private -Bills were hurried through,’ he declared that ‘it was not unfrequent -to decide upon the merits of a Bill which would affect the property -and interests of persons inhabiting a district of several miles in -extent, in less time than it took him to determine upon the propriety -of issuing an order for a few pounds, by which no man’s property -could be injured.’ He concluded by telling the House of Lords a story -of how Sir George Savile once noticed a man ‘rather meanly habited’ -watching the proceedings of a committee with anxious interest. When the -committee had agreed on its report, the agitated spectator was seen to -be in great distress. Sir George Savile asked him what was the matter, -and he found that the man would be ruined by a clause that had been -passed by the committee, and that, having heard that the Bill was to be -introduced, he had made his way to London on foot, too poor to come in -any other way or to fee counsel. Savile then made inquiries and learnt -that these statements were correct, whereupon he secured the amendment -of the Bill, ‘by which means an innocent, indigent man and his family -were rescued from destruction.’ It would not have been very easy for a -‘meanly habited man’ to make the journey to London from Wakefield or -Knaresborough or Haute Huntre, even if he knew when a Bill was coming -on, and to stay in London until it went into committee; and if he did, -he would not always be so lucky as to find a Sir George Savile on the -committee--the public man who was regarded by his contemporaries, to -whatever party they belonged, as the Bayard of politics.[58] - -We get very few glimpses into the underworld of the common and obscure -people, whose homes and fortunes trembled on the chance that a quarrel -over tithes and the conflicting claims of squire and parson might -disturb the unanimity of a score of gentlemen sitting round a table. -London was far away, and the Olympian peace of Parliament was rarely -broken by the protests of its victims. But we get one such glimpse in a -passage in the _Annual Register_ for 1767. - -‘On Tuesday evening a great number of farmers were observed going along -Pall Mall with cockades in their hats. On enquiring the reason, it -appeared they all lived in or near the parish of Stanwell in the county -of Middlesex, and they were returning to their wives and families to -carry them the agreeable news of a Bill being rejected for inclosing -the said common, which if carried into execution, might have been the -ruin of a great number of families.’[59] - -When the Committee on the Enclosure Bill had reported to the House of -Commons, the rest of the proceedings were generally formal. The Bill -was read a third time, engrossed, sent up to the Lords, where petitions -might be presented as in the Commons, and received the Royal Assent. - -A study of the pages of Hansard and Debrett tells us little about -transactions that fill the _Journals_ of the Houses of Parliament. -Three debates in the House of Lords are fully reported,[60] and they -illustrate the play of forces at Westminster. The Bishop of St. -Davids[61] moved to recommit an Enclosure Bill in 1781 on the ground -that, like many other Enclosure Bills, it provided for the commutation -of tithes--an arrangement which he thought open to many objections. -Here was an issue that was vital, for it concerned the interests of -the classes represented in Parliament. Did the Church stand to gain or -to lose by taking land instead of tithe? Was it a bad thing or a good -thing that the parson should be put into the position of a farmer, that -he should be under the temptation to enter into an arrangement with -the landlord which might prejudice his successor, that he should be -relieved from a system which often caused bad blood between him and his -parishioners? Would it ‘make him neglect the sacred functions of his -ministry’ as the Bishop of St. Davids feared, or would it improve his -usefulness by rescuing him from a situation in which ‘the pastor was -totally sunk in the tithe-collector’ as the Bishop of Peterborough[62] -hoped, and was a man a better parson on the Sunday for being a farmer -the rest of the week as Lord Coventry believed? The bishops and the -peers had in this discussion a subject that touched very nearly the -lives and interests of themselves and their friends, and there was a -considerable and animated debate,[63] at the end of which the House of -Lords approved the principle of commuting tithes in Enclosure Bills. -This debate was followed by another on 6th April, when Lord Bathurst -(President of the Council) as a counterblast to his colleague on the -Woolsack, moved, but afterwards withdrew, a series of resolutions on -the same subject. In the course of this debate Thurlow, who thought -perhaps that his zeal for the Church had surprised and irritated -his fellow-peers, among whom he was not conspicuous in life as a -practising Christian, explained that though he was zealous for the -Church, ‘his zeal was not partial or confined to the Church, further -than it was connected with the other great national establishments, -of which it formed a part, and no inconsiderable one.’ The Bishop -of St. Davids returned to the subject on the 14th June, moving to -recommit the Bill for enclosing Kington in Worcestershire. He read a -string of resolutions which he wished to see applied to all future -Enclosure Bills, in order to defend the interests of the clergy from -‘the oppressions of the Lord of the Manor, landowners, etc.’ Thurlow -spoke for him, but he was defeated by 24 votes to 4, his only other -supporters being Lord Galloway and the Bishop of Lincoln. - -Thurlow’s story of Sir George Savile’s ‘meanly habited man’ did not -disturb the confidence of the House of Lords in the justice of the -existing procedure towards the poor: the enclosure debates revolve -solely round the question of the relative claims of the lord of the -manor and the tithe-owner. The House of Commons was equally free -from scruple or misgiving. One petitioner in 1800 commented on the -extraordinary haste with which a New Forest Bill was pushed through -Parliament, and suggested that if it were passed into law in this rapid -manner at the end of a session, some injustice might unconsciously be -done. The Speaker replied with a grave and dignified rebuke: ‘The House -was always competent to give every subject the consideration due to its -importance, and could not therefore be truly said to be incapable at -any time of discussing any question gravely, dispassionately, and with -strict regard to justice.’[64] He recommended that the petition should -be passed over as if it had never been presented. The member who had -presented the petition pleaded that he had not read it. Such were the -plausibilities and decorum in which the House of Commons wrapped up -its abuses. We can imagine that some of the members must have smiled -to each other like the Roman augurs, when they exchanged these solemn -hypocrisies. - -We have a sidelight on the vigilance of the House of Commons, when an -Enclosure Bill came down from a committee, in a speech of Windham’s -in defence of bull-baiting. Windham attacked the politicians who -had introduced the Bill to abolish bull-baiting, for raising such a -question at a time of national crisis when Parliament ought to be -thinking of other things. He then went on to compare the subject to -local subjects that ‘contained nothing of public or general interest. -To procure the discussion of such subjects it was necessary to resort -to canvass and intrigue. Members whose attendance was induced by -local considerations in most cases of this description, were present: -the discussion, if any took place, was managed by the friends of -the measure: and the decision of the House was ultimately, perhaps, -a matter of mere chance.’ From Sheridan’s speech in answer, we -learn that this is a description of the passing of Enclosure Bills. -‘Another honourable gentleman who had opposed this Bill with peculiar -vehemence, considered it as one of those light and trivial subjects, -which was not worthy to occupy the deliberations of Parliament: and -he compared it to certain other subjects of Bills: that is to say, -bills of a local nature, respecting inclosures and other disposal of -property, which merely passed by chance, as Members could not be got -to attend their progress by dint of canvassing.’[65] Doubtless most -Members of the House of Commons shared the sentiments of Lord Sandwich, -who told the House of Lords that he was so satisfied ‘that the more -inclosures the better, that as far as his poor abilities would enable -him, he would support every inclosure bill that should be brought into -the House.’[66] - -For the last act of an enclosure drama the scene shifts back to the -parish. The commissioners arrive, receive and determine claims, -and publish an award, mapping out the new village. The life and -business of the village are now in suspense, and the commissioners -are often authorised to prescribe the course of husbandry during the -transition.[67] The Act which they administer provides that a certain -proportion of the land is to be assigned to the lord of the manor, in -virtue of his rights, and a certain proportion to the owner of the -tithes. An occasional Act provides that some small allotment shall be -made to the poor: otherwise the commissioners have a free hand: their -powers are virtually absolute. This is the impression left by all -contemporary writers. Arthur Young, for example, writes emphatically -in this sense. ‘Thus is the property of proprietors, and especially of -the poor ones, entirely at their mercy: every passion of resentment -and prejudice may be gratified without control, for they are vested -with a despotic power known in no other branch of business in this -free country.’[68] Similar testimony is found in the Report of the -Select Committee (1800) on the Expense and Mode of Obtaining Bills of -Enclosure: ‘the expediency of despatch, without the additional expense -of multiplied litigation, has suggested the necessity of investing them -with a summary, and in most cases uncontrollable jurisdiction.’[69] In -the General Report of the Board of Agriculture on Enclosures, published -in 1808, though any more careful procedure is deprecated as likely to -cause delay, it is stated that the adjusting of property worth £50,000 -was left to the arbitration of a majority of five, ‘often persons -of mean education.’ The author of _An Inquiry into the Advantages -and Disadvantages resulting from Bills of Inclosure_, published in -1781, writes as if it was the practice to allow an appeal to Quarter -Sessions; such an appeal he characterised as useless to a poor man, -and we can well believe that most of the squires who sat on such a -tribunal to punish vagrants or poachers had had a hand in an enclosure -in the past or had their eyes on an enclosure in the future. Thurlow -considered such an appeal quite inadequate, giving the more polite -reason that Quarter Sessions had not the necessary time.[70] The Act -of 1801 is silent on the subject, but Sinclair’s draft of a General -Inclosure Bill, published in the _Annals of Agriculture_ in 1796,[71] -provided for an appeal to Quarter Sessions. It will be seen that in -five of the cases analysed in the Appendix (Haute Huntre, Simpson, -Stanwell, Wakefield and Winfrith Newburgh), the decision of the -commissioners on claims was final, except that at Wakefield an objector -might oblige the commissioners to take the opinion of a counsel chosen -by themselves. In five cases (Ashelworth, Croydon, Cheshunt, Laleham -and Louth), a disappointed claimant might bring a suit on a feigned -issue against a proprietor. At Armley and Knaresborough the final -decision was left to arbitrators, but whereas at Armley the arbitrator -was to be chosen by a neutral authority, the Recorder of Leeds, the -arbitrators at Knaresborough were named in the Act, and were presumably -as much the nominees of the promoters as the commissioners themselves. - -The statements of contemporaries already quoted go to show that none -of these arrangements were regarded as seriously fettering the power -of the commissioners, and it is easy to understand that a lawsuit, -which might of course overwhelm him, was not a remedy for the use of a -small proprietor or a cottager, though it might be of some advantage -to a large proprietor who had not been fortunate enough to secure -adequate representation of his interests on the Board of Commissioners. -But the decision as to claims was only part of the business. A man’s -claim might be allowed, and yet gross injustice might be done him in -the redistribution. He might be given inferior land, or land in an -inconvenient position. In ten of the cases in the Appendix the award -of the commissioners is stated to be final, and there is no appeal from -it. The two exceptions are Knaresborough and Armley. The Knaresborough -Act is silent on the point, and the Armley Act allows an appeal to the -Recorder of Leeds. So far therefore as the claims and allotments of -the poor were concerned, the commissioners were in no danger of being -overruled. Their freedom in other ways was restricted by the Standing -Orders of 1774, which obliged them to give an account of their expenses. - -It would seem to be obvious that any society which had an elementary -notion of the meaning and importance of justice would have taken the -utmost pains to see that the men appointed to this extraordinary office -had no motive for showing partiality. This might not unreasonably -have been expected of the society about which Pitt declared in the -House of Commons, that it was the boast of the law of England that -it afforded equal security and protection to the high and low, the -rich and poor.[72] How were these commissioners appointed at the time -that Pitt was Prime Minister? They were appointed in each case before -the Bill was presented to Parliament, and generally, as Young tells -us, they were appointed by the promoters of the enclosure before the -petition was submitted for local signatures, so that in fact they -were nominated by the persons of influence who agreed on the measure. -In one case (Moreton Corbet in Shropshire; 1950 acres enclosed in -1797) the Act appointed one commissioner only, and he was to name -his successor. Sometimes, as in the case of Otmoor,[73] it might -happen that the commissioners were changed while the Bill was passing -through Committee, if some powerful persons were able to secure better -representation of their own interests. In the case of Wakefield again, -the House of Commons Committee placated Lord Strafford by giving him a -commissioner. - -Now, who was supposed to have a voice in the appointment of the -commissioners? There is to be found in the _Annals of Agriculture_[74] -an extremely interesting paper by Sir John Sinclair, preliminary -to a memorandum of the General Enclosure Bill which he promoted in -1796. Sinclair explains that he had had eighteen hundred Enclosure -Acts (taken indiscriminately) examined in order to ascertain what -was the usual procedure and what stipulations were made with regard -to particular interests; this with the intention of incorporating -the recognised practice in his General Bill. In the course of these -remarks he says, ‘the probable result will be the appointment of one -Commissioner by the Lord of the Manor, of another by the tithe-owner, -and of a third by the major part in value of the proprietors.’[75] It -will be observed that the third commissioner is not appointed by a -majority of the commoners, nor even by the majority of the proprietors, -but by the votes of those who own the greater part of the village. This -enables us to assess the value of what might have seemed a safeguard -to the poor--the provision that the names of the commissioners should -appear in the Bill presented to Parliament. The lord of the manor, the -impropriator of tithes, and the majority in value of the owners are a -small minority of the persons affected by an enclosure, and all that -they have to do is to meet round a table and name the commissioners -who are to represent them.[76] Thus we find that the powerful persons -who carried an enclosure against the will of the poor nominated the -tribunal before which the poor had to make good their several claims. -This was the way in which the constitution that Pitt was defending -afforded equal security and protection to the rich and to the poor. - -It will be noticed further that two interests are chosen out for -special representation. They are the lord of the manor and the -impropriator of tithes: in other words, the very persons who are -formally assigned a certain minimum in the distribution by the Act -of Parliament. Every Act after 1774 declares that the lord of the -manor is to have a certain proportion, and the tithe-owner a certain -proportion of the land divided: scarcely any Act stipulates that any -share at all is to go to the cottager or the small proprietor. Yet in -the appointment of commissioners the interests that are protected by -the Act have a preponderating voice, and the interests that are left -to the caprice of the commissioners have no voice at all. Thurlow, -speaking in the House of Lords in 1781,[77] said that it was grossly -unjust to the parson that his property should be at the disposal of -these commissioners, of whom he only nominated one. ‘He thanked God -that the property of an Englishman depended not on so loose a tribunal -in any other instance whatever.’ What, then, was the position of the -poor and the small farmers who were not represented at all among the -commissioners? In the paper already quoted, Sinclair mentions that -in some cases the commissioners were peers, gentlemen and clergymen, -residing in the neighbourhood, who acted without fees or emolument. He -spoke of this as undertaking a useful duty, and it does not seem to -have occurred to him that there was any objection to such a practice. -‘To lay down the principle that men are to serve for nothing,’ said -Cobbett, in criticising the system of unpaid magistrates, ‘puts me in -mind of the servant who went on hire, who being asked what wages he -demanded, said he wanted no wages: for that he always found about the -house little things to pick up.’ - -There is a curious passage in the General Report of the Board of -Agriculture[78] on the subject of the appointment of commissioners. The -writer, after dwelling on the unexampled powers that the commissioners -enjoy, remarks that they are not likely to be abused, because a -commissioner’s prospect of future employment in this profitable -capacity depends on his character for integrity and justice. This is -a reassuring reflection for the classes that promoted enclosures and -appointed commissioners, but it rings with a very different sound in -other ears. It would clearly have been much better for the poor if the -commissioners had not had any prospect of future employment at all. We -can obtain some idea of the kind of men whom the landowners considered -to be competent and satisfactory commissioners from the Standing Orders -of 1801, which forbade the employment in this capacity of the bailiff -of the lord of the manor. It would be interesting to know how much of -England was appropriated on the initiative of the lord of the manor, by -his bailiff, acting under the authority given to him by the High Court -of Parliament. It is significant, too, that down to 1801 a commissioner -was only debarred from buying land in a parish in which he had acted in -this capacity, until his award was made. The Act of 1801 debarred him -from buying land under such circumstances for the following five years. - -The share of the small man in these transactions from first to last -can be estimated from the language of Arthur Young in 1770. ‘The small -proprietor whose property in the township is perhaps his all, has -little or no weight in regulating the clauses of the Act of Parliament, -has seldom, if ever, an opportunity of putting a single one in the Bill -favourable to his rights, and has as little influence in the choice of -Commissioners.’[79] But even this description does less than justice -to his helplessness. There remains to be considered the procedure -before the commissioners themselves. Most Enclosure Acts specified a -date before which all claims had to be presented. It is obvious that -there must have been very many small proprietors who had neither the -courage nor the knowledge necessary to put and defend their case, and -that vast numbers of claims must have been disregarded because they -were not presented, or because they were presented too late, or because -they were irregular in form. The Croydon Act, for example, prescribes -that claimants must send in their claims ‘in Writing under their Hands, -or the Hands of their Agents, distinguishing in such Claims the Tenure -of the Estates in respect whereof such Claims are made, and stating -therein such further Particulars as shall be necessary to describe -such Claims with Precision.’ And if this was a difficult fence for the -small proprietor, unaccustomed to legal forms and documents, or to -forms and documents of any kind, what was the plight of the cottager? -Let us imagine the cottager, unable to read or write, enjoying certain -customary rights of common without any idea of their origin or history -or legal basis: knowing only that as long as he can remember he has -kept a cow, driven geese across the waste, pulled his fuel out of the -neighbouring brushwood, and cut turf from the common, and that his -father did all these things before him. The cottager learns that before -a certain day he has to present to his landlord’s bailiff, or to the -parson, or to one of the magistrates into whose hands perhaps he has -fallen before now over a little matter of a hare or a partridge, or to -some solicitor from the country town, a clear and correct statement -of his rights and his claim to a share in the award. Let us remember -at the same time all that we know from Fielding and Smollett of the -reputation of lawyers for cruelty to the poor. Is a cottager to be -trusted to face the ordeal, or to be in time with his statement, or to -have that statement in proper legal form? The commissioners can reject -his claim on the ground of any technical irregularity, as we learn -from a petition presented to Parliament in 1774 by several persons -interested in the enclosure of Knaresborough Forest, whose claims -had been disallowed by the commissioners because of certain ‘mistakes -made in the description of such tenements ... notwithstanding the said -errors were merely from inadvertency, and in no way altered the merits -of the petitioners’ claims.’ A Bill was before Parliament to amend -the previous Act for enclosing Knaresborough Forest, in respect of -the method of payment of expenses, and hence these petitioners had an -opportunity of making their treatment public.[80] It is easy to guess -what was the fate of many a small proprietor or cottager, who had to -describe his tenement or common right to an unsympathetic tribunal. -We are not surprised that one of the witnesses told the Enclosure -Committee of 1844 that the poor often did not know what their claims -were, or how to present them. It is significant that in the case of -Sedgmoor, out of 4063 claims sent in, only 1798 were allowed.[81] - - * * * * * - -We have now given an account of the procedure by which Parliamentary -enclosures were carried out. We give elsewhere a detailed analysis, -disentangled from the _Journals_ of Parliament and other sources, of -particular enclosures. We propose to give here two illustrations of the -temper of the Parliamentary Committees. One illustration is provided by -a speech made by Sir William Meredith, one of the Rockingham Whigs, in -1772, a speech that needs no comment. ‘Sir William Meredith moved, That -it might be a general order, that no Bill, or clause in a Bill, making -any offence capital, should be agreed to but in a Committee of the -whole House. He observed, that at present the facility of passing such -clauses was shameful: that he once passing a Committee-room, when only -one Member was holding a Committee, with a clerk’s boy, he happened -to hear something of hanging; he immediately had the curiosity to ask -what was going forward in that small Committee that could merit such a -punishment? He was answered, that it was an Inclosing Bill, in which -a great many poor people were concerned, who opposed the Bill; that -they feared those people would obstruct the execution of the Act, and -therefore this clause was to make it capital felony in anyone who did -so. This resolution was unanimously agreed to.’[82] - -The other illustration is provided by the history of an attempted -enclosure in which we can watch the minds of the chief actors without -screen or disguise of any kind: in this case we have very fortunately a -vivid revelation of the spirit and manner in which Committees conducted -their business, from the pen of the chairman himself. George Selwyn -gives us in his letters, published in the _Carlisle Papers_, a view -of the proceedings from the inside. It is worth while to set out in -some detail the passages from these letters published in the _Carlisle -Papers_, by way of supplementing and explaining the official records of -the House of Commons. - -We learn from the _Journals_ of the House of Commons that, on 10th -November, 1775, a petition was presented to the House of Commons -for the enclosure of King’s Sedgmoor, in the County of Somerset, -the petitioners urging that this land was of very little value in -its present state, and that it was capable of great improvement by -enclosure and drainage. Leave was given to bring in a Bill, to be -prepared by Mr. St. John and Mr. Coxe. Mr. St. John was brother of -Lord Bolingbroke. On 13th November, the Bill was presented and read -a first time. Four days later it received a second reading, and was -sent to a Committee of Mr. St. John and others. At this point, those -who objected to the enclosure began to take action. First of all there -is a petition from William Waller, Esq., who says that under a grant -of Charles I. he is entitled to the soil of the moor: it is agreed -that he shall be heard by counsel before the Committee. The next day -there arrives a petition from owners and occupiers in thirty-five -‘parishes, hamlets and places,’ who state that all these parishes have -enjoyed rights of common without discrimination over the 18,000 acres -of pasture on Sedgmoor: that these rights of pasture and cutting turf -and rushes and sedges have existed from time immemorial, and that no -Enclosure Act is wanted for the draining of Sedgmoor, because an Act of -the reign of William III. had conferred all the necessary powers for -this purpose on the Justices of the Peace. The petitioners prayed to be -heard by themselves and counsel against the application for enclosure -on Committee and on Report. The House of Commons ordered that the -petition should lie on the Table, and that the petitioners should be -heard when the Report had been received from Committee. Five days later -three lords of manors (Sir Charles Kemys Tynte, Baronet, Copleston -Warre Bampfylde, Esq., and William Hawker, Esq.) petition against the -Bill and complain of the haste with which the promoters are pushing -the Bill through Parliament. This petition is taken more seriously: a -motion is made and defeated to defer the Bill for two months, but the -House orders that the petitioners shall be heard before the Committee. -Two of these three lords of manor present a further petition early in -December, stating that they and their tenants are more than a majority -in number and value of the persons interested, and a second petition -is also presented by the thirty-seven parishes and hamlets already -mentioned, in which it is contended that, in spite of the difficulties -of collecting signatures in a scattered district in a very short time, -749 persons interested had already signed the petition against the -Bill, that the effect of the Bill had been misrepresented to many of -the tenants, that the facts as to the different interests affected had -been misrepresented to the Committee, that the number and rights of -the persons supporting the Bill had been exaggerated (only 213 having -signed their names as consenting), and that if justice was to be done -to the various parties concerned, it was essential that time should be -given for the hearing of complaints and the circulation of the Bill in -the district. This petition was presented on 11th December, and the -House of Commons ordered that the petitioners should be heard when the -Report was received. Next day Mr. Selwyn, as Chairman of the Committee, -presented a Report in favour of the Bill, mentioning among other things -that the number of tenements concerned was 1269, and that 303 refused -to sign; but attention was drawn to the fact that there were several -variations between the Bill as it was presented to the House, and the -Bill as it was presented to the parties concerned for their consent, -and on this ground the Bill was defeated by 59 to 35 votes. - -This is the cold impersonal account of the proceedings given in the -official journals, but the letters of Selwyn take us behind the scenes -and supply a far livelier picture.[83] His account begins with a letter -to Lord Carlisle in November: - - ‘Bully has a scheme of enclosure, which, if it succeeds, I am told - will free him from all his difficulties. It is to come into our House - immediately. If I had this from a better judgment than that of our - sanguine counsellors, I should have more hopes from it. I am ready to - allow that he has been very faulty, but I cannot help wishing to see - him once more on his legs....’ - -(Bully, of course, is Bolingbroke, brother of St. John, called the -counsellor, author of the Bill.) We learn from this letter that there -are other motives than a passion to drain Sedgmoor in the promotion of -this great improvement scheme. We learn from the next letter that it is -not only Bully’s friends and creditors who have some reason for wishing -it well: - - ‘Stavordale is returning to Redlinch; I believe that he sets out - to-morrow. He is also deeply engaged in this Sedgmoor Bill, and it - is supposed that he or Lord Ilchester, which you please, will get - 2000_l._ a year by it. He will get more, or save more at least, by - going away and leaving the Moor in my hands, for he told me himself - the other night that this last trip to town had cost him 4000_l._’ - -Another letter warns Lord Carlisle that the only way to get his -creditors to pay their debts to him, when they come into their money -through the enclosure, is to press for payment, and goes on to describe -the unexpected opposition the Bill had encountered. Selwyn had been -made chairman of the Committee. - - ‘... My dear Lord, if your delicacy is such that you will not be - pressing with him about it, you may be assured that you will never - receive a farthing. I have spoke to Hare about it, who [was] kept - in it till half an hour after 4; as I was also to-day, and shall be - to-morrow. I thought that it was a matter of form only, but had no - sooner begun to read the preamble to the Bill, but I found myself in a - nest of hornets. The room was full, and an opposition made to it, and - disputes upon every word, which kept me in the Chair, as I have told - you. I have gained it seems great reputation, and am at this minute - reputed one of the best Chairmen upon this stand. Bully and Harry came - home and dined with me....’ - -The next letter, written on 9th December, shows that Selwyn is afraid -that Stavordale may not get his money out of his father, and also that -he is becoming still more anxious about the fate of the Enclosure Bill, -on which of course the whole pack of cards depends: - - ‘... I have taken the liberty to talk a good deal to Lord Stavordale, - partly for his own sake and partly for yours, and pressed him much to - get out of town as soon as possible, and not quit Lord I. [Ilchester] - any more. His attention there cannot be of long duration, and his - absence may be fatal to us all. I painted it in very strong colours, - and he has promised me to go, as soon as this Sedgmoor Bill is - reported. I moved to have Tuesday fixed for it. We had a debate and - division upon my motion, and this Bill will at last not go down so - glibly as Bully hoped that it would. It will meet with more opposition - in the H. of Lords, and Lord North being adverse to it, does us no - good. Lord Ilchester gets, it is said, £5000 a year by it, and amongst - others Sir C. Tynte something, who, for what reason I cannot yet - comprehend, opposes it....’ - -The next letter describes the final catastrophe: - - ‘December 12. Tuesday night.... Bully has lost his Bill. I reported - it to-day, and the Question was to withdraw it. There were 59 against - us, and we were 35. It was worse managed by the agents, supposing no - treachery, than ever business was. Lord North, Robinson, and Keene - divided against. Charles[84] said all that could be said on our side. - But as the business was managed, it was the worst Question that I - ever voted for. We were a Committee absolutely of Almack’s,[85] so - if the Bill is not resumed, and better conducted and supported, this - phantom of 30,000_l._ clear in Bully’s pocket to pay off his annuities - vanishes. - - ‘It is surprising what a fatality attends some people’s proceedings. - I begged last night as for alms, that they would meet me to settle - the Votes. I have, since I have been in Parliament, been of twenty - at least of these meetings, and always brought numbers down by those - means. But my advice was slighted, and twenty people were walking - about the streets who could have carried this point. - - ‘The cause was not bad, but the Question was totally indigestible. - The most conscientious man in the House in Questions of this nature, - Sir F. Drake, a very old acquaintance of mine, told me that nothing - could be so right as the enclosure. But they sent one Bill into - the country for the assent of the people interested, and brought - me another, differing in twenty particulars, to carry through the - Committee, without once mentioning to me that the two Bills differed. - This they thought was cunning, and I believe a happy composition of - Bully’s cunning and John’s idea of his own parts. I had no idea, or - could have, of this difference. The adverse party said nothing of it, - _comme de raison_, reserving the objection till the Report, and it - was insurmountable. If one of the Clerks only had hinted it to me, - inexperienced as I am in these sort of Bills, I would have stopped it, - and by that means have given them a better chance by a new Bill than - they can have now, that people will have a pretence for not altering - their opinion....’ - -These letters compensate for the silence of Hansard, so real and -instructive a picture do they present of the methods and motives of -enclosure. ‘Bully has a scheme of enclosure which, if it succeeds, I -am told will free him from all his difficulties.’ The journals may talk -of the undrained fertility of Sedgmoor, but we have in this sentence -the aspect of the enclosure that interests Selwyn, the Chairman of -the Committee, and from beginning to end of the proceedings no other -aspect ever enters his head. And it interests a great many other people -besides Selwyn, for Bully owes money; so too does Stavordale, another -prospective beneficiary: he owes money to Fox, and Fox owes money to -Carlisle. Now Bully and Stavordale are not the only eighteenth-century -aristocrats who are in difficulties; the waiters at Brooks’s and at -White’s know that well enough, as Selwyn felt when, on hearing that -one of them had been arrested for felony, he exclaimed, ‘What an idea -of us he will give in Newgate.’ Nor is Bully the only aristocrat in -difficulties whose thoughts turn to enclosure; Selwyn’s letters alone, -with their reference to previous successes, would make that clear. It -is here that we begin to appreciate the effect of our system of family -settlements in keeping the aristocracy together. These young men, whose -fortunes come and go in the hurricanes of the faro table, would soon -have dissipated their estates if they had been free to do it; as they -were restrained by settlements, they could only mortgage them. But -there is a limit to this process, and after a time their debts begin -to overwhelm them; perhaps also too many of their fellow gamblers are -their creditors to make Brooks’s or White’s quite as comfortable a -place as it used to be, for we may doubt whether all of these creditors -were troubled with Lord Carlisle’s morbid delicacy of feeling. Happily -there is an escape from this painful situation: a scheme of enclosure -which will put him ‘once more on his legs.’ The other parties concerned -are generally poor men, and there is not much danger of failure. Thus -if we trace the adventures of the gaming table to their bitter end, we -begin to understand that these wild revellers are gambling not with -their own estates but with the estates of their neighbours. This is the -only property they can realise. _Quidquid delirant reges plectuntur -Achivi._ - -The particular obstacle on which the scheme split was a fraudulent -irregularity: the Bill submitted for signature to the inhabitants -differing seriously (in twenty particulars) from the Bill presented -to Parliament. Selwyn clearly attached no importance at all to the -Petitions that were received against the Bill, or to the evidence of -its local unpopularity. It is clear too, that it was very rare for a -scheme like this to miscarry, for, speaking of his becoming Chairman -of the Committee, he adds, ‘I thought it was a matter of form only.’ -Further with a little care this project would have weathered the -discovery of the fraud of which the authors were guilty. ‘I begged -last night as for alms that they would meet us to settle the Votes. -I have, since I have been in Parliament, been of twenty at least of -these meetings, and always brought numbers down by these means. But my -advice was slighted, and twenty people were walking about the streets -who could have carried this point.’ In other words, the Bill would -have been carried, all its iniquities notwithstanding, if only Bully’s -friends had taken Selwyn’s advice and put themselves out to go down -to Westminster. So little impression did this piece of trickery make -on the mind of the Chairman of the Committee, that he intended to the -last, by collecting his friends, to carry the Bill, for the fairness -and good order of which he was responsible, through the House of -Commons. This glimpse into the operations of the Committee enables us -to picture the groups of comrades who sauntered down from Almack’s of -an afternoon to carve up a manor in Committee of the House of Commons. -We can see Bully’s friends meeting round the table in their solemn -character of judges and legislators, to give a score of villages to -Bully, and a dozen to Stavordale, much as Artaxerxes gave Magnesia to -Themistocles for his bread, Myus for his meat and Lampsacus for his -wine. And if those friends happened to be Bully’s creditors as well, -it would perhaps not be unjust to suppose that their action was not -altogether free from the kind of gratitude that inspired the bounty of -the great king.[86] - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[33] _E.g._ Laxton enclosed on petition of Lord Carbery in 1772. Total -area 1200 acres. Enclosure proceedings completed in the Commons in -nineteen days. Also Ashbury, Berks, enclosed on petition of Lord Craven -in 1770. There were contrary petitions. Also Nylands, enclosed in 1790 -on petition of the lady of the manor. Also Tilsworth, Beds, enclosed -on petition of Charles Chester, Esq., 1767, and Westcote, Bucks, on -petition of the most noble George, Duke of Marlborough, January 24, -1765. Sometimes the lord of the manor associated the vicar with his -petition: thus Waltham, Croxton and Braunston, covering 5600 acres, in -Leicestershire, were all enclosed in 1766 by the Duke of Rutland and -the local rector or vicar. The relations of Church and State are very -happily illustrated by the language of the petitions, ‘A petition of -the most noble John, Duke of Rutland, and the humble petition’ of the -Rev. ---- Brown or Rastall or Martin. - -[34] This Standing Order does not seem to have been applied -universally, for Mr. Bragge on December 1, 1800, made a motion that it -should be extended to the counties where it had not hitherto obtained. -See _Senator_, vol. xxvii., December 1, 1800. - -[35] See particulars in Appendix. - -[36] _A Six Months’ Tour through the North of England_, 1771, vol. i. -p. 122. - -[37] Pp. 21 f. - -[38] Cf. Otmoor in next chapter. - -[39] See Appendix. - -[40] See Appendix. - -[41] See _House of Commons Journal_. - -[42] Eden, _The State of the Poor_, vol. ii. p. 157. - -[43] Eden, writing a few years later, remarks that since the enclosure -‘the property in Holy Island has gotten into fewer hands,’ vol. ii. p. -149. - -[44] Report of Select Committee on Most Effectual Means of Facilitating -Enclosure, 1800. - -[45] Cf. also Wraisbury in Bucks, _House of Commons Journal_, June 17, -1799, where the petitioners against the Bill claimed that they spoke -on behalf of ‘by much the greatest Part of the Proprietors of the said -Lands and Grounds,’ yet in the enumeration of consents the committee -state that the owners of property assessed at £6, 18s. are hostile out -of a total value of £295, 14s. - -[46] _House of Commons Journal_, March 21, 1796. - -[47] _House of Commons Journal_, June 10, 1801; cf. also case of -Laleham. See Appendix. - -[48] _Ibid._, June 15, 1801. - -[49] _Ibid._, May 3, 1809. - -[50] _Ibid._, June 29, 1797. - -[51] See Appendix A (13). - -[52] _A Political Enquiry into the Consequences of enclosing Waste -Lands_, 1785, p. 108. - -[53] See Appendix A (12). - -[54] House of Commons, May 1, 1845. - -[55] Aglionby, House of Commons, June 5, 1844. - -[56] Thurlow was Chancellor from 1778 to 1783 (when Fox contrived to -get rid of him) and from 1783 to 1792. - -[57] _Parliamentary Register_, House of Lords, March 30, 1781. - -[58] Sir George Savile (1726-1784), M.P. for Yorkshire, 1759-1783; -carried the Catholic Relief Bill, which provoked the Gordon Riots, and -presented the great Yorkshire Petition for Economical Reform. - -[59] _Annual Register_, 1867, p. 68. For a detailed history of the -Stanwell Enclosure, see Appendix A (10). Unhappily the farmers were -only reprieved; Stanwell was enclosed at the second attempt. - -[60] See _Parliamentary Register_, House of Lords, March 30, 1781; -April 6, 1781; June 14, 1781. - -[61] John Warren (1730-1800). - -[62] John Hinchcliffe (1731-1794), at one time Master of Trinity -College, Cambridge. - -[63] _Parliamentary Register_, March 30, 1781. - -[64] _Senator_, vol. xxvi., July 2, 1800. - -[65] For both speeches see _Parliamentary Register_, May 24, 1802. - -[66] _Ibid._, June 14, 1781. - -[67] See Cheshunt, Louth, Simpson, and Stanwell in Appendix. - -[68] _Six Months’ Tour through the North of England_, 1771, vol. i. p. -122. - -[69] See _Annual Register_, 1800, Appendix to Chronicle, p. 87. - -[70] _Parliamentary Register_, June 14, 1781. - -[71] _Annals of Agriculture_, vol. xxvi. p. 111. - -[72] February 1, 1793. - -[73] See Chapter iv. - -[74] Vol. xxvi. p. 70. - -[75] Sinclair’s language shows that this was the general arrangement. -Of course there are exceptions. See _e.g._ Haute Huntre and other cases -in Appendix. - -[76] Cf. Billingsley’s _Report on Somerset_, p. 59, where the -arrangements are described as ‘a _little system of patronage_. The -lord of the soil, the rector, and a few of the principal commoners, -monopolize and distribute the appointments.’ - -[77] _Parliamentary Register_, June 14, 1781. - -[78] _General Report on Enclosures_, 1808. - -[79] _Six Months’ Tour through the North of England_, vol. i. p. 122. - -[80] See Appendix A (6). - -[81] _Report on Somerset_, p. 192. - -[82] _Parliamentary Register_, January 21, 1772. - -[83] _Carlisle MSS._; _Historical MSS. Commission_, pp. 301 ff. - -[84] Charles James Fox. - -[85] The earlier name of Brooks’s Club. - -[86] For the subsequent history of King’s Sedgmoor, see Appendix A -(14). - - - - -CHAPTER IV - -ENCLOSURE (2) - - -In the year 1774, Lord North’s Government, which had already received -a bad bruise or two in the course of its quarrels with printers and -authors, got very much the worst of it in an encounter that a little -prudence would have sufficed to avert altogether. The affair has -become famous on account of the actors, and because it was the turning -point in a very important career. The cause of the quarrel has passed -into the background, but students of the enclosure movement will find -more to interest them in its beginning than in its circumstances and -development. - -Mr. De Grey, Member for Norfolk, and Lord of the Manor of Tollington -in that county, had a dispute of long standing with Mr. William Tooke -of Purley, a landowner in Tollington, who had resisted Mr. De Grey’s -encroachments on the common. An action on this subject was impending, -but Mr. De Grey, who held, as Sir George Trevelyan puts it, ‘that the -law’s delay was not intended for Members of Parliament’ got another -Member of Parliament to introduce a petition for a Bill for the -enclosure of Tollington. As it happened, Mr. Tooke was a friend of one -of the clerks in the House of Commons, and this friend told him on -6th January that a petition from De Grey was about to be presented. A -fortnight later Mr. Tooke received from this clerk a copy of Mr. De -Grey’s petition, in which the Lord Chief Justice, brother of Mr. De -Grey was included. Mr. Tooke hurried to London and prepared a counter -petition, and Sir Edward Astley, the member for the constituency, -undertook to present that petition together with the petition from Mr. -De Grey. There were some further negotiations, with the result that -both sides revised their respective petitions, and it was arranged that -they should be presented on 4th February. On that day the Speaker said -the House was not full enough, and the petitions must be presented on -the 7th. Accordingly Sir Edward Astley brought up both petitions on -the 7th, but the Speaker said it was very extraordinary to present two -contrary petitions at the same time. ‘Bring the first petition first.’ -When members began to say ‘Hear, hear,’ the Speaker remarked, ‘It is -only a common petition for a common enclosure,’ and the Members fell -into general conversation, paying no heed to the proceedings at the -Table. In the midst of this the petition was read, and the Speaker -asked for ‘Ayes and Noes,’ and declared that the Ayes had it. The -petition asking for the Bill had thus been surreptitiously carried -without the House being made aware that there was a contrary petition -to be presented, the contrary petition asking for delay. The second -petition was then read and ordered to lie on the Table. - -In ordinary circumstances nothing more would have been heard of the -opposition to Mr. De Grey’s Bill. Hundreds of petitions may have been -so stifled without the world being any the wiser. But Mr. Tooke, who -would never have known of Mr. De Grey’s intention if he had not had -a friend among the clerks of the House of Commons, happened to have -another friend who was able to help him in a very different way in his -predicament. This was Horne, who was now living in a cottage at Purley, -reading law, on the desperate chance that a man, who was a clergyman -against his will, would be admitted to the bar. Flushed rather than -spent by his public quarrel with Wilkes, which was just dying down, -Horne saw in Mr. Tooke’s wrongs an admirable opportunity for a champion -of freedom, whose earlier exploits had been a little tarnished by his -subsequent feuds with his comrades. Accordingly he responded very -promptly, and published in the _Public Advertiser_ of 11th February, -an anonymous indictment of the Speaker, Sir Fletcher Norton, based on -his unjust treatment of these petitions. This letter scandalised the -House of Commons and drew the unwary Government into a quarrel from -which Horne emerged triumphant; for the Government, having been led on -to proceed against Horne, was unable to prove his authorship of the -letter. The incident had consequences of great importance for many -persons. It was the making of Horne, for he became Horne Tooke, with -£8000 from his friend and a reputation as an intrepid and vigilant -champion of popular liberty that he retained to the day of his death. -It was also the making of Fox, for it was this youth of twenty-five who -had led the Government into its scrape, and the king could not forgive -him. His temerity on this occasion provoked the famous letter from -North. ‘Sir, His Majesty has thought proper to order a new Commission -of the Treasury to be made out, in which I do not see your name.’ Fox -left the court party to lend his impetuous courage henceforth to very -different causes. But for social students the incident is chiefly -interesting because it was the cause of the introduction of Standing -Orders on Enclosure Bills. It had shown what might happen to rich men -under the present system. Accordingly the House of Commons set to work -to construct a series of Standing Orders to regulate the proceedings on -Enclosure Bills. - -Most of these Standing Orders have already been mentioned in the -previous chapter, but we propose to recapitulate their main provisions -in order to show that the gross unfairness of the procedure, described -in the last chapter, as between the rich and the poor, made no -impression at all upon Parliament. The first Standing Orders dealing -with Enclosure Bills were passed in 1774, and they were revised in -1775, 1781, 1799, 1800 and 1801. These Standing Orders prevented a -secret application to Parliament by obliging promoters to publish -a notice on the church door; they introduced some control over the -extortions of commissioners, and laid down that the Bill presented -to Parliament should contain the names of the commissioners and a -description of the compensation to be given to the lord of the manor -and the impropriator of tithes. But they contained no safeguard at all -against robbery of the small proprietors or the commoners. Until 1801 -there was no restriction on the choice of a commissioner, and it was -only in that year that Parliament adopted the Standing Order providing -that no lord of the manor, or steward, or bailiff of any lord or lady -or proprietor should be allowed to act as commissioner in an enclosure -in which he was an interested party.[87] In one respect Parliament -deliberately withdrew a rule introduced to give greater regularity and -publicity to the proceedings of committees. Under the Standing Orders -of 1774, the Chairman of a Committee had to report not only whether the -Standing Orders had been complied with, but also what evidence had been -submitted to show that all the necessary formalities had been observed; -but in the following year the House of Commons struck out this second -provision. A Committee of the House of Commons suggested in 1799 that -no petition should be admitted for a Parliamentary Bill unless a fourth -part of the proprietors in number and value signed the application, but -this suggestion was rejected. - -The poor then found no kind of shelter in the Standing Orders. The -legislation of this period, from first to last, shows just as great an -indifference to the injustice to which they were exposed. The first -public Act of the time deals not with enclosures for growing corn, -but with enclosures for growing wood. The Act of 1756 states in its -preamble that the Acts of Henry VIII., Charles II. and William III. for -encouraging the growth of timber had been obstructed by the resistance -of the commoners, and Parliament therefore found it necessary to enact -that any owner of waste could enclose for the purpose of growing timber -with the approval of the majority in number and value of those who -had common rights, and any majority of those who had common rights -could enclose with the approval of the owner of the waste. Any person -or persons who thought themselves aggrieved could appeal to Quarter -Sessions, within six months after the agreement had been registered. We -hear very little of this Act, and the enclosures that concern us are -enclosures of a different kind. In the final years of the century there -was a succession of General Enclosure Bills introduced and debated in -Parliament, under the stimulus of the fear of famine. These Bills were -promoted by the Board of Agriculture, established in 1793 with Sir -John Sinclair as President, and Arthur Young as secretary. This Board -of Agriculture was not a State department in the modern sense, but a -kind of Royal Society receiving, not too regularly, a subsidy from -Parliament.[88] As a result of its efforts two Parliamentary Committees -were appointed to report on the enclosure of waste lands, and the -Reports of these Committees, which agreed in recommending a General -Enclosure Bill, were presented in 1795 and 1799. Bills were introduced -in 1795, 1796, 1797 and 1800, but it was not until 1801 that any Act -was passed. - -The first Bills presented to Parliament were General Enclosure Bills, -that is to say, they were Bills for prescribing conditions on which -enclosure could be carried out without application to Parliament. The -Board of Agriculture was set on this policy partly, as we have seen, -in the interest of agricultural expansion, partly as the only way of -guaranteeing a supply of food during the French war. But these were -not the only considerations in the mind of Parliament, and we are able -in this case to see what happened to a disinterested proposal when it -had to pass through the sieve of a Parliament of owners of land and -tithes. For we have in the _Annals of Agriculture_[89] the form of the -General Enclosure Bill of 1796 as it was presented to the Government -by that expert body, the Board of Agriculture, and we have among the -Parliamentary Bills in the British Museum (1) the form in which this -Bill left a Select Committee, and (2) the form in which it left a -second Select Committee of Knights of the Shire and Gentlemen of the -Long Robe. We are thus able to see in what spirit the lords of the -manor who sat in Parliament regarded, in a moment of great national -urgency, the policy put before it by the Board of Agriculture. We -come at once upon a fact of great importance. In the first version it -is recognised that Parliament has to consider the future as well as -the present, that it is dealing not only with the claims of a certain -number of living cottagers, whose rights and property may be valued by -the commissioners at a five pound note, but with the necessities of -generations still to be born, and that the most liberal recognition -of the right to pasture a cow, in the form of a cash payment to an -individual, cannot compensate for the calamities that a society suffers -in the permanent alienation of all its soil. The Bill as drafted in the -Board of Agriculture enacted that in view of the probable increase of -population, a portion of the waste should be set aside, and vested in -a corporate body (composed of the lord of the manor, the rector, the -vicar, the churchwardens and the overseers), for allotments for ever. -Any labourer over twenty-one, with a settlement in the parish, could -claim a portion and hold it for fifty years, rent free, on condition -of building a cottage and fencing it. When the fifty years were over, -the cottages, with their parcels of land, were to be let on leases of -twenty-one years and over at reasonable rents, half the rent to go to -the owner of the soil, and half to the poor rates. The land was never -to be alienated from the cottage. All these far-sighted clauses vanish -absolutely under the sifting statesmanship of the Parliament, of which -Burke said in all sincerity, in his _Reflections on the Revolution in -France_, that ‘our representation has been found perfectly adequate -to all the purposes for which a representation of the people can be -desired or devised.’ - -There was another respect in which the Board of Agriculture was -considered to be too generous to the poor by the lords of the manor, -who made the laws of England. In version 1 of the Bill, not only those -entitled to such right but also those who have enjoyed or exercised -the right of getting fuel are to have special and inalienable fuel -allotments made to them: in version 2 only those who are entitled -to such rights are to have a fuel allotment, and in version 3, this -compensation is restricted to those who have possessed fuel rights -for ten years. Again in version 1, the cost of enclosing and fencing -small allotments, where the owners are unable to pay, is to be borne by -the other owners: in version 2, the small owners are to be allowed to -mortgage their allotments in order to cover the cost. The importance -of the proposal thus rejected by the Parliamentary Committee will -appear when we come to consider the practical effects of Enclosure -Acts. The only people who got their fencing done for them under most -Acts were the tithe-owners, a class neither so poor nor so powerless in -Parliament. - -However this Bill shared the fate of all other General Enclosure Bills -at this time. There were many obstacles to a General Enclosure Bill. -Certain Members of Parliament resisted them on the ground that if it -were made legal for a majority to coerce a minority into enclosure -without coming to Parliament, such protection as the smaller commoners -derived from the possibility of Parliamentary discussion would -disappear. Powis quarrelled with the Bill of 1796 on this ground, and -he was supported by Fox and Grey, but his objections were overruled. -However a more formidable opposition came from other quarters. -Enclosure Acts furnished Parliamentary officials with a harvest of -fees,[90] and the Church thought it dangerous that enclosure, affecting -tithe-owners, should be carried through without the bishops being given -an opportunity of interfering. These and other forces were powerful -enough to destroy this and all General Enclosure Bills, intended to -make application to Parliament unnecessary. - -The Board of Agriculture accordingly changed its plans. In 1800 the -Board abandoned its design of a General Enclosure Bill, and presented -instead a consolidating Bill, which was to cheapen procedure. Hitherto -there had been great diversities of form and every Bill was an -expensive little work of art of its own. The Act of 1801 was designed -to save promoters of enclosure some of this trouble and expense. It -took some forty clauses that were commonly found in Enclosure Bills and -provided that they could be incorporated by reference in private Bills, -thus cheapening legal procedure. Further, it allowed affidavits to be -accepted as evidence, thus relieving the promoters from the obligation -of bringing witnesses before the Committee to swear to every signature. -All the recognition that was given to the difficulties and the claims -of the poor was comprised in sections 12 and 13, which allow small -allotments to be laid together and depastured in common, and instruct -the commissioners to have particular regard to the convenience of the -owners or proprietors of the smallest estates. In 1813, the idea of -a General Bill was revived once more, and a Bill passed the House of -Commons which gave a majority of three-fifths in value the right to -petition Quarter Sessions for an enclosure. The Bill was rejected in -the Lords. In 1836 a General Enclosure Bill was passed, permitting -enclosure when two-thirds in number and value desired it, and in 1845 -Parliament appointed central Commissioners with a view to preventing -local injustice. - -It is unfortunate that the Parliamentary Reports of the debates on -General Enclosure Bills in the unreformed Parliament are almost as -meagre as the debates on particular Enclosure Bills. We can gather from -various indications that the rights of the clergy received a good deal -of notice, and Lord Grenville made an indignant speech to vindicate -his zeal in the cause of the Church, which had been questioned by -opponents. The cause of the poor does not often ruffle the surface of -discussion. This we can collect not only from negative evidence but -also from a statement by Mr. Lechmere, Member for Worcester. Lechmere, -whose loss of his seat in 1796 deprived the poor of one of their very -few champions in Parliament, drew attention more than once during the -discussions on scarcity and the high price of corn to the lamentable -consequences of the disappearances of the small farms, and recommended -drastic steps to arrest the process. Philip Francis gave him some -support. The general temper of Parliament can be divined from his -complaint that when these subjects were under discussion it was very -difficult to make a House. - - * * * * * - -It must not be supposed that the apathy of the aristocracy was part of -a universal blindness or anæsthesia, and that the method and procedure -of enclosure were accepted as just and inevitable, without challenge -or protest from any quarter. The poor were of course bitterly hostile. -This appears not only from the petitions presented to Parliament, -but from the echoes that have reached us of actual violence. It was -naturally easier for the threatened commoners to riot in places where -a single enclosure scheme affected a wide district, and most of the -records of popular disturbances that have come down to us are connected -with attempts to enclose moors that were common to several parishes. -An interesting example is afforded by the history of the enclosure -of Haute Huntre Fen in Lincolnshire. This enclosure, which affected -eleven parishes, was sanctioned by Parliament in 1767, but three years -later the Enclosure Commissioners had to come to Parliament to explain -that the posts and rails that they had set up had been destroyed ‘by -malicious persons, in order to hinder the execution of the said Act,’ -and to ask for permission to make ditches instead of fences.[91] -An example of disturbances in a single village is given by the -Bedfordshire reporter for the Board of Agriculture, who says that when -Maulden was enclosed it was found necessary to send for troops from -Coventry to quell the riots:[92] and another in the _Annual Register_ -for 1799[93] describing the resistance of the commoners at Wilbarston -in Northamptonshire, and the employment of two troops of yeomanry to -coerce them. The general hatred of the poor for enclosures is evident -from the language of Eden, and from statements of contributors to the -_Annals of Agriculture_. Eden had included a question about commons -and enclosures in the questions he put to his correspondents, and he -says in his preface that he had been disappointed that so few of his -correspondents had given an answer to this question. He then proceeds -to give this explanation: ‘This question, like most others, that can -now be touched upon, has its popular and its unpopular sides: and -where no immediate self-interest, or other partial leaning, interferes -to bias the judgment, a good-natured man cannot but wish to think -with the multitudes; stunned as his ears must daily be, with the -oft-repeated assertion, that, to condemn commons, is to determine -on depopulating the country.’[94] The writer of the _Bedfordshire -Report_ in 1808 says that ‘it appears that the poor have invariably -been inimical to enclosures, as they certainly remain to the present -day.’[95] Dr. Wilkinson, writing in the _Annals of Agriculture_[96] -in favour of a General Enclosure Bill says, ‘the grand objection to -the inclosure of commons arises from the unpopularity which gentlemen -who are active in the cause expose themselves to in their own -neighbourhood, from the discontent of the poor when any such question -is agitated.’ Arthur Young makes a similar statement.[97] ‘A general -inclosure has been long ago proposed to administration, but particular -ones have been so unpopular in some cases that government were afraid -of the measure.’ - -The popular feeling, though quite unrepresented in Parliament, was not -unrepresented in contemporary literature. During the last years of the -eighteenth century there was a sharp war of pamphlets on the merits -of enclosure, and it is noticeable that both supporters and opponents -denounced the methods on which the governing class acted. There is, -among others, a very interesting anonymous pamphlet, published in 1781 -under the title of _An Inquiry into the Advantages and Disadvantages -resulting from Bills of Inclosure_, in which the existing practice is -reviewed and some excellent suggestions are made for reform. The writer -proposed that the preliminary to a Bill should be not the fixing of a -notice to the church door, but the holding of a public meeting, that -there should be six commissioners, that they should be elected by the -commoners by ballot, that no decision should be valid that was not -unanimous, and that an appeal from that decision should lie not to -Quarter Sessions, but to Judges of Assize. The same writer proposed -that no enclosure should be sanctioned which did not allot one acre to -each cottage. - -These proposals came from an opponent of enclosure, but the most -distinguished supporters of enclosure were also discontented with the -procedure. Who are the writers on eighteenth-century agriculture whose -names and publications are known and remembered? They are, first of -all, Arthur Young (1741-1820), who, though he failed as a merchant and -failed as a farmer, and never ceased to regret his father’s mistake -in neglecting to put him into the soft lap of a living in the Church, -made for himself, by the simple process of observing and recording, -a European reputation as an expert adviser in the art which he had -practised with so little success. A scarcely less important authority -was William Marshall (1745-1818), who began by trading in the West -Indies, afterwards farmed in Surrey, and then became agent in Norfolk -to Sir Harbord Harbord. It was Marshall who suggested the creation of -a Board of Rural Affairs, and the preparation of Surveys and Minutes. -Though he never held an official position, it was from his own choice, -for he preferred to publish his own Minutes and Surveys rather than to -write them for the Board. He was interested in philology as well as in -agriculture; he published a vocabulary of the Yorkshire dialect and -he was a friend of Johnson, whom he rather scandalised by condoning -Sunday labour in agriculture under special circumstances. Nathaniel -Kent (1737-1810) studied husbandry in the Austrian Netherlands, where -he had been secretary to an ambassador, and on his return to England -in 1766 he was employed as an estate agent and land valuer. He wrote -a well-known book _Hints to Gentlemen of Landed Property_, and he had -considerable influence in improving the management of various estates. -He was, for a short time, bailiff of George III.’s farm at Windsor. - -All of these writers, though they are very far from taking the view -which found expression in the riots in the Lincolnshire fens, or in the -anonymous pamphlet already mentioned, addressed some very important -criticisms and recommendations to the class that was enclosing the -English commons. Both Marshall and Young complained of the injustice -of the method of choosing commissioners. Marshall, ardent champion -of enclosure as he was, and no sentimentalist on the subject of the -commoners, wrote a most bitter account of the motives of the enclosers. -‘At this juncture, it is true, the owners of manors and tithes, whether -clergy or laity, men of ministry or men of opposition, are equally on -the alert: not however pressing forward with offerings and sacrifices -to relieve the present distresses of the country, but searching for -vantage ground to aid them in the scramble.’[98] Holding this view, -he was not unnaturally ill-content with the plan of letting the big -landlords nominate the commissioners, and proposed that the lord of the -soil and the owner or owners of tithes should choose one commissioner -each, that the owner or owners of pasturage should choose two, and that -the four should choose a fifth. Arthur Young proposed that the small -proprietors should have a share in the nomination of commissioners -either by a union of votes or otherwise, as might be determined. - -The general engrossing of farms was arraigned by Thomas Stone, the -author of an important pamphlet, _Suggestions for rendering the -inclosure of common fields and waste lands a source of population and -of riches_, 1787, who proposed that in future enclosures farms should -be let out in different sizes from £40 to £200 a year. He thought -further that Parliament should consider the advisability of forbidding -the alienation of cottagers’ property, in order to stop the frittering -away of cottagers’ estates which was general under enclosure. Kent, -a passionate enthusiast for enclosing, was not less critical of the -practice of throwing farms together, a practice which had raised the -price of provisions to the labourer, and he appealed to landlords to -aid the distressed poor by reducing the size of their farms, as well as -by raising wages. Arbuthnot, the author of a pamphlet on _An Inquiry -into the Connection between the present Price of Provisions and the -Size of Farms_, by a Farmer, 1773, who had defended the large-farm -system against Dr. Price, wrote, ‘My plan is to allot to each cottage -three or four acres which should be annexed to it without power or -alienation and without rent while under the covenant of being kept in -grass.’ - -So much for writers on agriculture. But the eighteenth century produced -two authoritative writers on social conditions. Any student of social -history who wishes to understand this period would first turn to the -three great volumes of Eden’s _State of the Poor_, published in 1797, -as a storehouse of cold facts. Davies, who wrote _The Case of Labourers -in Husbandry_, published in 1795, is less famous than he deserves to -be, if we are to judge from the fact that the _Dictionary of National -Biography_ only knows about him that he was Rector of Barkham in -Berkshire, and a graduate of Jesus College, Oxford, that he received -a D.D. degree in 1800, that he is the author of this book, and that -he died, perhaps, in the year 1809. But Davies’ book, which contains -the result of most careful and patient investigation, made a profound -impression on contemporary observers. Howlett called it ‘incomparable,’ -and it is impossible for the modern reader to resist its atmosphere of -reality and truth. This country parson gives us a simple, faithful and -sincere picture of the facts, seen without illusion or prejudice, and -free from all the conventional affectations of the time: a priceless -legacy to those who are impatient of the generalisations with which -the rich dismiss the poor. Now both of these writers warned their -contemporaries of the danger of the uncontrolled tendencies of the age. -Eden proposed that in every enclosure a certain quantity of land should -be reserved for cottagers and labourers, to be vested in the whole -district. He spoke in favour of the crofters in Scotland, and declared -that provision of this kind was made for the labouring classes in the -first settled townships of New England. Davies was still more emphatic -in calling upon England to settle cottagers and to arrest the process -of engrossing farms.[99] - -Thus of all the remembered writers of the period who had any practical -knowledge of agriculture or of the poor, there is not one who did -not try to teach the governing class the need for reform, and the -dangers of the state into which they were allowing rural society -to drift. Parliament was assailed on all sides with criticisms and -recommendations, and its refusal to alter its ways was deliberate. - -Of the protests of the time the most important and significant came -from Arthur Young. No man had been so impatient of objections to -enclosure: no man had taken so severe and disciplinary a view of -the labourer: no man had dismissed so lightly the appeals for the -preservation of the fragmentary possessions of the poor. He had -taught a very simple philosophy, that the more the landowner pressed -the farmer, and the more the farmer pressed the labourer, the better -it was for agriculture. He had believed as implicitly as Sinclair -himself, and with apparently as little effort to master the facts, that -the cottagers were certain to benefit by enclosure. All this gives -pathos, as well as force, to his remarkable paper, published under the -title _An Inquiry into the Propriety of applying Wastes to the better -Maintenance and Support of the Poor_. - -The origin of this document is interesting. It was written in 1801, a -few years after the Speenhamland system had begun to fix itself on the -villages. The growth of the poor rates was troubling the minds of the -upper and middle classes. Arthur Young, in the course of his travels -at this time, stumbled on the discovery that in those parishes where -the cottagers had been able to keep together a tiny patch of property, -they had shown a Spartan determination to refuse the refuge of the Poor -Law. When once he had observed this, he made further investigations -which only confirmed his first impressions. This opened his eyes to the -consequences of enclosure as it had been carried out, and he began to -examine the history of these operations in a new spirit. He then found -that enclosure had destroyed with the property of the poor one of the -great incentives to industry and self-respect, and that his view that -the benefit of the commons to the poor was ‘perfectly contemptible,’ -and ‘when it tempts them to become owners of cattle or sheep usually -ruinous,’[100] was fundamentally wrong. Before the enclosures, the -despised commons had enabled the cottager to keep a cow, and this, -so far from bringing ruin, had meant in very many cases all the -difference between independence and pauperism. His scrutiny of the -Acts convinced him that in respect of this they had been unjust. ‘By -nineteen out of twenty Inclosure Bills the poor are injured, and some -grossly injured.... Mr. Forster of Norwich, after giving me an account -of twenty inclosures in which he had acted as Commissioner, stated his -opinion on their general effect on the poor, and lamented that he had -been accessory to the injuring of 2000 poor people, at the rate of -twenty families per parish.... The poor in these parishes may say, and -with truth, “Parliament may be tender of property: all I know is that -I had a cow and an Act of Parliament has taken it from me.”’ - -This paper appeared on the eve of the Enclosure Act of 1801, the Act to -facilitate and cheapen procedure, which Young and Sinclair had worked -hard to secure. It was therefore an opportune moment for trying to -temper enclosure to the difficulties of the poor. Arthur Young made a -passionate appeal to the upper classes to remember these difficulties. -‘To pass Acts beneficial to every other class in the State and hurtful -to the lowest class only, when the smallest alteration would prevent -it, is a conduct against which reason, justice and humanity equally -plead.’ He then proceeded to outline a constructive scheme. He proposed -that twenty millions should be spent in setting up half a million -families with allotments and cottages: the fee-simple of the cottage -and land to be vested in the parish, and possession granted under -an Act of Parliament, on condition that if the father or his family -became chargeable to the rates, the cottage and land should revert to -the parish. The parishes were to carry out the scheme, borrowing the -necessary money on the security of the rates.[101] ‘A man,’ he told -the landlords, in a passage touched perhaps with remorse as well as -with compassion, ‘will love his country the better even for a pig.’ -‘At a moment,’ so he concludes, ‘when a General Inclosure of Wastes is -before Parliament, to allow such a measure to be carried into execution -in conformity with the practice hitherto, without entering one voice, -however feeble, in defence of the interests of the poor, would have -been a wound to the feelings of any man not lost to humanity who had -viewed the scenes which I have visited.’ - -The appeal broke against a dense mass of class prejudice, and so far as -any effect on the Consolidating Act of 1801 is concerned, Arthur Young -might never have written a line. This is perhaps not surprising, for we -know from Young’s autobiography (p. 350) that he did not even carry the -Board of Agriculture with him, and that Lord Carrington, who was then -President, only allowed him to print his appeal on the understanding -that it was not published as an official document, and that the -Board was in no way identified with it. Sinclair, who shared Young’s -conversion, had ceased to be President in 1798. The compunction he -tried to awaken did affect an Act here and there. A witness before the -Allotments Committee of 1843 described the arrangements he contrived -to introduce into an Enclosure Act. The witness was Mr. Demainbray, an -admirable and most public-spirited parson, Rector of Broad Somerford -in Wiltshire. Mr. Demainbray explained that when the Enclosure Act for -his parish was prepared in 1806, he had been pressed to accept land in -lieu of tithes, and that he took the opportunity to stipulate for some -provision for the poor. As a consequence of his efforts, half an acre -was attached to each cottage on the waste, the land being vested in -the rector, churchwardens and overseers for the time being, and eight -acres were reserved for the villagers for allotment and reallotment -every Easter. This arrangement, which had excellent results, ‘every man -looking forward to becoming a man of property,’ was copied in several -of the neighbouring parishes. Dr. Slater has collected some other -examples. One Act, passed in 1824 for Pottern in Wiltshire, vested -the ownership of the enclosed common in the Bishop of Salisbury, who -was lord of the manor, the vicar, and the churchwardens, in trust for -the parish. The trustees were required to lease it in small holdings -to poor, honest and industrious persons, who had not, except in cases -of accident or sickness, availed themselves of Poor Law Relief.[102] -Thomas Stone’s proposal for making inalienable allotments to cottagers -was adopted in two or three Acts in the eastern counties, but the Acts -that made some provision for the poor do not amount, in Dr. Slater’s -opinion, to more than one per cent. of the Enclosure Acts passed before -1845,[103] and this view is corroborated by the great stress laid in -the Reports of the Society for Bettering the Condition of the Poor, -upon a few cases where the poor were considered, and by a statement -made by Mr. Demainbray in a pamphlet published in 1831.[104] In this -pamphlet Mr. Demainbray quotes what Davies had said nearly forty years -earlier about the effect of enclosures in robbing the poor, and then -adds: ‘Since that time many hundred enclosures have taken place, but in -how few of them has any reserve been made for the privileges which the -poor man and his ancestors had for centuries enjoyed?’ - -Some interesting provisions are contained in certain of the Acts -analysed in the Appendix. At Stanwell the commissioners were to set -aside such parcel as they thought proper not exceeding thirty acres, to -be let out and the rents and profits were to be given for the benefit -of such occupiers and inhabitants as did not receive parochial relief -or occupy lands and tenements of more than £5 a year, and had not -received any allotment under the Act. Middleton, the writer of the -_Report on Middlesex_, says that the land produced £30 a year,[105] -and he remarks that this is a much better way of helping the poor than -leaving them land for their use. We may doubt whether the arrangement -seemed equally attractive to the poor. It could not have been much -compensation to John Carter, who owned a cottage, to receive three -roods, twenty-six perches in lieu of his rights of common, which is -his allotment in the award, for three-quarters of an acre is obviously -insufficient for the pasture of a cow, but it was perhaps still less -satisfactory for James Carter to know that one acre and seven perches -were allotted to the ‘lawful owner or owners’ of the cottage and land -which he occupied, and that his own compensation for the loss of his -cow or sheep or geese was the cold hope that if he kept off the rates, -Sir William Gibbons, the vicar, and the parish officers might give -him a dole. The Laleham Commissioners were evidently men of a rather -grim humour, for, in setting aside thirteen acres for the poor, they -authorised the churchwardens and overseers to encourage the poor, if -they were so minded, by letting this plot for sixty years and using the -money so received to build a workhouse. A much more liberal provision -was made at Cheshunt, where the poor were allowed 100 acres. At -Knaresborough and Louth, the poor got nothing at all. - -Before we proceed to describe the results of enclosure on village -life, we may remark one curious fact. In 1795 and 1796 there was some -discussion in the House of Commons of the condition of the agricultural -labourers, arising out of the proposal of Whitbread’s to enable the -magistrates to fix a minimum wage. Pitt made a long speech in reply, -and promised to introduce a scheme of his own for correcting evils -that were too conspicuous to be ignored. This promise he kept next -year in the ill-fated Poor Law Bill, which died, almost at its birth, -of general hostility. That Bill will be considered elsewhere. All -that we are concerned to notice here is that neither speech nor Bill, -though they cover a wide range of topics, and though Pitt said that -they represented the results of long and careful inquiry, hint at this -cause of social disturbance, or at the importance of safe-guarding the -interests of the poor in future enclosure schemes: this in spite of the -fact that, as we have seen, there was scarcely any contemporary writer -or observer who had not pointed out that the way in which the governing -class was conducting these revolutions was not only unjust to the poor -but perilous to the State. - -It is interesting, in the light of the failure to grasp and retrieve -an error in national policy which marks the progress of these -transactions, to glance at the contemporary history of France. -The Legislative Assembly, under the influence of the ideas of the -economists, decreed the division of the land of the communes in 1792. -The following year this decree was modified. Certain provincial -assemblies had asked for division, but many of the villages were -inexorably hostile. The new decree of June 1793 tried to do justice -to these conflicting wishes by making division optional. At the same -time it insisted on an equitable division in cases where partition took -place. But this policy of division was found to have done such damage -to the interests of the poor that there was strenuous opposition, with -the result that in 1796 the process was suspended, and in the following -year it was forbidden.[106] Can any one suppose that if the English -legislature had had as swift and ready a sense for things going wrong, -the policy of enclosure would have been pursued after 1801 with the -same reckless disregard for its social consequences? - - * * * * * - -We have given in the last chapter the history of an enclosure project -for the light it throws on the play of motive in the enclosing class. -We propose now to give in some detail the history of an enclosure -project that succeeded for the light it throws on the attention which -Parliament paid to local opinion, and on the generally received views -as to the rights of the small commoners. Our readers will observe that -this enclosure took place after the criticisms and appeals which we -have described had all been published. - -Otmoor is described in Dunkin’s _History of Oxfordshire_,[107] as a -‘dreary and extensive common.’ Tradition said that the tract of land -was the gift of some mysterious lady ‘who gave as much ground as she -could ride round while an oat-sheaf was burning, to the inhabitants of -its vicinity for a public common,’ and hence came its name of Oatmoor, -corrupted into Otmoor. Whatever the real origin of the name, which -more prosaic persons connected with ‘_Oc_’, a Celtic word for ‘water,’ -this tract of land had been used as a ‘public common without stint ... -from remote antiquity.’ Lord Abingdon, indeed, as Lord of the Manor of -Beckley, claimed and exercised the right of appointing a moor-driver, -who at certain seasons drove all the cattle into Beckley, where those -which were unidentified became Lord Abingdon’s property. Lord Abingdon -also claimed rights of soil and of sport: these, like his other claim, -were founded on prescription only, as there was no trace of any grant -from the Crown. - -The use to which Otmoor, in its original state, was put, is thus -described by Dunkin. ‘Whilst this extensive piece of land remained -unenclosed, the farmers of the several adjoining townships estimated -the profits of a summer’s pasturage at 20s. per head, subject to -the occasional loss of a beast by a peculiar distemper called the -moor-evil. But the greatest benefit was reaped by the cottagers, -many of whom turned out large numbers of geese, to which the coarse -aquatic sward was well suited, and thereby brought up their families in -comparative plenty.[108] - -‘Of late years, however, this dreary waste was surveyed with longing -eyes by the surrounding landowners, most of whom wished to annex a -portion of it to their estates, and in consequence spared no pains to -recommend the enclosure as a measure beneficial to the country.’ - -The promoters of the enclosure credited themselves with far loftier -motives: prominent among them being a desire to improve the morals -of the poor. An advocate of the enclosure afterwards described the -pitiable state of the poor in pre-enclosure days in these words: ‘In -looking after a brood of goslings, a few rotten sheep, a skeleton of a -cow or a mangy horse, they lost more than they might have gained by -their day’s work, and acquired habits of idleness and dissipation and -a dislike to honest labour, which has rendered them the riotous and -lawless set of men which they have now shown themselves to be.’ A pious -wish to second the intention of Providence was also a strong incentive: -‘God did not create the earth to lie waste for feeding a few geese, but -to be cultivated by man, in the sweat of his brow.’[109] - -The first proposal for enclosure came to Parliament from George, Duke -of Marlborough, and others on 11th March, 1801. The duke petitioned for -the drainage and the allotment of the 4000 acres of Otmoor among the -parishes concerned, namely Beckley (with Horton and Studley), Noke, -Oddington, and Charlton (with Fencott and Moorcott). This petition was -referred to a Committee, to consider amongst other things, whether the -Standing Orders with reference to Drainage Bills had been duly complied -with. The Committee reported in favour of allowing the introduction of -the Bill, but made this remarkable admission, that though the Standing -Orders with respect to the affixing of notices on church doors had been -complied with on Sunday, 3rd August, ‘it appeared to the Committee -that on the following Sunday, the 10th of August, the Person employed -to affix the like Notices was prevented from so doing at Beckley, -Oddington and Charlton, by a Mob at each Place, but that he read the -Notices to the Persons assembled, and afterwards threw them amongst -them into the Church Yards of those Parishes.’ Notice was duly affixed -that Sunday at Noke. The next Sunday matters were even worse, for no -notices were allowed to be fixed in any parish. - -The Bill that was introduced in spite of this local protest, was -shipwrecked during its Committee stage by a petition from Alexander -Croke, LL.D., Lord of the Manor of Studley with Whitecross Green, and -from John Mackarness, Esq., who stated that as proprietors in the -parish of Beckley, their interests had not been sufficiently considered. - -The next application to Parliament was not made till 1814. In the -interval various plans were propounded, and Arthur Young, in his -_Survey of Oxfordshire for the Board of Agriculture_, published in 1809 -(a work which Dunkin describes as supported by the farmers and their -landlords and as having caught their strain), lamented the wretched -state of the land. ‘I made various inquiries into the present value -of it by rights of commonage; but could ascertain no more than the -general fact, of its being to a very beggarly amount.... Upon the -whole, the present produce must be quite contemptible, when compared -with the benefit which would result from enclosing it. And I cannot -but remark, that such a tract of waste land in summer, and covered -the winter through with water, to remain in such a state, within five -miles of Oxford and the Thames, in a kingdom that regularly imports to -the amount of a million sterling in corn, and is almost periodically -visited with apprehensions of want--is a scandal to the national -policy.... If drained and enclosed, it is said that no difficulty would -occur in letting it at 30s. per acre, and some assert even 40s.’ (p. -228). - -When the new application was made in November 1814, it was again -referred to a Committee, who again had to report turbulent behaviour -in the district concerned. Notices had been fixed on all the church -doors on 7th August, and on three doors on 14th August, ‘but it was -found impracticable to affix the Notices on the Church doors of the -other two Parishes on that day, owing to large Mobs, armed with every -description of offensive weapons, having assembled for the purpose of -obstructing the persons who went to affix the Notices, and who were -prevented by violence, and threats of immediate death, from approaching -the Churches.’[110] From the same cause no notices could be affixed on -these two church doors on 21st or 28th August. - -These local disturbances were not allowed to check the career of the -Bill. It was read a first time on 21st February, and a second time on -7th March. But meanwhile some serious flaws had been discovered. The -Duke of Marlborough and the Earl of Abingdon both petitioned against -it. The Committee, however, were able to introduce amendments that -satisfied both these powerful personages, and on 1st May Mr. Fane -reported from the Committee that no persons had appeared for the -said petitions, and that the parties concerned had consented to the -satisfaction of the Committee, and had also consented ‘to the changing -the Commissioners therein named.’ Before the Report had been passed, -however, a petition was received on behalf of Alexander Croke,[111] -Esq., who was now in Nova Scotia, which made further amendments -necessary, and the Committee was empowered to send for persons, papers -and records. Meanwhile the humbler individuals whose future was -imperilled were also bestirring themselves. They applied to the Keeper -of the Records in the Augmentation Office for a report on the history -of Otmoor. This Report, which is published at length by Dunkin,[112] -states that in spite of laborious research no mention of Otmoor could -be found in any single record from the time of William the Conqueror -to the present day. Even _Doomsday Book_ contained no reference to it. -Nowhere did it appear in what manor Otmoor was comprehended, nor was -there any record that any of the lords of neighbouring manors had ever -been made capable of enjoying any rights of common upon it. The custom -of usage without stint, in fact, pointed to some grant before the -memory of man, and made it unlikely that any lord of the manor had ever -had absolute right of soil. Armed, no doubt, with this learned report, -some ‘Freeholders, Landholders, Cottagers and Persons’ residing in four -parishes sent up a petition asking to be heard against the Bill. But -they were too late: their petition was ordered to lie on the Table, and -the Bill passed the Commons the same day (26th June) and received the -Royal Assent on 12th July. - -The Act directed that one-sixteenth of the whole (which was stated -to be over 4000 acres) should be given to the Lord of the Manor of -Beckley, Lord Abingdon, in compensation of his rights of soil, and -one-eighth as composition for all tithes. Thus Lord Abingdon received, -to start with, about 750 acres. The residue was to be allotted among -the various parishes, townships and hamlets, each allotment to be held -as a common pasture for the township. So far, beyond the fact that -Lord Abingdon had taken off more than a sixth part of their common -pasture, and that the pasture was now divided up into different parts, -it did not seem that the ordinary inhabitants were much affected. The -sting lay in the arrangements for the future of these divided common -pastures. ‘And if at any future time the major part in value of the -several persons interested in such plot or parcels of land, should -require a separate division of the said land, he (the commissioner) is -directed to divide and allot the same among the several proprietors, in -proportion to their individual rights and interests therein.’[113] - -We have, fortunately, a very clear statement of the way in which -the ‘rights and interests’ of the poorer inhabitants of the Otmoor -towns were regarded in the enclosure. These inhabitants, it must be -remembered, had enjoyed rights of common without any stint from time -immemorial, simply by virtue of living in the district. In a letter -from ‘An Otmoor Proprietor’ to the Oxford papers in 1830, the writer -(Sir Alexander Croke himself?), who was evidently a man of some local -importance, explains that by the general rule of law a commoner is -not entitled to turn on to the common more cattle than are sufficient -to manure and stock the land to which the right of common is annexed. -Accordingly, houses without land attached to them cannot, strictly -speaking, claim a right of common. How then explain the state of -affairs at Otmoor, where all the inhabitants, landed or landless, -enjoyed the same rights? By prescription, he answers, mere houses do -in point of fact sometimes acquire a right of common, but this right, -though it may be said to be without stint, is in reality always liable -to be stinted by law. Hence, when a common like Otmoor is enclosed, the -allotments are made as elsewhere in proportion to the amount of land -possessed by each commoner, whilst a ‘proportionable share’ is thrown -in to those who own mere houses. But even this share, he points out, -does not necessarily belong to the person who has been exercising the -right of common, unless he happens to own his own house. It belongs -to his landlord, who alone is entitled to compensation. A superficial -observer might perhaps think this a hardship, but in point of fact it -is quite just. The tenants, occupying the houses, must have been paying -a higher rent in consideration of the right attached to the houses, and -they have always been liable to be turned out by the landlord at will. -‘They had no permanent interest, and it has been decided by the law -that _no man can have any right in any common, as belonging to a house, -wherein he has no interest but only habitation_: so that the poor, as -such, had no right to the common whatever.’[114] - -The results of the Act, framed and administered on these lines, were -described by Dunkin,[115] writing in 1823, as follows: ‘It now only -remains to notice the effect of the operation of this act. On the -division of the land allotted to the respective townships, a certain -portion was assigned to each cottager in lieu of his accustomed -commonage, but the delivery of the allotment did not take place, -unless the party to whom it was assigned paid his share of the expenses -incurred in draining and dividing the waste: and he was also further -directed to enclose the same with a fence. The poverty of the cottager -in general prevented his compliance with these conditions, and he was -necessitated to sell his share for any paltry sum that was offered. -In the spring of 1819, several persons at Charlton and elsewhere made -profitable speculations by purchasing these commons for £5 each, and -afterwards prevailing on the commissioners to throw them into one lot, -thus forming a valuable estate. In this way was Otmoor lost to the poor -man, and awarded to the rich, under the specious idea of benefitting -the public.’ The expenses of the Act, it may be mentioned, came to -something between £20,000 and £30,000, or more than the fee-simple of -the soil.[116] - -Enclosed Otmoor did not fulfil Arthur Young’s hopes: ‘... instead -of the expected improvement in the quality of the soil, it has been -rendered almost totally worthless; a great proportion being at this -moment over-rated at 5s. an acre yearly rent, few crops yielding -any more than barely sufficient to pay for labour and seed.’[117] -This excess of expenses over profits was adduced by the ‘Otmoor -proprietor,’ to whom we have already referred, as an illustration of -the public-spirited self-sacrifice of the enclosers, who were paying -out of their own pockets for a national benefit, and by making some, at -any rate, of the land capable of cultivation, were enabling the poor to -have ‘an honest employment, instead of losing their time in idleness -and waste.’[118] But fifteen years of this ‘honest employment’ failed -to reconcile the poor to their new position, and in 1830 they were able -to express their feelings in a striking manner.[119] - -In the course of his drainage operations, the commissioner had made a -new channel for the river Ray, at a higher level, with the disastrous -result that the Ray overflowed into a valuable tract of low land above -Otmoor. For two years the farmers of this tract suffered severe losses -(one farmer was said to have lost £400 in that time), then they took -the law into their own hands, and in June 1829 cut the embankments, -so that the waters of the Ray again flowed over Otmoor and left their -valuable land unharmed. Twenty-two farmers were indicted for felony for -this act, but they were acquitted at the Assizes, under the direction -of Mr. Justice Parke, on the grounds that the farmers had a right to -abate the nuisance, and that the commissioner had exceeded his powers -in making this new channel and embankment. - -This judgment produced a profound impression on the Otmoor farmers -and cottagers. They misread it to mean that all proceedings under -the Enclosure Act were illegal and therefore null and void, and -they determined to regain their lost privileges. Disturbances began -at the end of August (28th August). For about a week, straggling -parties of enthusiasts paraded the moor, cutting down fences here -and there. A son of Sir Alexander Croke came out to one of these -parties and ordered them to desist. He had a loaded pistol with him, -and the moor-men, thinking, rightly or wrongly, that he was going to -fire, wrested it from him and gave him a severe thrashing. Matters -began to look serious: local sympathy with the rioters was so strong -that special constables refused to be sworn in; the High Sheriff -accordingly summoned the Oxfordshire Militia, and Lord Churchill’s -troop of Yeomanry Cavalry was sent to Islip. But the inhabitants were -not overawed. They determined to perambulate the bounds of Otmoor -in full force, in accordance with the old custom. On Monday, 6th -September, five hundred men, women and children assembled from the -Otmoor towns, and they were joined by five hundred more from elsewhere. -Armed with reap-hooks, hatchets, bill-hooks and duckets, they marched -in order round the seven-mile-long boundary of Otmoor, destroying -all the fences on their way. By noon their work of destruction was -finished. ‘A farmer in the neighbourhood who witnessed the scene gives -a ludicrous description of the zeal and perseverance of the women -and children as well as the men, and the ease and composure with -which they waded through depths of mud and water and overcame every -obstacle in their march. He adds that he did not hear any threatening -expressions against any person or his property, and he does not believe -any individuals present entertained any feeling or wish beyond the -assertion of what they conceived (whether correctly or erroneously) to -be their prescriptive and inalienable right, and of which they speak -precisely as the freemen of Oxford would describe their right to Port -Meadow.’[120] - -By the time the destruction of fences was complete, Lord Churchill’s -troop of yeomanry came up to the destroying band: the Riot Act was -read, but the moormen refused to disperse. Sixty or seventy of them -were thereupon seized and examined, with the result that forty-four -were sent off to Oxford Gaol in wagons, under an escort of yeomanry. -Now it happened to be the day of St. Giles’ Fair, and the street of -St. Giles, along which the yeomanry brought their prisoners, was -crowded with countryfolk and townsfolk, most of whom held strong views -on the Otmoor question. The men in the wagons raised the cry ‘Otmoor -for ever,’ the crowd took it up, and attacked the yeomen with great -violence, hurling brickbats, stones and sticks at them from every side. -The yeomen managed to get their prisoners as far as the turning down -Beaumont Street, but there they were overpowered, and all forty-four -prisoners escaped. At Otmoor itself peace now reigned. Through the -broken fences cattle were turned in to graze on all the enclosures, -and the villagers even appointed a herdsman to look after them. The -inhabitants of the seven Otmoor towns formed an association called -‘the Otmoor Association,’ which boldly declared that ‘the Right of -Common on Otmoor was always in the inhabitants, and that a non-resident -proprietor had no Right of Common thereon,’ and determined to raise -subscriptions for legal expenses in defence of their right, calling -upon ‘the pecuniary aid of a liberal and benevolent public ... to -assist them in attempting to restore Otmoor once more to its original -state.’[121] - -Meanwhile the authorities who had lost their prisoners once, sent down -a stronger force to take them next time, and although at the Oxford -City Sessions a bill of indictment against William Price and others -for riot in St. Giles and rescue of the prisoners was thrown out, at -the County Sessions the Grand Jury found a true Bill against the same -William Price and others for the same offence, and also against Cooper -and others for riot at Otmoor. The prisoners were tried at the Oxford -Assizes next month, before Mr. Justice Bosanquet and Sir John Patteson. -The jury returned a verdict which shows the strength of public opinion. -‘We find the defendants guilty of having been present at an unlawful -assembly on the 6th September at Otmoor, but it is the unanimous wish -of the Jury to recommend all the parties to the merciful consideration -of the Court.’ The judges responded to this appeal and the longest -sentence inflicted was four months’ imprisonment.[122] - -The original enclosure was now fifteen years old, but Otmoor was -still in rebellion, and the Home Office Papers of the next two years -contain frequent applications for troops from Lord Macclesfield, -Lord-Lieutenant, Sir Alexander Croke and other magistrates. Whenever -there was a full moon, the patriots of the moor turned out and pulled -down the fences. How strong was the local resentment of the overriding -of all the rights and traditions of the commoners may be seen not -only from the language of one magistrate writing to Lord Melbourne -in January 1832: ‘all the towns in the neighbourhood of Otmoor are -more or less infected with the feelings of the most violent, and -cannot at all be depended on’: but also from a resolution passed by -the magistrates at Oxford in February of that year, declaring that no -constabulary force that the magistrates could raise would be equal to -suppressing the Otmoor outrages, and asking for soldiers. The appeal -ended with this significant warning: ‘Any force which Government may -send down should not remain for a length of time together, but that to -avoid the possibility of an undue connexion between the people and the -Military, a succession of troops should be observed.’ So long and so -bitter was the civil war roused by an enclosure which Parliament had -sanctioned in absolute disregard of the opinions or the traditions or -the circumstances of the mass of the people it affected. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[87] Most private Enclosure Acts provided that if a commissioner died -his successor was to be somebody not interested in the property. - -[88] Sir John Sinclair complained in 1796 that the Board had not even -the privilege of franking its letters.--_Annals of Agriculture_, vol. -xxvi, p. 506. - -[89] Vol. xxvi. p. 85. - -[90] From the Select Committee on the Means of Facilitating Enclosures -in 1800, reprinted in _Annual Register_, 1800, Appendix to Chronicle, -p. 85 ff., we learn that the fees received alone in the House of -Commons (Bill fees, small fees, committee fees, housekeepers’ and -messengers’ fees, and engrossing fees) for 707 Bills during the -fourteen years from 1786 to 1799 inclusive amounted to no less than -£59,867, 6s. 4d. As the scale of fees in the House of Lords was about -the same (Bill fees, yeoman, usher, door-keepers’ fees, order of -committee, and committee fees) during these years about £120,000 must -have gone into the pockets of Parliamentary officials. - -[91] See Appendix A (5). - -[92] _Bedford Report_, 1808, p. 235. - -[93] _Annual Register_, 1799, Chron., p. 27. - -[94] Eden, 1. Preface, p. xviii. - -[95] _Bedford Report_, p. 249. Cf. writer in Appendix of _Report on -Middlesex_, pp. 507-15, ‘a gentleman of the least sensibility would -rather suffer his residence to continue surrounded by marshes and -bogs, than take the lead in what may be deemed an obnoxious measure.’ -This same writer urges, that the unpopularity of enclosures would be -overcome were care taken ‘to place the inferior orders of mankind--the -cottager and industrious poor--in such a situation, with regard to -inclosures, that they should certainly have some share secured to them, -and be treated with a gentle hand. Keep all in temper--let no rights be -now disputed.... It is far more easy to prevent a clamour than to stop -it when once it is raised. Those who are acquainted with the business -of inclosure must know that there are more than four-fifths of the -inhabitants in most neighbourhoods who are generally left out of the -bill for want of property, and therefore cannot possibly claim any part -thereof.’ - -[96] Vol. xx. p. 456. - -[97] Vol. xxiv. p. 543. - -[98] _The Appropriation and Enclosure of Commonable and Intermixed -Lands_, 1801. - -[99] ‘Allow to the cottager a little land about his dwelling for -keeping a cow, for planting potatoes, for raising flax or hemp. -2ndly, Convert the waste lands of the kingdom into _small_ arable -farms, a certain quantity every year, to be let on favourable -terms to industrious families. 3rdly, Restrain the engrossment and -over-enlargement of farms. The propriety of those measures cannot, I -think, be questioned.’--_The Case of Labourers in Husbandry_, p. 103. - -[100] _Annals of Agriculture_, vol. i. p. 52. - -[101] This scheme marks a great advance on an earlier scheme which -Young published in the first volume of the _Annals of Agriculture_. He -then proposed that public money should be spent in settling cottagers -or soldiers on the waste, giving them their holding free of rent and -tithes for three lives, at the end of which time the land they had -redeemed was to revert to its original owners. - -[102] Slater, pp. 126-7. - -[103] _Ibid._, p. 128. - -[104] _The Poor Man’s Best Friend, or Land to cultivate for his -own Benefit._ Letter to the Marquis of Salisbury, by the Rev. S. -Demainbray, B.D., 1831. - -[105] P. 126. - -[106] See for this subject _Cambridge Modern History_, vol. viii. chap. -24, and P. Sagnac, _La Législation Civile de la Révolution Française_. - -[107] Vol. i. p. 119 ff. - -[108] Jackson’s _Oxford Journal_, September 11, 1830, said that a -single cottager sometimes cleared as much as £20 a year by geese. - -[109] _Oxford University and City Herald_, September 25, 1830. - -[110] _House of Commons Journal_, February 17, 1815. - -[111] Alexander Croke (1758-1842), knighted in 1816, was from 1801-1815 -judge in the Vice-Admiralty Court, Nova Scotia. As a lawyer, he could -defend his own interests. - -[112] Dunkin’s _Oxfordshire_, vol. i. pp. 122-3. - -[113] _Ibid._, p. 123. - -[114] Jackson’s _Oxford Journal_, September 18, 1830. - -[115] Vol. i. p. 124. - -[116] Jackson’s _Oxford Journal_, September 11, 1830. - -[117] _Ibid._ - -[118] _Ibid._, September 18. - -[119] See Jackson’s _Oxford Journal_, and _Oxford University and City -Herald_, for September 11, 1830, and also _Annual Register_, 1830, -Chron., p. 142, and Home Office Papers, for what follows. - -[120] _Oxford University and City Herald_, September 11, 1830. - -[121] _Ibid._ - -[122] Jackson’s _Oxford Journal_, March 5, 1831. - - - - -CHAPTER V - -THE VILLAGE AFTER ENCLOSURE - - -THE governing class continued its policy of extinguishing the old -village life and all the relationships and interests attached to it, -with unsparing and unhesitating hand; and as its policy progressed -there were displayed all the consequences predicted by its critics. -Agriculture was revolutionised: rents leapt up: England seemed to be -triumphing over the difficulties of a war with half the world. But it -had one great permanent result which the rulers of England ignored. The -anchorage of the poor was gone. - -For enclosure was fatal to three classes: the small farmer, the -cottager, and the squatter. To all of these classes their common rights -were worth more than anything they received in return. Their position -was just the opposite of that of the lord of the manor. The lord of the -manor was given a certain quantity of land (the conventional proportion -was one-sixteenth[123]) in lieu of his surface rights, and that compact -allotment was infinitely more valuable than the rights so compensated. -Similarly the tithe-owner stood to gain with the increased rent. The -large farmer’s interests were also in enclosure, which gave him a wider -field for his capital and enterprise. The other classes stood to lose. - -For even if the small farmer received strict justice in the division -of the common fields, his share in the legal costs and the additional -expense of fencing his own allotments often overwhelmed him, and he -was obliged to sell his property.[124] The expenses were always very -heavy, and in some cases amounted to £5 an acre.[125] The lord of the -manor and the tithe-owner could afford to bear their share, because -they were enriched by enclosure: the classes that were impoverished by -enclosure were ruined when they had to pay for the very proceeding that -had made them the poorer. The promoter of the General Enclosure Bill of -1796, it will be remembered, had proposed to exempt the poor from the -expense of fencing, but the Select Committee disapproved, and the only -persons exempted in the cases we have examined were the lords of the -manor or tithe-owners. - -If these expenses still left the small farmer on his feet, he found -himself deprived of the use of the fallow and stubble pasture, which -had been almost as indispensable to him as the land he cultivated. -‘Strip the small farms of the benefit of the commons,’ said one -observer, ‘and they are all at one stroke levelled to the ground.’[126] -It was a common clause in Enclosure Acts that no sheep were to be -depastured on allotments for seven years.[127] The small farmer either -emigrated to America or to an industrial town, or became a day -labourer. His fate in the last resort may perhaps be illustrated by -the account given by the historian of _Oxfordshire_ of the enclosure -of Merton. ‘About the middle of last century a very considerable -alteration was produced in the relative situation of different classes -in the village. The Act of Parliament for the inclosure of the fields -having annulled all leases, and the inclosure itself facilitated the -plan of throwing several small farms into a few large bargains,[128] -the holders of the farms who had heretofore lived in comparative -plenty, became suddenly reduced to the situation of labourers, and in -a few years were necessitated to throw themselves and their families -upon the parish. The overgrown farmers who had fattened upon this -alteration, feeling the pressure of the new burden, determined if -possible to free themselves: they accordingly decided upon reducing -the allowance of these poor to the lowest ratio,[129] and resolved -to have no more servants so that their parishioners might experience -no further increase from that source. In a few years the numbers of -the poor rapidly declined: the more aged sank into their graves, and -the youth, warned by their parents’ sufferings, sought a settlement -elsewhere. The farmers, rejoicing in the success of their scheme, -procured the demolition of the cottages, and thus endeavoured to secure -themselves and their successors from the future expenses of supporting -an increased population, so that in 1821 the parish numbered only -thirty houses inhabited by thirty-four families.’[130] Another writer -gave an account of the results of a Norfolk enclosure. ‘In passing -through a village near Swaffham, in the County of Norfolk a few years -ago, to my great mortification I beheld the houses tumbling into ruins, -and the common fields all enclosed; upon enquiring into the cause of -this melancholy alteration, I was informed that a gentleman of Lynn had -bought that township and the next adjoining to it: that he had thrown -the one into three, and the other into four farms; which before the -enclosure were in about twenty farms: and upon my further enquiring -what was becoming of the farmers who were turned out, the answer was -that some of them were dead and the rest were become labourers.’[131] - -The effect on the cottager can best be described by saying that before -enclosure the cottager was a labourer with land, after enclosure he -was a labourer without land. The economic basis of his independence -was destroyed. In the first place, he lost a great many rights for -which he received no compensation. There were, for instance, the cases -mentioned by Mr. Henry Homer (1719-1791), Rector of Birdingbury and -Chaplain to Lord Leigh, in the pamphlet he published in 1769,[132] -where the cottagers lost the privileges of cutting furze and turf on -the common land, the proprietor contending that they had no right to -these privileges, but only enjoyed them by his indulgence. In every -other case, Mr. Homer urged, uninterrupted, immemorial usage gives a -legal sanction even to encroachments. ‘Why should the poor, as poor, -be excluded from the benefit of this general Indulgence; or why should -any set of proprietors avail themselves of the inability of the poor to -contend with them, to get possession of more than they enjoyed?’[133] - -Another right that was often lost was the prescriptive right of keeping -a cow. The _General Report on Enclosures_ (p. 12) records the results -of a careful inquiry made in a journey of 1600 miles, which showed that -before enclosure cottagers often kept cows without a legal right, and -that nothing was given them for the practice. Other cottagers kept cows -by right of hiring their cottages and common rights, and on enclosure -the land was thrown into a farm, and the cottager had to sell his -cow. Two examples taken from the _Bedfordshire Report_ illustrate the -consequences of enclosure to the small man. One is from Maulden:[134] -‘The common was very extensive. I conversed with a farmer, and several -cottagers. One of them said, enclosing would ruin England; it was worse -than ten wars. Why, my friend, what have you lost by it? _I kept four -cows before the parish was enclosed, and now I don’t keep so much as -a goose; and you ask me what I lose by it!_’[135] The other is from -Sandy:[136] ‘This parish was very peculiarly circumstanced; it abounds -with gardeners, many cultivating their little freeholds, so that on -the enclosure, there were found to be sixty-three proprietors, though -nine-tenths, perhaps, of the whole belonged to Sir P. Monoux and Mr. -Pym. These men kept cows on the boggy common, and cut fern for litter -on the warren, by which means they were enabled to raise manure for -their gardens, besides fuel in plenty: the small allotment of an -acre and a half, however good the land, has been no compensation for -what they were deprived of. They complain heavily, and know not how -they will now manage to raise manure. This was no reason to preserve -the deserts in their old state, but an ample one for giving a full -compensation.’ - -Lord Winchilsea stated in his letter to the Board of Agriculture in -1796: ‘Whoever travels through the Midland Counties and will take the -trouble of inquiring, will generally receive for answer that formerly -there were a great many cottagers who kept cows, but that the land is -now thrown to the farmers, and if he inquires still further, he will -find that in those parishes the Poor Rates have increased in an amazing -degree more than according to the average rise throughout England.’ - -These cottagers often received nothing at all for the right they had -lost, the compensation going to the owner of the cottage only. But even -those cottagers who owned their cottage received in return for their -common right something infinitely less valuable. For a tiny allotment -was worth much less than a common right, especially if the allotment -was at a distance from their cottage, and though the Haute Huntre Act -binds the commissioners to give Lord FitzWilliam an allotment near -his gardens, there was nothing in any Act that we have seen to oblige -the commissioners to give the cottager an allotment at his door. And -the cottagers had to fence their allotments or forfeit them. Anybody -who glances at an award will understand what this meant. It is easy, -for example, to imagine what happened under this provision to the -following cottagers at Stanwell: Edmund Jordan (1-1/2 acres) J. and -F. Ride (each 1-1/4 acres) T. L. Rogers (1-1/4 acres) Brooker Derby -(1-1/4) Mary Gulliver (1-1/4 acres) Anne Higgs (1-1/4) H. Isherwood -(1-1/4) William Kent (1-1/4) Elizabeth Carr (1 acre) Thomas Nash (1 -acre) R. Ride (just under 1 acre) William Robinson (just under 1 acre) -William Cox (3/4 acre) John Carter (3/4 acre) William Porter (3/4 acre) -Thomas King (1/2 acre) John Hetherington (under 1/2 an acre) J. Trout -(1/4 acre and 4 perches) and Charles Burkhead (12 perches). It would be -interesting to know how many of these small parcels of land found their -way into the hands of Sir William Gibbons and Mr. Edmund Hill. - -The Louth award is still more interesting from this point of view. -J. Trout and Charles Burkhead passing rich, the one on 1/4 acre and -4 perches, the other on 12 perches, had only to pay their share of -the expenses of the enclosure, and for their own fencing. Sir William -Gibbons was too magnanimous a man to ask them to fence his 500 acres -as well. But at Louth the tithe-owners, who took more than a third of -the whole, were excused their share of the costs, and also had their -fencing done for them by the other proprietors. The prebendary and the -vicar charged the expenses of fencing their 600 acres on persons like -Elizabeth Bryan who went off with 39 perches, Ann Dunn (35 perches), -Naomi Hodgson, widow (35 perches), John Betts (34 perches), Elizabeth -Atkins (32 perches), Will Boswell (31 perches), Elizabeth Eycon (28 -perches), Ann Hubbard, widow (15 perches), and Ann Metcalf, whose share -of the spoil was 14 perches. The award shows that there were 67 persons -who received an acre or less. Cottagers who received such allotments -and had to fence them had no alternative but to sell, and little to do -with the money but to drink it. This is the testimony of the _General -Report on Enclosures_.[137] - -The squatters, though they are often spoken of as cottagers, must be -distinguished from the cottager in regard to their legal and historical -position. They were in a sense outside the original village economy. -The cottager was, so to speak, an aboriginal poor man: the squatter a -poor alien. He settled on a waste, built a cottage, and got together -a few geese or sheep, perhaps even a horse or a cow, and proceeded to -cultivate the ground. - -The treatment of encroachments seems to have varied very greatly, as -the cases analysed in the Appendix show, and there was no settled -rule. Squatters of less than twenty years’ standing seldom received -any consideration beyond the privilege of buying their encroachment. -Squatters of more than twenty or forty years’ standing, as the case -might be, were often allowed to keep their encroachments, and in some -cases were treated like cottagers, with a claim to an allotment. But, -of course, like the cottagers, they lost their common rights. - -Lastly, enclosure swept away the bureaucracy of the old village: -the viewers of fields and letters of the cattle, who had general -supervision of the arrangements for pasturing sheep or cows in the -common meadow, the common shepherd, the chimney peepers who saw that -the chimneys were kept properly, the hayward, or pinder, who looked -after the pound. Most of these little officials of the village court -had been paid either in land or by fees. When it was proposed to -abolish Parliamentary Enclosure, and to substitute a General Enclosure -Bill, the Parliamentary officials, who made large sums out of fees from -Enclosure Bills, were to receive compensation; but there was no talk of -compensation for the stolen livelihood of a pinder or a chimney peeper, -as there had been for the lost pickings of the officials of Parliament, -or as there was whenever an unhappy aristocrat was made to surrender -one of his sinecures. George Selwyn, who had been Paymaster of the -Works for twenty-seven years at the time that Burke’s Act of 1782 -deprived him of that profitable title, was not allowed to languish very -long on the two sinecures that were left to him. In 1784 Pitt consoled -him with the lucrative name of Surveyor-General of Crown Lands. The -pinder and the viewer received a different kind of justice. For the -rich there is compensation, as the weaver said in Disraeli’s _Sybil_, -but ‘sympathy is the solace of the poor.’ In this case, if the truth be -told, even this solace was not administered with too liberal a hand. - -All these classes and interests were scattered by enclosure, but it -was not one generation alone that was struck down by the blow. For -the commons were the patrimony of the poor. The commoner’s child, -however needy, was born with a spoon in his mouth. He came into a world -in which he had a share and a place. The civilisation which was now -submerged had spelt a sort of independence for the obscure lineage of -the village. It had represented, too, the importance of the interest of -the community in its soil, and in this aspect also the robbery of the -present was less important than the robbery of the future. For one act -of confiscation blotted out a principle of permanent value to the State. - -The immediate consequences of this policy were only partially visible -to the governing or the cultivated classes. The rulers of England -took it for granted that the losses of individuals were the gains of -the State, and that the distresses of the poor were the condition of -permanent advance. Modern apologists have adopted the same view; and -the popular resistance to enclosure is often compared to the wild and -passionate fury that broke against the spinning and weaving machines, -the symbols and engines of the Industrial Revolution. History has drawn -a curtain over those days of exile and suffering, when cottages were -pulled down as if by an invader’s hand, and families that had lived -for centuries in their dales or on their small farms and commons were -driven before the torrent, losing - - ‘Estate and house ... and all their sheep, - A pretty flock, and which for aught I know - Had clothed the Ewbanks for a thousand years.’ - -Ancient possessions and ancient families disappeared. But the first -consequence was not the worst consequence: so far from compensating -for this misery, the ultimate result was still more disastrous. The -governing class killed by this policy the spirit of a race. The -petitions that are buried with their brief and unavailing pathos in -the _Journals_ of the House of Commons are the last voice of village -independence, and the unnamed commoners who braved the dangers of -resistance to send their doomed protests to the House of Commons that -obeyed their lords, were the last of the English peasants. These were -the men, it is not unreasonable to believe, whom Gray had in mind when -he wrote:-- - - ‘Some village Hampden that with dauntless breast - The little tyrant of his fields withstood.’ - - * * * * * - -As we read the descriptions of the state of France before the -Revolution, there is one fact that comforts the imagination and braces -the heart. We read of the intolerable services of the peasant, of -his forced labour, his confiscated harvests, his crushing burdens, -his painful and humiliating tasks, including in some cases even the -duty of protecting the sleep of the seigneur from the croaking of -the neighbouring marshes. The mind of Arthur Young was filled with -this impression of unsupportable servitude. But a more discerning eye -might have perceived a truth that escaped the English traveller. It -is contained in an entry that often greets us in the official reports -on the state of the provinces: _ce seigneur litige avec ses vassaux_. -Those few words flash like a gleam of the dawn across this sombre -and melancholy page. The peasant may be overwhelmed by the dîme, -the taille, the corvée, the hundred and one services that knit his -tenure to the caprice of a lord: he may be wretched, brutal, ignorant, -ill-clothed, ill-fed, and ill-housed: but he has not lost his status: -he is not a casual figure in a drifting proletariat: he belongs to a -community that can withstand the seigneur, dispute his claims at law, -resume its rights, recover its possessions, and establish, one day, its -independence. - -In England the aristocracy destroyed the promise of such a development -when it broke the back of the peasant community. The enclosures -created a new organisation of classes. The peasant with rights and a -status, with a share in the fortunes and government of his village, -standing in rags, but standing on his feet, makes way for the labourer -with no corporate rights to defend, no corporate power to invoke, no -property to cherish, no ambition to pursue, bent beneath the fear of -his masters, and the weight of a future without hope. No class in the -world has so beaten and crouching a history, and if the blazing ricks -in 1830 once threatened his rulers with the anguish of his despair, in -no chapter of that history could it have been written, ‘This parish is -at law with its squire.’ For the parish was no longer the community -that offered the labourer friendship and sheltered his freedom: it was -merely the shadow of his poverty, his helplessness, and his shame. -‘Go to an ale-house kitchen of an old enclosed country, and there you -will see the origin of poverty and poor-rates. For whom are they to be -sober? For whom are they to save? For the parish? If I am diligent, -shall I have leave to build a cottage? If I am sober, shall I have -land for a cow? If I am frugal, shall I have half an acre of potatoes? -You offer no motives; you have nothing but a parish officer and a -workhouse!--Bring me another pot--.’[138] - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[123] See the Evidence of Witnesses before the Committee on Commons -Inclosure of 1844. (Baily, land-agent): ‘General custom to give the -Lord of Manor 1/16th as compensation for his rights exclusive of the -value of minerals and of his rights as a common right owner.’ Another -witness (Coulson, a solicitor) defined the surface rights as ‘game and -stockage,’ and said that the proportion determined upon was the result -of a bargain beforehand. - -[124] ‘Many small proprietors have been seriously injured by being -obliged in pursuance of ill-framed private bills to enclose lands which -never repaid the expense.’ Marshall, _The Appropriation and Enclosure -of Commonable and Intermixed Lands_, 1801, p. 52. - -[125] COST OF ENCLOSURE.--The expenses of particular Acts varied very -much. Billingsley in his _Report on Somerset_ (p. 57) gives £3 an acre -as the cost of enclosing a lowland parish, £2, 10s. for an upland -parish. The enclosure of the 12,000 acre King’s Sedgmoor (_Ibid._, p. -196) came (with the subdivisions) to no less than £59,624, 4s. 8d., -or nearly £5 an acre. Stanwell Enclosure, on the other hand, came to -about 23s. an acre, and various instances given in the _Report for -Bedfordshire_ work out at about the same figure. When the allotments -to the tithe-owners and the lord of the manor were exempted, the sum -per acre would of course fall more heavily on the other allottees, -_e.g._ of Louth, where more than a third of the 1701 acres enclosed -were exempt. In many cases, of course, land was sold to cover expenses. -The cost of fencing allotments would also vary in different localities. -In Somerset, from 7s. 7d. to 8s. 7d. for 20 feet of quickset hedge was -calculated, in Bedfordshire, 10s. 6d. per pole. See also for expense -Hasbach, pp. 64, 65, and _General Report on Enclosures_, Appendix xvii. -Main Items:-- - - 1. Country solicitor’s fees for drawing up Bill and attending in town; - - 2. Attendance of witnesses at House of Commons and House of Lords to - prove that Standing Orders had been complied with; - - 3. Expenses of persons to get signatures of consents and afterwards to - attend at House of Commons to swear to them (it once cost from £70 to - £80 to get consent of principal proprietor); - - 4. Expense of Parliamentary solicitor, 20 gs., but more if opposition; - - 5. Expense of counsel if there was opposition; - - 6. Parliamentary fees, see p. 76. - - -[126] _Inquiry into the Advantages and Disadvantages resulting from -Bills of Enclosure_, 1780, p. 14. - -[127] Cf. Ashelworth, Cheshunt, Knaresborough. - -[128] Previous to enclosure there were twenty-five farmers: the land is -now divided among five or six persons only. - -[129] It was then confidently said that several poor persons actually -perished from want, and so great was the outcry that some of the -farmers were hissed in the public market at Bicester. - -[130] Dunkin’s _Oxfordshire_, pp. 2 and 3. - -[131] F. Moore, _Considerations on the Exorbitant Price of -Proprietors_, 1773, p. 22; quoted by Levy, p. 27. - -[132] _Essay on the Nature and Method of ascertaining the specific -Share of Proprietors upon the Inclosure of Common fields, with -observations on the inconveniences of common fields, etc._, p. 22. - -[133] The Kirton, Sutterton and Wigtoft (Lincs) Acts prescribed a -penalty for taking turf or sod after the passing of the Act, of £10, -and in default of payment imprisonment in the House of Correction with -hard labour for three months. - -[134] P. 235. - -[135] The only provision for the poor in the Maulden Act, (36 Geo. III. -c. 65) was a fuel allotment as a compensation for the ancient usage -of cutting peat or moor turf. The trustees (rector, churchwarden and -overseers) were to distribute the turf to poor families, and were to -pay any surplus from the rent of the herbage to the poor rates. - -[136] P. 240. - -[137] At St. Neots a gentleman complained to Arthur Young in 1791 that -in the enclosure which took place sixteen years before, ‘the poor were -ill-treated by having about half a rood given them in lieu of a _cow -keep_, the inclosure of which land costing more than they could afford, -they sold the lots at £5, the money was drank out at the ale-house, -and the men, spoiled by the habit, came, with their families to the -parish.’--_Annals of Agriculture_, vol. xvi. p. 482. - -[138] _Annals of Agriculture_, vol. xxxvi. p. 508. - - - - -CHAPTER VI - -THE LABOURER IN 1795 - - -In an unenclosed village, as we have seen, the normal labourer did not -depend on his wages alone. His livelihood was made up from various -sources. His firing he took from the waste, he had a cow or a pig -wandering on the common pasture, perhaps he raised a little crop on a -strip in the common fields. He was not merely a wage earner, receiving -so much money a week or a day for his labour, and buying all the -necessaries of life at a shop: he received wages as a labourer, but in -part he maintained himself as a producer. Further, the actual money -revenue of the family was not limited to the labourer’s earnings, for -the domestic industries that flourished in the village gave employment -to his wife and children. - -In an enclosed village at the end of the eighteenth century the -position of the agricultural labourer was very different. All his -auxiliary resources had been taken from him, and he was now a wage -earner and nothing more. Enclosure had robbed him of the strip that he -tilled, of the cow that he kept on the village pasture, of the fuel -that he picked up in the woods, and of the turf that he tore from the -common. And while a social revolution had swept away his possessions, -an industrial revolution had swept away his family’s earnings. To -families living on the scale of the village poor, each of these losses -was a crippling blow, and the total effect of the changes was to -destroy their economic independence. - -Some of these auxiliary resources were not valued very highly by -the upper classes, and many champions of enclosure proved to their -own satisfaction that the advantage, for example, of the right of -cutting fuel was quite illusory. Such writers had a very superficial -knowledge of the lot of the cottagers. They argued that it would be -more economical for the labourer to spend on his ordinary employment -the time he devoted to cutting fuel and turf, and to buy firing out of -his wages: an argument from the theory of the division of labour that -assumed that employment was constant. Fortunately we have, thanks to -Davies, a very careful calculation that enables us to form rather a -closer judgment. He estimates[139] that a man could cut nearly enough -in a week to serve his family all the year, and as the farmers will -give the carriage of it in return for the ashes, he puts the total -cost at 10s. a year, or a little more than a week’s wages.[140] If we -compare this with his accounts of the cost of fuel elsewhere, we soon -see how essential common fuel rights were to a labourer’s economy. -At Sidlesham in Surrey, for instance,[141] in the expenses of five -families of labourers, the fuel varies from £1, 15s. 0d. up to £4, 3s. -0d., with an average of £2, 8s. 0d. per family. It must be remembered, -too, that the sum of 10s. for fuel from the common is calculated on -the assumption that the man would otherwise be working; whereas, in -reality, he could cut his turf in slack times and in odd hours, when -there was no money to be made by working for some one else. - -There was another respect in which the resources of a labouring family -were diminished towards the end of the century, and this too was a -loss that the rich thought trifling. From time immemorial the labourer -had sent his wife and children into the fields to glean or leaze -after the harvest. The profits of gleaning, under the old, unimproved -system of agriculture, were very considerable. Eden says of Rode in -Northamptonshire, where agriculture was in a ‘wretched state, from the -land being in common-fields,’ that ‘several families will gather as -much wheat as will serve them for bread the whole year, and as many -beans as will keep a pig.’[142] From this point of view enclosure, with -its improved methods of agriculture, meant a sensible loss to the poor -of the parish, but even when there was less to be gleaned the privilege -was by no means unimportant. A correspondent in the _Annals of -Agriculture_,[143] writing evidently of land under improved cultivation -in Shropshire, estimates that a wife can glean three or four bushels. -The consumption of wheat, exclusive of other food, by a labourer’s -family he puts at half a bushel a week at least; the price of wheat at -13s. 6d. a bushel; the labourer’s wages at 7s. or 8s. To such a family -gleaning rights represented the equivalent of some six or seven weeks’ -wages. - -With the introduction of large farming these customary rights were -in danger. It was a nuisance for the farmer to have his fenced fields -suddenly invaded by bands of women and children. The ears to be -picked up were now few and far between, and there was a risk that -the labourers, husbands and fathers of the gleaners, might wink at -small thefts from the sheaves. Thus it was that customary rights, -which had never been questioned before, and seemed to go back to -the Bible itself, came to be the subject of dispute. On the whole -question of gleaning there is an animated controversy in the _Annals of -Agriculture_[144] between Capel Lofft,[145] a romantic Suffolk Liberal, -who took the side of the gleaners, and Ruggles,[146] the historian, -who argued against them. Capel Lofft was a humane and chivalrous -magistrate who, unfortunately for the Suffolk poor, was struck off the -Commission of the Peace a few years later, apparently at the instance -of the Duke of Portland, for persuading the Deputy-Sheriff to postpone -the execution of a girl sentenced to death for stealing, until he had -presented a memorial to the Crown praying for clemency. The chief -arguments on the side of the gleaners were (1) that immemorial custom -gave legal right, according to the maxim, _consuetudo angliae lex est -angliae communis_; (2) that Blackstone had recognised the right in -his _Commentaries_, basing his opinion upon Hale and Gilbert, ‘Also -it hath been said, that by the common law and customs of England the -poor are allowed to enter and glean on another’s ground after harvest -without being guilty of trespass, which humane provision seems borrowed -from the Mosaic law’ (iii. 212, 1st edition); (3) that in Ireland the -right was recognised by statutes of Henry VIII.’s reign, which modified -it; (4) that it was a custom that helped to keep the poor free from -degrading dependence on poor relief. It was argued, on the other hand, -by those who denied the right to glean, that though the custom had -existed from time immemorial, it did not rest on any basis of actual -right, and that no legal sanction to it had ever been explicitly given, -Blackstone and the authorities on whom he relied being too vague to be -considered final. Further, the custom was demoralising to the poor; -it led to idleness, ‘how many days during the harvest are lost by the -mother of a family and all her children, in wandering about from field -to field, to glean what does not repay them the wear of their cloathes -in seeking’; it led to pilfering from the temptation to take handfuls -from the swarth or shock; and it was deplorable that on a good-humoured -permission should be grafted ‘a legal claim, in its use and exercise so -nearly approaching to licentiousness.’ - -Whilst this controversy was going on, the legal question was decided -against the poor by a majority of judges in the Court of Common Pleas -in 1788. One judge, Sir Henry Gould,[147] dissented in a learned -judgment; the majority based their decision partly on the mischievous -consequences of the practice to the poor. The poor never lost a right -without being congratulated by the rich on gaining something better. -It did not, of course, follow from this decision that the practice -necessarily ceased altogether, but from that time it was a privilege -given by the farmer at his own discretion, and he could warn off -obnoxious or ‘saucy’ persons from his fields. Moreover, the dearer the -corn, and the more important the privilege for the poor, the more the -farmer was disinclined to largess the precious ears. Capel Lofft had -pleaded that with improved agriculture the gleaners could pick up so -little that that little should not be grudged, but the farmer found -that under famine prices this little was worth more to him than the -careless scatterings of earlier times.[148] - -The loss of his cow and his produce and his common and traditional -rights was rendered particularly serious to the labourer by the general -growth of prices. For enclosure which had produced the agrarian -proletariat, had raised the cost of living for him. The accepted -opinion that under enclosure England became immensely more productive -tends to obscure the truth that the agricultural labourer suffered in -his character of consumer, as well as in his character of producer, -when the small farms and the commons disappeared. Not only had he to -buy the food that formerly he had produced himself, but he had to buy -it in a rising market. Adam Smith admitted that the rise of price of -poultry and pork had been accelerated by enclosure, and Nathaniel -Kent laid stress on the diminution in the supply of these and other -small provisions. Kent has described the change in the position of -the labourers in this respect: ‘Formerly they could buy milk, butter, -and many other small articles in every parish, in whatever quantity -they are wanted. But since small farms have decreased in number, no -such articles are to be had; for the great farmers have no idea of -retailing such small commodities, and those who do retail them carry -them all to town. A farmer is even unwilling to sell the labourer who -works for him a bushel of wheat, which he might get ground for three -or four pence a bushel. For want of this advantage he is driven to the -mealman or baker, who, in the ordinary course of their profit, get -at least ten per cent. of them, upon this principal article of their -consumption.’[149] Davies, the author of _The Case of Labourers in -Husbandry_, thus describes the new method of distribution: ‘The great -farmer deals in a wholesale way with the miller: the miller with the -mealman: the mealman with the shopkeeper, of which last the poor man -buys his flour by the bushel. For neither the miller nor the mealman -will sell the labourer a less quantity than a sack of flour, under the -retail price of shops, and the poor man’s pocket will seldom allow of -his buying a whole sack at once.’[150] - -It is clear from these facts that it would have needed a very large -increase of wages to compensate the labourer for his losses under -enclosure. But real wages, instead of rising, had fallen, and fallen -far. The writer of the _Bedfordshire Report_ (p. 67), comparing the -period of 1730-50 with that of 1802-6 in respect of prices of wheat -and labour, points out that to enable him to purchase equal quantities -of bread in the second period and in the first, the pay of the day -labourer in the second period should have been 2s. a day, whereas it -was 1s. 6d. Nathaniel Kent, writing in 1796,[151] says that in the last -forty or fifty years the price of provisions had gone up by 60 per -cent., and wages by 25 per cent., ‘but this is not all, for the sources -of the market which used to feed him are in a great measure cut off -since the system of large farms has been so much encouraged.’ Professor -Levy estimates that wages rose between 1760 and 1813 by 60 per cent., -and the price of wheat by 130 per cent.[152] Thus the labourer who now -lived on wages alone earned wages of a lower purchasing power than the -wages which he had formerly supplemented by his own produce. Whereas -his condition earlier in the century had been contrasted with that of -Continental peasants greatly to his advantage in respect of quantity -and variety of food, he was suddenly brought down to the barest -necessities of life. Arthur Young had said a generation earlier that -in France bread formed nineteen parts in twenty of the food of the -people, but that in England all ranks consumed an immense quantity of -meat, butter and cheese.[153] We know something of the manner of life -of the poor in 1789 and 1795 from the family budgets collected by Eden -and Davies from different parts of the country.[154] These budgets -show that the labourers were rapidly sinking in this respect to the -condition that Young had described as the condition of the poor in -France. ‘Bacon and other kinds of meat form a very small part of their -diet, and cheese becomes a luxury.’ But even on the meagre food that -now became the ordinary fare of the cottage, the labourers could not -make ends meet. All the budgets tell the same tale of impoverished diet -accompanied by an overwhelming strain and an actual deficit. The normal -labourer, even with constant employment, was no longer solvent. - -If we wish to understand fully the predicament of the labourer, we -must remember that he was not free to roam over England, and try his -luck in some strange village or town when his circumstances became -desperate at home. He lived under the capricious tyranny of the old law -of settlement, and enclosure had made that net a much more serious fact -for the poor. The destruction of the commons had deprived him of any -career within his own village; the Settlement Laws barred his escape -out of it. It is worth while to consider what the Settlement Laws were, -and how they acted, and as the subject is not uncontroversial it will -be necessary to discuss it in some detail. - -Theoretically every person had one parish, and one only, in which he -or she had a settlement and a right to parish relief. In practice it -was often difficult to decide which parish had the duty of relief, -and disputes gave rise to endless litigation. From this point of view -eighteenth-century England was like a chessboard of parishes, on which -the poor were moved about like pawns. The foundation of the various -laws on the subject was an Act passed in Charles II.’s reign (13 and -14 Charles II. c. 12) in 1662. Before this Act each parish had, it -is true, the duty of relieving its own impotent poor and of policing -its own vagrants, and the infirm and aged were enjoined by law to -betake themselves to their place of settlement, which might be their -birthplace, or the place where they had lived for three years, but, as -a rule, ‘a poor family might, without the fear of being sent back by -the parish officers, go where they choose, for better wages, or more -certain employment.’[155] This Act of 1662 abridged their liberty, -and, in place of the old vagueness, established a new and elaborate -system. The Act was declared to be necessary in the preamble, because -‘by reason of some defects in the law, poor people are not restrained -from going from one parish to another, and therefore do endeavour to -settle themselves in those parishes where there is the best stock, -the largest commons or wastes to build cottages, and the most woods -for them to burn and destroy; and when they have consumed it, then -to another parish; and at last become rogues and vagabonds; to the -great discouragement of parishes to provide stock, when it is liable -to be devoured by strangers.’ By the Act any new-comer, within forty -days of arrival, could be ejected from a parish by an order from the -magistrates, upon complaint from the parish officers, and removed to -the parish where he or she was last legally settled. If, however, the -new-comer settled in a tenement of the yearly value of £10, or could -give security for the discharge of the parish to the magistrates’ -satisfaction, he was exempt from this provision. - -As this Act carried with it the consequence that forty days’ residence -without complaint from the parish officers gained the new-comer a -settlement, it was an inevitable temptation to Parish A to smuggle its -poor into Parish B, where forty days’ residence without the knowledge -of the parish officers would gain them a settlement. Fierce quarrels -broke out between the parishes in consequence. To compose these it -was enacted (1 James II. c. 17) that the forty days’ residence were -to be reckoned only after a written notice had been given to a parish -officer. Even this was not enough to protect Parish B, and by 3 William -and Mary, c. 11 (1691) it was provided that this notice must be read in -church, immediately after divine service, and then registered in the -book kept for poor’s accounts. Such a condition made it practically -impossible for any poor man to gain a settlement by forty days’ -residence, unless his tenement were of the value of £10 a year, but -the Act allowed an immigrant to obtain a settlement in any one of four -ways; (1) by paying the parish taxes; (2) by executing a public annual -office in the parish; (3) by serving an apprenticeship in the parish; -(4) by being hired for a year’s service in the parish. (This, however, -only applied to the unmarried.) In 1697 (8 and 9 William III. c. 30) -a further important modification of the settlement laws was made. -To prevent the arbitrary ejection of new-comers by parish officers, -who feared that the fresh arrival or his children might somehow or -other gain a settlement, it was enacted that if the new-comer brought -with him to Parish B a certificate from the parish officers of -Parish A taking responsibility for him, then he could not be removed -till he became actually chargeable. It was further decided by this -and subsequent Acts and by legal decisions, that the granting of a -certificate was to be left to the discretion of the parish officers and -magistrates, that the cost of removal fell on the certificating parish, -and that a certificate holder could only gain a settlement in a new -parish by renting a tenement of £10 annual value, or by executing a -parish office, and that his apprentice or hired servant could not gain -a settlement. - -In addition to these methods of gaining a settlement there were four -other ways, ‘through which,’ according to Eden, ‘it is probable -that by far the greater part of the labouring Poor ... are actually -settled.’[156] (1) Bastards, with some exceptions, acquired a -settlement by birth[157]; (2) legitimate children also acquired a -settlement by birth if their father’s, or failing that, their mother’s -legal settlement was not known; (3) women gained a settlement by -marriage; (4) persons with an estate of their own were irremovable, if -residing on it, however small it might be. - -Very few important modifications had been made in the laws of -Settlement during the century after 1697. In 1722 (9 George I. c. 7) it -was provided that no person was to obtain a settlement in any parish by -the purchase of any estate or interest of less value than £30, to be -‘bona fide paid,’ a provision which suggests that parishes had connived -at gifts of money for the purchase of estates in order to discard -their paupers: by the same Act the payment of the scavenger or highway -rate was declared not to confer a settlement. In 1784 (24 George III. -c. 6) soldiers, sailors and their families were allowed to exercise -trades where they liked, and were not to be removable till they became -actually chargeable; and in 1793 (33 George III. c. 54) this latter -concession was extended to members of Friendly Societies. None of these -concessions affected the normal labourer, and down to 1795 a labourer -could only make his way to a new village if his own village would give -him a certificate, or if the other village invited him. His liberty was -entirely controlled by the parish officers. - -How far did the Settlement Acts operate? How far did this body of -law really affect the comfort and liberty of the poor? The fiercest -criticism comes from Adam Smith, whose fundamental instincts rebelled -against so crude and brutal an interference with human freedom. ‘To -remove a man who has committed no misdemeanour, from a parish where -he chuses to reside, is an evident violation of natural liberty and -justice. The common people of England, however, so jealous of their -liberty, but, like the common people of most other countries, never -rightly understanding wherein it consists, have now, for more than a -century together, suffered themselves to be exposed to this oppression -without a remedy. Though men of reflexion, too, have sometimes -complained of the law of settlements as a public grievance; yet it has -never been the object of any general popular clamour, such as that -against general warrants, an abusive practice undoubtedly, but such -a one as was not likely to occasion any general oppression. There is -scarce a poor man in England, of forty years of age, I will venture to -say, who has not, in some part of his life, felt himself most cruelly -oppressed by this ill-contrived law of settlements.’[158] - -Adam Smith’s view is supported by two contemporary writers on the Poor -Law, Dr. Burn and Mr. Hay. Dr. Burn, who published a history of the -Poor Law in 1764, gives this picture of the overseer: ‘The office of -an Overseer of the Poor seems to be understood to be this, to keep an -extraordinary look-out to prevent persons coming to inhabit without -certificates, and to fly to the Justices to remove them: and if a man -brings a certificate, then to caution the inhabitants not to let him -a farm of £10 a year, and to take care to keep him out of all parish -offices.’[159] He further says that the parish officers will assist a -poor man in taking a farm in a neighbouring parish, and give him £10 -for the rent. Mr. Hay, M.P., protested in his remarks on the Poor Laws -against the hardships inflicted on the poor by the Laws of Settlement. -‘It leaves it in the breast of the parish officers whether they will -grant a poor person a certificate or no.’[160] Eden, on the other hand, -thought Adam Smith’s picture overdrawn, and he contended that though -there were no doubt cases of vexatious removal, the Laws of Settlement -were not administered in this way everywhere. Howlett also considered -the operation of the Laws of Settlement to be ‘trifling,’ and instanced -the growth of Sheffield, Birmingham, and Manchester as proof that there -was little interference with the mobility of labour. - -A careful study of the evidence seems to lead to the conclusion that -the Laws of Settlement were in practice, as they were on paper, a -violation of natural liberty; that they did not stop the flow of -labour, but that they regulated it in the interest of the employing -class. The answer to Howlett is given by Ruggles in the _Annals of -Agriculture_.[161] He begins by saying that the Law of Settlement -has made a poor family ‘of necessity stationary; and obliged them to -rest satisfied with those wages they can obtain where their legal -settlement happens to be; a restraint on them which ought to insure to -them wages in the parish where they must remain, more adequate to their -necessities, because it precludes them in a manner from bringing their -labour, the only marketable produce they possess, to the best market; -it is this restraint which has, in all manufacturing towns, been one -cause of reducing the poor to such a state of miserable poverty; for, -among the manufacturers, they have too frequently found masters who -have taken, and continue to take every advantage, which strict law will -give; of consequence, the prices of labour have been, in manufacturing -towns, in an inverse ratio of the number of poor settled in the place; -and the same cause has increased that number, by inviting foreigners, -in times when large orders required many workmen; the masters -themselves being the overseers, whose duty as parish officers has been -opposed by their interest in supplying the demand.’ In other words, -when it suited an employer to let fresh workers in, he would, _qua_ -overseer, encourage them to come with or without certificates; but when -they were once in and ‘settled’ he would refuse them certificates to -enable them to go and try their fortunes elsewhere, in parishes where -a certificate was demanded with each poor new-comer.[162] Thus it is -not surprising to find, from Eden’s _Reports_, that certificates are -never granted at Leeds and Skipton; seldom granted at Sheffield; not -willingly granted at Nottingham, and that at Halifax certificates are -not granted at present, and only three have been granted in the last -eighteen years. - -It has been argued that the figures about removals in different -parishes given by Eden in his second and third volumes show that the -Law of Settlement was ‘not so black as it has been painted.’[163] But -in considering the small number of removals, we must also consider the -large number of places where there is this entry, ‘certificates are -never granted.’ It needed considerable courage to go to a new parish -without a certificate and run the risk of an ignominious expulsion, and -though all overseers were not so strict as the one described by Dr. -Burn, yet the fame of one vexatious removal would have a far-reaching -effect in checking migration. It is clear that the law must have -operated in this way in districts where enclosures took away employment -within the parish. Suppose Hodge to have lived at Kibworth-Beauchamp in -Leicestershire. About 1780, 3600 acres were enclosed and turned from -arable to pasture; before enclosure the fields ‘were solely applied to -the production of corn,’ and ‘the Poor had then plenty of employment -in weeding, reaping, threshing, etc., and could also collect a great -deal of corn by gleaning.’[164] After the change, as Eden admits, a -third or perhaps a fourth of the number of hands would be sufficient -to do all the farming work required. Let us say that Hodge was one of -the superfluous two-thirds, and that the parish authorities refused him -a certificate. What did he do? He applied to the overseer, who sent -him out as a roundsman.[165] He would prefer to bear the ills he knew -rather than face the unknown in the shape of a new parish officer, -who might demand a certificate, and send him back with ignominy if he -failed to produce one. If he took his wife and family with him there -was even less chance of the demand for a certificate being waived.[166] -So at Kibworth-Beauchamp Hodge and his companions remained, in a state -of chronic discontent. ‘The Poor complain of hard treatment from the -overseers, and the overseers accuse the Poor of being saucy.’[167] - -Now, at first sight, it seems obvious that it would be to the interest -of a parish to give a poor man a certificate, if there were no market -for his labour at home, in order to enable him to go elsewhere and -make an independent living. This seems the reasonable view, but it -is incorrect. In the same way, it would seem obvious that a parish -would give slight relief to a person whose claim was in doubt rather -than spend ten times the amount in contesting that claim at law. In -point of fact, in neither case do we find what seems the reasonable -course adopted. Parishes spent fortunes in lawsuits. And to the parish -authorities it would seem that they risked more in giving Hodge a -certificate than in obliging him to stay at home, even if he could not -make a living in his native place; for he might, with his certificate, -wander a long way off, and then fall into difficulties, and have to -be fetched back at great expense, and the cost of removing him would -fall on the certificating parish. There is a significant passage in -the _Annals of Agriculture_[168] about the wool trade in 1788. ‘We -have lately had some hand-bills scattered about Bocking, I am told, -promising full employ to combers and weavers, that would migrate -to Nottingham. Even if they chose to try this offer; as probably a -parish certificate for such a distance would be refused; it cannot be -attempted.’ Where parishes saw an immediate prospect of getting rid -of their superfluous poor into a neighbouring parish with open fields -or a common, they were indeed not chary of granting certificates. At -Hothfield in Kent, for example, ‘full half of the labouring poor are -certificated persons from other parishes: the above-mentioned common, -which affords them the means of keeping a cow, or poultry, is supposed -to draw many Poor into the parish; certificated persons are allowed to -dig peat.’[169] - -In the Rules for the government of the Poor in the hundreds of Loes and -Wilford in Suffolk[170] very explicit directions are given about the -granting of certificates. In the first place, before any certificate -is granted the applicant must produce an examination taken before a -Justice of the Peace, showing that he belongs to one of the parishes -within the hundred. Granted that he has complied with this condition, -then, (1) if he be a labourer or husbandman no certificate will be -granted him out of the hundreds unless he belongs to the parish of -Kenton, and even in that case it is ‘not to exceed the distance of -three miles’; (2) if he be a tradesman, artificer, or manufacturer a -certificate may be granted to him out of the hundreds, but in no case -is it to exceed the distance of twenty miles from the parish to which -he belongs. The extent of the hundreds was roughly fourteen miles by -five and a half. - -Eden, describing the neighbourhood of Coventry, says: ‘In a country -parish on one side the city, chiefly consisting of cottages inhabited -by ribbon-weavers, the Rates are as high as in Coventry; whilst, in -another parish, on the opposite side, they do not exceed one-third of -the City Rate: this is ascribed to the care that is taken to prevent -manufacturers from settling in the parish.’[171] In the neighbourhood -of Mollington (Warwickshire and Oxon) the poor rates varied from 2s. -to 4s. in the pound. ‘The difference in the several parishes, it is -said, arises, in a great measure, from the facility or difficulty of -obtaining settlements: in several parishes, a fine is imposed on a -parishioner, who settles a newcomer by hiring, or otherwise, so that a -servant is very seldom hired for a year. Those parishes which have for -a long time been in the habit of using these precautions, are now very -lightly burthened with Poor. This is often the case, where farms are -large, and of course in few hands; while other parishes, not politic -enough to observe these rules, are generally burthened with an influx -of poor neighbours.’[172] Another example of this is Deddington (Oxon) -which like other parishes that possessed common fields suffered from -an influx of small farmers who had been turned out elsewhere, whereas -neighbouring parishes, possessed by a few individuals, were cautious in -permitting newcomers to gain settlements.[173] - -This practice of hiring servants for fifty-one weeks only was common: -Eden thought it fraudulent and an evasion of the law that would not -be upheld in a court of justice,[174] but he was wrong, for the 1817 -Report on the Poor Law mentions among ‘the measures, justifiable -undoubtedly in point of law, which are adopted very generally in many -parts of the kingdom, to defeat the obtaining a settlement, that -of hiring labourers for a less period than a year; from whence it -naturally and necessarily follows, that a labourer may spend the season -of his health and industry in one parish, and be transferred in the -decline of life to a distant part of the kingdom.’[175] We hear little -about the feelings of the unhappy labourers who were brought home by -the overseers when they fell into want in a parish which had taken -them in with their certificate, but it is not difficult to imagine -the scene. It is significant that the Act of 1795 (to which we shall -refer later), contained a provision that orders of removal were to be -suspended in cases where the pauper was dangerously ill. - -From the Rules for the Government of the Poor in the Hundreds of Loes -and Wilford, already alluded to, we learn some particulars of the -allowance made for the removal of paupers. Twenty miles was to be -considered a day’s journey; 2d. was to be allowed for one horse, and so -on in proportion per mile: but if the distance were over twenty miles, -or the overseer were obliged to be out all night, then 2s. was to be -allowed for him, 1s. for his horse, and 6d. for each pauper.[176] It is -improbable that such a scale of payment would induce the overseer to -look kindly on the causes of his trouble: much less would a pauper be a -_persona grata_ if litigation over his settlement had already cost the -parish large sums. - -It has been necessary to give these particulars of the Law of -Settlement for two reasons. In the first place, the probability of -expulsion, ‘exile by administrative order,’ as it has been called, -threw a shadow over the lives of the poor. In the second place, the -old Law of Settlement became an immensely more important social -impediment when enclosure and the great industrial inventions began to -redistribute population. When the normal labourer had common rights -and a strip and a cow, he would not wish to change his home on account -of temporary distress: after enclosure he was reduced to a position in -which his distress, if he stayed on in his own village, was likely to -be permanent. - - * * * * * - -The want and suffering revealed in Davies’ and Eden’s budgets came to -a crisis in 1795, the year of what may be called the revolt of the -housewives. That year, when exceptional scarcity sharpened the edge -of the misery caused by the changes we have summarised, was marked by -a series of food riots all over England, in which a conspicuous part -was taken by women. These disturbances are particularly interesting -from the discipline and good order which characterise the conduct -of the rioters. The rioters when they found themselves masters of -the situation did not use their strength to plunder the shops: they -organised distribution, selling the food they seized at what they -considered fair rates, and handing over the proceeds to the owners. -They did not rob: they fixed prices, and when the owner of provisions -was making for a dearer market they stopped his carts and made him sell -on the spot. At Aylesbury in March ‘a numerous mob, consisting chiefly -of women, seized on all the wheat that came to market, and compelled -the farmers to whom it belonged to accept of such prices as they -thought proper to name.’[177] In Devonshire the rioters scoured the -country round Chudleigh, destroying two mills: ‘from the great number -of petticoats, it is generally supposed that several men were dressed -in female attire.’[178] At Carlisle a band of women accompanied by boys -paraded the streets, and in spite of the remonstrances of a magistrate, -entered various houses and shops, seized all the grain, deposited it -in the public hall, and then formed a committee to regulate the price -at which it should be sold.[179] At Ipswich there was a riot over the -price of butter, and at Fordingbridge, a certain Sarah Rogers, in -company with other women started a cheap butter campaign. Sarah took -some butter from Hannah Dawson ‘with a determination of keeping it at -a reduced price,’ an escapade for which she was afterwards sentenced -to three months’ hard labour at the Winchester Assizes. ‘Nothing but -the age of the prisoner (being very young) prevented the Court from -passing a more severe sentence.’[180] At Bath the women actually -boarded a vessel, laden with wheat and flour, which was lying in the -river and refused to let her go. When the Riot Act was read they -retorted that they were not rioting, but were resisting the sending of -corn abroad, and sang God save the King. Although the owner took an -oath that the corn was destined for Bristol, they were not satisfied, -and ultimately soldiers were called in, and the corn was relanded and -put into a warehouse.[181] In some places the soldiers helped the -populace in their work of fixing prices: at Seaford, for example, they -seized and sold meat and flour in the churchyard, and at Guildford -they were the ringleaders in a movement to lower the price of meat -to 4d. a pound, and were sent out of the town by the magistrates in -consequence.[182] These spontaneous leagues of consumers sprang up in -many different parts, for in addition to the places already mentioned -there were disturbances of sufficient importance to be chronicled in -the newspapers, in Wiltshire, Suffolk, and Norfolk, whilst Eden states -that at Deddington the populace seized on a boat laden with flour, -but restored it on the miller’s promising to sell it at a reduced -price.[183] - -These riots are interesting from many points of view. They are a rising -of the poor against an increasing pressure of want, and the forces -that were driving down their standard of life. They did not amount to -a social rebellion, but they mark a stage in the history of the poor. -To the rich they were a signal of danger. Davies declared that if the -ruling classes learnt from his researches what was the condition of the -poor, they would intervene to rescue the labourers from ‘the abject -state into which they are sunk.’ Certainly the misery of which his -budgets paint the plain surface could not be disregarded. If compassion -was not a strong enough force to make the ruling classes attend to the -danger that the poor might starve, fear would certainly have made them -think of the danger that the poor might rebel. Some of them at any rate -knew their Virgil well enough to remember that in the description of -the threshold of Orcus, while ‘senectus’ is ‘tristis’ and ‘egestas’ is -‘turpis,’ ‘fames’ is linked with the more ominous epithet ‘malesuada.’ -If a proletariat were left to starve despair might teach bad habits, -and this impoverished race might begin to look with ravenous eyes on -the lot of those who lived on the spoils and sinecures of the State. -Thus fear and pity united to sharpen the wits of the rich, and to turn -their minds to the distresses of the poor. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[139] Davies, _The Case of Labourers in Husbandry_, p. 15. - -[140] In some instances it is reckoned as costing only 7s. _Ibid._, see -p. 185. - -[141] Davies, p. 181. - -[142] Eden, vol. ii. p. 547. - -[143] Vol. xxv. p. 488. - -[144] See _Annals of Agriculture_, vol. ix. pp. 13, 14, 165-167, -636-646, and vol. x. pp. 218-227. - -[145] Capel Lofft (1751-1824); follower of Fox; writer of poems and -translations from Virgil and Petrarch; patron of Robert Bloomfield, -author of _Farmer’s Boy_. Called by Boswell ‘This little David of -popular spirit.’ - -[146] Thomas Ruggles (1737-1813), author of _History of the Poor_, -published in 1793, Deputy-Lieutenant of Essex and Suffolk. - -[147] Sir Henry Gould, 1710-1794. - -[148] The _Annals of Agriculture_ (vol. xvii. p. 293) contains a -curious apology by a gleaner in 1791 to the owner of some fields, who -had begun legal proceedings against her and her husband. ‘Whereas -I, Margaret Abree, wife of Thomas Abree, of the city of New Sarum, -blacksmith, did, during the barley harvest, in the month of September -last, many times wilfully and maliciously go into the fields of, and -belonging to, Mr. Edward Perry, at Clarendon Park, and take with me my -children, and did there leaze, collect, and carry away a quantity of -barley.... Now we do hereby declare, that we are fully convinced of the -illegality of such proceedings, and that no person has a right to leaze -any sort of grain, or to come on any field whatsoever, without the -consent of the owner; and are also truly sensible of the obligation we -are under to the said Edward Perry for his lenity towards us, inasmuch -as the damages given, together with the heavy cost incurred, would have -been much greater than we could possibly have discharged, and must -have amounted to perpetual imprisonment, as even those who have least -disapproved of our conduct, would certainly not have contributed so -large a sum to deliver us from the legal consequences of it. And we do -hereby faithfully promise never to be guilty of the same, or any like -offence in future. Thomas Abree, Margaret Abree. Her + Mark.’ It is -interesting to compare with this judge-made law of England the Mosaic -precept: ‘And when ye reap the harvest of your land, thou shalt not -make clean riddance of the corners of thy field when thou reapest, -neither shalt thou gather any gleaning of thy harvest: thou shalt leave -them unto the poor, and to the stranger’ (Leviticus xxiii. 22). - -[149] Kent, _Hints_, p. 238. - -[150] P. 34; cf. Marshall on the Southern Department, p. 9, ‘Yorkshire -bacon, generally of the worst sort, is retailed to the poor from little -chandlers’ shops at an advanced price, bread in the same way.’ - -[151] _Notes on the Agriculture of Norfolk_, p. 165. - -[152] _Large and Small Holdings_, p. 11. - -[153] Young’s _Political Arithmetic_, quoted by Lecky, vol. vii. p. 263 -note. - -[154] See Appendix B for six of these budgets. - -[155] Ruggles, _Annals of Agriculture_, vol. xiv. p. 205. - -[156] Eden, vol. i. p. 180. - -[157] The parish might have the satisfaction of punishing the mother by -a year’s hard labour (7 James I. c. 4, altered in 1810), but could not -get rid of the child. - -[158] _Wealth of Nations_, vol. i. p. 194. - -[159] Quoted by Eden, vol. i. p. 347. - -[160] See _Ibid._, p. 296. - -[161] Vol. xiv. pp. 205, 206. - -[162] An example of a parish where the interests of the employer and -of the parish officers differed is given in the _House of Commons -Journal_ for February 4, 1788, when a petition was presented from Mr. -John Wilkinson, a master iron-founder at Bradley, near Bilston, in -the parish of Wolverhampton. The petitioner states ‘that the present -Demand for the Iron of his Manufacture and the Improvement of which -it is capable, naturally encourage a very considerable Extension of -his Works, but that the Experience he has had of the vexatious Effect, -as well as of the constantly increasing Amount of Poor Rates to which -he is subject, has filled him with Apprehensions of final Ruin to his -Establishment; and that the Parish Officers ... are constantly alarming -his Workmen with Threats of Removal to the various Parishes from which -the Necessity of employing skilful Manufacturers has obliged him to -collect them.’ He goes on to ask that his district shall be made -extra-parochial to the poor rates. - -[163] Hasbach, pp. 172-3. - -[164] Eden, vol. ii. p. 384. - -[165] See p. 148. - -[166] The unborn were the special objects of parish officers’ dread. -At Derby the persons sent out under orders of removal are chiefly -pregnant girls. (Eden, vol. ii. p. 126.) Bastards (see above) with -some exceptions gained a settlement in their birthplace, and Hodge’s -legitimate children might gain one too if there was any doubt about the -place of their parents’ settlements. - -[167] Eden, vol. ii. p. 383. - -[168] Vol. ix. p. 660. - -[169] Eden, vol. ii. p. 288. In considering the accounts of the state -of the commons, it must be remembered that the open parishes thus paid -the penalty of enclosure elsewhere. _Colluvies vicorum._ But these open -fields and commons were becoming rapidly more scarce. - -[170] _Ibid._, p. 691. - -[171] Eden, vol. iii. p. 743. - -[172] _Ibid._ - -[173] _Ibid._, vol. ii. p. 591. - -[174] _Ibid._, p. 654, _re_ Litchfield. ‘In two or three small parishes -in this neighbourhood, which consist of large farms, there are very -few poor: the farmers, in order to prevent the introduction of poor -from other parishes, hire their servants for fifty-one weeks only. I -conceive, however, that this practice would be considered, by a court -of justice, as fraudulent, and a mere evasion in the master; and that -a servant thus hired, if he remained the fifty-second week with his -master, on a fresh contract, would acquire a settlement in the parish.’ - -[175] See _Annual Register_, 1817, p. 298. - -[176] Eden, vol. ii. p. 689. - -[177] _Reading Mercury_, April 20, 1795; also _Ipswich Journal_, March -28. - -[178] _Ipswich Journal_, April 18. - -[179] _Ibid._, August 8. - -[180] _Ibid._ - -[181] _Ibid._ - -[182] _Reading Mercury_, April 27, 1795. - -[183] Eden, vol. ii. p. 591. - - - - -CHAPTER VII - -THE REMEDIES OF 1795 - - -The collapse of the economic position of the labourer was the result of -many causes, and in examining the various remedies that were proposed -we shall see that they touch in turn on the several deficiencies -that produced this failure. The governing fact of the situation was -that the labourer’s wages no longer sufficed to provide even a bare -and comfortless existence. It was necessary then that his wages -should be raised, or that the effects of the rise in prices should -be counteracted by changes of diet and manner of life, or that the -economic resources which formerly supplemented his earnings should in -some way be restored, unless he was to be thrown headlong on to the -Poor Law. We shall see what advice was given and what advice was taken -in these momentous years. - - -DIET REFORM - -A disparity between income and expenditure may be corrected by -increasing income or by reducing expenditure. Many of the upper classes -thought that the second method might be tried in this emergency, and -that a judicious change of diet would enable the labourer to face the -fall of wages with equanimity. The solution seemed to lie in the simple -life. Enthusiasts soon began to feel about this proposal the sort of -excitement that Robinson Crusoe enjoyed when discovering new resources -on his island: an infinite vista of kitchen reform beckoned to their -ingenious imaginations: and many of them began to persuade themselves -that the miseries of the poor arose less from the scantiness of their -incomes than from their own improvidence and unthriftiness.[184] -The rich set an example in the worst days by cutting off pastry and -restricting their servants to a quartern loaf a week each.[185] It was -surely not too much in these circumstances to ask the poor to adapt -their appetites to the changed conditions of their lives, and to shake -off what Pitt called ‘groundless prejudices’ to mixed bread of barley, -rye, and wheat.[186] Again oatmeal was a common food in the north, why -should it not be taken in the south? If no horses except post horses -and perhaps cavalry horses were allowed oats, there would be plenty for -the poor.[187] A Cumberland labourer with a wife and family of five -was shown by Eden[188] to have spent £7, 9s. 2d. a year on oatmeal and -barley, whereas a Berkshire labourer with a wife and four children at -home spent £36, 8s. a year on wheaten bread alone.[189] Clearly the -starving south was to be saved by the introduction of cheap cereals. - -Other proposals of this time were to break against the opposition of -the rich. This broke against the opposition of the poor. All attempts -to popularise substitutes failed, and the poorer the labourer grew -the more stubbornly did he insist on wheaten bread. ‘Even household -bread is scarcely ever used: they buy the finest wheaten bread, and -declare (what I much doubt), that brown bread disorders their bowels. -Bakers do not now make, as they formerly did, bread of unsifted flour: -at some farmers’ houses, however, it is still made of flour, as it -comes from the mill; but this practice is going much into disuse. -20 years ago scarcely any other than brown bread was used.’[190] At -Ealing, when the charitable rich raised a subscription to provide -the distressed poor with brown bread at a reduced price, many of the -labourers thought it so coarse and unpalatable that they returned the -tickets though wheaten bread was at 1s. 3d. the quartern loaf.[191] -Correspondent after correspondent to the _Annals of Agriculture_ notes -and generally deplores the fact that the poor, as one of them phrases -it, are too fine-mouthed to eat any but the finest bread.[192] Lord -Sheffield, judging from his address to Quarter Sessions at the end of -1795, would have had little mercy on such grumblers. After explaining -that in his parish relief was now given partly in potatoes, partly in -wheaten flour, and partly in oaten or barley flour, he declared: ‘If -any wretches should be found so lost to all decency, and so blind as -to revolt against the dispensations of providence, and to refuse the -food proposed for their relief, the parish officers will be justified -in refusing other succour, and may be assured of support from the -magistracy of the county.’[193] - -To the rich, the reluctance of the labourer to change his food came -as a painful surprise. They had thought of him as a roughly built and -hardy animal, comparatively insensible to his surroundings, like the -figure Lucretius drew of the primeval labourer: - - Et majoribus et solidis magis ossibus intus - Fundatum, et validis aptum per viscera nervis; - Nec facile ex aestu, nec frigore quod caperetur, - Nec novitate cibi, nec labi corporis ulla. - -They did not know that a romantic and adventurous appetite is one of -the blessings of an easy life, and that the more miserable a man’s -condition, and the fewer his comforts, the more does he shrink from -experiments of diet. They were therefore surprised and displeased to -find that labourers rejected soup, even soup served at a rich man’s -table, exclaiming, ‘This is washy stuff, that affords no nourishment: -we will not be fed on meal, and chopped potatoes like hogs.’[194] The -dislike of change of food was remarked by the Poor Law Commissioners -in 1834, who observed that the labourer had acquired or retained ‘with -the moral helplessness some of the other peculiarities of a child. He -is often disgusted to a degree which other classes scarcely conceive -possible, by slight differences in diet; and is annoyed by anything -that seems to him strange and new.’[195] - -Apart from the constitutional conservatism of the poor there were good -reasons for the obstinacy of the labourers. Davies put one aspect -of the case very well. ‘If the working people of other countries are -content with bread made of rye, barley, or oats, have they not milk, -cheese, butter, fruits, or fish, to eat with that coarser bread? And -was not this the case of our own people formerly, when these grains -were the common productions of our land, and when scarcely wheat -enough was grown for the use of the nobility and principal gentry? -Flesh-meat, butter, and cheese, were then at such moderate prices, -compared with the present prices, that poor people could afford to -use them in common. And with a competent quantity of these articles, -a coarser kind of bread might very well satisfy the common people of -any country.’[196] He also states that where land had not been so -highly improved as to produce much wheat, barley, oatmeal, or maslin -bread were still in common use. Arthur Young himself realised that the -labourer’s attachment to wheaten bread was not a mere superstition of -the palate. ‘In the East of England I have been very generally assured, -by the labourers who work the hardest, that they prefer the finest -bread, not because most pleasant, but most contrary to a lax habit of -body, which at once prevents all _strong_ labour. The quality of the -bread that is eaten by those who have meat, and perhaps porter and -port, is of very little consequence indeed; but to the hardworking -man, who nearly lives on it, the case is abundantly different.’[197] -Fox put this point in a speech in the House of Commons in the debate -on the high price of corn in November 1795. He urged gentlemen, who -were talking of mixed bread for the people, ‘not to judge from any -experiment made with respect to themselves. I have myself tasted bread -of different sorts, I have found it highly pleasant, and I have no -doubt it is exceedingly wholesome. But it ought to be recollected -how very small a part the article of bread forms of the provisions -consumed by the more opulent classes of the community. To the poor it -constitutes, the chief, if not the sole article of subsistence.’[198] -The truth is that the labourer living on bread and tea had too delicate -a digestion to assimilate the coarser cereals, and that there was, -apart from climate and tradition, a very important difference between -the labourer in the north and the labourer in the south, which the -rich entirely overlooked. That difference comes out in an analysis of -the budgets of the Cumberland labourer and the Berkshire labourer. -The Cumberland labourer who spent only £7, 9s. on his cereals, spent -£2, 13s. 7d. a year on milk. The Berkshire labourer who spent £36, 8s. -on wheaten bread spent 8s. 8d. a year on milk. The Cumberland family -consumed about 1300 quarts in the year, the Berkshire family about two -quarts a week. The same contrast appears in all budget comparisons -between north and south. A weaver at Kendal (eight in the family) -spends £12, 9s. on oatmeal and wheat, and £5, 4s. on milk.[199] An -agricultural labourer at Wetherall in Cumberland (five in family) -spends £7, 6s. 9d. on cereals and £2, 13s. 4d. on milk.[200] On the -other side we have a labourer in Shropshire (four in family) spending -£10, 8s. on bread (of wheat rye), and only 8s. 8d. on milk,[201] and -a cooper at Frome, Somerset (seven in family) spending £45, 10s. on -bread, and about 17s. on milk.[202] These figures are typical.[203] - -Now oatmeal eaten with milk is a very different food from oatmeal taken -alone, and it is clear from a study of the budgets that if oatmeal -was to be acclimatised in the south, it was essential to increase -the consumption of milk. But the great difference in consumption -represented not a difference of demand, but a difference of supply. The -southern labourer went without milk not from choice but from necessity. -In the days when he kept cows he drank milk, for there was plenty of -milk in the village. After enclosure, milk was not to be had. It may -be that more cows were kept under the new system of farming, though -this is unlikely, seeing that at this time every patch of arable was -a gold-mine, but it is certainly true that milk became scarce in the -villages. The new type of farmer did not trouble to sell milk at home. -‘Farmers are averse to selling milk; while poor persons who have only -one cow generally dispose of all they can spare.’[204] The new farmer -produced for a larger market: his produce was carried away, as Cobbett -said, to be devoured by ‘the idlers, the thieves, the prostitutes who -are all taxeaters in the wens of Bath and London.’ Davies argued, when -pleading for the creation of small farms, ‘The occupiers of these small -farms, as well as the occupiers of Mr. _Kent’s_ larger cottages, would -not think much of retailing to their poorer neighbours a little corn or -a little milk, as they might want, which the poor can now seldom have -at all, and never but as a great favour from the rich farmers.’[205] -Sir Thomas Bernard mentioned among the advantages of the Winchilsea -system the ‘no inconsiderable convenience to the inhabitants of that -neighbourhood, that these cottagers are enabled to supply them, at a -very moderate price, with milk, cream, butter, poultry, pig-meat, and -veal: articles which, in general, are not worth the farmer’s attention, -and which, therefore, are supplied by speculators, who greatly enhance -the price on the public.’[206] Eden[207] records that in Oxfordshire -the labourers bitterly complain that the farmers, instead of selling -their milk to the poor, give it to their pigs, and a writer in the -Reports of the Society for Bettering the Condition of the Poor says -that this was a practice not unusual in many parts of England.[208] - -The scarcity of milk must be considered a contributory cause of the -growth of tea-drinking, a habit that the philanthropists and Cobbett -agreed in condemning. Cobbett declared in his _Advice to Young -Men_[209] that ‘if the slops were in fashion amongst ploughmen and -carters, we must all be starved; for the food could never be raised. -The mechanics are half ruined by them.’ In the Report on the Poor -presented to the Hants Quarter Sessions in 1795,[210] the use of tea is -described as ‘a vain present attempt to supply to the spirits of the -mind what is wanting to the strength of the body; but in its lasting -effects impairing the nerves, and therein equally injuring both the -body and the mind.’ Davies retorted on the rich who found fault with -the extravagance of the poor in tea-drinking, by pointing out that it -was their ‘last resource.’ ‘The topic on which the declaimers against -the extravagance of the poor display their eloquence with most success, -is _tea-drinking_. Why should such people, it is asked, indulge in a -luxury which is only proper for their betters; and not rather content -themselves with milk, which is in every form wholesome and nourishing? -Were it true that poor people could every where procure so excellent -an article as milk, there would be then just reason to reproach them -for giving the preference to the miserable infusion of which they -are so fond. But it is not so. Wherever the poor can get milk, do -they not gladly use it? And where they cannot get it, would they not -gladly exchange their tea for it?[211]... Still you exclaim, _Tea is -a luxury_. If you mean fine hyson tea, sweetened with refined sugar, -and softened with cream, I readily admit it to be so. But _this_ is -not the tea of the poor. Spring water, just coloured with a few leaves -of the lowest-priced tea, and sweetened with the brownest sugar, is -the luxury for which you reproach them. To this they have recourse -from mere necessity: and were they now to be deprived of this, they -would immediately be reduced to bread and water. Tea-drinking is not -the cause, but the consequence, of the distresses of the poor.’[212] -We learn from the _Annals of Agriculture_ that at Sedgefield in -Durham[213] many of the poor declared that they had been driven to -drinking tea from not being able to procure milk.[214] - -No doubt the scarcity of milk helped to encourage a taste that was -very quickly acquired by all classes in England, and not in England -only, for, before the middle of the eighteenth century, the rapid -growth of tea-drinking among the poor in the Lowlands of Scotland was -affecting the revenue very seriously.[215] The English poor liked tea -for the same reason that Dr. Johnson liked it, as a stimulant, and the -fact that their food was monotonous and insipid made it particularly -attractive. Eden shows that by the end of the eighteenth century it -was in general use among poor families, taking the place both of beer -and of milk, and excluding the substitutes that Eden wished to make -popular. It seems perhaps less surprising to us than it did to him, -that when the rich, who could eat or drink what they liked, enjoyed -tea, the poor thought bread and tea a more interesting diet than bread -and barley water. - -A few isolated attempts were made to remedy the scarcity of milk,[216] -which had been caused by enclosure and the consolidation of farms. -Lord Winchilsea’s projects have already been described. In the Reports -of the Society for bettering the Condition of the Poor, there are two -accounts of plans for supplying milk cheap, one in Staffordshire, where -a respectable tradesman undertook to keep a certain number of cows -for the purpose in a parish where ‘the principal number of the poorer -inhabitants were destitute of all means of procuring milk for their -families,’[217] another at Stockton in Durham, where the bishop made -it a condition of the lease of a certain farm, that the tenant should -keep fifteen cows whose milk was to be sold at 1/2d. a pint to the -poor.[218] Mr. Curwen again, the Whig M.P. for Carlisle, had a plan -for feeding cows in the winter with a view to providing the poor with -milk.[219] - -There was another way in which the enclosures had created an -insuperable obstacle to the popularising of ‘cheap and agreeable -substitutes’ for expensive wheaten bread. The Cumberland housewife -could bake her own barley bread in her oven ‘heated with heath, furze -or brush-wood, the expence of which is inconsiderable’[220]; she had -stretches of waste land at her door where the children could be sent -to fetch fuel. ‘There is no comparison to the community,’ wrote a -contributor to the _Annals of Agriculture_,[221] ‘whether good wheat, -rye, turnips, etc., are not better than brakes, goss, furz, broom, and -heath,’ but as acre after acre in the midlands and south was enclosed, -the fuel of the poor grew ever scantier. When the common where he had -gleaned his firing was fenced off, the poor man could only trust for -his fuel to pilferings from the hedgerows. To the spectator, furze from -the common might seem ‘gathered with more loss of time than it appears -to be worth’[222]; to the labourer whose scanty earnings left little -margin over the expense of bread alone, the loss of firing was not -balanced by the economy of time.[223] - -Insufficient firing added to the miseries caused by insufficient -clothes and food. An ingenious writer in the _Annals of -Agriculture_[224] suggested that the poor should resort to the stables -for warmth, as was the practice in the duchy of Milan. Fewer would -suffer death from want of fire in winter, he argued, and also it would -be a cheap way of helping them, as it cost no fuel, for cattle were so -obliging as to dispense warmth from their persons for nothing. But even -this plan (which was not adopted) would not have solved the problem -of cooking. The labourer might be blamed for his diet of fine wheaten -bread and for having his meat (when he had any) roasted instead of made -into soup, but how could cooking be done at home without fuel? ‘No -doubt, a labourer,’ says Eden,[225] ‘whose income was only £20 a year, -would, in general, act wisely in substituting hasty-pudding, barley -bread, boiled milk, and potatoes, for bread and beer; but in most parts -of this county, he is debarred not more by prejudice, than by local -difficulties, from using a diet that requires cooking at home. The -extreme dearness of fuel in Oxfordshire, compels him to purchase his -dinner at the baker’s; and, from his unavoidable consumption of bread, -he has little left for cloaths, in a country where warm cloathing is -most essentially wanted.’ In Davies’ more racy and direct language, ‘it -is but little that in the present state of things the belly can spare -for the back.’[226] Davies also pointed out the connection between dear -fuel and the baker. ‘Where fuel is scarce and dear, poor people find it -cheaper to buy their bread of the baker than to bake for themselves.... -But where fuel abounds, and costs only the trouble of cutting and -carrying home, there they may save something by baking their own -bread.’[227] Complaints of the pilfering of hedgerows were very common. -‘Falstaff says “his soldiers found linen on every hedge”; and I fear -it is but too often the case, that labourers’ children procure fuel -from the same quarter.’[228] There were probably many families like -the two described in Davies[229] who spent nothing on fuel, which -they procured by gathering cow-dung, and breaking their neighbours’ -hedges.’[230] - -In some few cases, the benevolent rich did not content themselves with -attempting to enforce the eighth commandment, but went to the root of -the matter, helping to provide a substitute for their hedgerows. An -interesting account of such an experiment is given in the _Reports -on the Poor_,[231] by Scrope Bernard. ‘There having been several -prosecutions at the Aylesbury Quarter Sessions, for stealing fuel last -winter, I was led to make particular inquiries, respecting the means -which the poor at Lower Winchendon had of providing fuel. I found that -there was no fuel then to be sold within several miles of the place; -and that, amid the distress occasioned by the long frost, a party of -cottagers had joined in hiring a person, to fetch a load of pit-coal -from Oxford, for their supply. In order to encourage this disposition -to acquire fuel in an honest manner,’ a present was made to all this -party of as much coal again as they had already purchased carriage -free. Next year the vestry determined to help, and with the aid of -private donations coal was distributed at 1s. 4d. the cwt. (its cost -at the Oxford wharf), and kindling faggots at 1d. each. ‘It had been -said that the poor would not find money to purchase them, when they -were brought: instead of which out of 35 poor families belonging to -the parish, 29 came with ready money, husbanded out of their scanty -means, to profit with eagerness of this attention to their wants; and -among them a person who had been lately imprisoned by his master for -stealing wood from his hedges.’ Mr. Bernard concludes his account with -some apt remarks on the difficulties of combining honesty with grinding -poverty.[232] - - -MINIMUM WAGE - -The attempts to reduce cottage expenditure were thus a failure. We must -now describe the attempts to increase the cottage income. There were -two ways in which the wages of the labourers might have been raised. -One way, the way of combination, was forbidden by law. The other way -was the fixing of a legal minimum wage in relation to the price of -food. This was no new idea, for the regulation of wages by law was a -venerable English institution, as old as the Statute of Edward III. The -most recent laws on the subject were the famous Act of Elizabeth, an -Act of James I., and an Act of George II. (1747). The Act of Elizabeth -provided that the Justices of the Peace should meet annually and assess -the wages of labourers in husbandry and of certain other workmen. -Penalties were imposed on all who gave or took a wage in excess of -this assessment. The Act of James I. was passed to remove certain -ambiguities that were believed to have embarrassed the operation of the -Act of Elizabeth, and among other provisions imposed a penalty on all -who gave a wage below the wage fixed by the magistrates. The Act of -1747[233] was passed because the existing laws were ‘insufficient and -defective,’ and it provided that disputes between masters and men could -be referred to the magistrates, ‘although no rate or assessment of -wages has been made that year by the Justices of the shire where such -complaint shall be made.’ - -Two questions arise on the subject of this legislation, Was it -operative? In whose interests was it administered, the interests of the -employers or the interests of the employed? As to the first question -there is a good deal of negative evidence to show that during the -eighteenth century these laws were rarely applied. An example of an -assessment (an assessment declaring a maximum) made by the Lancashire -magistrates in 1725, was published in the _Annals of Agriculture_ in -1795[234] as an interesting curiosity, and the writer remarks: ‘It -appears from Mr. Ruggles’ excellent _History of the Poor_ that such -orders must in general be searched for in earlier periods, and a -friend of ours was much surprised to hear that any magistrates in the -present century would venture on so bold a measure.’[235] - -As to the second question, at the time we are discussing it was -certainly taken for granted that this legislation was designed to keep -wages down. So implicitly was this believed that the Act of James I. -which provided penalties in cases where wages were given below the -fixed rate was generally ignored, and speakers and writers mentioned -only the Act of Elizabeth, treating it as an Act for fixing a maximum. -Whitbread, for example, when introducing a Bill in 1795 to fix a -minimum wage, with which we deal later, argued that the Elizabethan -Act ought to be repealed because it fixed a maximum. This view of the -earlier legislation was taken by Fox, who supported Whitbread’s Bill, -and by Pitt who opposed it. Fox said of the Act of Elizabeth that -‘it secured the master from a risk which could but seldom occur, of -being charged exorbitantly for the quantity of service; but it did not -authorise the magistrate to protect the poor from the injustice of a -grinding and avaricious master, who might be disposed to take advantage -of their necessities, and undervalue the rate of their services.’[236] -Pitt said that Whitbread ‘imagined that he had on his side of the -question the support of experience in this country, and appealed to -certain laws upon the statute-book in confirmation of his proposition. -He did not find himself called upon to defend the principle of these -statutes, but they were certainly introduced for purposes widely -different from the object of the present bill. They were enacted to -guard the industry of the country from being checked by a general -combination among labourers; and the bill now under consideration was -introduced solely for the purpose of remedying the inconveniences which -labourers sustain from the disproportion existing between the price of -labour and the price of living.’[237] Only one speaker in the debates, -Vansittart, afterwards Chancellor of the Exchequer, took the view -that legislation was not needed because the Act of James I. gave the -magistrates the powers with which Whitbread sought to arm them. - -It was natural that many minds searching after a way of escape from the -growing distress of the labourers, at a time when wages had not kept -pace with prices, should have turned to the device of assessing wages -by law in accordance with the price of provisions. If prices could -not be assimilated to wages, could not wages be assimilated to prices? -Nathaniel Kent, no wild visionary, had urged employers to raise wages -in proportion to the increase of their profits, but his appeal had -been without effect. But the policy of regulating wages according to -the price of food was recommended in several quarters, and it provoked -a great deal of discussion. Burke, whose days were closing in, was -tempted to take part in it, and he put an advertisement into the papers -announcing that he was about to publish a series of letters on the -subject. The letters never appeared, but Arthur Young has described the -visit he paid to Beaconsfield at this time and Burke’s rambling thunder -about ‘the absurdity of regulating labour and the mischief of our -poor laws,’ and Burke’s published works include a paper _Thoughts and -Details on Scarcity_, presented to Pitt in November 1795. In this paper -Burke argued that the farmer was the true guardian of the labourer’s -interest, in that it would never be profitable to him to underpay the -labourer: an uncompromising application of the theory of the economic -man, which was not less superficial than the Jacobins’ application of -the theory of the natural man. - -In October 1795 Arthur Young sent out to the various correspondents of -the Board of Agriculture a circular letter containing this question -among others: ‘It having been recommended by various quarter-sessions, -that the price of labour should be regulated by that of bread corn, -have the goodness to state what you conceive to be the advantages or -disadvantages of such a system?’[238] Arthur Young was himself in -favour of the proposal, and the Suffolk magistrates, at a meeting which -he attended on the 12th of October, ordered: ‘That the Members for this -county be requested by the chairman to bring a bill into parliament, so -to regulate the price of labour, that it may fluctuate with the average -price of bread corn.’[239] Most of the replies were adverse, but the -proposal found a warm friend in Mr. Howlett, the Vicar of Dunmow, -who put into his answer some of the arguments which he afterwards -developed in a pamphlet published in reply to Pitt’s criticisms of -Whitbread’s Bill.[240] Howlett argued that Parliament had legislated -with success to prevent combinations of workmen, and as an example he -quoted the Acts of 8 George III., which had made the wages of tailors -and silk-weavers subject to the regulations of the magistrates. It was -just as necessary and just as practicable to prevent a combination of -a different kind, that of masters. ‘Not a combination indeed formally -drawn up in writing and sanctioned under hand and seal, a combination, -however, as certain (the result of contingencies or providential -events) and as fatally efficacious as if in writing it had filled five -hundred skins of parchment: a combination which has operated for many -years with a force rapidly increasing, a combination which has kept -back the hire of our labourers who have reaped down our fields, and -has at length torn the clothes from their backs, snatched the food -from their mouths, and ground the flesh from their bones.’ Howlett, it -will be seen, took the same view as Thelwall, that the position of the -labourers was deteriorating absolutely and relatively. He estimated -from a survey taken at Dunmow that the average family should be taken -as five; if wages had been regulated on this basis, and the labourer -had been given per head no more than the cost of a pauper’s keep in the -workhouse sixty years ago, he would have been very much better off in -1795. He would himself take a higher standard. In reply to the argument -that the policy of the minimum wage would deprive the labourers of all -spur and incentive he pointed to the case of the London tailors; they -at any rate displayed plenty of life and ingenuity, and nobody could -say that the London fashions did not change fast enough. Employers -would no more raise wages without compulsion than they would make good -roads without the aid of turnpikes or the prescription of statutes -enforced by the magistrates. His most original contribution to the -discussion was the argument that the legal regulation should not be -left to the unassisted judgment of the magistrates: ‘it should be -the result of the clearest, fullest, and most accurate information, -and at length be judiciously adapted to each county, hundred, or -district in every quarter of the kingdom.’ Howlett differed from some -of the supporters of a minimum wage, in thinking that wages should be -regulated by the prices of the necessaries of life, not merely by that -of bread corn. - -The same policy was advocated by Davies in _The Case of Labourers -in Husbandry_.[241] Davies argued that if the minimum only were -fixed, emulation would not be discouraged, for better workmen would -both be more sure of employment and also obtain higher wages. He -suggested that the minimum wage should be fixed by calculating the -sum necessary to maintain a family of five, or by settling the scale -of day wages by the price of bread alone, treating the other expenses -as tolerably steady. He did not propose to regulate the wages of any -but day labourers, nor did he propose to deal with piecework, although -piecework had been included in the Act of Elizabeth. He further -suggested that the regulation should be in force only for half the -year, from November to May, when the labourers’ difficulties pressed -hardest upon them. Unfortunately he coupled with his minimum wage -policy a proposal to give help from the rates to families with more -than five members, if the children were unable to earn. - -But the most interesting of all the declarations in favour of a minimum -wage was a declaration from labourers. A correspondent sent the -following advertisement to the _Annals of Agriculture_:-- - - ‘The following is an advertisement which I cut out of a Norwich - newspaper:-- - - “DAY LABOURERS - - “At a numerous meeting of the day labourers of the little parishes - of Heacham, Snettisham, and Sedgford, this day, 5th November, in the - parish church of Heacham, in the county of Norfolk, in order to take - into consideration the best and most peaceable mode of obtaining a - redress of all the severe and peculiar hardships under which they - have for many years so patiently suffered, the following resolutions - were unanimously agreed to:--1st, That--_The labourer is worthy of - his hire_, and that the mode of lessening his distresses, as hath - been lately the fashion, by selling him flour under the market - price, and thereby rendering him an object of a parish rate, is - not only an indecent insult on his lowly and humble situation (in - itself sufficiently mortifying from his degrading dependence on the - caprice of his employer) but a fallacious mode of relief, and every - way inadequate to a radical redress of the manifold distresses of - his calamitous state. 2nd, That the price of labour should, at all - times, be proportioned to the price of wheat, which should invariably - be regulated by the average price of that necessary article of life; - and that the price of labour, as specified in the annexed plan, is - not only well calculated to make the labourer happy without being - injurious to the farmer, but it appears to us the only rational means - of securing the permanent happiness of this valuable and useful class - of men, and, if adopted in its full extent, will have an immediate and - powerful effect in reducing, if it does not entirely annihilate, that - disgraceful and enormous tax on the public--the POOR RATE. - - “_Plan of the Price of Labour proportionate to the Price of Wheat_ - - per last. per day. - - When wheat shall be 14l. the price of labour shall be 1s. 2d. - „ „ 16 „ „ „ 1s. 4d. - „ „ 18 „ „ „ 1s. 6d. - „ „ 20 „ „ „ 1s. 8d. - „ „ 22 „ „ „ 1s. 10d. - „ „ 24 „ „ „ 2s. 0d. - „ „ 26 „ „ „ 2s. 2d. - „ „ 28 „ „ „ 2s. 4d. - „ „ 30 „ „ „ 2s. 6d. - „ „ 32 „ „ „ 2s. 8d. - „ „ 34 „ „ „ 2s. 10d. - „ „ 36 „ „ „ 3s. 0d. - - And so on, according to this proportion. - - “3rd, That a petition to parliament to regulate the price of labour, - conformable to the above plan, be immediately adopted; and that - the day labourers throughout the county be invited to associate - and co-operate in this necessary application to parliament, as a - peaceable, legal, and probable mode of obtaining relief; and, in doing - this, no time should be lost, as the petition must be presented before - the 29th January 1796. - - “4th, That one shilling shall be paid into the hands of the treasurer - by every labourer, in order to defray the expences of advertising, - attending on meetings, and paying counsel to support their petition in - parliament. - - “5th, That as soon as the sense of the day labourers of this county, - or a majority of them, shall be made known to the clerk of the - meeting, a general meeting shall be appointed, in some central town, - in order to agree upon the best and easiest mode of getting the - petition signed: when it will be requested that one labourer, properly - instructed, may be deputed to represent two or three contiguous - parishes, and to attend the above intended meeting with a list of - all the labourers in the parishes he shall represent, and pay their - respective subscriptions; and that the labourer, so deputed, shall - be allowed two shillings and six pence a day for his time, and two - shillings and six pence a day for his expences. - - “6th, That Adam Moore, clerk of the meeting, be directed to have the - above resolutions, with the names of the farmers and labourers who - have subscribed to and approved them, advertised in one Norwich and - one London paper; when it is hoped that the above plan of a petition - to parliament will not only be approved and immediately adopted by the - day labourers of this county, but by the day labourers of every county - in the kingdom. - - “7th, That all letters, _post paid_, addressed to Adam Moore, - labourer, at Heacham, near Lynn, Norfolk, will be duly noticed.”[242] - -This is one of the most interesting and instructive documents of the -time. It shows that the labourers, whose steady decline during the -next thirty years we are about to trace, were animated by a sense of -dignity and independence. Something of the old spirit of the commoners -still survived. But there is no sequel to this incident. This great -scheme of a labourers’ organisation vanishes: it passes like a flash of -summer lightning. What is the explanation? The answer is to be found, -we suspect, in the Treason and Sedition Acts that Pitt was carrying -through Parliament in this very month. Under those Acts no language -of criticism was safe, and fifty persons could not meet except in the -presence of a magistrate, who had power to extinguish the meeting and -arrest the speaker. Those measures inflicted even wider injury upon the -nation than Fox and Sheridan and Erskine themselves believed. - - * * * * * - -The policy of a minimum wage was brought before Parliament in the -winter of 1795, in a Bill introduced by Samuel Whitbread, one of -the small band of brave Liberals who had stood by Fox through the -revolutionary panic. Whitbread is a politician to whom history has done -less than justice, and he is generally known only as an implacable -opponent of the Peninsular War. That opposition he contrived to -conduct, as we know from the _Creevey Papers_, in such a way as to -win and keep the respect of Wellington. Whitbread’s disapproval of -that war, of which Liberals like Holland and Lord John Russell, who -took Fox’s view of the difference of fighting revolutions by the aid -of kings and fighting Napoleon by the aid of peoples, were strong -supporters, sprang from his compassion for the miseries of the English -poor. His most notable quality was his vivid and energetic sympathy; -he spent his life in hopeless battles, and he died by his own hand of -public despair. The Bill he now introduced was the first of a series of -proposals designed for the rescue of the agricultural labourers. It was -backed by Sheridan and Grey,[243] and the members for Suffolk. - -The object of the Bill[244] was to explain and amend the Act of -Elizabeth, which empowered Justices of the Peace at or within six weeks -of every General Quarter Sessions held at Easter to regulate the wages -of labourers in husbandry. The provisions of the Bill were briefly as -follows. At any Quarter Sessions the justices could agree, if they -thought fit, to hold a General Sessions for carrying into execution -the powers given them by the Act. If they thought good to hold such -a General Sessions, the majority of them could ‘rate and appoint the -wages and fix and declare the hours of working of all labourers in -husbandry, by the day, week, month or year, and with beer or cyder or -without, respect being had to the value of money and the plenty or -scarcity of the time.’ This rate was to be printed and posted on the -church doors, and was to hold good till superseded by another made in -the same way. The rate was not to apply to any tradesman or artificer, -nor to any labourer whose diet was wholly provided by his employer, nor -to any labourer _bona fide_ employed on piecework, nor to any labourer -employed by the parish. The young, the old, and the infirm were also -exempted from the provisions of the Act. It was to be lawful ‘to -contract with and pay to any male person, under the age of ----[245] -years, or to any man who from age or infirmity or any other incapacity -shall be unable to do the ordinary work of a labouring man, so much as -he shall reasonably deserve for the work which he shall be able to do -and shall do.’ In case of complaint the decision as to the ability of -the labourer rested with the justices. - -With the above exceptions no labourer was to be hired under the -appointed rates, and any contract for lower wages was void. If -convicted of breaking the law, an employer was to be fined; if he -refused to pay the fine, his goods were to be distrained on, and -if this failed to produce enough to pay the expenses, he could be -committed to the common gaol or House of Correction. A labourer with -whom an illegal contract was made was to be a competent witness. - -The first discussions of the Bill were friendly in tone. On 25th -November Whitbread asked for leave to bring it in. Sir William Young, -Lechmere, Charles Dundas, and Sir John Rous all spoke with sympathy -and approval. The first reading debate took place on 9th December, and -though Whitbread had on that occasion the powerful support of Fox, -who, while not concealing his misgivings about the Bill, thought the -alternative of leaving the great body of the people to depend on the -charity of the rich intolerable, an ominous note was struck by Pitt and -Henry Dundas on the other side. The Bill came up for second reading -on 12th February 1796.[246] Whitbread’s opening speech showed that he -was well aware that he would have to face a formidable opposition. -Pitt rose at once after the motion had been formally seconded by one -of the Suffolk members, and assailed the Bill in a speech that made -an immediate and overwhelming impression. He challenged Whitbread’s -argument that wages had not kept pace with prices; he admitted the -hardships of the poor, but he thought the picture overdrawn, for -their hardships had been relieved by ‘a display of beneficence never -surpassed at any period,’ and he argued that it was a false remedy -to use legislative interference, and to give the justices the power -to regulate the price of labour, and to endeavour ‘to establish by -authority what would be much better accomplished by the unassisted -operation of principles.’ This led naturally to an attack on the -restrictions on labour imposed by the Law of Settlement, and a -discussion of the operation of the Poor Laws, and the speech ended, -after a glance at the great possibilities of child employment, with -the promise of measures which should restore the original purity of -the Poor Laws, and make them a blessing instead of the curse they had -become. The speech seems to have dazzled the House of Commons, and few -stood up against the general opinion that Whitbread’s proposal was -dangerous, and that the whole question had better be left to Pitt. -Lechmere, a Worcestershire member, was one of them, and he made an -admirable little speech in which he tried to destroy the general -illusion that the poor could not be unhappy in a country where the -rich were so kind. Whitbread himself defended his Bill with spirit -and ability, showing that Pitt had not really found any substantial -argument against it, and that Pitt’s own remedies were all hypothetical -and distant. Fox reaffirmed his dislike of compulsion, but restated -at the same time his opinion that Whitbread’s Bill, though not an -ideal solution, was the best solution available of evils which pressed -very hardly on the poor and demanded attention. General Smith pointed -out that one of Pitt’s remedies was the employment of children, and -warned him that he had himself seen some of the consequences of the -unregulated labour of children ‘whose wan and pale complexions bespoke -that their constitutions were already undermined, and afforded but -little promise of a robust manhood, or of future usefulness to the -community.’ But the general sense of the House was reflected in the -speeches of Buxton, Coxhead and Burdon, whose main argument was that -the poor were not in so desperate a plight as Whitbread supposed, and -that whatever their condition might be, Pitt was the most likely person -to find such remedies as were practicable and effective. The motion for -second reading was negatived without a division. The verdict of the -House was a verdict of confidence in Pitt. - -Four years later (11th February 1800) Whitbread repeated his -attempt.[247] He asked for leave to bring in a Bill to explain and -amend the Act of Elizabeth, and said that he had waited for Pitt to -carry out his promises. He was aware of the danger of overpaying -the poor, but artificers and labourers should be so paid as to be -able to keep themselves and their families in comfort. He saw no -way of securing this result in a time of distress except the way he -had suggested. Pitt rose at once to reply. He had in the interval -brought in and abandoned his scheme of Poor Law Reform. He had spent -his only idea, and he was now confessedly without any policy at all. -All that he could contribute was a general criticism of legislative -interference, and another discourse on the importance of letting labour -find its own level. He admitted the fact of scarcity, but he believed -the labouring class seldom felt fewer privations. History scarcely -provides a more striking spectacle of a statesman paying himself with -soothing phrases in the midst of a social cyclone. The House was more -than ever on his side. All the interests and instincts of class were -disguised under the gold dust of Adam Smith’s philosophy. Sir William -Young, Buxton, Wilberforce, Ellison, and Perceval attacked the Bill. -Whitbread replied that charity as a substitute for adequate wages had -mischievous effects, for it took away the independence of the poor, -‘a consideration as valuable to the labourer as to the man of high -rank,’ and as for the argument that labour should be left to find -its own level, the truth surely was that labour found its level by -combinations, and that this had been found to be so great an evil that -Acts of Parliament had been passed against it. - -The date of the second reading of the Bill was hotly disputed:[248] the -friends of the measure wanted it to be fixed for 28th April, so that -Quarter Sessions might have time to deliberate on the proposals; the -opponents of the measure suggested 25th February, on the grounds that -it was dangerous to keep the Bill in suspense so long: ‘the eyes of all -the labouring poor,’ said Mr. Ellison, ‘must in that interval be turned -upon it.’ The opponents won their point, and when the Bill came up for -second reading its fate was a foregone conclusion. Whitbread made one -last appeal, pleading the cause of the labourers bound to practical -serfdom in parishes where the landowner was an absentee, employed at -starvation wages by farmers, living in cottages let to them by farmers. -But his appeal was unheeded: Lord Belgrave retorted with the argument -that legislative interference with agriculture could not be needed, -seeing that five hundred Enclosure Bills had passed the House during a -period of war, and the Bill was rejected. - -So died the policy of the minimum wage. Even later it had its -adherents, for, in 1805, Sir Thomas Bernard criticised it[249] as -the ‘favourite idea of some very intelligent and benevolent men.’ He -mentioned as a _reductio ad absurdum_ of the scheme, that had the rate -of wages been fixed by the standard of 1780 when the quartern loaf was -6d. and the labourer’s pay 9s. a week, the result in 1800 when the -quartern loaf cost 1s. 9d. would have been a wage of £1, 11s. 6d. - -When Whitbread introduced his large and comprehensive Poor Law Bill in -1807,[250] the proposal for a minimum wage was not included. - -From an examination of the speeches of the time and of the answers -to Arthur Young’s circular printed in the _Annals of Agriculture_, -it is evident that there was a genuine fear among the opponents of -the measure that if once wages were raised to meet the rise in prices -it would not be easy to reduce them when the famine was over. This -was put candidly by one of Arthur Young’s correspondents: ‘it is -here judged more prudent to indulge the poor with bread corn at a -reduced price than to raise the price of wages.’[251] The policy of -a minimum wage was revived later by a society called ‘The General -Association established for the Purpose of bettering the Condition of -the Agricultural and Manufacturing Labourers.’ Three representatives of -this society gave evidence before the Select Committee on Emigration in -1827, and one of them pointed out as an illustration of the injustice -with which the labourers were treated, that in 1825 the wages of -agricultural labourers were generally 9s. a week, and the price of -wheat 9s. a bushel, whereas in 1732 the wages of agricultural labour -were fixed by the magistrates at 6s. a week, and the price of wheat was -2s. 9d. the bushel. In support of this comparison he produced a table -from _The Gentleman’s Magazine_ of 1732:-- - - Wheat in February 1732, 23s. to 25s. per quarter. - Wheat in March 1732, 20s. to 22s. per quarter. - -Yearly wages appointed by the Justices to be taken by the servants in -the county of Kent, not exceeding the following sums: - - Head ploughman waggoner or seedsman £8 0 0 - His mate 4 0 0 - Best woman 3 0 0 - Second sort of woman 2 0 0 - Second ploughman 6 0 0 - His mate 3 0 0 - Labourers by day in summer 1 2 - In winter 1 0 - - -JUSTICES OF GLOUCESTER - - Head servant in husbandry 5 0 0 - Second servant in husbandry 4 0 0 - Driving boy under fourteen 1 0 0 - Head maid servant or dairy servant 2 10 0 - Mower in harvest without drink per day 1 2 - With drink 1 0 - Other day labourers with drink 1 0 - From corn to hay harvest with drink 0 8 - Mowers and reapers in corn harvest with drink 1 0 - Labourers with diet 0 4 - Without diet or drink 0 10 - Carpenter wheelwright or mason without drink 1 2 - With drink 1 0 - -One of the witnesses pointed out that there were five millions of -labourers making with their families eight millions, and that if the -effect of raising their wages was to increase their expenditure by a -penny a day, there would be an increase of consumption amounting to -twelve millions a year. These arguments made little impression on the -Committee, and the representations of the society were dismissed with -contempt: ‘It is from an entire ignorance of the universal operation of -the principle of Supply and Demand regulating the rate of wages that -all these extravagant propositions are advanced, and recommendations -spread over the country which are so calculated to excite false -hopes, and consequently discontent, in the minds of the labouring -classes. Among the most extravagant are those brought forward by the -Society established for the purpose of bettering the condition of the -manufacturing and agricultural labourers.’ - - -POOR LAW REFORM - -Pitt, having secured the rejection of Whitbread’s Minimum Wage Bill in -1796, produced his own alternative: Poor Law Reform. It is necessary to -state briefly what were the Poor Law arrangements at the time of his -proposals. - -The Poor Law system reposed on the great Act of Elizabeth (1601), by -which the State had acknowledged and organised the duty to the poor -which it had taken over from the Church. The parish was constituted -the unit, and overseers, unsalaried and nominated by the J.P.’s, were -appointed for administering relief, the necessary funds being obtained -by a poor rate. Before 1722 a candidate for relief could apply either -to the overseers or to the magistrate. By an Act passed in that year, -designed to make the administration stricter, application was to be -made first to the overseer. If the overseer rejected the application -the claimant could submit his case to a magistrate, and the magistrate, -after hearing the overseer’s objection, could order that relief -should be given. There were, however, a number of parishes in which -applications for relief were made to salaried guardians. These were -the parishes that had adopted an Act known as Gilbert’s Act, passed in -1782.[252] In these parishes,[253] joined in incorporations, the parish -overseers were not abolished, for they still had the duty of collecting -and accounting for the rates, but the distribution was in the hands -of paid guardians, one for each parish, appointed by the justices -out of a list of names submitted by the parishioners. In each set of -incorporated parishes there was a ‘Visitor’ appointed by the justices, -who had practically absolute power over the guardians. If the guardians -refused relief, the claimant could still appeal, as in the case of the -overseers, to the justices. - -Such was the parish machinery. The method of giving relief varied -greatly, but the main distinction to be drawn is between (1) out -relief, or a weekly pension of a shilling or two at home; and (2) -indoor relief, or relief in a workhouse, or poorhouse, or house of -industry. Out relief was the earlier institution, and it held its own -throughout the century, being the only form of relief in many parishes. -Down to 1722 parishes that wished to build a workhouse had to get a -special Act of Parliament. In that year a great impetus was given to -the workhouse movement by an Act[254] which authorised overseers, with -the consent of the vestry, to start workhouses, or to farm out the -poor, and also authorised parishes to join together for this purpose. -If applicants for relief refused to go into the workhouse, they -forfeited their title to any relief at all. A great many workhouses -were built in consequence of this Act: in 1732 there were stated to be -sixty in the country, and about fifty in the metropolis.[255] - -Even if the applicant for relief lived in a parish which had built or -shared in a workhouse, it did not follow that he was forced into it. -He lost his title to receive relief outside, but his fate would depend -on the parish officers. In the parishes which had adopted Gilbert’s -Act the workhouse was reserved for the aged, for the infirm, and for -young children. In most parishes there was out relief as well as indoor -relief: in some parishes outdoor relief being allowed to applicants -of a certain age or in special circumstances. In some parishes all -outdoor relief had stopped by 1795.[256] There is no doubt that -in most parishes the workhouse accommodation would have been quite -inadequate for the needs of the parish in times of distress. It was -quite common to put four persons into a single bed. - -The workhouses were dreaded by the poor,[257] not only for the dirt -and disease and the devastating fevers that swept through them,[258] -but for reasons that are intelligible enough to any one who has read -Eden’s descriptions. Those descriptions show that Crabbe’s picture is -no exaggeration:-- - - ‘Theirs is yon House that holds the Parish-Poor, - Whose walls of mud scarce bear the broken door; - There, where the putrid vapours, flagging, play, - And the dull wheel hums doleful through the day;-- - There Children dwell who know no Parents’ care; - Parents, who know no Children’s love, dwell there! - Heart-broken Matrons on their joyless bed, - Forsaken Wives and Mothers never wed; - Dejected Widows with unheeded tears, - And crippled Age with more than childhood fears; - The Lame, the Blind, and, far the happiest they! - The moping Idiot and the Madman gay. - Here too the Sick their final doom receive, - Here brought, amid the scenes of grief, to grieve, - Where the loud groans from some sad chamber flow, - Mixt with the clamours of the crowd below; - Here sorrowing, they each kindred sorrow scan, - And the cold charities of man to man: - Whose laws indeed for ruin’d Age provide, - And strong compulsion plucks the scrap from pride; - But still that scrap is bought with many a sigh, - And pride embitters what it can’t deny.’[259] - -A good example of this mixture of young and old, virtuous and vicious, -whole and sick, sane and mad, is given in Eden’s catalogue of the -inmates of Epsom Workhouse in January 1796.[260] There were eleven -men, sixteen women, and twenty-three children. We read of J. H., aged -forty-three, ‘always ... somewhat of an idiot, he is now become -quite a driveller’; of E. E., aged sixty-two, ‘of a sluggish, stupid -character’; of A. M., aged twenty-six, ‘afflicted with a leprosy’; of -R. M., aged seventy-seven, ‘worn out and paralytic’; of J. R., aged -seventeen, who has contracted so many disorderly habits that decent -people will not employ him. It is interesting to notice that it was -not till 1790 that the Justices of the Peace were given any power of -inspecting workhouses. - -In 1796, before Pitt’s scheme was brought in, the Act of 1722, which -had been introduced to stiffen the administration of the Poor Laws, -was relaxed. An Act,[261] of which Sir William Young was the author, -abolished the restriction of right to relief to persons willing to -enter the workhouse, and provided that claimants could apply for relief -directly to a magistrate. The Act declares that the restrictions had -been found ‘inconvenient and oppressive.’ It is evidence, of course, of -the increasing pressure of poverty. - -But to understand the arrangements in force at this time, and also the -later developments, we must glance at another feature of the Poor Law -system. The Poor Laws were a system of employment as well as a system -of relief. The Acts before 1722 are all called Acts for the Relief -of the Poor: the Act of 1722 speaks of ‘the Settlement, Employment -and Relief.’ That Act empowered parishes to farm out the poor to -an employer. Gilbert’s Act of 1782 provided that in the parishes -incorporated under that Act the guardians were not to send able-bodied -poor to the poorhouse, but to find work for them or maintain them until -work was found: the guardian was to take the wage and provide the -labourer with a maintenance. Thus there grew up a variety of systems -of public employment: direct employment of paupers on parish work: -the labour rate system, or the sharing out of the paupers among the -ratepayers: the roundsman system by which pauper labour was sold to the -farmers.[262] - -This was the state of things that Pitt proposed to reform. His general -ideas on Poor Law reform were put before the House of Commons in the -debate on the second reading of Whitbread’s Bill.[263] He thought that -persons with large families should be treated as entitled to relief, -that persons without a settlement, falling into want, should not be -liable to removal at the caprice of the parish officer, that Friendly -Societies should be encouraged, and that Schools of Industry should be -established. ‘If any one would take the trouble to compute the amount -of all the earnings of the children who are already educated in this -manner, he would be surprised, when he came to consider the weight -which their support by their own labours took off the country, and the -addition which, by the fruits of their toil, and the habits to which -they were formed, was made to its internal opulence.’ On 22nd December -of that year, in a new Parliament, he asked for leave to bring in a -Bill for the better Support and Maintenance of the Poor. He said the -subject was too extensive to be discussed at that stage, that he only -proposed that the Bill should be read a first and second time and -sent to a committee where the blanks could be filled up, and the Bill -printed before the holidays, ‘in order that during the interval of -Parliament it might be circulated in the country and undergo the most -serious investigation.’[264] Sheridan hinted that it was unfortunate -for the poor that Pitt had taken the question out of Whitbread’s hands, -to which Pitt replied that any delay in bringing forward his Bill was -due to the time spent on taking advice. On 28th February of the next -year (1797), while strangers were excluded from the Gallery, there -occurred what the _Parliamentary Register_ calls ‘a conversation upon -the farther consideration of the report of the Poor’s Bill,’ in which -nobody but Pitt defended the Bill, and Sheridan and Joliffe attacked -it. With this its Parliamentary history ends. - -The main features of the Bill were these.[265] Schools of Industry were -to be established in every parish or group of parishes. These schools -were to serve two purposes. First, the young were to be trained there -(this idea came, of course, from Locke). Every poor man with more -than two children who were not self-supporting, and every widow with -more than one such child, was to be entitled to a weekly allowance in -respect of each extra child. Every allowance child who was five years -or over was to be sent to the School of Industry, unless his parent -could instruct and employ him, and the proceeds of his work was to go -towards the upkeep of the school. Secondly, grown-up people were to -be employed there. The authorities were to provide ‘a proper stock of -hemp, flax, silk, cotton, wool, iron, leather or other materials, and -also proper tools and implements for the employment of the poor,’ and -they were empowered to carry on all trades under this Act, ‘any law or -custom to the contrary notwithstanding.’ Any person lawfully settled -in a parish was entitled to be employed in the school; any person -residing in a parish, able and willing to be employed at the usual -rates, was entitled to be employed there when out of work. Poor persons -refusing to be employed there were not to be entitled to relief. The -authorities might either pay wages at a rate fixed by the magistrates, -or they might let the employed sell their products and merely repay the -school for the material, or they might contract to feed them and take -a proportion of their receipts. If the wages paid in the school were -insufficient, they were to be supplemented out of the rates. - -The proposals for outside relief were briefly and chiefly these. A -person unable to earn the full rate of wages usually given might -contract with his employer to work at an inferior rate, and have the -balance between his earnings and an adequate maintenance made up by -the parish. Money might be advanced under certain circumstances for -the purchase of a cow or other animal, if it seemed likely that such a -course would enable the recipient to maintain himself without the help -of the parish. The possession of property up to thirty pounds was not -to disqualify a person for relief. A parochial insurance fund was to be -created, partly from private subscriptions and partly from the rates. -No person was to be removed from a parish on account of relief for -temporary disability or sickness. - -The most celebrated and deadly criticism came from Bentham, who is -often supposed to have killed the Bill. Some of his objections are -captious and eristical, and he is a good deal less than just to the -good elements of the scheme. Pitt deserves credit for one statesmanlike -discovery, the discovery that it is bad policy to refuse to help a -man until he is ruined. His cow-money proposal was also conceived in -the right spirit if its form was impracticable. But the scheme as -a whole was confused and incoherent, and it deserved the treatment -it received. It was in truth a huge patchwork, on which the ideas -of living and dead reformers were thrown together without order -or plan. As a consequence, its various parts did not agree. It is -surprising that the politician who had attacked Whitbread’s Bill as an -interference with wages could have included in his scheme the proposal -to pay wages in part out of rates. The whole scheme, though it would -have involved a great expenditure, would have produced very much the -same result as the Speenhamland system, by virtue of this clause. Pitt -showed no more judgment or foresight than the least enlightened of -County Justices in introducing into a scheme for providing relief, and -dealing with unemployment, a proposal that could only have the effect -of reducing wages. The organisation of Schools of Industry as a means -of dealing with unemployment has sometimes been represented as quite -a new proposal, but it was probably based on the suggestion made by -Fielding in 1753 in his paper, ‘A proposal for making an effectual -provision for the poor, for amending their morals, and for rendering -them useful members of society.’ Fielding proposed the erection of a -county workhouse, which was to include a house of correction. He drew -up a sharp and drastic code which would have authorised the committal -to his County House, not only of vagrants, but of persons of low degree -found harbouring in an ale-house after ten o’clock at night. But the -workhouse was not merely to be used as a penal settlement, it was -to find work for the unemployed. Any person who was unable to find -employment in his parish could apply to the minister or churchwardens -for a pass, and this pass was to give him the right to claim admission -to the County House where he was to be employed. The County House was -also to be provided with instructors who could teach native and foreign -manufactures to the inmates. Howlett, one of Pitt’s critics, was -probably right in thinking that Pitt was reviving this scheme. - -The Bill excited general opposition. Bentham’s analysis is the most -famous of the criticisms that have survived, but in some senses -his opposition was less serious than the dismay of magistrates and -ratepayers. Hostile petitions poured into the House of Commons from -London and from all parts of the country; among others there were -petitions from Shrewsbury, Oswestry, Worcester, Bristol, Lincoln, -Carmarthen, Bedford, Chester and Godalming.[266] Howlett attacked the -scheme on the ground of the danger of parish jobbery and corruption. -Pitt apparently made no attempt to defend his plan, and he surrendered -it without a murmur. We are thus left in the curious and disappointing -position of having before us a Bill on the most important subject of -the day, introduced and abandoned by the Prime Minister without a -word or syllable in its defence. Whitbread observed[267] four years -later that the Bill was brought in and printed, but never brought -under the discussion of the House. Pitt’s excuse is significant: ‘He -was, as formerly, convinced of its propriety; but many objections had -been started to it by those whose opinion he was bound to respect. -Inexperienced himself in country affairs, and in the condition of the -poor, he was diffident of his own opinion, and would not press the -measure upon the attention of the House.’ - -Poor Law Reform was thus abandoned, but two attempts were made, at the -instance of Pitt, one of them with success, to soften the brutalities -of the Law of Settlement. Neither proposal made it any easier to gain -a settlement, and Pitt very properly declared that they did not go -nearly far enough. Pitt had all Adam Smith’s just hatred of these -restrictions, and in opposing Whitbread’s Bill for a minimum wage he -pointed to ‘a radical amendment’ of the Law of Settlement as the true -remedy. He was not the formal author of the Act of 1795, but it may -safely be assumed that he was the chief power behind it. This Act[268] -provided that nobody was to be removeable until he or she became -actually chargeable to the parish. The preamble throws light on the -working of the Settlement laws. It declares that ‘Many industrious -poor persons, chargeable to the parish, township, or place where they -live, merely from want of work there, would in any other place where -sufficient employment is to be had, maintain themselves and families -without being burthensome to any parish, township, or place; and -such poor persons are for the most part compelled to live in their -own parishes, townships, or places, and are not permitted to inhabit -elsewhere, under pretence that they are likely to become chargeable to -the parish, township, or place into which they go for the purpose of -getting employment, although the labour of such poor persons might, in -many instances, be very beneficial to such parish, township, or place.’ -The granting of certificates is thus admitted to have been ineffectual. -The same Act provided that orders of removal were to be suspended in -cases where the pauper was dangerously ill, a provision that throws -some light on the manner in which these orders had been executed, and -that no person should gain a settlement by paying levies or taxes, in -respect of any tenement of a yearly value of less than ten pounds.[269] - -From this time certificates were unnecessary, and if a labourer moved -from Parish A to Parish B he was no longer liable to be sent back at -the caprice of Parish B’s officers until he became actually chargeable, -but, of course, if from any cause he fell into temporary distress, for -example, if he were out of work for a few weeks, unless he could get -private aid from ‘the opulent,’ he had to return to his old parish. -An attempt was made to remedy this state of things by Mr. Baker who, -in March 1800, introduced a Bill[270] to enable overseers to assist -the deserving but unsettled poor in cases of temporary distress. He -explained that the provisions of the Bill would apply only to men who -could usually keep themselves, but from the high cost of provisions had -to depend on parochial aid. He found a powerful supporter in Pitt, who -argued that if people had enriched a parish with their industry, it was -unfair that owing to temporary pressure they should be removed to a -place where they were not wanted, and that it was better for a parish -to suffer temporary inconvenience than for numbers of industrious men -to be rendered unhappy and useless. But in spite of Pitt’s unanswerable -case, the Bill, which was denounced by Mr. Buxton as oppressive to -the landed interest, by Lord Sheffield as ‘subversive of the whole -economy of the country,’ by Mr. Ellison as submerging the middle ranks, -and by Sir William Pulteney as being a ‘premium for idleness and -extravagance,’ was rejected by thirty votes to twenty-three.[271] - - -ALLOTMENTS - -Another policy that was pressed upon the governing class was the policy -of restoring to the labourer some of the resources he had lost with -enclosure, of putting him in such a position that he was not obliged -to depend entirely on the purchasing power of his wages at the shop. -This was the aim of the allotment movement. The propaganda failed, but -it did not fail for the want of vigorous and authoritative support. We -have seen in a previous chapter that Arthur Young awoke in 1801 to the -social mischief of depriving the poor of their land and their cows, -and that he wanted future Enclosure Acts to be juster and more humane. -Cobbett suggested a large scheme of agrarian settlement to Windham in -1806. These proposals had been anticipated by Davies, whose knowledge -of the actual life of the poor made him understand the important -difference between a total and a partial dependence on wages. ‘Hope is -a cordial, of which the poor man has especially much need, to cheer his -heart in the toilsome journey through life. And the fatal consequence -of that policy, which deprives labouring people of the expectation of -possessing any property in the soil, must be the extinction of every -generous principle in their minds.... No gentleman should be permitted -to pull down a cottage, until he had first erected another, upon one of -Mr. Kent’s plans, either on some convenient part of the waste, or on -his own estate, with a certain quantity of land annexed.’ He praised -the Act of Elizabeth which forbade the erection of cottages with less -than four acres of land around them, ‘that poor people might secure for -themselves a maintenance, and not be obliged on the loss of a few days -labour to come to the parish,’[272] and urged that this prohibition, -which had been repealed in 1775,[273] should be set up again. - -The general policy of providing allotments was never tried, but we -know something of individual experiments from the Reports of the -Society for Bettering the Condition and Increasing the Comforts of the -Poor. This society took up the cause of allotments very zealously, and -most of the examples of private benevolence seem to have found their -way into the pages of its reports. - -These experiments were not very numerous. Indeed, the name of Lord -Winchilsea recurs so inevitably in every allusion to the subject as to -create a suspicion that the movement and his estates were coextensive. -This is not the truth, but it is not very wide of the truth, for -though Lord Winchilsea had imitators, those imitators were few. The -fullest account of his estate in Rutlandshire is given by Sir Thomas -Bernard.[274] The estate embraced four parishes--Hambledon, Egleton, -Greetham, and Burley on the Hill. The tenants included eighty cottagers -possessing one hundred and seventy-four cows. ‘About a third part -have all their land in severalty; the rest of them have the use of a -cow-pasture in common with others; most of them possessing a small -homestead, adjoining to their cottage; every one of them having a -good garden, and keeping one pig at least, if not more.... Of all the -rents of the estate, none are more punctually paid than those for the -cottagers’ land.’ In this happy district if a man seemed likely to -become a burden on the parish his landlord and neighbours saved the -man’s self-respect and their own pockets as ratepayers, by setting -him up with land and a cow instead. So far from neglecting their work -as labourers, these proprietors of cows are described as ‘most steady -and trusty.’ We have a picture of this little community leading a -hard but energetic and independent life, the men going out to daily -work, but busy in their spare hours with their cows, sheep, pigs, and -gardens; the women and children looking after the live stock, spinning, -or working in the gardens: a very different picture from that of the -landless and ill-fed labourers elsewhere. - -Other landlords, who, acting on their own initiative, or at the -instance of their agents, helped their cottagers by letting them land -on which to keep cows were Lord Carrington and Lord Scarborough in -Lincolnshire, and Lord Egremont on his Yorkshire estates (Kent was his -agent). Some who were friendly to the allotments movement thought it a -mistake to give allotments of arable land in districts where pasture -land was not available. Mr. Thompson, who writes the account of Lord -Carrington’s cottagers with cows, thought that ‘where cottagers occupy -arable land, it is very rarely of advantage to them, and generally a -prejudice to the estate.’[275] He seems, however, to have been thinking -more of small holdings than of allotments. ‘The late Abel Smith, -Esq., from motives of kindness to several cottagers on his estates in -Nottinghamshire, let to each of them a small piece of arable land. I -have rode over that estate with Lord Carrington several times since it -descended to him, and I have invariably observed that the tenants upon -it, who occupy only eight or ten acres of arable land, are poor, and -their land in bad condition. They would thrive more and enjoy greater -comfort with the means of keeping two or three cows each than with -three times their present quantity of arable land; but it would be a -greater mortification to them to be deprived of it than their landlord -is disposed to inflict.’[276] On the other hand, a striking instance -of successful arable allotments is described by a Mr. Estcourt in the -Reports of the Society for Bettering the Condition of the Poor.[277] -The scene was the parish of Long Newnton in Wilts, which contained -one hundred and forty poor persons, chiefly agricultural labourers, -distributed in thirty-two families, and the year was 1800. The price of -provisions was very high, and ‘though all had a very liberal allowance -from the poor rate’ the whole village was plunged in debt and misery. -From this hopeless plight the parish was rescued by an allotment scheme -that Mr. Estcourt established and described. Each cottager who applied -was allowed to rent a small quantity of land at the rate of £1, 12s. an -acre[278] on a fourteen years’ lease: the quantity of land let to an -applicant depended on the number in his family, with a maximum of one -and a half acres: the tenant was to forfeit his holding if he received -poor relief other than medical relief. The offer was greedily accepted, -two widows with large families and four very old and infirm persons -being the only persons who did not apply for a lease. A loan of £44 -was divided among the tenants to free them from their debts and give -them a fresh start. They were allowed a third of their plot on Lady -Day 1801, a second third on Lady Day 1802, and the remainder on Lady -Day 1803. The results as recorded in 1805 were astonishing. None of -the tenants had received any poor relief: all the conditions had been -observed: the loan of £44 had long been repaid and the poor rate had -fallen from £212, 16s. to £12, 6s. ‘They are so much beforehand with -the world that it is supposed that it must be some calamity still more -severe than any they have ever been afflicted with that could put them -under the necessity of ever applying for relief to the parish again.... -The farmers of this parish allow that they never had their work better -done, their servants more able, willing, civil, and sober, and that -their property was never so free from depredation as at present.’[279] - -Some philanthropists, full of the advantages to the poor of possessing -live-stock, argued that it was a good thing for cottagers to keep -cows even in arable districts. Sir Henry Vavasour wrote an account in -1801[280] of one of his cottagers who managed to keep two cows and two -pigs and make a profit of £30 a year on three acres three perches of -arable with a summer’s gait for one of his cows. The man, his wife, and -his daughter of twelve worked on the land in their spare hours. The -Board of Agriculture offered gold medals in 1801 for the best report of -how to keep one or two cows on arable land, and Sir John Sinclair wrote -an essay on the subject, reproduced in the account of ‘Useful Projects’ -in the _Annual Register_.[281] Sir John Sinclair urged that if the -system was generally adopted it would remove the popular objections to -enclosure. - -Other advocates of the policy of giving the labourers land pleaded only -for gardens in arable districts; ‘a garden,’ wrote Lord Winchilsea, -‘may be allotted to them in almost every situation, and will be found -of infinite use to them. In countries, where it has never been the -custom for labourers to keep cows, it may be difficult to introduce -it; but where no gardens have been annexed to the cottages, it is -sufficient to give the ground, and the labourer is sure to know what -to do with it, and will reap an immediate benefit from it. Of this I -have had experience in several places, particularly in two parishes -near Newport Pagnell, Bucks, where there never have been any gardens -annexed to the labourers’ houses, and where, upon land being allotted -to them, they all, without a single exception, have cultivated their -gardens extremely well, and profess receiving the greatest benefits -from them.’[282] ‘A few roods of land, at a fair rent,’ wrote a -correspondent in the _Annals of Agriculture_ in 1796,[283] ‘would do -a labourer as much good as wages almost doubled: there would not, -then, be an idle hand in his family, and the man himself would often -go to work in his root yard instead of going to the ale house.’[284] -The interesting report on the ‘Inquiry into the General State of the -Poor’ presented at the Epiphany General Quarter Sessions for Hampshire -and published in the _Annals of Agriculture_,[285] a document which -does not display too much indulgence to the shortcomings of labourers, -recommends the multiplication of cottages with small pieces of ground -annexed, so that labourers might live nearer their work, and spend -the time often wasted in going to and from their work, in cultivating -their plot of ground at home. ‘As it is chiefly this practice which -renders even the state of slavery in the West Indies tolerable, what an -advantage would it be to the state of free service here!’[286] - -The experiments in the provision of allotments of any kind were few, -and they are chiefly interesting for the light they reflect on the -character of the labourer of the period. They show of what those -men and women were capable whose degradation in the morass of the -Speenhamland system is the last and blackest page in the history of -the eighteenth century. Their rulers put a stone round their necks, -and it was not their character but their circumstances that dragged -them into the mire. In villages where allotments were tried the -agricultural labourer is an upright and self-respecting figure. The -immediate moral effects were visible enough at the time. Sir Thomas -Bernard’s account of the cottagers on Lord Winchilsea’s estate contains -the following reflections: ‘I do not mean to assert that the English -cottager, narrowed as he now is in the means and habits of life, may -be immediately capable of taking that active and useful station in -society, that is filled by those who are the subject of this paper. -To produce so great an improvement in character and circumstances of -life, will require time and attention. The cottager, however, of -this part of the county of Rutland, _is not of a different species -from other English cottagers_; and if he had not been protected and -encouraged by his landlord, he would have been the same hopeless and -comfortless creature that we see in some other parts of England. The -farmer (with the assistance of the steward) would have taken his land; -the creditor, his cow and pig; and the workhouse, his family.’[287] - -We have seen, in discussing enclosures, that the policy of securing -allotments to the labourers in enclosure Acts was defeated by the class -interests of the landlords. Why, it may be asked, were schemes such -as those of Lord Winchilsea’s adopted so rarely in villages already -enclosed? These arrangements benefited all parties. There was no -doubt about the demand; ‘in the greatest part of this kingdom,’ wrote -one correspondent, ‘the cottager would rejoice at being permitted to -pay the utmost value given by the farmers, for as much land as would -keep a cow, if he could obtain it at that price.’[288] The steadiness -and industry of the labourers, stimulated by this incentive, were -an advantage both to the landlords and to the farmers. Further, it -was well known that in the villages where the labourers had land, -poor rates were light.[289] Why was it that a policy with so many -recommendations never took root? Perhaps the best answer is given in -the following story. Cobbett proposed to the vestry of Bishops Walthams -that they should ‘ask the Bishop of Winchester to grant an acre of -waste land to every married labourer. All, however, but the village -schoolmaster voted against it, on the ground ... that it would make the -men “too saucy,” that they would “breed more children” and “want higher -wages.”’[290] - -The truth is that enclosures and the new system of farming had set up -two classes in antagonism to allotments, the large farmer, who disliked -saucy labourers, and the shopkeeper, who knew that the more food the -labourer raised on his little estate the less would he buy at the -village store. It had been to the interest of a small farmer in the old -common-field village to have a number of semi-labourers, semi-owners -who could help at the harvest: the large farmer wanted a permanent -supply of labour which was absolutely at his command. Moreover, the -roundsman system maintained his labourers for him when he did not -want them. The strength of the hostility of the farmers to allotments -is seen in the language of those few landlords who were interested -in this policy. Lord Winchilsea and his friends were always urging -philanthropists to proceed with caution, and to try to reason the -farmers out of their prejudices. The Report of the Poor Law Commission -in 1834 showed that these prejudices were as strong as ever. ‘We can do -little or nothing to prevent pauperism; the farmers will have it: they -prefer that the labourers should be slaves; they object to their having -gardens, saying “The more they work for themselves, the less they work -for us.”’[291] This was the view of Boys, the writer in agricultural -subjects, who, criticising Kent’s declaration in favour of allotments, -remarks: ‘If farmers in general were to accommodate their labourers -with two acres of land, a cow and two or three pigs, they would -probably have more difficulty in getting their hard work done--as the -cow, land, etc., would enable them to live with less earnings.’[292] -Arthur Young and Nathaniel Kent made a great appeal to landlords and to -landlords’ wives to interest themselves in their estates and the people -who lived on them, but landlords’ bailiffs did not like the trouble of -collecting a number of small rents, and most landlords preferred to -leave their labourers to the mercy of the farmers. There was, however, -one form of allotment that the farmers themselves liked: they would -let strips of potato ground to labourers, sometimes at four times the -rent they paid themselves, getting the land manured and dug into the -bargain.[293] - -The Select Vestry Act of 1819[294] empowered parishes to buy or lease -twenty acres of land, and to set the indigent poor to work on it, or -to lease it out to any poor and industrious inhabitant. A later Act of -1831[295] raised the limit from twenty to fifty acres, and empowered -parishes to enclose fifty acres of waste (with the consent of those who -had rights on it) and to lease it out for the same purposes. Little -use was made of these Acts, and perhaps the clearest light is thrown -on the extent of the allotment movement by a significant sentence -that occurs in the Report of the Select Committee on Allotments in -1843. ‘It was not until 1830, when discontent had been so painfully -exhibited amongst the peasantry of the southern counties that this -method of alleviating their situation was much resorted to.’ In other -words, little was done till labourers desperate with hunger had set the -farmers’ ricks blazing. - - -THE REMEDY ADOPTED. SPEENHAMLAND - -The history has now been given of the several proposals made at this -time that for one reason or another fell to the ground. A minimum wage -was not fixed, allotments were only sprinkled with a sparing hand on an -estate here and there, there was no revolution in diet, the problems of -local supply and distribution were left untouched, the reconstruction -of the Poor Law was abandoned. What means then did the governing class -take to tranquillise a population made dangerous by hunger? The answer -is, of course, the Speenhamland Act. The Berkshire J.P.’s and some -discreet persons met at the Pelican Inn at Speenhamland[296] on 6th -May 1795, and there resolved on a momentous policy which was gradually -adopted in almost every part of England. - -There is a strange irony in the story of this meeting which gave such -a fatal impetus to the reduction of wages. It was summoned in order to -raise wages, and so make the labourer independent of parish relief. At -the General Quarter Sessions for Berkshire held at Newbury on the 14th -April, Charles Dundas, M.P.,[297] in his charge to the Grand Jury[298] -dwelt on the miserable state of the labourers and the necessity of -increasing their wages to subsistence level, instead of leaving them -to resort to the parish officers for support for their families, as -was the case when they worked for a shilling a day. He quoted the -Acts of Elizabeth and James with reference to the fixing of wages. -The Court, impressed by his speech, decided to convene a meeting for -the rating of wages. The advertisement of the meeting shows that this -was the only object in view. ‘At the General Quarter Sessions of the -Peace for this county held at Newbury, on Tuesday, the 14th instant, -the Court, having taken into consideration the great Inequality of -Labourers’ Wages, and the insufficiency of the same for the necessary -support of an industrious man and his family; and it being the opinion -of the Gentlemen assembled on the Grand Jury, that many parishes -have not advanced their labourers’ weekly pay in proportion to the -high price of corn and provisions, do (in pursuance of the Acts of -Parliament, enabling and requiring them so to do, either at the Easter -Sessions, yearly, or within six weeks next after) earnestly request the -attendance of the Sheriff, and all the Magistrates of this County, at -a Meeting intended to be held at the Pelican Inn in Speenhamland, on -Wednesday, the sixth day of May next, at ten o’clock in the forenoon, -for the purpose of consulting together with such discreet persons as -they shall think meet, and they will then, having respect to the plenty -and scarcity of the time, and other circumstances (if approved of) -proceed to limit, direct, and appoint the wages of day labourers.’[299] - -The meeting was duly held on 6th May.[300] Mr. Charles Dundas was in -the chair, and there were seventeen other magistrates and discreet -persons present, of whom seven were clergymen. It was resolved -unanimously ‘that the present state of the poor does require further -assistance than has been generally given them.’ Of the details of the -discussion no records have come down to us, nor do we know by what -majority the second and fatal resolution rejecting the rating of wages -and substituting an allowance policy was adopted. According to Eden, -the arguments in favour of adopting the rating of wages were ‘that -by enforcing a payment for labour, from the employers, in proportion -to the price of bread, some encouragement would have been held out -to the labourer, as what he would have received, would have been -payment for labour. He would have considered it as his right, and -not as charity.’[301] But these arguments were rejected, and a pious -recommendation to employers to raise wages, coupled with detailed -directions for supplementing those wages from parish funds, adopted -instead.[302] The text of the second resolution runs thus: ‘Resolved, -that it is not expedient for the Magistrates to grant that assistance -by regulating the wages of Day Labourers according to the directions of -the Statutes of the 5th Elizabeth and 1st James: But the Magistrates -very earnestly recommend to the Farmers and others throughout the -county to increase the Pay of their Labourers in proportion to the -present Price of Provisions; and agreeable thereto the Magistrates now -present have unanimously Resolved, That they will in their several -divisions, make the following calculations and allowances for the -relief of all poor and industrious men and their families, who, to the -satisfaction of the Justices of their parish, shall endeavour (as far -as they can), for their own support and maintenance, that is to say, -when the gallon loaf of second flour, weighing 8 lbs. 11 oz. shall -cost one shilling, then every poor and industrious man shall have for -his own support 3s. weekly, either produced by his own or his family’s -labour or an allowance from the poor rates, and for the support of his -wife and every other of his family 1s. 6d. When the gallon loaf shall -cost 1s. 4d., then every poor and industrious man shall have 4s. weekly -for his own, and 1s. 10d. for the support of every other of his family. - -‘And so in proportion as the price of bread rises or falls (that is to -say), 3d. to the man and 1d. to every other of the family, on every -penny which the loaf rises above a shilling.’ - -In other words, it was estimated that the man must have three gallon -loaves a week, and his wife and each child one and a half. - -It is interesting to notice that at this same famous Speenhamland -meeting the justices ‘wishing, as much as possible, to alleviate the -Distresses of the Poor with as little burthen on the occupiers of the -Land as possible’ recommended overseers to cultivate land for potatoes -and to give the workers a quarter of the crop, selling the rest at one -shilling a bushel; overseers were also recommended to purchase fuel and -to retail it at a loss. - -The Speenhamland policy was not a full-blown invention of that unhappy -May morning in the Pelican Inn. The principle had already been adopted -elsewhere. At the Oxford Quarter Sessions on 13th January 1795, the -justices had resolved that the following incomes were ‘absolutely -necessary for the support of the poor, industrious labourer, and that -when the utmost industry of a family cannot produce the undermentioned -sums, it must be made up by the overseer, exclusive of rent, viz.:-- - -‘A single Man according to his labour. - -‘A Man and his Wife not less than 6s. a week. - -‘A Man and his Wife with one or two Small Children, not less than 7s. a -week. - -‘And for every additional Child not less than 1s. a week.’ This -regulation was to be sent to all overseers within the county.[303] - -But the Speenhamland magistrates had drawn up a table which became -a convenient standard, and other magistrates found it the simplest -course to accept the table as it stood. The tables passed rapidly from -county to county. The allowance system spread like a fever, for while -it is true to say that the northern counties took it much later and -in a milder form, there were only two counties still free from it in -1834--Northumberland and Durham. - -To complete our picture of the new system we must remember the results -of Gilbert’s Act. It had been the practice in those parishes that -adopted the Act to reserve the workhouse for the infirm and to find -work outside for the unemployed, the parish receiving the wages of -such employment and providing maintenance. This outside employment -had spread to other parishes, and the way in which it had been worked -may be illustrated by cases mentioned by Eden, writing in the summer -and autumn of 1795. At Kibworth-Beauchamp in Leicestershire, ‘in the -winter, and at other times, when a man is out of work, he applies to -the overseer, who sends him from house to house to get employ: the -housekeeper, who employs him, is obliged to give him victuals, and 6d. -a day; and the parish adds 4d.; (total 10d. a day;) for the support -of his family: persons working in this manner are called rounds-men, -from their going round the village or township for employ.’[304] At -Yardley Goben, in Northamptonshire, every person who paid more than -£20 rent was bound in his turn to employ a man for a day and to pay -him a shilling.[305] At Maids Morton the roundsman got 6d. from the -employer and 6d. or 9d. from the parish.[306] At Winslow in Bucks the -system was more fully developed. ‘There seems to be here a great want -of employment: most labourers are (as it is termed,) _on the Rounds_; -that is, they go to work from one house to another _round_ the parish. -In winter, sometimes 40 persons are on the rounds. They are wholly paid -by the parish, unless the householders choose to employ them; and from -these circumstances, labourers often become very lazy, and imperious. -Children, about ten years old, are put on the rounds, and receive -from the parish from 1s. 6d. to 3s. a week.’[307] The Speenhamland -systematised scale was easily grafted on to these arrangements. ‘During -the late dear season, the Poor of the parish went in a body to the -Justices, to complain of their want of bread. The Magistrates sent -orders to the parish officers to raise the earnings of labourers, to -certain weekly sums, according to the number of their children; a -circumstance that should invariably be attended to in apportioning -parochial relief. These sums were from 7s. to 19s.; and were to be -reduced, proportionably with the price of bread.’[308] - -The Speenhamland system did not then spring Athene-like out of the -heads of the justices and other discreet persons whose place of meeting -has given the system its name. Neither was the unemployment policy -thereafter adopted a sudden inspiration of the Parliament of 1796. The -importance of these years is that though the governing classes did -not then introduce a new principle, they applied to the normal case -methods of relief and treatment that had hitherto been reserved for the -exceptions. The Poor Law which had once been the hospital became now -the prison of the poor. Designed to relieve his necessities, it was now -his bondage. If a labourer was in private employment, the difference -between the wage his master chose to give him and the recognised -minimum was made up by the parish. Those labourers who could not find -private employment were either shared out among the ratepayers, or else -their labour was sold by the parish to employers, at a low rate, the -parish contributing what was needed to bring the labourers’ receipts up -to scale. Crabbe has described the roundsman system: - - ‘Alternate Masters now their Slave command, - Urge the weak efforts of his feeble hand, - And when his age attempts its task in vain, - With ruthless taunts, of lazy poor complain.’[309] - -The meshes of the Poor Law were spread over the entire labour system. -The labourers, stripped of their ancient rights and their ancient -possessions, refused a minimum wage and allotments, were given instead -a universal system of pauperism. This was the basis on which the -governing class rebuilt the English village. Many critics, Arthur -Young and Malthus among them, assailed it, but it endured for forty -years, and it was not disestablished until Parliament itself had passed -through a revolution. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[184] Eden, vol. i. p. 495. - -[185] Resolution of Privy Council, July 6, 1795, and Debate and -Resolution in House of Commons. _Parliamentary Register_, December 11, -1795, and Lord Sheffield in _Annals of Agriculture_, vol. xxv. p. 31. - -[186] See _Senator_ for March 1, 1796, p. 1147. - -[187] See Wilberforce’s speech, _Parliamentary Register_ and _Senator_, -February 18, 1800. - -[188] Eden, vol. ii. pp. 104-6. - -[189] _Ibid._, p. 15. - -[190] _Ibid._, p. 280. - -[191] _Ibid._, p. 426. - -[192] See _Annals of Agriculture_, vol. xxiv. pp. 63, 171, 177, 204, -285, 316, etc. - -[193] _Annals of Agriculture_, vol. xxv. p. 678. - -[194] Eden, vol. i. p. 533. - -[195] Perhaps the unpopularity of soup is partly explained by a letter -published in the _Annals of Agriculture_ in December 1795, vol. xxvi. -p. 215. The writer says it is the custom for most families in the -country ‘to give their poor neighbours the pot liquor, that is, the -liquor in which any meat has been boiled, and to which they sometimes -add the broken bread from the parlour and kitchen tables: this,’ he -adds, ‘makes but an indifferent mess.’ The publications of the time -contain numerous recipes for cheap soups: ‘the power of giving an -increased effect to Christian benevolence by these soups’ (_Reports on -Poor_, vol. i. p. 167) was eagerly welcomed. Cf. Mrs. Shore’s account -of stewed ox’s head for the poor, according to which, at the cost of -2s. 6d. with the leavings of the family, a savoury mess for fifty-two -persons could be prepared (_Ibid._, p. 60). - -[196] Davies, pp. 31-2. - -[197] _Annals of Agriculture_, vol. xxv. p. 455. - -[198] _Parliamentary Register_, November 2, 1795. - -[199] Eden, vol. iii. p. 769. - -[200] _Ibid._, vol. ii. p. 97. - -[201] _Ibid._, p. 621. - -[202] _Ibid._, p. 645. - -[203] In many budgets no milk is included. - -[204] _Reports on Poor_, vol. iv. p. 151. - -[205] Davies, p. 104. - -[206] _Reports on Poor_, vol. ii. p. 178. - -[207] Vol. ii. p. 587. - -[208] _Reports on Poor_, vol. i. p. 134; another reason for the dearth -of milk was the growing consumption of veal in the towns. Davies says -(p. 19), ‘Suckling is here so profitable (to furnish veal for London) -that the poor can seldom either buy or beg milk.’ - -[209] P. 27. - -[210] See _Annals of Agriculture_, vol. xxv. pp. 367-8. - -[211] Davies, p. 37. - -[212] _Ibid._, p. 39. - -[213] _Annals of Agriculture_, vol. xxvi. p. 121. - -[214] The dearness of malt was another fact which helped the -introduction of tea. Cf. Davies, p. 38: ‘Time was when _small beer_ was -reckoned one of the necessaries of life, even in poor families.’ - -[215] Lecky, _History of England in Eighteenth Century_, vol. ii. p. -318. - -[216] In connection with the dearth of milk it is important to notice -the rise in the price of cheese. ‘Poor people,’ says Davies, (p. 19), -‘reckon cheese the dearest article they can use’ (cf. also p. 143), and -in his comparison of prices in the middle of the eighteenth century -with those of 1787-94 he gives the price of 112 lbs. of cheese at -Reading Fair as from 17s. to 21s. in the first period, and 40s. to -46s. in the second. Retail cheese of an inferior sort had risen from -2-1/2d. or 3d. a lb. to 4-1/2d. or 5d. (p. 65); cf. also correspondent -in _Annals of Agriculture_, vol. ii. p. 442. ‘Every inhabitant of Bath -must be sensible that butter and cheese have risen in price one-third, -or more, within these twenty years.’ (Written in 1784). - -[217] _Reports on Poor_, vol. i. p. 129. - -[218] _Ibid._, vol. iii. p. 78. - -[219] _Annual Register_, 1806, p. 974; ‘My local situation afforded -me ample means of knowing how greatly the lower orders suffered from -being unable to procure a supply of milk; and I am fully persuaded of -the correctness of the statement that the labouring poor lose a number -of their children from the want of a food so pre-eminently adapted to -their support’; cf. also Curwen’s _Hints_. - -[220] Eden, vol. i. p. 510. - -[221] Vol. iii. p. 96. - -[222] Eden, vol. iii. p. 694. - -[223] Cf. _Reports on Poor_, vol. i. p. 43; ‘Where there are commons, -the ideal advantage of cutting flags, peat, or whins, often causes -a poor man to spend more time in procuring such fuel, than, if he -reckoned his labour, would purchase for him double the quantity of good -firing.’ - -[224] Vol. iv. p. 496. - -[225] Vol. ii. p. 587. - -[226] Davies, p. 28. - -[227] _Ibid._, p. 118. - -[228] Eden, vol. iii. p. 805. - -[229] P. 179. - -[230] Cf. also Eden’s description of a labourer’s expenses, vol. iii. -p. 797, where he says that whilst hedging and ditching, they are -allowed to take home a faggot every evening, whilst the work lasts, -‘but this is by no means sufficient for his consumption: his children, -therefore, are sent into the fields, to collect wood where they can; -and neither hedges nor trees are spared by the young marauders, who are -thus, in some degree, educated in the art of thieving.’ - -[231] Vol. ii. p. 231. - -[232] Cf. also for the difficulties of the poor in getting fuel, the -account by the Rev. Dr. Glasse; _Reports on Poor_, vol. i. p. 58. -‘Having long observed, that there is scarcely any article of life, in -respect to which the poor are under greater difficulties, or for the -supply of which they have stronger temptations to dishonest practices, -than that of fuel,’ he laid up in summer a store of coals in Greenford -(Middlesex), and Wanstead, and sold them rather under original cost -price, carriage free, in winter. ‘The benefit arising from the relief -afforded them in this article of coals, is obvious: they are habituated -to pay for what they have; whereas at the shop they ran in debt. -When their credit was at an end, they contrived to do without coals, -by having recourse to wood-stealing; than which I know no practise -which tends more effectually to introduce into young minds a habit of -dishonesty; it is also very injurious to the farmer, and excites a -degree of resentment in his breast, which, in many instances, renders -him averse to affording relief to the poor, even when real necessity -calls loudly for it.’ - -[233] 20 George II. c. 19. - -[234] _Annals of Agriculture_, vol. xxv. p. 305 ff. - -[235] _Annals of Agriculture_, vol. xxv. p. 298. - -[236] _Parliamentary Register_, December 9, 1795. - -[237] _Ibid._, February 12, 1796. - -[238] _Annals of Agriculture_, vol. xxv. p. 345. - -[239] _Ibid._, p. 316. - -[240] _An Examination of Mr. Pitt’s Speech in the House of Commons, -February 12, 1796._ - -[241] P. 106 ff. - -[242] _Annals of Agriculture_, 1795, vol. xxv. p. 503. - -[243] _Parliamentary Debates._ - -[244] Printed in _Parliamentary Papers_ for 1795-6. - -[245] The age was not filled up. - -[246] For report of debate see _Parliamentary Register_ for that date. - -[247] See _Parliamentary Register_. - -[248] See _Parliamentary Register_, February 14, 1800. - -[249] _Reports on Poor_, vol. v. p. 23. - -[250] See p. 179. - -[251] _Annals of Agriculture_, vol. xxvi. p. 178. - -[252] 22 George III. c. 83. - -[253] In 1834 there were 924 comprised in 67 incorporations (Nicholls, -vol. ii. p. 91.) - -[254] 9 George I. c. 7. - -[255] Eden, vol. i. p. 269. - -[256] _E.g._ Oxford and Shrewsbury. - -[257] There is a significant entry in the Abstracts of Returns to -the 1775 Poor Relief Committee in reference to the building of that -death-trap, the Bulcamp House of Industry. ‘In the Expences for -Building is included £500 for building a Part which was pulled down by -a Mob.’ - -[258] At Heckingham in Norfolk a putrid fever, in 1774, killed 126 -out of 220 inmates (Eden, vol. ii. p. 473, quoting Howlett); cf. also -Ruggles, _History of the Poor_, vol. ii. p. 266. - -[259] ‘The Village,’ pp. 16 and 17. - -[260] Eden, vol. iii. p. 694 ff. - -[261] 36 George III. c. 23. - -[262] The last of these systems had been included in a Bill introduced -by Sir William Young in 1788. ‘In order to relieve agricultural -labourers, who are often, during the winter, out of employment, the -vestry in every parish is empowered, by notice affixed to the church -door, to settle a rate of wages to be paid to labourers out of employ, -from the 30th Nov. to the 28th of Feb.; and to distribute and send -them round in rotation to the parishioners, proportionally as they pay -to the Rates; to be paid by the person employing them two-thirds of -the wages so settled, and one-third by the parish-officers out of the -Rates.’--Eden, vol. i. p. 397. - -[263] _Parliamentary Register_, February 12, 1796. - -[264] _Ibid._, December 22, 1796. - -[265] The Bill is printed in House of Commons Papers, 1796. The ‘Heads -of the Bill’ as circulated appear in the _Annals of Agriculture_, vol. -xxvi. pp. 260 ff. and 359 ff. Eden gives in the form of Appendices (1) -the Heads of the Bill, (2) the Amendments introduced in Committee. - -[266] _House of Commons Journal._ - -[267] _Parliamentary Register_, February 11, 1800. - -[268] 35 George III. c. 101. - -[269] For Whitbread’s proposals to amend the Law of Settlement in 1807 -see next chapter. An attempt was made in 1819 (59 George III. c. 50) to -define and simplify the conditions under which the hiring of a tenement -of £10 annual value conferred the right to a settlement. The term -of residence was extended to a year, the nature of the tenement was -defined, and it was laid down that the rent must be £10, and paid for -a whole year. But so unsuccessful was this piece of legislation that -it was found necessary to pass a second Act six years later (1826, 6 -George IV. c. 57), and a third Act in 1831 (1 William IV. c. 18). - -[270] _Senator_, March 1800. - -[271] See Debates in _Senator_, March 31 and April 3, 1800, and -_Parliamentary Register_. Cf. for removals for temporary distress, Sir -Thomas Bernard’s Charge to Overseers in the Hundred of Stoke. Bucks. -_Reports on Poor_, vol. i. p. 260. ‘With regard to the removal of -labourers belonging to other parishes, consider thoroughly what you -may lose, and what the individual may suffer, by the removal, before -you apply to us on the subject. Where you have had, for a long time, -the benefit of their labour, and where all they want is a little -_temporary_ relief, reflect whether, after so many years spent in your -service, this is the _moment_ and the _cause_, for removing them from -the scene of their daily labour to a distant parish, etc.’ (1798). - -[272] Davies, pp. 102-4. - -[273] 15 George III. c. 32. - -[274] _Reports on Poor_, vol. ii. p. 171. - -[275] _Reports on Poor_, vol. ii. p. 136. - -[276] _Ibid._, p. 137. - -[277] _Ibid._, vol. v. p. 66. - -[278] Mr. Estcourt mentions that the land ‘would let to a farmer at -about 20s. per acre now.’ - -[279] It is interesting to find that these allotments were still -being let out successfully in 1868. See p. 4145 of the Report on the -Employment of Children, Young Persons, and Women in Agriculture, 1868. - -[280] _Reports on Poor_, vol. iii. p. 329. - -[281] 1803, p. 850. - -[282] _Reports on Poor_, vol. i. p. 100. - -[283] Vol. xxvi. p. 4. - -[284] The most distinguished advocate of this policy was William -Marshall, the agricultural writer who published a strong appeal for -the labourers in his book _On the Management of Landed Estates_, 1806, -p. 155; cf. also Curwen’s _Hints_, p. 239: ‘A farther attention to the -cottager’s comfort is attended with little cost; I mean giving him a -small garden, and planting that as well as the walls of his house with -fruit trees.’ - -[285] Vol. xxv. p. 349. - -[286] _Ibid._, p. 358. - -[287] _Reports on Poor_, vol. ii. p. 184. - -[288] _Ibid._, p. 134. - -[289] Cf. _Poor Law Report_, 1817, Appendix G, p. 4. - -[290] Capes, _Rural Life in Hampshire_, p. 282. - -[291] _Poor Law Report_, 1834, p. 61; cf. _ibid._, p. 185. - -[292] Notes to Kent’s _Norfolk_, p. 178. - -[293] See _Poor Law Report_, 1834, p. 181, and _Allotments Committee_, -1843, p. 108. - -[294] 59 George III. c. 12. - -[295] 1 and 2 William IV. c. 42. - -[296] Speenhamland is now part of Newbury. The Pelican Inn has -disappeared, but the Pelican Posting House survives. - -[297] Charles Dundas, afterwards Lord Amesbury, 1751-1832; Liberal M.P. -for Berkshire, 1794-1832, nominated by Sheridan for the Speakership in -1802 but withdrew. - -[298] _Reading Mercury_, April 20, 1795. - -[299] _Reading Mercury_, April 20, 1795. - -[300] See _Ibid._, May 11, 1795. - -[301] Eden, vol. i. p. 578. - -[302] On the same day a ‘respectable meeting’ at Basingstoke, with -the Mayor in the chair, was advocating the fixing of labourers’ wages -in accordance with the price of wheat without any reference to parish -relief.--_Reading Mercury_, May 11, 1795. - -[303] See _Ipswich Journal_, February 7, 1795, and _Reading Mercury_, -July 6, 1795. - -[304] Eden, vol. ii. p. 384. - -[305] _Ibid._, p. 548. - -[306] _Ibid._, p. 27. - -[307] Eden, vol. ii. p. 29. - -[308] _Ibid._, p. 32. - -[309] ‘The Village,’ Book I. - - - - -CHAPTER VIII - -AFTER SPEENHAMLAND - - -The Speenhamland system is often spoken of as a piece of pardonable -but disastrous sentimentalism on the part of the upper classes. This -view overlooks the predicament in which these classes found themselves -at the end of the eighteenth century. We will try to reconstruct the -situation and to reproduce their state of mind. Agriculture, which -had hitherto provided most people with a livelihood, but few people -with vast fortunes, had become by the end of the century a great -capitalist and specialised industry. During the French war its profits -were fabulous, and they were due partly to enclosures, partly to the -introduction of scientific methods, partly to the huge prices caused -by the war. It was producing thus a vast surplus over and above the -product necessary for maintenance and for wear and tear. Consequently, -as students of Mr. Hobson’s _Industrial System_ will perceive, there -arose an important social problem of distribution, and the Poor Law was -closely involved with it. - -This industry maintained, or helped to maintain, four principal -interests: the landlords, the tithe-owners, the farmers, and the -labourers. Of these interests the first two were represented in the -governing class, and in considering the mind of that class we may -merge them into one. The sympathies of the farmers were rather with -the landlords than with the labourers, but their interests were not -identical. The labourers were unrepresented either in the Government or -in the voting power of the nation. If the forces had been more equally -matched, or if Parliament had represented all classes, the surplus -income of agriculture would have gone to increase rents, tithes, -profits, and wages. It might, besides turning the landlords into great -magnates like the cotton lords of Lancashire, and throwing up a race of -farmers with scarlet coats and jack boots, have raised permanently the -standard and character of the labouring class, have given them a decent -wage and decent cottages. The village population whose condition, as -Whitbread said, was compared by supporters of the slave trade with that -of the negroes in the West Indies, to its disadvantage, might have been -rehoused on its share of this tremendous revenue. In fact, the revenue -went solely to increase rent, tithes, and to some extent profits. -The labourers alone had made no advance when the halcyon days of the -industry clouded over and prices fell. The rent receiver received -more rent than was needed to induce him to let his land, the farmer -made larger profits than were necessary to induce him to apply his -capital and ability to farming, but the labourer received less than was -necessary to maintain him, the balance being made up out of the rates. -Thus not only did the labourer receive no share of this surplus; he did -not even get his subsistence directly from the product of his labour. -Now let us suppose that instead of having his wages made up out of the -rates he had been paid a maintenance wage by the farmer. The extra cost -would have come out of rent to the same extent as did the subsidy from -the rates. The landlord therefore made no sacrifice in introducing the -Speenhamland system, for though the farmers thought that they could -obtain a reduction of rent more easily if they could plead high rates -than if they pleaded the high price of labour,[310] it is obvious that -the same conditions which produced a reduction of rents in the one case -must ultimately have produced a reduction in the other. As it was, none -of this surplus went to labour, and the proportion in which it was -divided between landlord and farmer was not affected by the fact that -the labourer was kept alive partly from the rates and not wholly from -wages.[311] - -Now the governing class which was confronted with the situation that -we have described in a previous chapter consisted of two classes who -had both contrived to slip off their obligations to the State. They -were both essentially privileged classes. The landlords were not -in the eye of history absolute owners; they had held their land on -several conditions, one of which was the liability to provide military -services for the Crown, and this obligation they had commuted into a -tax on the nation. The tithe-owners had for centuries appropriated to -their own use a revenue that was designed in part for the poor. Tithes -were originally taxation for four objects: (1) the bishop; (2) the -maintenance of the fabric of the Church; (3) the relief of the poor; -(4) the incumbent. After the endowment of the bishopricks the first of -these objects dropped out. The poor had not a very much longer life. -It is true that the clergy were bidden much later to use tithes, _non -quasi suis sed quasi commendatis_, and Dryden in his character of the -Good Parson had described their historical obligations: - - ‘True priests, he said, and preachers of the Word - Were only stewards of their sovereign Lord: - Nothing was theirs but all the public store, - Intrusted riches to relieve the poor.’ - -The right of the poor to an allowance from the tithes was declared in -an Act of Richard II. and an Act of Henry IV. After that it disappears -from view. Of course, great masses of tithe property had passed, by -the time we are considering, into secular hands. The monasteries -appropriated about a third of the livings of England, and the tithes -in these parishes passed at the Reformation to the Crown, whence they -passed in grants to private persons. No responsibility for the poor -troubled either the lay or spiritual owners of tithes, and though -they used the name of God freely in defending their claims, they were -stewards of God in much the same sense as George IV. was the defender -of the faith. The landowners and tithe-owners had their differences -when it came to an Enclosure Bill, but these classes had the same -interests in the disposal of the surplus profits of agriculture; and -both alike were in a vulnerable position if the origin and history of -their property came under too fierce a discussion. - -There was a special reason why the classes that had suddenly become -very much richer should dread too searching a discontent at this -moment. They had seen tithes, and all seignorial dues abolished -almost at a single stroke across the Channel, and they were at this -time associating constantly with the emigrant nobility of France, -whose prospect of recovering their estates seemed to fade into a more -doubtful distance with every battle that was fought between the France -who had given the poor peasant such a position as the peasant enjoyed -nowhere else, and her powerful neighbour who had made her landlords -the richest and proudest class in Europe. The French Convention had -passed a decree (November 1792), declaring that ‘wherever French -armies shall come, all taxes, tithes, and privileges of rank are to -be abolished, all existing authorities cancelled, and provisional -administrations elected by universal suffrage. The property of the -fallen Government, of the privileged classes and their adherents to be -placed under French protection.’ This last sentence had an unpleasant -ring about it; it sounded like a terse paraphrase of _non quasi suis -sed quasi commendatis_. In point of fact there was not yet any violent -criticism of the basis of the social position of the privileged classes -in England. Even Paine, when he suggested a scheme of Old Age Pensions -for all over fifty, and a dowry for every one on reaching the age of -twenty-one, had proposed to finance it by death duties. Thelwall, -who wrote with a not unnatural bitterness about the great growth of -ostentatious wealth at a time when the poor were becoming steadily -poorer, told a story which illustrated very well the significance of -the philanthropy of the rich. ‘I remember I was once talking to a -friend of the charity and benevolence exhibited in this country, when -stopping me with a sarcastic sneer, “Yes,” says he, “we steal the -goose, and we give back the giblets.” “No,” said a third person who was -standing by, “giblets are much too dainty for the common herd, we give -them only the pen feathers.”’[312] But the literature of Radicalism -was not inflammatory, and the demands of the dispossessed were for -something a good deal less than their strict due. The richer classes, -however, were naturally anxious to soothe and pacify the poor before -discontent spread any further, and the Speenhamland system turned out, -from their point of view, a very admirable means to that end, for it -provided a maintenance for the poor by a method which sapped their -spirit and disarmed their independence. They were anxious that the -labourers should not get into the way of expecting a larger share in -the profits of agriculture, and at the same time they wanted to make -them contented. Thelwall[313] stated that when he was in the Isle of -Wight, the farmers came to a resolution to raise the price of labour, -and that they were dissuaded by one of the greatest proprietors in the -island, who called a meeting and warned the farmers that they would -make the common people insolent and would never be able to reduce their -wages again. - -An account of the introduction of the system into Warwickshire and -Worcestershire illustrates very well the state of mind in which this -policy had its origin. ‘In Warwickshire, the year 1797 was mentioned -as the date of its commencement in that county, and the scales of -relief giving it authority were published in each of these counties -previously to the year 1800. It was apprehended by many at that time, -that either the wages of labour would rise to a height from which it -would be difficult to reduce them when the cause for it had ceased, -or that during the high prices the labourers might have had to endure -privations to which it would be unsafe to expose them. To meet the -emergency of the time, various schemes are said to have been adopted, -such as weekly distributions of flour, providing families with clothes, -or maintaining entirely a portion of their families, until at length -the practice became general, and a right distinctly admitted by the -magistrates was claimed by the labourer to parish relief, on the ground -of inadequate wages and number in family. I was informed that the -consequences of the system were not wholly unforeseen at the time, as -affording a probable inducement to early marriages and large families; -but at this period there was but little apprehension on that ground. -A prevalent opinion, supported by high authority, that population was -in itself a source of wealth, precluded all alarm. The demands for the -public service were thought to endure a sufficient draught for any -surplus people; and it was deemed wise by many persons at this time -to present the Poor Laws to the lower classes, as an institution for -their advantage, peculiar to this country; and to encourage an opinion -among them, that by this means their own share in the property of the -kingdom was recognised.’[314] To the landlords the Speenhamland system -was a safety-valve in two ways. The farmers got cheap labour, and the -labourers got a maintenance, and it was hoped thus to reconcile both -classes to high rents and the great social splendour of their rulers. -There was no encroachment on the surplus profits of agriculture, and -landlords and tithe-owners basked in the sunshine of prosperity. It -would be a mistake to represent the landlords as deliberately treating -the farmers and the labourers on the principle which Cæsar boasted -that he had applied with such success, when he borrowed money from his -officers to give it to his soldiers, and thus contrived to attach both -classes to his interest; but that was in effect the result and the -significance of the Speenhamland system. - -This wrong application of those surplus profits was one element in -the violent oscillations of trade during the generation after the -war. A long war adding enormously to the expenditure of Government -must disorganise industry seriously in any case, and in this case the -demoralisation was increased by a bad currency system. The governing -class, which was continually meditating on the subject of agricultural -distress, holding inquiries, and appointing committees, never conceived -the problem as one of distribution. The Select Committee of 1833 on -Agriculture, for example, expressly disclaims any interest in the -question of rents and wages, treating these as determined by a law -of Nature, and assuming that the only question for a Government was -the question of steadying prices by protection. What they did not -realise was that a bad distribution of profits was itself a cause of -disturbance. The most instructive speech on the course of agriculture -during the French war was that in which Brougham showed in the House -of Commons, on 9th April 1816, how the country had suffered from -over-production during the wild elation of high prices, and how a -tremendous system of speculative farming had been built up, entangling -a variety of interests in this gamble. If those days had been employed -to raise the standard of life among the labourers and to increase their -powers of consumption, the subsequent fall would have been broken. -The economists of the time looked on the millions of labourers as an -item of cost, to be regarded like the price of raw material, whereas -it is clear that they ought to have been regarded also as affording -the best and most stable of markets. The landlord or the banker who -put his surplus profits into the improvement and cultivation of land, -only productive under conditions that could not last and could not -return, was increasing unemployment in the future, whereas if the same -profits had been distributed in wages among the labourers, they would -have permanently increased consumption and steadied the vicissitudes -of trade. Further, employment would have been more regular in another -respect, for the landowner spent his surplus on luxuries, and the -labourer spent his wages on necessaries. - -Now labour might have received its share of these profits either in an -increase of wages, or in the expenditure of part of the revenue in a -way that was specially beneficial to it. Wages did not rise, and it was -a felony to use any pressure to raise them. What was the case of the -poor in regard to taxation and expenditure? Taxation was overwhelming. -A Herefordshire farmer stated that in 1815 the rates and taxes on a -farm of three hundred acres in that county were:-- - - £ _s._ _d._ - Property tax, landlord and tenant 95 16 10 - Great tithes 64 17 6 - Lesser tithes 29 15 0 - Land tax 14 0 0 - Window lights 24 1 6 - Poor rates, landlord 10 0 0 - Poor rates, tenant 40 0 0 - Cart-horse duty, landlord, 3 horses 2 11 0 - Two saddle horses, landlord 9 0 0 - Gig 6 6 0 - Cart-horse duty, tenant 7 2 0 - One saddle horse, tenant 2 13 6 - Landlord’s malt duty on 60 bushels of barley 21 0 0 - Tenant’s duty for making 120 bushels of barley - into malt 42 0 0 - New rate for building shire hall, paid by landlord 9 0 0 - New rate for building shire hall, paid by tenant 3 0 0 - Surcharge 2 8 0 - ---------- - £383 11 4[315] - ---------- - -The _Agricultural and Industrial Magazine_, a periodical published by -a philanthropical society in 1833, gave the following analysis of the -taxation of a labourer earning £22, 10s. a year:-- - - £ _s._ _d._ - 1. Malt 4 11 3 - 2. Sugar 0 17 4 - 3. Tea and Coffee 1 4 0 - 4. Soap 0 13 0 - 5. Housing 0 12 0 - 6. Food 3 0 0 - 7. Clothes 0 10 0 - --------- - £11 7 7 - --------- - -But in the expenditure from this taxation was there a single item -in which the poor had a special interest? The great mass of the -expenditure was war expenditure, and that was not expenditure in which -the poor were more interested than the rest. Indeed, much of it was -expenditure which could not be associated directly or indirectly with -their interests, such as the huge subsidies to the courts of Europe. -Nearly fifty millions went in these subventions, and if some of them -were strategical others were purely political. Did the English labourer -receive any profit from the two and a half millions that Pitt threw to -the King of Prussia, a subsidy that was employed for crushing Kosciusko -and Poland, or from the millions that he gave to Austria, in return -for which Austria ceded Venice to Napoleon? Did he receive any benefit -from the million spent every year on the German legion, which helped -to keep him in order in his own country? Did he receive any benefit -from the million and a half which, on the confession of the Finance -Committee of the House of Commons in 1810, went every year in absolute -sinecures? Did he receive any benefit from the interest on the loans -to the great bankers and contractors, who made huge profits out of the -war and were patriotic enough to lend money to the Government to keep -it going? Did he receive any benefit from the expenditure on crimping -boys or pressing seamen, or transporting and imprisoning poachers and -throwing their families by thousands on the rates? Pitt’s brilliant -idea of buying up a cheap debt out of money raised by a dear one cost -the nation twenty millions, and though Pitt considered the Sinking -Fund his best title to honour, nobody will pretend that the poor of -England gained anything from this display of his originality.[316] -In these years Government was raising by taxation or loans over a -hundred millions, but not a single penny went to the education of -the labourer’s children, or to any purpose that made the perils and -difficulties of his life more easy to be borne. If the sinecures had -been reduced by a half, or if the great money-lenders had been treated -as if their claims to the last penny were not sacrosanct, and had been -made to take their share of the losses of the time, it would have been -possible to set up the English cottager with allotments on the modest -plan proposed by Young or Cobbett, side by side with the great estates -with which that expenditure endowed the bankers and the dealers in -scrip. - - * * * * * - -Now, so long as prices kept up, the condition of the labourer was -masked by the general prosperity of the times. The governing class -had found a method which checked the demand for higher wages and the -danger that the labourer might claim a share in the bounding wealth of -the time. The wolf was at the door, it is true, but he was chained, and -the chain was the Speenhamland system. Consequently, though we hear -complaints from the labourers, who contended that they were receiving -in a patronising and degrading form what they were entitled to have -as their direct wages, the note of rebellion was smothered for the -moment. At this time it was a profitable proceeding to grow corn on -almost any soil, and it is still possible to trace on the unharvested -downs of Dartmoor the print of the harrow that turned even that wild -moorland into gold, in the days when Napoleon was massing his armies -for invasion. During these years parishes did not mind giving aid from -the rates on the Speenhamland scale, and, though under this mischievous -system population was advancing wildly, there was such a demand for -labour that this abundance did not seem, as it seemed later, a plague -of locusts, but a source of strength and wealth. The opinion of the -day was all in favour of a heavy birth rate, and it was generally -agreed, as we have seen, that Pitt’s escapades in the West Indies and -elsewhere would draw off the surplus population fast enough to remove -all difficulties. But although the large farmers prayed incessantly to -heaven to preserve Pitt and to keep up religion and prices, the day -came when it did not pay to plough the downs or the sands, and tumbling -prices brought ruin to the farmers whose rents and whole manner of -living were fixed on the assumption that there was no serious danger -of peace, and that England was to live in a perpetual heyday of famine -prices. - -With the fall in prices, the facts of the labourer’s condition were -disclosed. Doctors tell us that in some cases of heart disease there -is a state described as compensation, which may postpone failure for -many years. With the fall in 1814 compensation ceased, and the disease -which it obscured declared itself. For it was now no longer possible -to absorb the redundant population in the wasteful roundsman system, -and the maintenance standard tended to fall with the growing pressure -on the resources from which the labourer was kept. By this time all -labour had been swamped in the system. The ordinary village did not -contain a mass of decently paid labourers and a surplus of labourers, -from time to time redundant, for whom the parish had to provide as best -it could. It contained a mass of labourers, all of them underpaid, whom -the parish had to keep alive in the way most convenient to the farmers. -Bishop Berkeley once said that it was doubtful whether the prosperity -that preceded, or the calamities that succeeded, the South Sea Bubble -had been the more disastrous to Great Britain: that saying would very -well apply to the position of the agricultural labourer in regard to -the rise and the fall of prices. With the rise of prices the last -patch of common agriculture had been seized by the landlords, and the -labourer had been robbed even of his garden;[317] with the fall, the -great mass of labourers were thrown into destitution and misery. We may -add that if that prosperity had been briefer, the superstition that an -artificial encouragement of population was needed--the superstition of -the rich for which the poor paid the penalty--would have had a shorter -life. As it was, at the end of the great prosperity the landlords -were enormously rich; rents had in some cases increased five-fold -between 1790 and 1812:[318] the large farmers had in many cases climbed -into a style of life which meant a crash as soon as prices fell; the -financiers had made great and sudden fortunes; the only class for whom -a rise in the standard of existence was essential to the nation, had -merely become more dependent on the pleasure of other classes and the -accidents of the markets. The purchasing power of the labourer’s wages -had gone down. - -The first sign of the strain is the rioting of 1816. In that year -the spirit which the governing class had tried to send to sleep by -the Speenhamland system, burst out in the first of two peasants’ -revolts. Let us remember what their position was. They were not the -only people overwhelmed by the fall in prices. Some landlords, who -had been so reckless and extravagant as to live up to the enormous -revenue they were receiving, had to surrender their estates to the -new class of bankers and money-lenders that had been made powerful by -the war. Many farmers, who had taken to keeping liveried servants and -to copying the pomp of their landlords, and who had staked everything -on the permanence of prices, were now submerged. Small farmers too, -as the answers sent to the questions issued this year by the Board -of Agriculture show, became paupers. The labourer was not the only -sufferer. But he differed from the other victims of distress in that -he had not benefited, but, as we have seen, had lost, by the prosperity -of the days when the plough turned a golden furrow. His housing had -not been improved; his dependence had not been made less abject or -less absolute; his wages had not risen; and in many cases his garden -had disappeared. When the storm broke over agriculture his condition -became desperate. In February 1816 the Board of Agriculture sent out -a series of questions, one of which asked for an account of the state -of the poor, and out of 273 replies 237 reported want of employment -and distress, and 25 reported that there was not unemployment or -distress.[319] One of the correspondents explained that in his district -the overseer called a meeting every Saturday, when he put up each -labourer by name to auction, and they were let generally at from -1s. 6d. to 2s. per week and their provisions, their families being -supported by the parish.[320] - -In 1816 the labourers were suffering both from unemployment and -from high prices. In 1815, as the _Annual Register_[321] puts it, -‘much distress was undergone in the latter part of the year by the -trading portion of the community. This source of private calamity was -unfortunately coincident with an extraordinary decline in agricultural -prosperity, immediately proceeding from the greatly reduced price of -corn and other products, which bore no adequate proportion to the -exorbitant rents and other heavy burdens pressing upon the farmer.’ -At the beginning of 1816 there were gloomy anticipations of a fall in -prices, and Western[322] moved a series of resolutions designed to -prevent the importation of corn. But as the year advanced it became -evident that the danger that threatened England was not the danger -of abundance but the danger of scarcity. A bitterly cold summer was -followed by so meagre a harvest that the price of corn rose rapidly -beyond the point at which the ports were open for importation. But high -prices which brought bidders at once for farms that had been unlet made -bread and meat dear to the agricultural labourer, without bringing him -more employment or an advance of wages, and the riots of 1816 were the -result of the misery due to this combination of misfortunes. - -The riots broke out in May of that year, and the counties affected -were Norfolk, Suffolk, Huntingdon and Cambridgeshire. Nightly -assemblies were held, threatening letters were sent, and houses, barns -and ricks were set on fire. These fires were a prelude to a more -determined agitation, which had such an effect on the authorities that -the Sheriff of Suffolk and Mr. Willet, a banker of Brandon near Bury, -hastened to London to inform the Home Secretary and to ask for the -help of the Government in restoring tranquillity. Mr. Willet’s special -interest in the proceedings is explained in a naïve sentence in the -_Annual Register_: ‘A reduction in the price of bread and meat was the -avowed object of the rioters. They had fixed a maximum for the price of -both. They insisted that the lowest price of wheat must be half a crown -a bushel, and that of prime joints of beef fourpence per pound. Mr. -Willet, a butcher at Brandon, was a marked object of their ill-will, -in which Mr. Willet, the banker, was, from the similarity of his name, -in danger of sharing. This circumstance, and a laudable anxiety to -preserve the public peace, induced him to take an active part and exert -all his influence for that purpose.’[323] The rioters numbered some -fifteen hundred, and they broke up into separate parties, scattering -into different towns and villages. In the course of their depredations -the house of the right Mr. Willet was levelled to the ground, after -which the wrong Mr. Willet, it is to be hoped, was less restless.[324] -‘They were armed with long, heavy sticks, the ends of which, to the -extent of several inches, were studded with short iron spikes, sharp at -the sides and point. Their flag was inscribed “_Bread or Blood!_” and -they threatened to march to London.’[325] - -During the next few days there were encounters between insurgent mobs -in Norwich and Bury and the yeomanry, the dragoons, and the West -Norfolk Militia. No lives seem to have been lost, but a good deal -of property was destroyed, and a number of rioters were taken into -custody. The _Times_ of 25th May says, in an article on these riots, -that wages had been reduced to a rate lower than the magistrates -thought reasonable, for the magistrates, after suppressing a riot near -Downham, acquiesced in the propriety of raising wages, and released the -offenders who had been arrested with a suitable remonstrance. There was -a much more serious battle at Littleport in the Isle of Ely, when the -old fighting spirit of the fens seems to have inspired the rioters. -They began by driving from his house a clergyman magistrate of the name -of Vachel, after which they attacked several houses and extorted money. -They then made for Ely, where they carried out the same programme. -This state of anarchy, after two or three days, ended in a battle in -Littleport in which two rioters were killed, and seventy-five taken -prisoners. The prisoners were tried next month by a Special Commission: -twenty-four were capitally convicted; of these five were hung, five -were transported for life, one was transported for fourteen years, -three for seven years, and ten were imprisoned for twelve months in -Ely gaol.[326] The spirit in which one of the judges, Mr. Christian, -the Chief Justice of the Isle of Ely, conducted the proceedings may be -gathered from his closing speech, in which he said that the rioters -were receiving ‘great wages’ and that ‘any change in the price of -provisions could only lessen that superfluity, which, I fear, they too -frequently wasted in drunkenness.’[327] - - * * * * * - -The pressure of the changed conditions of the nation on this system -of maintenance out of the rates is seen, not only in the behaviour of -the labourers, but also in the growing anxiety of the upper classes -to control the system, and in the tenacity with which the parishes -contested settlement claims. This is the great period of Poor Law -litigation. Parish authorities kept a stricter watch than ever on -immigrants. In 1816, for example, the Board of Agriculture reported -that according to a correspondent ‘a late legal decision, determining -that keeping a cow gained a settlement, has deprived many cottagers -of that comfort, as it is properly called.’[328] This decision was -remedied by the 1819 Act[329] to amend the Settlement Laws as regards -renting tenements, and the Report on the Poor Law in 1819 states -that in consequence there ‘will no longer be an obstacle to the -accommodation which may be afforded in some instances to a poor family, -by renting the pasturage of a cow, or some other temporary profit from -the occupation of land.’[330] Lawsuits between parishes were incessant, -and in 1815 the money spent on litigation and the removal of paupers -reached the gigantic figure of £287,000. - -In Parliament, too, the question of Poor Law Reform was seen to be -urgent, but the problem assumed a particular and very limited shape. -The significance of this development can be illustrated by comparing -the character and the fate of a measure Whitbread had introduced in -1807 with the character and the fate of the legislation after Waterloo. - -Whitbread’s scheme had aimed at (1) improving and humanising the Law of -Settlement; (2) reforming the administration of the Poor Law as such -in such a way as to give greater encouragement to economy and a fairer -distribution of burdens; (3) stimulating thrift and penalising idleness -in the labourers; (4) reforming unemployment policy. - -The proposals under the first head provided that settlement might be -gained by five years’ residence as a householder, if the householder -had not become chargeable or been convicted of crime, or been absent -for more than six weeks in a year. Two Justices of the Peace were to -have power on complaint of the parish authorities to adjudicate on the -settlement of any person likely to become chargeable, subject to an -appeal to Quarter Sessions. - -The proposals under the second head aimed partly at vestry reform -and partly at rating reform. In those parishes where there was an -open vestry, all ratepayers were still equal as voters, but Whitbread -proposed to give extra voting power at vestry meetings in proportion -to assessment.[331] He wished to reform rating, by making stock in -trade and personal property (except farming stock), which produced -profit liable to assessment, by authorising the vestry to exempt such -occupiers of cottages as they should think fit, and by giving power -to the Justices of the Peace to strike out of the rate any person -occupying a cottage not exceeding five pounds in yearly value, who -should make application to them, such exemptions not to be considered -parochial relief. He also proposed that the county rate should be -charged in every parish in proportion to the assessed property in the -parish, and that any parish whose poor rate was for three years more -than double the average of the parish rate in the county, should have -power to apply to Quarter Sessions for relief out of county stock. - -Whitbread’s proposals for stimulating thrift and penalising idleness -were a strange medley of enlightenment and childishness. He proposed -to give the parish officers power to build cottages which were to be -let at the best rents that were to be obtained: but the parish officers -might with the consent of the vestry allow persons who could not pay -rent to occupy them rent free, or at a reduced rent. He proposed also -to create a National Bank, something of the nature of a Post Office -Savings Bank, to be employed both as a savings bank and an insurance -system for the poor. With these two excellent schemes he combined a -ridiculous system of prizes and punishments for the thrifty and the -irresponsible. Magistrates were to be empowered to give rewards (up to -a maximum of £20) with a badge of good conduct, to labourers who had -brought up large families without parish help, and to punish any man -who appeared to have become chargeable from idleness or misconduct, and -to brand him with the words, ‘criminal Poor.’ - -In his unemployment policy Whitbread committed the fatal mistake, -common to almost all the proposals of the time, of mixing up poor -relief with wages in a way to depress and demoralise the labour market. -The able-bodied unemployed, men, youths, or single women, were to be -hired out by parish officers at the best price to be obtained. The -wages were to be paid to the worker. If the worker was a single man -or woman, or a widower with no children dependent on him, his or her -earnings were to be made up by the parish to a sum necessary to his or -her subsistence. If he or she had children, they were to be made up to -three-quarters, or four-fifths, or the full average rate, according to -the number of children. No single man or woman was to be hired out for -more than a year, and no man or woman with dependent children for more -than a month. - -The proposals were attacked vigorously by two critics who were not -often found in company, Cobbett and Malthus. Cobbett criticised the -introduction of plural voting at vestry meetings in an excellent -passage in the _Political Register_.[332] ‘Many of those who pay rates -are but a step or two from pauperism themselves; and they are the most -likely persons to consider duly the important duty of doing, in case of -relief, what they would be done unto. “But,” Mr. Whitbread will say, -“is it right for these persons to _give away the money of others_.” It -is _not_ the money of others, any more than the amount of tithes is -the farmer’s money. The maintenance of the poor is a charge upon the -land, a charge duly considered in every purchase and in every lease. -Besides, as the law now stands, though every parishioner has a vote -in vestry, must it not be evident, to every man who reflects, that a -man of large property and superior understanding will have weight in -proportion? That he will, in fact, have _many votes_? If he play the -tyrant, even little men will rise against him, and it is right they -should have the power of so doing; but, while he conducts himself with -moderation and humanity, while he behaves as he ought to do to those -who are beneath him in point of property, there is no fear but he will -have a sufficiency of weight at every vestry. The votes of the inferior -persons in the parish are, in reality, dormant, unless in cases where -some innovation, or some act of tyranny, is attempted. They are, like -the sting of the bee, weapons merely of defence.’ - -Malthus’ criticisms were of a very different nature.[333] He objected -particularly to the public building of cottages, and the assessment of -personal property to the rates. He argued that the scarcity of houses -was the chief reason ‘why the Poor Laws had not been so extensive -and prejudicial in their effects as might have been expected.’ If a -stimulus was given to the building of cottages there would be no check -on the increase of population. A similar tendency he ascribed to the -rating of personal property. The employers of labour had an interest -in the increase of population, and therefore in the building of -cottages. This instinct was at present held in check by consideration -of the burden of the rates. If, however, they could distribute that -burden more widely, this consideration would have much less weight. -Population would increase and wages would consequently go down. ‘It -has been observed by Dr. Adam Smith that no efforts of the legislature -had been able to raise the salary of curates to that price which -seemed necessary for their decent maintenance: and the reason which -he justly assigns is that the bounties held out to the profession by -the scholarships and fellowships of the universities always occasioned -a redundant supply. In the same manner, if a more than usual supply -of labour were encouraged by the premiums of small tenements, nothing -could prevent a great and general fall in its price.’ - -The Bill was introduced in 1807, before the fall of the Whig Ministry, -and it went to a Committee. But the Tory Parliament elected that year -to support Portland and his anti-Catholic Government was unfriendly, -and the county magistrates to whom the draft of the Bill was sent -for criticisms were also hostile. Whitbread accordingly proceeded no -further. At this time the Speenhamland system seemed to be working -without serious inconvenience, and there was therefore no driving power -behind such proposals. But after 1815 the conditions had changed, and -the apathy of 1807 had melted away. The ruling class was no longer -passive and indifferent about the growth of the Speenhamland system: -both Houses of Parliament set inquiries on foot, schemes of emigration -were invited and discussed, and measures of Vestry Reform were carried. -But the problem was no longer the problem that Whitbread had set out -to solve. Whitbread had proposed to increase the share of property -in the control of the poor rates, but he had also brought forward a -constructive scheme of social improvement. The Vestry Reformers of -this period were merely interested in reducing the rates; the rest of -Whitbread’s programme was forgotten. - -In 1818 an Act[334] was passed which established plural voting in -vestries, every ratepayer whose rateable value was £50 and over being -allowed a vote for every £25 of rateable property. In the following -year an Act[335] was passed which allowed parishes to set up a select -vestry, and ordained that in these parishes the overseers should -give such relief as was ordered by the Select Vestry, and further -allowed the appointment of salaried assistant overseers. These -changes affected the administration of the Speenhamland system very -considerably: and the salaried overseers made themselves hated in many -parishes by the Draconian regime which they introduced. The parish -cart, or the cart to which in some parishes men and women who asked -for relief were harnessed, was one of the innovations of this period. -The administrative methods that were adopted in these parishes are -illustrated by a fact mentioned by a clerk to the magistrates in Kent, -in October 1880.[336] The writer says that there was a severe overseer -at Ash, who had among other applicants for relief an unemployed -shepherd, with a wife and five children living at Margate, thirteen -miles away. The shepherd was given 9s. a week, but the overseer -made him walk to Ash every day except Sunday for his eighteenpence. -The shepherd walked his twenty-six miles a day on such food as he -could obtain out of his share of the 9s. for nine weeks, and then -his strength could hold out no longer. The writer remarked that the -shepherd was an industrious and honest man, out of work through no -fault of his own. It was by such methods that the salaried overseers -tried to break the poor of the habit of asking for relief, and it -is not surprising that such methods rankled in the memories of the -labourers. In this neighbourhood the writer attributed the fires of -1830 more to this cause than to any other. - -These attempts to relieve the ratepayer did nothing to relieve the -labourer from the incubus of the system. His plight grew steadily -worse. A Committee on Agricultural Wages, of which Lord John Russell -was chairman, reported in 1824 that whereas in certain northern -counties, where the Speenhamland system had not yet taken root, wages -were 12s. to 15s., in the south they varied from 8s. or 9s. a week to -3s. for a single man and 4s. 6d. for a married man.[337] In one part of -Kent the lowest wages in one parish were 6d. a day, and in the majority -of parishes 1s. a day. The wages of an unmarried man in Buckinghamshire -in 1828, according to a clergyman who gave evidence before the -Committee of that year on the Poor Laws, were 3s. a week, and the wages -of a married man were 6s. a week. In one parish in his neighbourhood -the farmers had lately reduced the wages of able-bodied married men to -4s. a week. Thus the Speenhamland system had been effective enough in -keeping wages low, but as a means of preserving a minimum livelihood -it was breaking down by this time on all sides. We have seen from the -history of Merton in Oxfordshire[338] what happened in one parish long -before the adversities of agriculture had become acute. It is easy from -this case to imagine what happened when the decline in employment -and agriculture threw a steadily increasing burden on the system of -maintenance from the rates. In some places, as the Commissioners of -1834 reported, the labourers were able by intimidation to keep the -system in force, but though parishes did not as a rule dare to abandon -or reform the system, they steadily reduced their scale. - - * * * * * - -The most direct and graphic demonstration of this fact, which has not -apparently ever been noticed in any of the voluminous discussions -of the old Poor Law system, is to be seen in the comparison of the -standards of life adopted at the time the system was introduced with -the standards that were adopted later. In 1795, as we have seen, the -magistrates at Speenhamland recommended an allowance of three gallon -loaves for each labourer, and a gallon loaf and a half for his wife -and for each additional member of his family. This scale, it must be -remembered, was not peculiar to Berkshire. It was the authoritative -standard in many counties. We are able to compare this with some -later scales, and the comparison yields some startling results. In -Northamptonshire in 1816 the magistrates fixed a single man’s allowance -at 5s., and the allowance for a man and his wife at 6s., the price -of wheat the quartern loaf being 11-1/2d.[339] On this scale a man -is supposed to need a little over two and a half gallon loaves, and -a man and his wife a little more than three gallon loaves, or barely -more than a single man was supposed to need in 1795. This is a grave -reduction, but the maintenance standard fell very much lower before -1832. For though we have scales for Cambridgeshire and Essex for 1821 -published in the Report of the Poor Law Commission of 1834,[340] which -agree roughly with the Northamptonshire scale (two gallon loaves for a -man, and one and a half for a woman), in Wiltshire, according to the -complicated scale adopted at Hindon in 1817, a man was allowed one -and three-fifths gallon loaves, and a woman one and one-tenth.[341] A -Hampshire scale, drawn up in 1822 by eight magistrates, of whom five -were parsons, allowed only one gallon loaf a head, with 4d. a week -per head in addition to a family of four persons, the extra allowance -being reduced by a penny in cases where there were six in the family, -and by twopence in cases where there were more than six.[342] The -Dorsetshire magistrates in 1826 allowed a man the equivalent of one -and a half gallon loaves and a penny over, and a woman or child over -fourteen one and one-sixth.[343] We have a general statement as to -the scales in force towards the end of our period in a passage in -M‘Culloch’s _Political Economy_ quoted in the _Edinburgh Review_ for -January 1831 (p. 353): ‘The allowance scales now issued from time to -time by the magistrates are usually framed on the principle that every -labourer should have a gallon loaf of standard wheaten bread weekly for -every member of his family and one over: that is four loaves for three -persons, five for four, six for five, and so on.’ That is, a family of -four persons would have had seven and a half gallon loaves in 1795, and -only five gallon loaves in 1831. - -Now the Speenhamland scale did not represent some easy and luxurious -standard of living; it represented the minimum on which it was supposed -that a man employed in agriculture could support life. In thirty-five -years the standard had dropped, according to M‘Culloch’s statement, as -much as a third, and this not because of war or famine, for in 1826 -England had had eleven years of peace, but in the ordinary course of -the life of the nation. Is such a decline in the standard of life -recorded anywhere else in history? - -How did the labourers live at all under these conditions? Their life -was, of course, wretched and squalid in the extreme. Cobbett describes -a group of women labourers whom he met by the roadside in Hampshire -as ‘such an assemblage of rags as I never saw before even amongst the -hoppers at Farnham.’ Of the labourers near Cricklade he said: ‘Their -dwellings are little better than pig-beds, and their looks indicate -that their food is not nearly equal to that of a pig. These wretched -hovels are stuck upon little beds of ground on the _roadside_ where -the space has been wider than the road demanded. In many places they -have not two rods to a hovel. It seems as if they had been swept off -the fields by a hurricane, and had dropped and found shelter under -the banks on the roadside. Yesterday morning was a sharp frost, and -this had set the poor creatures to digging up their little plots of -potatoes. In my whole life I never saw human wretchedness equal -to this; no, not even amongst the free negroes in America who, on -an average, do not work one day out of four.’[344] The labourers’ -cottages in Leicestershire he found were ‘hovels made of mud and -straw, bits of glass or of old cast-off windows, without frames or -hinges frequently, and merely stuck in the mud wall. Enter them and -look at the bits of chairs or stools, the wretched boards tacked -together to serve for a table, the floor of pebble broken or of the -bare ground; look at the thing called a bed, and survey the rags on -the backs of the inhabitants.’[345] A Dorsetshire clergyman, a witness -before the Committee on Wages in 1824, said that the labourers lived -almost entirely on tea and potatoes; a Bedfordshire labourer said that -he and his family lived mainly on bread and cheese and water, and -that sometimes for a month together he never tasted meat; a Suffolk -magistrate described how a labourer out of work, convicted of stealing -wood, begged to be sent at once to a House of Correction, where he -hoped to find food and employment. If Davies had written an account -of the labouring classes in 1820 or 1830, the picture he drew in 1795 -would have seemed bright in comparison. But even this kind of life -could not be supported on such provision as was made by the parish. -How, then, did the labourers maintain any kind of existence when -society ceased to piece together a minimum livelihood out of rates and -wages? - - * * * * * - -For the answer to this question we must turn to the history of crime -and punishment; to the Reports of the Parliamentary Committees -on Labourers’ Wages (1824), on the Game Laws (1823 and 1828), on -Emigration (1826 and 1827), on Criminal Commitments and Convictions and -Secondary Punishments (1827, 1828, 1831, and 1832), and the evidence -of those who were in touch with this side of village life. From these -sources we learn that, rate aid not being sufficient to bring wages to -the maintenance level, poaching, smuggling, and ultimately thieving -were called in to rehabilitate the labourer’s economic position.[346] -He was driven to the wages of crime. The history of the agricultural -labourer in this generation is written in the code of the Game Laws, -the growing brutality of the Criminal Law, and the preoccupation of -the rich with the efficacy of punishment. - -We know from Fielding with what sort of justice the magistrates treated -persons accused of poaching in the reign of George III.’s grandfather, -but when he wrote his account of Squire Western, and when Blackstone -wrote that the Game Laws had raised up a little Nimrod in every manor, -the blood of men and boys had not yet been spilt for the pleasures of -the rich. It is only after Fielding and Blackstone were both in their -graves that this page of history became crimson, and that the gentlemen -of England took to guarding their special amusements by methods of -which a Member of Parliament declared that the nobles of France had not -ventured on their like in the days of their most splendid arrogance. -The little Nimrods who made and applied their code were a small and -select class. They were the persons qualified under the law of Charles -II. to shoot game, _i.e._ persons who possessed a freehold estate of at -least £100 a year, or a leasehold estate of at least £150 a year, or -the son or heir-apparent of an esquire or person of higher degree. The -legislation that occupies so much of English history during a period -of misery and famine is devoted to the protection of the monopoly of -this class, comprising less than one in ten thousand of the people of -England. A Member of Parliament named Warburton said in the House of -Commons that the only parallel to this monopoly was to be found in -Mariner’s account of the Tonga Islands, where rats were preserved as -game. Anybody might eat rats there, but nobody was allowed to kill them -except persons descended from gods or kings. - -With the general growth of upper-class riches and luxury there came -over shooting a change corresponding with the change that turned -hunting into a magnificent and extravagant spectacle. The habit set -in of preserving game in great masses, of organising the battue, of -maintaining armies of keepers. In many parts of the country, pheasants -were now introduced for the first time. Whereas game had hitherto -kept something of the wildness, and vagrancy, and careless freedom of -Nature, the woods were now packed with tame and docile birds, whose gay -feathers sparkled among the trees, before the eyes of the half-starved -labourers breaking stones on the road at half a crown a week. The -change is described by witnesses such as Sir James Graham and Sir -Thomas Baring, magistrates respectively in Cumberland and Hampshire, -before the Select Committee on Criminal Commitments and Convictions -in 1827. England was, in fact, passing through a process precisely -opposite to that which had taken place in France: the sport of the rich -was becoming more and more of an elaborate system, and more of a vested -interest. This development was marked by the growth of an offensive -combination among game preservers; in some parts of the country game -associations were formed, for the express purpose of paying the costs -of prosecutions, so that the poacher had against him not merely a bench -of game preservers, but a ring of squires, a sort of Holy Alliance for -the punishment of social rebels, which drew its meshes not round a -parish but round a county. Simultaneously, as we have seen, a general -change was coming over the circumstances and position of the poor. The -mass of the people were losing their rights and independence; they were -being forced into an absolute dependence on wages, and were living on -the brink of famine. These two developments must be kept in mind in -watching the building up of the game code in the last phase of the -ancient régime. - -The Acts for protecting game passed after the accession of George III. -are in a crescendo of fierceness. The first important Act was passed -In 1770. Under this Act any one who killed game of any kind between -sunsetting and sunrising, or used any gun, or dog, snare, net, or other -engine for destroying game at night, was, on conviction by one witness -before one Justice of the Peace, to be punished with imprisonment for -not less than three months or more than six. For a subsequent offence -he was to be imprisoned for not more than twelve months or less than -six, and to be whipped publicly between the hours of twelve and one -o’clock. This was light punishment compared with the measures that were -to follow. In the year 1800, the year of Marengo, when all England -was braced up for its great duel with the common enemy of freedom and -order, and the labourers were told every day that they would be the -first to suffer if Napoleon landed in England, the English Parliament -found time to pass another Act to punish poachers, and to teach justice -to mend her slow pace. By this Act when two or more persons were found -in any forest, chase, park, wood, plantation, paddock, field, meadow, -or other open or enclosed ground, having any gun, net, engine, or other -instrument, with the intent to destroy, take, or kill game, they were -to be seized by keepers or servants, and on conviction before a J.P., -they were to be treated as rogues and vagabonds under the Act of 1744, -_i.e._ they were to be punished by imprisonment with hard labour; an -incorrigible rogue, _i.e._ a second offender, was to be imprisoned for -two years with whipping. Further, if the offender was over twelve years -of age, the magistrates might sentence him to serve in the army or -navy. If an incorrigible rogue escaped from the House of Correction he -was to be liable to transportation for seven years. - -Two consequences followed from this Act. Now that punishment was made -so severe, the poacher had a strong reason for violence: surrender -meant service in a condemned regiment, and he therefore took the risks -of resistance. The second consequence was the practice of poaching in -large groups. The organisation of poaching gangs was not a natural -development of the industry; it was adopted in self-defence.[347] This -Act led inevitably to those battles between gamekeepers and labourers -that became so conspicuous a feature of English life at this time, and -in 1803 Lord Ellenborough passed an Act which provided that any persons -who presented a gun or tried to stab or cut ‘with intent to obstruct, -resist, or prevent the lawful apprehension or detainer of the person or -persons so stabbing or cutting, or the lawful apprehension or detainer -of any of his, her, or their accomplices for any offences for which -he, she, or they may respectively be liable by law to be apprehended, -imprisoned, or detained,’ should suffer death as a felon. In 1816, when -peace and the fall of prices were bringing new problems in their train, -there went through Parliament, without a syllable of debate, a Bill of -which Romilly said that no parallel to it could be found in the laws of -any country in the world. By that Act a person who was found at night -unarmed, but with a net for poaching, in any forest, chase, or park -was to be punished by transportation for seven years. This Act Romilly -induced Parliament to repeal in the following year, but the Act that -took its place only softened the law to the extent of withdrawing this -punishment from persons found with nets, but without guns or bludgeons: -it enacted that any person so found, armed with gun, crossbow, -firearms, bludgeon, or any other offensive weapon, was to be tried at -Quarter Sessions, and if convicted, to be sentenced to transportation -for seven years: if such offender were to return to Great Britain -before his time was over, he was to be transported for the rest of his -life.[348] - -This savage Act, though by no means a dead letter, as Parliamentary -Returns show, seems to have defeated its own end, for in 1828 it was -repealed, because, as Lord Wharncliffe told the House of Lords, there -was a certain reluctance on the part of juries to convict a prisoner, -when they knew that conviction would be followed by transportation. -The new Act of 1828, which allowed a person to be convicted before two -magistrates, reserved transportation for the third offence, punishing -the first offence by three months’, and the second by six months’ -imprisonment. But the convicted person had to find sureties after his -release, or else go back to hard labour for another six months if it -was a first offence, or another twelve months if it was his second. -Further, if three men were found in a wood and one of them carried a -gun or bludgeon, all three were liable to be transported for fourteen -years.[349] Althorp’s Bill of 1831 which abolished the qualifications -of the Act of Charles II., gave the right to shoot to every landowner -who took out a certificate, and made the sale of game legal, proposed -in its original form to alter these punishments, making that for the -first and second offences rather more severe (four and eight months), -and that for the third, two years’ imprisonment. In Committee in the -House of Commons the two years were reduced to one year on the proposal -of Orator Hunt. The House of Lords, however, restored the punishments -of the Act of 1828. - -These were the main Acts for punishing poachers that were passed -during the last phase of the ancient régime. How large a part they -played in English life may be imagined from a fact mentioned by the -Duke of Richmond in 1831.[350] In the three years between 1827 and -1830 one in seven of all the criminal convictions in the country were -convictions under the Game Code. The number of persons so convicted -was 8502, many of them being under eighteen. Some of them had been -transported for life, and some for seven or fourteen years. In some -years the proportion was still higher.[351] We must remember, too, what -kind of judges had tried many of these men and boys. ‘There is not a -worse-constituted tribunal on the face of the earth,’ said Brougham -in 1828, ‘not even that of the Turkish Cadi, than that at which -summary convictions on the Game Laws constantly take place; I mean -a bench or a brace of sporting justices. I am far from saying that, -on such subjects, they are actuated by corrupt motives; but they are -undoubtedly instigated by their abhorrence of that _caput lupinum_, -that _hostis humani generis_, as an Honourable Friend of mine once -called him in his place, that _fera naturæ_--a poacher. From their -decisions on those points, where their passions are the most likely to -mislead them, no appeal in reality lies to a more calm and unprejudiced -tribunal; for, unless they set out any matter illegal on the face of -the conviction, you remove the record in vain.’[352] - -The close relation of this great increase of crime to the general -distress was universally recognised. Cobbett tells us that a gentleman -in Surrey asked a young man, who was cracking stones on the roadside, -how he could live upon half a crown a week. ‘I don’t live upon it,’ -said he. ‘How do you live then?’ ‘Why,’ said he, ‘I _poach_: it is -better to be hanged than to be starved to death.’[353] This story -receives illustration after illustration in the evidence taken by -Parliamentary Committees. The visiting Justices of the Prisons in -Bedfordshire reported in 1827 that the great increase in commitments, -and particularly the number of commitments for offences against the -Game Laws, called for an inquiry. More than a third of the commitments -during the last quarter had been for such offences. The Report -continues:-- - -‘In many parishes in this county the wages given to young unmarried -agricultural labourers, in the full strength and vigour of life, seldom -exceed 3s. or 3s. 6d. a week, paid to them, generally, under the -description of roundsmen, by the overseers out of the poor rates; and -often in the immediate vicinity of the dwellings of such half-starved -labourers there are abundantly-stocked preserves of game, in which, -during a single night, these dissatisfied young men can obtain a rich -booty by snaring hares and taking or killing pheasants ... offences -which they cannot be brought to acknowledge to be any violation of -private property. Detection generally leads to their imprisonment, and -imprisonment introduces these youths to familiarity with criminals of -other descriptions, and thus they become rapidly abandoned to unlawful -pursuits and a life of crime.’[354] Mr. Orridge, Governor of the -Gaol of Bury St. Edmunds, gave to the Committee on Commitments and -Convictions[355] the following figures of prisoners committed to the -House of Correction for certain years:-- - - 1805, 221 1815, 387 1824, 457 - 1806, 192 1816, 476 1825, 439 - 1807, 173 1817, 430 1826, 573. - -He stated that the great increase in the number of commitments began -in the year 1815 with the depression of agriculture and the great -dearth of employment: that men were employed on the roads at very low -rates: that the commitments under the Game Laws which in 1810 were -five, in 1811 four, and in 1812 two, were seventy-five in 1822, a year -of great agricultural distress, sixty in 1823, sixty-one in 1824, and -seventy-one in 1825. Some men were poachers from the love of sport, but -the majority from distress. Mr. Pym, a magistrate in Cambridgeshire, -and Sir Thomas Baring, a magistrate for Hampshire, gave similar -evidence as to the cause of the increase of crime, and particularly of -poaching, in these counties. Mr. Bishop, a Bow Street officer, whose -business it was to mix with the poachers in public-houses and learn -their secrets, told the Committee on the Game Laws in 1823 that there -had not been employment for the labouring poor in most of the places -he had visited. Perhaps the most graphic picture of the relation of -distress to crime is given in a pamphlet, _Thoughts and Suggestions on -the Present Condition of the Country_, published in 1830 by Mr. Potter -Macqueen, late M.P. for Bedford. - -‘In January 1829, there were ninety-six prisoners for trial in Bedford -Gaol, of whom seventy-six were able-bodied men, in the prime of life, -and, chiefly, of general good character, who were driven to crime by -sheer want, and who would have been valuable subjects had they been -placed in a situation, where, by the exercise of their health and -strength, they could have earned a subsistence. There were in this -number eighteen poachers, awaiting trial for the capital offence of -using arms in self-defence when attacked by game-keepers; of these -eighteen men, one only was not a parish pauper, and he was the agent -of the London poulterers, who, passing under the apparent vocation of -a rat-catcher, paid these poor creatures more in one night than they -could obtain from the overseer for a week’s labour. I conversed with -each of these men singly, and made minutes of their mode of life. The -two first I will mention are the two brothers, the Lilleys, in custody -under a charge of firing on and wounding a keeper, who endeavoured to -apprehend them whilst poaching. They were two remarkably fine young -men, and very respectably connected. The elder, twenty-eight years -of age, married, with two small children. When I inquired how he -could lend himself to such a wretched course of life, the poor fellow -replied: ‘Sir, I had a pregnant wife, with one infant at her knee, and -another at her breast; I was anxious to obtain work, I offered myself -in all directions, but without success; if I went to a distance, I was -told to go back to my parish, and when I did so, I was allowed ... -What? Why, for myself, my babes, and my wife, in a condition requiring -more than common support, and unable to labour, I was allowed 7s. a -week for all; for which I was expected to work on the roads from light -to dark, and to pay three guineas a year for the hovel which sheltered -us.’ The other brother, aged twenty-two, unmarried, received 6d. a day. -These men were hanged at the spring assizes. Of the others, ten were -single men, their ages varying from seventeen to twenty-seven. Many had -never been in gaol before, and were considered of good character. Six -of them were on the roads at 6d. per day. Two could not obtain even -this pittance. One had been refused relief on the ground that he had -shortly previous obtained a profitable piece of job-work, and one had -existed on 1s. 6d. during the fortnight before he joined the gang in -question. Of five married men, two with wife and two children received -7s., two with wife and one child 6s., and one with wife and four small -children 11s.’[356] - -If we wish to obtain a complete picture of the social life of the -time, it is not enough to study the construction of this vindictive -code. We must remember that a sort of civil war was going on between -the labourers and the gamekeepers. The woods in which Tom Jones -fought his great fight with Thwackum and Blifil to cover the flight -of Molly Seagrim now echoed on a still and moonless night with the -din of a different sort of battle: the noise of gunshots and blows -from bludgeons, and broken curses from men who knew that, if they were -taken, they would never see the English dawn rise over their homes -again: a battle which ended perhaps in the death or wounding of a -keeper or poacher, and the hanging or transportation of some of the -favourite Don Quixotes of the village. A witness before the Committee -on the Game Laws said that the poachers preferred a quiet night. -Crabbe, in the poacher poem (Book XXI. of _Tales of the Hall_) which -he wrote at the suggestion of Romilly, takes what would seem to be the -more probable view that poachers liked a noisy night: - - ‘It was a night such bold desires to move - Strong winds and wintry torrents filled the grove; - The crackling boughs that in the forest fell, - The cawing rooks, the cur’s affrighted yell; - The scenes above the wood, the floods below, - Were mix’d, and none the single sound could know; - “Loud blow the blasts,” they cried, “and call us as they blow.”’ - -Such an encounter is put into cold arithmetic in an official return -like this[357]:-- - -‘An account of the nineteen persons committed to Warwick Gaol for trial -at the Lent Assizes 1829 for shooting and wounding John Slinn at Combe -Fields in the County of Warwick whilst endeavouring to apprehend them -for destroying game in the night with the result thereof:-- - - +---------+--------+---------------------------------------------+------------+ - | | | Capitally convicted and reprieved with-- | | - | | +--------------+--------------+---------------+ | - | Above 14| Above | | | Imprisonment | | - |and under|20 years|Transportation|Transportation| with hard | Admitted | - | 20 years| of age.| for life. | for 14 |labour in House|to Evidence.| - | of age. | | | years. | of Correction | | - | | | | | for 2 years. | | - +---------+--------+--------------+--------------+---------------+------------+ - | 11 | 8 | 7 | 9 | 1 | 2 | - +---------+--------+--------------+--------------+---------------+------------+ - -Seven peasants exiled for life, nine exiled for fourteen years, and two -condemned to the worst exile of all. In that village at any rate there -were many homes that had reason to remember the day when the pleasures -of the rich became the most sacred thing in England. - -But the warfare was not conducted only by these methods. For the -gentlemen of England, as for the genius who fought Michael and Gabriel -in the great battle in the sixth book of _Paradise Lost_, science did -not spread her light in vain. There was a certain joy of adventure -in a night skirmish, and a man who saw his wife and children slowly -starving, to whom one of those golden birds that was sleeping on its -perch the other side of the hedge, night after night, till the day when -it should please the squire to send a shot through its purple head, -meant comfort and even riches for a week, was not very much afraid of -trusting his life and his freedom to his quick ear, his light foot, or -at the worst his powerful arm. So the game preservers invented a cold -and terrible demon: they strewed their woods with spring guns, that -dealt death without warning, death without the excitement of battle, -death that could catch the nimblest as he slipped and scrambled through -the hiding bracken. The man who fell in an affray fell fighting, his -comrades by his side; it was a grim and uncomforted fate to go out -slowly and alone, lying desolate in the stained bushes, beneath the -unheeding sky. It is not clear when these diabolical engines, as Lord -Holland called them, were first introduced, but they were evidently -common by 1817, when Curwen made a passionate protest in the House of -Commons, and declared, ‘Better the whole race of game was extinct than -that it should owe its preservation to such cruel expedients.’[358] -Fortunately for England the spring guns, though they scattered murder -and wounds freely enough (Peel spoke in 1827 of ‘daily accidents and -misfortunes’), did not choose their victims with so nice an eye as a -Justice of the Peace, and it was often a gamekeeper or a farm servant -who was suddenly tripped up by this lurking death. By 1827 this state -of things had become such a scandal that Parliament intervened and -passed an Act, introduced in the Lords by Lord Suffield, who had made -a previous attempt in 1825, to make the setting of spring guns a -misdemeanor.[359] - -The Bill did not pass without considerable opposition. Tennyson, who -introduced it in the Commons, declared that the feudal nobility in -ancient France had never possessed a privilege comparable with this -right of killing and maiming, and he said that the fact that Coke of -Norfolk[360] and Lord Suffield, both large game preservers, refused -to employ them showed that they were not necessary. Members of both -Houses of Parliament complained bitterly of the ‘morbid sensibility’ -that inspired the proposal, and some of them defended spring guns as -a labour-saving machine, speaking of them with the enthusiasm that -a manufacturer might bestow on the invention of an Arkwright or a -Crompton. One member of the House of Commons, a Colonel French, opposed -the Bill with the argument that the honest English country gentleman -formed ‘the very subject and essence of the English character,’ while -Lord Ellenborough opposed it in the other House on the ground that it -was contrary to the principles of the English law, which gave a man -protection for his property in proportion to the difficulty with which -it could be defended by ordinary means. - -The crime for which men were maimed or killed by these engines or -torn from their homes by summary and heartless justice was, it must -be remembered, no crime at all in the eyes of the great majority of -their countrymen. At this time the sale of game was prohibited under -stern penalties, and yet every rich man in London, from the Lord Mayor -downwards, entertained his guests with game that he had bought from -a poulterer. How had the poulterer bought it? There was no secret -about the business. It was explained to two Select Committees, the -first of the House of Commons in 1823, and the second of the House of -Lords in 1828, by poulterers who lived by these transactions, and by -police officers who did nothing to interfere with them. Daniel Bishop, -for example, one of the chief Bow Street officers, described the -arrangements to the Committee in 1823.[361] - -‘Can you state to the Committee, how the Game is brought from the -poachers up to London, or other market?... The poachers generally -meet the coachman or guards of the mails or vans, and deliver it to -them after they are out of a town, they do not deliver it in a town; -then it is brought up to London, sometimes to their agents; but the -coachmen and guards mostly have their friends in London where they -know how to dispose of it, and they have their contracts made at so -much a brace.... There is no intermediate person between the poacher -and the coachman or guard that conveys it to town?... Very seldom; -generally the head of the gang pays the rest of the men, and he sends -off the Game.... When the game arrives in London, how is it disposed -of?... They have their agents, the bookkeepers at most of the inns, the -porters who go out with the carts; any persons they know may go and get -what quantity they like, by sending an order a day or two before; there -are great quantities come up to Leadenhall and Newgate markets.’ - -Nobody in London thought the worse of a poulterer for buying poached -game; and nobody in the country thought any the worse of the poacher -who supplied it. A witness before the Committee in 1823 said that in -one village the whole of the village were poachers, ‘the constable -of the village, the shoemaker and other inhabitants of the village.’ -Another witness before the Lords in 1828 said that occupiers and -unqualified proprietors agreed with the labourers in thinking that -poaching was an innocent practice. - -Those who wished to reform the Game Laws argued that if the sale -of game were legalised, and if the anomalous qualifications were -abolished, the poacher’s prize would become much less valuable, and -the temptation would be correspondingly diminished. This view was -corroborated by the evidence given to the Select Committees. But all -such proposals were bitterly attacked by the great majority of game -preservers. Lord Londonderry urged against this reform in 1827 ‘that -it would deprive the sportsman of his highest gratification ... the -pleasure of furnishing his friends with presents of game: nobody -would care for a present which everybody could give’![362] Other game -preservers argued that it was sport that made the English gentlemen -such good officers, on which the _Edinburgh Review_ remarked: ‘The -hunting which Xenophon and Cicero praise as the best discipline for -forming great generals from its being war in miniature must have been -very unlike pheasant shooting.’[363] Lord Deerhurst declared, when the -proposal was made fourteen years earlier, that this was not the time to -disgust resident gentlemen. The English aristocracy, like the French, -would only consent to live in the country on their own terms. When the -squires threatened to turn _émigrés_ if anybody else was allowed to -kill a rabbit, or if a poacher was not put to risk of life and limb, -Sydney Smith gave an answer that would have scandalised the House of -Commons, ‘If gentlemen cannot breathe fresh air without injustice, let -them putrefy in Cranbourne Court.’ - -But what about the justice of the laws against poachers? To most -members of Parliament there would have been an element of paradox in -such a question. From the discussions on the subject of the Game Laws -a modern reader might suppose that poachers were not men of flesh and -blood, but some kind of vermin. There were a few exceptions. In 1782, -when Coke of Norfolk, acting at the instance of the magistrates of that -county, proposed to make the Game Laws more stringent, Turner, the -member for York, made a spirited reply; he ‘exclaimed against those -laws as cruel and oppressive on the poor: he said it was a shame that -the House should always be enacting laws for the safety of gentlemen; -he wished they would make a few for the good of the poor.... For his -own part, he was convinced, that if he had been a common man, he would -have been a poacher, in spite of all the laws; and he was equally -sure that the too great severity of the laws was the cause that the -number of poachers had increased so much.’[364] Fox (29th April 1796) -protested with vigour against the morality that condemned poachers -without mercy, and condoned all the vices of the rich, but he, with -Sheridan, Curwen, Romilly, and a few others were an infinitesimal -minority. - -The aristocracy had set up a code, under which a man or boy who had -offended against the laws, but had done nothing for which any of his -fellows imputed discredit to him, was snatched from his home, thrown -into gaol with thieves and criminals, and perhaps flung to the other -side of the world, leaving his family either to go upon the rates or -to pick up a living by such dishonesties as they could contrive. This -last penalty probably meant final separation. Mr. T. G. B. Estcourt, -M.P., stated in evidence before the Select Committee on Secondary -Punishments in 1831[365] that as men who had been transported were not -brought back at the public expense, they scarcely ever returned,[366] -that agricultural labourers specially dreaded transportation, because -it meant ‘entire separation’ from ‘former associates, relations, and -friends,’ and that since he and his brother magistrates in Wiltshire -had taken to transporting more freely, committals had decreased. The -special misery that transportation inflicted on men of this class -is illustrated in Marcus Clarke’s famous novel, _For the Term of -His Natural Life_. In the passage describing the barracoon on the -transport ship, Clarke throws on the screen all the different types of -character--forgers, housebreakers, cracksmen, footpads--penned up in -that poisonous prison. ‘The poacher grimly thinking of his sick wife -and children would start as the night-house ruffian clapped him on the -shoulder and bade him with a curse to take good heart and be a man.’ -Readers of Mr. Hudson’s character sketches of the modern Wiltshire -labourer can imagine the scene. To the lad who had never been outside -his own village such a society must have been unspeakably alien and -terrible: a ring of callous and mocking faces, hardened, by crime and -wrong and base punishment, to make bitter ridicule of all the memories -of home and boyhood and innocence that were surging and breaking round -his simple heart. - - * * * * * - -The growing brutality of the Game Laws, if it is the chief, is not the -only illustration of the extent to which the pressure of poverty was -driving the labourers to press upon law and order, and the kind of -measures that the ruling class took to protect its property. Another -illustration is the Malicious Trespass Act. - -In 1820 Parliament passed an Act which provided that any person -convicted before a single J.P. within four months of the act of doing -any malicious injury to any building, hedge, fence, tree, wood, or -underwood was to pay damage not exceeding £5, and if he was unable to -pay these damages he was to be sent to hard labour in a common gaol -or House of Correction for three months. The law before the passing -of this Act was as it is to-day, _i.e._ the remedy lay in an action -at law against the trespasser, and the trespasser under the Act of -William and Mary had to pay damages. The Act of 1820 was passed without -any debate that is reported in _Hansard_, but it is not unreasonable -to assume that it was demanded for the protection of enclosures and -game preserves.[367] This Act exempted one set of persons entirely, -‘persons engaged in hunting, and qualified persons in pursuit of game.’ -These privileged gentlemen could do as much injury as they pleased. - -One clause provided that every male offender under sixteen who did not -pay damages, and all costs and charges and expenses forthwith, might -be sent by the magistrate to hard labour in the House of Correction -for six weeks. Thus a child who broke a bough from a tree by the -roadside might be sent by the magistrate, who would in many cases be -the owner of the tree, to the House of Correction, there to learn -the ways of criminals at an age when the magistrate’s own children -were about half-way through their luxurious education. This was no -_brutum fulmen_. Children were sent to prison in great numbers.[368] -Brougham said in 1828: ‘There was a Bill introduced by the Rt. Hon. -Gentleman opposite for extending the payment of expenses of witnesses -and prosecutors out of the county rates. It is not to be doubted that -it has greatly increased the number of Commitments, and has been -the cause of many persons being brought to trial, who ought to have -been discharged by the Magistrates. The habit of committing, from -this and other causes, has grievously increased everywhere of late, -and especially of boys. Eighteen hundred and odd, many of them mere -children, have been committed in the Warwick district during the last -seven years.’[369] The Governor of the House of Correction in Coldbath -Fields, giving evidence before the Committee on Secondary Punishments -in 1831, said that he had under his charge a boy of ten years old -who had been in prison eight times. Capper, the Superintendent of -the Convict Establishment, told the same Committee that some of the -boy convicts were so young that they could scarcely put on their -clothes, and that they had to be dressed. Richard Potter’s diary for -1813 contains this entry: ‘Oct. 13.--I was attending to give evidence -against a man. Afterwards, two boys, John and Thomas Clough, aged 12 -and 10 years, were tried and found guilty of stealing some Irish linen -out of Joseph Thorley’s warehouse during the dinner hour. The Chairman -sentenced them to seven years’ transportation. On its being pronounced, -the Mother of those unfortunate boys came to the Bar to her children, -and with them was in great agony, imploring mercy of the Bench. With -difficulty the children were removed. The scene was so horrifying -I could remain no longer in court.’[370] Parliament put these -tremendous weapons into the hands of men who believed in using them, -who administered the law on the principle by which Sir William Dyott -regulated his conduct as a magistrate, that ‘nothing but the terror of -human suffering can avail to prevent crime.’ - -The class that had, in Goldsmith’s words, hung round ‘our paltriest -possessions with gibbetts’ never doubted its power to do full justice -to the helpless creatures who tumbled into the net of the law. Until -1836 a man accused of a felony was not allowed to employ counsel to -make his defence in the Court. His counsel (if he could afford to have -one) could examine and cross-examine witnesses, and that was all; the -prisoner, whatever his condition of mind, or his condition of body, -had to answer the speech of the prosecuting counsel himself. In nine -cases out of ten he was quite an unlearned man; he was swept into the -glare of the Court blinking from long months of imprisonment in dark -cells; the case against him was woven into a complete and perfect story -by the skilled fingers of a lawyer, and it was left to this rude and -illiterate man, by the aid of his own memory and his own imagination, -his life on the razor’s edge, his mind bewildered by his strange and -terrible surroundings, to pick that story to pieces, to expose what was -mere and doubtful inference, to put a different complexion on a long -and tangled set of events, to show how a turn here or a turn there in -the narrative would change black into white and apparent guilt into -manifest innocence. Sydney Smith, whose opinions on the importance of -giving the poor a fair trial were as enlightened as his opinions on -their proper treatment in prison were backward, has described the scene. - - ‘It is a most affecting moment in a Court of Justice, when the - evidence has all been heard, and the Judge asks the prisoner what he - has to say in his defence. The prisoner who has (by great exertions, - perhaps of his friends) saved up money enough to procure Counsel, says - to the Judge “that he leaves his defence to his Counsel.” We have - often blushed for English humanity to hear the reply. “Your Counsel - cannot speak for you, you must speak for yourself”; and this is the - reply given to a poor girl of eighteen--to a foreigner--to a deaf - man--to a stammerer--to the sick--to the feeble--to the old--to the - most abject and ignorant of human beings!... How often have we seen a - poor wretch, struggling against the agonies of his spirit, and the - rudeness of his conceptions, and his awe of better-dressed men and - better-taught men, and the shame which the accusation has brought upon - his head, and the sight of his parents and children gazing at him in - the Court, for the last time perhaps, and after a long absence!’[371] - -Brougham said in the House of Commons that there was no man who -visited the Criminal Courts who did not see the fearful odds against -the prisoner. This anomaly was peculiar to England, and in England it -was peculiar to cases of felony. Men tried for misdemeanours, or for -treason, or before the House of Lords could answer by the mouth of -counsel. It was only in those cases where the prisoners were almost -always poor and uneducated men and women, as Lord Althorp pointed -out in an admirable speech in the House of Commons, that the accused -was left to shift for himself. Twice, in 1824 and in 1826, the House -of Commons refused leave to bring in a Bill to redress this flagrant -injustice, encouraged in that refusal not only by Canning, but, what is -much more surprising, by Peel. - -The favourite argument against this reform, taking precedence of the -arguments that to allow persons the aid of counsel in putting their -statement of fact would make justice slower, more expensive, and more -theatrical, was the contention that the judge did, in point of fact, -represent the interest of the prisoner: a confused plea which it did -not require any very highly developed gift of penetration to dissect. -But how far, in point of fact, were the judges able to enter into the -poor prisoner’s mind? They had the power of sentencing to death for -hundreds of trivial offences. It was the custom to pass the brutal -sentence which the law allowed to be inflicted for felonies, and then -to commute it in all except a few cases. By what considerations did -judges decide when to be severe? Lord Ellenborough told Lauderdale that -he had left a man to be hanged at the Worcester Assizes because he -lolled out his tongue and pretended to be an idiot, on which Lauderdale -asked the Chief Justice what law there was to punish that particular -offence with death. We learn from Romilly’s _Memoirs_[372] that one -judge left three men to be hanged for thefts at the Maidstone Assizes -because none of them could bring a witness to his character. - -The same disposition to trust to the discretion of the judge, which -Camden described as the law of tyrants, explains the vitality of the -system of prescribing death as the punishment for hundreds of paltry -offences. During the last fifty years the energy of Parliament in -passing Enclosure Acts had been only rivalled by its energy in creating -capital offences. The result was a penal code which had been condemned -by almost every Englishman of repute of the most various opinions, from -Blackstone, Johnson, and Goldsmith to Burke and Bentham. This system -made the poor man the prey of his rich neighbours. The most furious -punishments were held _in terrorem_ over the heads of prisoners, and -the wretched man who was caught in the net was exposed to all the -animosities that he might have provoked in his ordinary life. Dr. Parr -put this point writing to Romilly in 1811. - -‘There is, indeed, one consideration in the case of bad men which -ought to have a greater weight than it usually has in the minds of -the Judges. Dislike from party, quarrels with servants or neighbours, -offence justly or unjustly taken in a quarrel, jealousy about game, and -twenty other matters of the same sort, frequently induce men to wish to -get rid of a convicted person: and well does it behove every Judge to -be sure that the person who recommends the execution of the sentence is -a man of veracity, of sense, of impartiality and kindness of nature in -the habitual character of his mind. I remember hearing from Sergeant -Whitaker that, while he was trying a man for a capital offence at -Norwich, a person brought him a message from the late Lord Suffield, -“that the prisoner was a good-for-nothing fellow, and he hoped the -Judge would look to him”; and the Sergeant kindled with indignation, -and exclaimed in the hearing of the Court, “Zounds! would Sir Harbord -Harbord have me condemn the man before I have tried him?” What Sir -Harbord did during the trial, many squires and justices of the peace, -upon other occasions, do after it; and were I a Judge, I should listen -with great caution to all unfavourable representations. The rich, the -proud, the irascible, and the vindictive are very unfit to estimate the -value of life to their inferiors.’[373] - -We can see how the squires and the justices would close in round a man -of whom they wanted, with the best intentions in the world, to rid -their parish, woods, and warrens, when the punishment he was to receive -turned on his reputation as it was estimated by the gentlemen of his -neighbourhood. Was Sir Harbord Harbord very far removed from the state -of mind described in the Sixth Satire of Juvenal? - - ‘“Pone crucem servo.” “Meruit quo crimine servus - Supplicium? quis testis adest? quis detulit? Audi: - Nulla unquam de morte hominis cunctatio longa est.” - “O demens, ita servus homo est? nil fecerit, esto: - Hoc volo, sic jubeo, sit pro ratione voluntas.”’ - -And Sir Harbord Harbord had in hundreds of cases what he had not in -this case, the power to wreak his anger on ‘a good-for-nothing fellow.’ - -When Romilly entered on his noble crusade and tried very cautiously -to persuade Parliament to repeal the death penalty in cases in which -it was rarely carried out, he found the chief obstacle in his way -was the fear that became common among the governing class at this -time, the fear that existing methods of punishment were ceasing to be -deterrent. In 1810 he carried his Bill, for abolishing this penalty for -the crime of stealing privately to the amount of five shillings in a -shop, through the House of Commons, and the Bill was introduced in the -House of Lords by Lord Holland. There it was rejected by twenty-one to -eleven, the majority including the Archbishop of Canterbury and six -other bishops.[374] The chief speeches against the Bill were made by -Eldon and Ellenborough. Ellenborough argued that transportation was -regarded, and justly regarded, by those who violated the law as ‘a -summer airing by an easy migration to a milder climate.’ - -The nightmare that punishment was growing gentle and attractive to the -poor came to haunt the mind of the governing class. It was founded -on the belief that as human wretchedness was increasing, there was a -sort of law of Malthus, by which human endurance tended to outgrow the -resources of repression. The agricultural labourers were sinking into -such a deplorable plight that some of them found it a relief to be -committed to the House of Correction, where, at least, they obtained -food and employment, and the magistrates began to fear in consequence -that ordinary punishments could no longer be regarded as deterrent, -and to reason that some condition had yet to be discovered which -would be more miserable than the general existence of the poor. The -justices who punished Wiltshire poachers found such an El Dorado of -unhappiness in transportation. But disturbing rumours came to the ears -of the authorities that transportation was not thought a very terrible -punishment after all, and the Government sent out to Sir George Arthur, -the Governor of Van Diemen’s Land, certain complaints of this kind. The -answer which the Governor returned is published with the Report of the -Committee on Secondary Punishments, and the complete correspondence -forms a very remarkable set of Parliamentary Papers. The Governor -pointed out that these complaints, which made such an impression on -Lord Melbourne, came from employers in Australia, who wanted to have -greater control over their servants. Arthur was no sentimentalist; -his sympathies had been drilled in two hard schools, the army and the -government of prisoners; his account of his own methods shows that in -describing the life of a convict he was in no danger of falling into -the exaggerations or the rhetoric of pity. In these letters he made -it very clear that nobody who knew what transportation meant could -ever make the mistake of thinking it a light punishment. The ordinary -convict was assigned to a settler. ‘Deprived of liberty, exposed to -all the caprice of the family to whose service he may happen to be -assigned, and subject to the most summary laws, the condition of a -convict in no respect differs from that of a slave, except that his -master cannot apply corporal punishment by his own hands or those -of his overseer, and has a property in him for a limited period -only.’ Further, ‘idleness and insolence of expression, or even of -looks, anything betraying the insurgent spirit, subjects him to the -chain-gang, or the triangle, or to hard labour on the roads.’[375] -We can imagine what the life of an ordinary convict might become. In -earlier days every convict who went out began as an assigned servant, -and it was only for misconduct in the colony or on the way thither that -he was sent to a Penal Settlement, but the growing alarm of the ruling -class on the subject of punishment led to a demand for more drastic -sentences, and shortly after the close of our period Lord Melbourne -introduced a new system, under which convicts might be sentenced from -home to the Penal Settlement, and any judge who thought badly of a -prisoner might add this hideous punishment to transportation. - -The life of these Settlements has been described in one of the most -vivid and terrible books ever written. Nobody can read Marcus Clarke’s -great novel without feeling that the methods of barbarism had done -their worst and most devilish in Macquarie Harbour and Port Arthur. -The lot of the prisoners in _Resurrection_ is by comparison a paradise. -Not a single feature that can revolt and stupefy the imagination -is wanting to the picture. Children of ten committing suicide, men -murdering each other by compact as an escape from a hell they could no -longer bear, prisoners receiving a death sentence with ecstasies of -delight, punishments inflicted that are indistinguishable from torture, -men stealing into the parched bush in groups, in the horrible hope that -one or two of them might make their way to freedom by devouring their -comrades--an atmosphere in which the last faint glimmer of self-respect -and human feeling was extinguished by incessant and degrading cruelty. -Few books have been written in any language more terrible to read. Yet -not a single incident or feature is imaginary: the whole picture is -drawn from the cold facts of the official reports.[376] And this system -was not the invention of some Nero or Caligula; it was the system -imposed by men of gentle and refined manners, who talked to each other -in Virgil and Lucan of liberty and justice, who would have died without -a murmur to save a French princess from an hour’s pain or shame, who -put down the abominations of the Slave Trade, and allowed Clive and -Warren Hastings to be indicted at the bar of public opinion as monsters -of inhumanity; and it was imposed by them from the belief that as -the poor were becoming poorer, only a system of punishment that was -becoming more brutal could deter them from crime. - -If we want to understand how completely all their natural feelings were -lost in this absorbing fear, we must turn to the picture given by an -observer who was outside their world; an observer who could enter into -the misery of the punished, and could describe what transportation -meant to boys of nine and ten, exposed to the most brutal appetites -of savage men; to chained convicts, packed for the night in boxes so -narrow that they could only lie on one side; to crushed and broken men, -whose only prayer it was to die. From him we learn how these scenes and -surroundings impressed a mind that could look upon a convict settlement -as a society of living men and boys, and not merely as the Cloaca -Maxima of property and order.[377] - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[310] _Poor Law Report_, 1834, p. 60. - -[311] The big landlord under this method shared the privilege of paying -the labourer’s wages with the small farmer. - -[312] _Tribune_, vol. ii. p. 317. - -[313] _Ibid._, p. 339. - -[314] Poor Law Commission Report of 1834, p. 126. - -[315] See Curtler’s _Short History of Agriculture_, p. 249. - -[316] Smart, _Economic Annals_, p. 36. - -[317] ‘It was during the war that the cottagers of England were chiefly -deprived of the little pieces of land and garden, and made solely -dependent for subsistence on the wages of their daily labour, or the -poor rates. Land, and the produce of it, had become so valuable, -that the labourer was envied the occupation of the smallest piece -of ground which he possessed: and even “the bare-worn common” was -denied.’--_Kentish Chronicle_, December 14, 1830. - -[318] Curtler, p. 243. - -[319] _Agricultural State of the Kingdom_, Board of Agriculture, 1816, -p. 7. - -[320] _Ibid._, pp. 250-1. - -[321] P. 144. - -[322] C. C. Western (1767-1844); whig M.P., 1790-1832; chief -representative of agricultural interests; made peer in 1833. - -[323] _Annual Register_, 1816, Chron., p. 67. - -[324] The disturbances at Brandon ceased immediately on the concession -of the demands of the rioters; flour was reduced to 2s. 6d. a stone, -and wages were raised for two weeks to 2s. a head. The rioters were -contented, and peace was restored.--_Times_, May 23, 1816. - -[325] _Annual Register_, 1816, Chron., p. 67. - -[326] _Cambridge Chronicle_, June 28, 1816. - -[327] _Times_, June 26. A curious irony has placed side by side with -the account in the _Annual Register_ of the execution of the five men -who were hung for their share in this spasm of starvation and despair, -the report of a meeting, with the inevitable Wilberforce in the chair, -for raising a subscription for rebuilding the Protestant Church at -Copenhagen, which had been destroyed by the British Fleet at the -bombardment of Copenhagen in 1807. - -[328] _Agricultural State of the Kingdom_, p. 13. - -[329] 59 George III. c. 50. - -[330] See _Annual Register_, 1819, p. 320. - -[331] Those assessed at £100 were to have two votes, those at £150 -three votes, and those at £400 four votes. Whitbread did not propose to -copy the provision of Gilbert’s Act, which withdrew all voting power -in vestries in parishes that adopted that Act from persons assessed at -less than £5. - -[332] _Political Register_, August 29, 1807, p. 329. - -[333] Letter to Samuel Whitbread, M.P., on his proposed Bill for the -Amendment of the Poor Laws, 1807. - -[334] 58 George III. c. 69. - -[335] 59 George III. c. 12. - -[336] H. O. Papers, Municipal and Provincial. - -[337] Of course the system was only one of the causes of this -difference in wages. - -[338] P. 99. - -[339] See _Agricultural State of the Kingdom_, Board of Agriculture, p. -231, and Cobbett, _Political Register_, October 5, 1816. - -[340] Pp. 21 and 23. - -[341] The table is given in the Report of the Committee on the Poor -Laws, 1828. - -[342] Cobbett, _Political Register_, September 21, 1822. Cobbett wrote -one of his liveliest articles on this scale, setting out the number of -livings held by the five parsons, and various circumstances connected -with their families. - -[343] _Ibid._, September 9, 1826. - -[344] _Rural Rides_, p. 17. - -[345] _Ibid._, p. 609. - -[346] The farmers were usually sympathetic to poaching as a habit, but -it was not so much from a perception of its economic tendencies, as -from a general resentment against the Game Laws. - -[347] See Cobbett; _Letters to Peel_; _Political Register_; and Dr. -Hunt’s evidence before the Select Committee on Criminal Commitments and -Convictions, 1827. - -[348] A manifesto was published in a Bath paper in reply to this Act; -it is quoted by Sydney Smith, _Essays_, p. 263: ‘TAKE NOTICE.--We -have lately heard and seen that there is an act passed, and whatever -poacher is caught destroying the game is to be transported for seven -years.--_This is English Liberty!_ - -‘Now we do swear to each other that the first of our company that this -law is inflicted on, that there shall not be one gentleman’s seat in -our country escape the rage of fire. The first that impeaches shall -be shot. We have sworn not to impeach. You may think it a threat, but -they will find it a reality. The Game Laws were too severe before. The -Lord of all men sent these animals for the peasants as well as for the -prince. God will not let his people be oppressed. He will assist us in -our undertaking, and we will execute it with caution.’ - -[349] The Archbishop of Canterbury prosecuted a man under this Act -in January 1831, for rescuing a poacher from a gamekeeper without -violence, on the ground that he thought it his duty to enforce the -provisions of the Act. - -[350] House of Lords, September 19, 1831. - -[351] A magistrate wrote to Sir R. Peel in 1827 to say that many -magistrates sent in very imperfect returns of convictions, and that the -true number far exceeded the records.--Webb, _Parish and County_, p. -598 note. - -[352] _Brougham Speeches_, vol. ii. p. 373. - -[353] _Political Register_, March 29, 1823, vol. xxiv. p. 796. - -[354] Select Committee on Criminal Commitments and Convictions, 1827, -p. 30. - -[355] _Ibid._, p. 39. - -[356] Quoted in _Times_, December 18, 1830. - -[357] Return of Convictions under the Game Laws from 1827 to 1830. -Ordered by the House of Commons to be printed, February 14, 1831, p. 4. - -[358] _Hansard_, June 9, 1817. - -[359] Scotland was exempted from the operation of this statute, for -whilst the Bill was going through Parliament, a case raised in a -Scottish Court ended in a unanimous decision by the six Judges of the -High Court of Justiciary that killing by a spring gun was murder. -Hence the milder provisions of this Act were not required. See _Annual -Register_, 1827, p. 185, and Chron., p. 116. - -[360] That Coke of Norfolk did not err on the side of mercy towards -poachers is clear from his record. His biographer (Mrs. Stirling) -states that one of his first efforts in Parliament was to introduce a -Bill to punish night poaching. - -[361] P. 29 ff. - -[362] _Annual Register_, 1827, p. 184. - -[363] _Edinburgh Review_, December 1831. - -[364] _Parliamentary Register_, February 25, 1782. - -[365] P. 42. - -[366] ‘Speaking now of country and agricultural parishes, I do not know -above one instance in all my experience.’ - -[367] Some Enclosure Acts prescribed special penalties for the breaking -of fences. See cases of Haute Huntre and Croydon in Appendix. - -[368] See Mr. Estcourt’s evidence before Select Committee on Secondary -Punishments, 1831, p. 41. - -[369] _Present State of the Law_, p. 41. - -[370] _From Ploughshare to Parliament_, p. 186; the _Annual Register_ -for 1791 records the execution of two boys at Newport for stealing, one -aged fourteen and the other fifteen. - -[371] Sydney Smith, _Essays_, p. 487. - -[372] Vol. ii. p. 153. - -[373] Romilly, _Memoirs_, vol. ii. p. 181. - -[374] It was again rejected in 1813 by twenty to fifteen, the majority -including five bishops. - -[375] _Correspondence on the Subject of Secondary Punishments_, 1834, -p. 22. - -[376] See Select Committee on Secondary Punishments, 1831, and Select -Committee on Transportation, 1838. - -[377] See evidence of Dr. Ullathorne, Roman Catholic Vicar-General -of New Holland and Van Diemen’s Land, before the 1838 Committee on -Transportation. - - - - -CHAPTER IX - -THE ISOLATION OF THE POOR - - -The upper classes, to whom the fact that the labourers were more -wretched in 1830 than they had been in 1795 was a reason for making -punishment more severe, were not deliberately callous and cruel in -their neglect of all this growing misery and hunger. Most of those who -thought seriously about it had learnt a reasoned insensibility from -the stern Sibyl of the political economy in fashion, that strange and -partial interpretation of Adam Smith, Malthus and Ricardo which was -then in full power. This political economy had robbed poverty of its -sting for the rich by representing it as Nature’s medicine, bitter -indeed, but less bitter than any medicine that man could prescribe. -If poverty was sharper at one time than another, this only meant -that society was more than ever in need of this medicine. But the -governing class as a whole did not think out any such scheme or order -of society, or master the new science of misery and vice. They thought -of the poor not in relation to the mysterious forces of Nature, but -in relation to the privileges of their own class in which they saw -no mystery at all. Their state of mind is presented in a passage -in Bolingbroke’s _Idea of a Patriot King_. ‘As men are apt to make -themselves the measure of all being, so they make themselves the final -cause of all creation. Thus the reputed orthodox philosophers in all -ages have taught that the world was made for man, the earth for him -to inhabit, and all the luminous bodies in the immense expanse around -us for him to gaze at. Kings do no more, nay not so much, when they -imagine themselves the final cause for which societies were formed and -governments instituted.’ If we read ‘the aristocracy’ for ‘kings’ we -shall have a complete analysis of the social philosophy of the ruling -class. It was from this centre that they looked out upon the world. -When the misery of the poor reacted on their own comfort, as in the -case of poaching or crime or the pressure on the rates, they were aware -of it and took measures to protect their property, but of any social -problem outside these relations they were entirely unconscious. Their -philosophy and their religion taught them that it was the duty of the -rich to be benevolent, and of the poor to be patient and industrious. -The rich were ready to do their part, and all they asked of the poor -was that they should learn to bear their lot with resignation. Burke -had laid down the true and full philosophy of social life once and for -all. ‘Good order is the foundation of all good things. To be enabled -to acquire, the people, without being servile, must be tractable and -obedient. The magistrate must have his reverence, the laws their -authority. The body of the people must not find the principles of -natural subordination by art rooted out of their minds. They must -respect that property of which they cannot partake. They must labour -to obtain what by labour can be obtained; and when they find, as -they commonly do, the success disproportioned to the endeavour, they -must be taught their consolation in the final proportions of eternal -justice.’[378] - -The upper classes, looking upon the world in this way, considered that -it was the duty of the poor man to adapt himself, his tastes, his -habits, and his ambitions, to the arrangements of a society which it -had pleased Providence to organise on this interesting plan. We have -in the pages of Eden the portrait of the ideal poor woman, whose life -showed what could be done if poverty were faced in the proper spirit. -‘Anne Hurst was born at Witley in Surrey; there she lived the whole -period of a long life, and there she died. As soon as she was thought -able to work, she went to service: there, before she was twenty, she -married James Strudwick, who, like her own father, was a day labourer. -With this husband she lived, a prolific, hard-working, contented wife, -somewhat more than fifty years. He worked more than threescore years on -one farm, and his wages, summer and winter, were regularly a shilling a -day. He never asked more nor was never offered less. They had between -them seven children: and lived to see six daughters married and three -the mothers of sixteen children: all of whom were brought up, or are -bringing up, to be day labourers. Strudwick continued to work till -within seven weeks of the day of his death, and at the age of four -score, in 1787, he closed, in peace, a not inglorious life; for, to the -day of his death, he never received a farthing in the way of parochial -aid. His wife survived him about seven years, and though bent with age -and infirmities, and little able to work, excepting as a weeder in a -gentleman’s garden, she also was too proud to ask or receive any relief -from the parish. For six or seven of the last years of her life, she -received twenty shillings a year from the person who favoured me with -this account, which he drew up from her own mouth. With all her virtue, -and all her merit, she yet was not much liked in her neighbourhood; -people in affluence thought her haughty, and the Paupers of the parish, -seeing, as they could not help seeing, that her life was a reproach -to theirs, aggravated all her little failings. Yet, the worst thing -they had to say of her was, that she was proud; which, they said, was -manifested by the way in which she buried her husband. Resolute, as she -owned she was, to have the funeral, and everything that related to it, -what she called decent, nothing could dissuade her from having handles -to his coffin and a plate on it, mentioning his age. She was also -charged with having behaved herself crossly and peevishly towards one -of her sons-in-law, who was a mason and went regularly every Saturday -evening to the ale house as he said just to drink a pot of beer. -James Strudwick in all his life, as she often told this ungracious -son-in-law, never spent five shillings in any idleness: luckily (as -she was sure to add) he had it not to spend. A more serious charge -against her was that, living to a great age, and but little able to -work, she grew to be seriously afraid, that, at last, she might become -chargeable to the parish (the heaviest, in her estimation, of all human -calamities), and that thus alarmed she did suffer herself more than -once, during the exacerbations of a fit of distempered despondency, -peevishly (and perhaps petulantly) to exclaim that God Almighty, by -suffering her to remain so long upon earth, seemed actually to have -forgotten her.’ ‘Such,’ concludes Eden, ‘are the simple annals of Dame -Strudwick: and her historian, partial to his subject, closes it with -lamenting that such village memoirs have not oftener been sought for -and recorded.’[379] This was the ideal character for the cottage. How -Eden or anybody else would have hated this poor woman in whom every -kindly feeling had been starved to death if she had been in his own -class! We know from Creevey what his friends thought of ‘the stingy -kip’ Lambton when they found themselves under his roof, where ‘a round -of beef at a side table was run at with as much keenness as a banker’s -shop before a stoppage.’ A little peevishness or even petulance with -God Almighty would not have seemed the most serious charge that could -be brought against such a neighbour. But if every villager had had Dame -Strudwick’s hard and narrow virtues, and had crushed all other tastes -and interests in the passion for living on a shilling a day in a cold -and bitter independence, the problem of preserving the monopolies of -the few without disorder or trouble would have been greatly simplified. -There would have been little danger, as Burke would have said, that the -fruits of successful industry and the accumulations of fortune would -be exposed to ‘the plunder of the negligent, the disappointed, and the -unprosperous.’ - -The way in which the ruling class regarded the poor is illustrated in -the tone of the discussions when the problem of poverty had become -acute at the end of the eighteenth century. When Pitt, who had been -pestered by Eden to read his book, handed a volume to Canning, then his -secretary, that brilliant young politician spent his time writing a -parody on the grotesque names to be found in the Appendix, and it will -be recollected that Pitt excused himself for abandoning his scheme for -reforming the Poor Law, on the ground that he was inexperienced in the -condition of the poor. It was no shame to a politician to be ignorant -of such subjects. The poor were happy or unhappy in the view of the -ruling class according to the sympathy the rich bestowed on them. If -there were occasional misgivings they were easily dispelled. Thus one -philosopher pointed out that though the position of the poor man might -seem wanting in dignity or independence, it should be remembered by way -of consolation that he could play the tyrant over his wife and children -as much as he liked.[380] Another train of soothing reflections was -started by such papers as that published in the _Annals of Agriculture_ -in 1797, under the title ‘On the Comforts enjoyed by the Cottagers -compared to those of the ancient Barons.’ In such a society a sentiment -like that expressed by Fox when supporting Whitbread’s Bill in 1795, -that ‘it was not fitting in a free country that the great body of the -people should depend on the charity of the rich,’ seemed a challenging -paradox. Eden thought this an extraordinary way of looking at the -problem, and retorted that it was gratifying to see how ready the rich -were to bestow their benevolent attentions. This was the point of view -of Pitt and of almost all the speakers in the debate that followed -Fox’s outburst, Buxton going so far as to say that owing to those -attentions the condition of the poor had never been ‘so eligible.’ Just -as the boisterous captain in _Evelina_ thought it was an honour to a -wretched Frenchwoman to be rolled in British mud, so the English House -of Commons thought that poverty was turned into a positive blessing by -the kindness of the rich. - -Writing towards the end of the ancient régime, Cobbett maintained -that in his own lifetime the tone and language of society about the -poor had changed very greatly for the worse, that the old name of -‘the commons of England’ had given way to such names as ‘the lower -orders,’ ‘the peasantry,’ and ‘the population,’ and that when the poor -met together to demand their rights they were invariably spoken of by -such contumelious terms as ‘the populace’ or ‘the mob.’ ‘In short, -by degrees beginning about fifty years ago the industrious part of -the community, particularly those who create every useful thing by -their labour, have been spoken of by everyone possessing the power -to oppress them in any degree in just the same manner in which we -speak of the animals which compose the stock upon a farm. This is not -the manner in which the forefathers of us, the common people, were -treated.’[381] Such language, Cobbett said, was to be heard not only -from ‘tax-devourers, bankers, brewers, monopolists of every sort, but -also from their clerks, from the very shopkeepers and waiters, and from -the fribbles stuck up behind the counter to do the business that ought -to be done by a girl.’ This is perhaps only another way of saying that -the isolation of the poor was becoming a more and more conspicuous -feature of English society. - -Many causes combined to destroy the companionship of classes, and most -of all the break-up of the old village which followed on the enclosures -and the consolidation of farms. In the old village, labourers and -cottagers and small farmers were neighbours. They knew each other -and lived much the same kind of life. The small farmer was a farmer -one day of the week and a labourer another; he married, according to -Cobbett, the domestic servant of the gentry, a fact that explains the -remark of Sophia Western’s maid to the landlady of the inn, ‘and let -me have the bacon cut very nice and thin, for I can’t endure anything -that’s gross. Prythee try if you can’t do a little tolerably for once; -and don’t think you have a farmer’s wife or some of those creatures -in the house.’ The new farmer lived in a different latitude. He -married a young lady from the boarding school. He often occupied the -old manor house.[382] He was divided from the labourer by his tastes, -his interests, his ambitions, his display and whole manner of life. -The change that came over the English village in consequence was -apparent to all observers with social insight. When Goldsmith wanted to -describe a happy village he was careful to choose a village of the old -kind, with the farmers ‘strangers alike to opulence and to poverty,’ -and Crabbe, to whose sincere and realist pen we owe much of our -knowledge of the social life of the time, gives a particularly poignant -impression of the cold and friendless atmosphere that surrounded the -poor: - - ‘Where Plenty smiles, alas! she smiles for few, - And those who taste not, yet behold her store, - Are as the slaves that dig the golden ore, - The wealth around them makes them doubly poor.’[383] - -Perhaps the most vivid account of the change is given in a letter from -Cobbett in the _Political Register_ for 17th March 1821,[384] addressed -to Mr. Gooch:-- - - ‘I hold a return to _small farms_ to be _absolutely necessary_ to a - restoration to anything like an English community; and I am quite - sure, that the ruin of the present race of farmers, generally, is - a necessary preliminary to this.... The life of the husbandman - cannot be that of _a gentleman_ without injury to society at large. - When farmers become _gentlemen_ their labourers become _slaves_. A - _Virginian_ farmer, as he is called, very much resembles a _great - farmer_ in England; but then, the Virginian’s work is done by slaves. - It is in those States of America, where the farmer is only the - _first labourer_ that all the domestic virtues are to be found, and - all that public-spirit and that valour, which are the safeguards - of American independence, freedom, and happiness. You, Sir, with - others, complain of the increase of the _poor-rates_. But, you seem - to forget, that, in the destruction of the small farms, as separate - farms, small-farmers have become mere hired labourers.... Take - England throughout _three farms have been turned into one within - fifty years_, and the far greater part of the change has taken place - within the last _thirty years_; that is to say, since the commencement - of the deadly system of PITT. Instead of families of small farmers - with all their exertions, all their decency of dress and of manners, - and all their scrupulousness as to character, we have _families of - paupers_, with all the improvidence and wrecklessness belonging to an - irrevocable sentence of poverty for life. Mr. CURWEN in his _Hints on - Agriculture_, observes that he saw some where in Norfolk, I believe - it was, _two hundred_ farmers worth from _five to ten thousand pounds - each_; and exclaims “What a _glorious_ sight!” In commenting on this - passage in the Register, in the year 1810, I observed “Mr. CURWEN only - saw the _outside_ of the sepulchre; if he had seen the _two or three - thousand_ half-starved labourers of these two hundred farmers, and the - _five or six thousand_ ragged wives and children of those labourers; - if the farmers had brought those with them, the sight would not have - been so _glorious_.”’ - -A practice referred to in the same letter of Cobbett’s that tended -to widen the gulf between the farmer and the labourer was the -introduction of bailiffs: ‘Along with enormous prices for corn came -in the employment of _Bailiffs_ by farmers, a natural consequence of -large farms; and to what a degree of insolent folly the system was -leading, may be guessed from an observation of Mr. ARTHUR YOUNG, who -recommended, that the Bailiff should have a good horse to ride, and -a _bottle of port wine every day at his dinner_: while in the same -work, Mr. YOUNG gives great numbers of rules for saving labour upon -a farm. A pretty sort of farm where the bailiff was to have a bottle -of port wine at his dinner! The custom was, too, to bring bailiffs -from some _distant part_, in order to prevent them from having any -feeling of compassion for the labourers. _Scotch_ bailiffs above -all, were preferred, as being thought harder than any others that -could be obtained; and thus (with shame I write the words!) the farms -of _England_, like those of _Jamaica_, were supplied with drivers -from Scotland!... Never was a truer saying, than that of the common -people, that a Scotchman makes a “good _sole_, but a d----d bad _upper -leather_.”’[385] Bamford, speaking of 1745, says: ‘Gentlemen then lived -as they ought to live: as real gentlemen will ever be found living: in -kindliness with their neighbours; in openhanded charity towards the -poor, and in hospitality towards all friendly comers. There were no -grinding bailiffs and land stewards in those days to stand betwixt the -gentleman and his labourer or his tenant: to screw up rents and screw -down livings, and to invent and transact all little meannesses for so -much per annum.’[386] Cobbett’s prejudice against Scotsmen, the race of -‘feelosofers,’ blinded him to virtues which were notoriously theirs, as -in his round declaration that all the hard work of agriculture was done -by Englishmen and Irishmen, and that the Scotsmen chose such tasks as -‘peeping into melon frames.’ But that his remarks upon the subject of -the introduction of Scottish bailiffs reflected a general feeling may -be seen from a passage in Miss Austen’s _Emma_, ‘Mr. Graham intends to -have a Scotch bailiff for his new estate. Will it answer? Will not the -old prejudice be too strong?’ - -The change in the status of the farmer came at a time of a general -growth of luxury. All classes above the poor adopted a more extravagant -and ostentatious style and scale of living. This was true, for example, -of sporting England. Fox-hunting dates from this century. Before the -eighteenth century the amusement of the aristocracy was hunting the -stag, and that of the country squire was hunting the hare. It was -because Walpole kept beagles at Richmond and used to hunt once a week -that the House of Commons has always made Saturday a holiday. In the -Peninsular War, Wellington kept a pack of hounds at headquarters, but -they were fox-hounds. In its early days fox-hunting had continued the -simpler traditions of hare-hunting, and each small squire kept a few -couple of hounds and brought them to the meet. Gray has described his -uncle’s establishment at Burnham, where every chair in the house was -taken up by a dog. But as the century advanced the sport was organised -on a grander scale: the old buck-hounds and slow horses were superseded -by more expensive breeds, and far greater distances were covered. -Fox-hunting became the amusement both of the aristocracy and of the -squires, and it resembled rather the pomp and state of stag-hunting -than the modest pleasures of Walpole and his friends. In all other -directions there was a general increase of magnificence in life. The -eighteenth century was the century of great mansions, and some of -the most splendid palaces of the aristocracy were built during the -distress and famine of the French war. The ambitions of the aristocracy -became the ambitions of the classes that admired them, as we know -from Smollett, and Sir William Scott in 1802, speaking in favour of -the non-residence of the clergy, ‘expressly said that they and their -families ought to appear at watering-places, and that this was amongst -the means of making them respected by their flocks!’[387] - - * * * * * - -The rich and the poor were thus growing further and further apart, and -there was nobody in the English village to interpret these two worlds -to each other. M. Babeau has pointed out that in France, under the -ancient régime, the lawyers represented and defended in some degree -the rights of the peasants. This was one consequence of the constant -litigation between peasants and seigneurs over communal property. -The lawyers who took the side of the peasants lived at their expense -it is true, but they rendered public services, they presented the -peasants’ case before public opinion, and they understood their ideas -and difficulties. This explains a striking feature of the French -Revolution, the large number of local lawyers who became prominent -as champions of revolutionary ideas. One of Burke’s chief complaints -of the Constituent Assembly was that it contained so many country -attorneys and notaries, ‘the fomenters and conductors of the petty war -of village vexation.’[388] In England the lawyers never occupied this -position, and it is impossible to imagine such a development taking -place there. The lawyers who interested themselves in the poor were -enlisted not in the defence of the rights of the commoners but in the -defence of the purses of the parishes. For them the all-important -question was not what rights the peasant had against his lord, but on -which parish he had a claim for maintenance. - -The causes of litigation were endless: if a man rented a tenement of -the annual value of £10 he acquired a settlement. But his rental might -not have represented the annual value, and so the further question -would come up, Was the annual value actually £10? ‘If it may be really -not far from that sum, and the family of the pauper be numerous, the -interests of the contending parishes, supported by the conflicting -opinions of their respective surveyors, leads to the utmost expense -and extremity of litigation.’[389] If the annual value were not in -dispute there might be nice and intricate questions about the kind of -tenement and the nature of the tenure: if the settlement was claimed -in virtue of a contract of hiring, was the contract ‘general, special, -customary, retrospective, conditional, personal’ or what not?[390] If -the settlement was claimed in virtue of apprenticeship,[391] what was -the nature of the indentures and so on. If claimed for an estate of -£30, was the estate really worth £30, and how was it acquired? These -are a few of the questions in dispute, and to add to the confusion ‘on -no branch of the law have the judgments of the superior court been so -contradictory.’[392] - -Thus the principal occupation of those lawyers whose business brought -them into the world of the poor was of a nature to draw their -sympathies and interests to the side of the possessing classes, and -whereas peasants’ ideas were acclimatised outside their own class in -France as a consequence of the character of rural litigation and of -rural lawyers, the English villager came before the lawyer, not as a -client, but as a danger; not as a person whose rights and interests -had to be explored and studied, but as a person whose claims on the -parish had to be parried or evaded. It is not surprising, therefore, -to find that both Fielding and Smollett lay great stress on the -reputation of lawyers for harshness and extortion in their treatment -of the poor, regarding them, like Carlyle, as ‘attorneys and law -beagles who hunt ravenous on the earth.’ Readers of the adventures -of Sir Launcelot Greaves will remember Tom Clarke ‘whose goodness -of heart even the exercise of his profession had not been able to -corrupt. Before strangers he never owned himself an attorney without -blushing, though he had no reason to blush for his own practice, for he -constantly refused to engage in the cause of any client whose character -was equivocal, and was never known to act with such industry as when -concerned for the widow and orphan or any other object that sued _in -forma pauperis_.’ Fielding speaks in a foot-note to _Tom Jones_ of -the oppression of the poor by attorneys, as a scandal to the law, the -nation, Christianity, and even human nature itself. - - * * * * * - -There was another class that might, under different circumstances, have -helped to soothe and soften the isolation of the poor, but the position -and the sympathies of the English Church made this impossible. This -was seen very clearly by Adam Smith, who was troubled by the fear that -‘enthusiasm,’ the religious force so dreaded by the men of science and -reason, would spread among the poor, because the clergy who should have -controlled and counteracted it were so little in touch with the mass -of the people. Under the government of the Anglican Church, as set up -by the Reformation, he pointed out, ‘the clergy naturally endeavour -to recommend themselves to the sovereign, to the court, and to the -nobility and gentry of the country, by whose influence they chiefly -expect to obtain preferment.’[393] He added that such a clergy are very -apt to neglect altogether the means of maintaining their influence and -authority with the lower ranks of life. The association of the Anglican -Church with the governing class has never been more intimate and -binding than it was during the eighteenth century. This was true alike -of bishops and of clergy. The English bishop was not a gay Voltairean -like the French, but he was just as zealous a member of the privileged -orders, and the system over which he presided and which he defended -was a faint copy of the gloriously coloured scandals of the French -Church. The prelates who lived upon those scandals were described by -Robespierre, with a humour that he did not often indulge, as treating -the deity in the same way as the mayor of the palace used to treat -the French kings. ‘Ils l’ont traité comme jadis les maires du palais -traitèrent les descendants de Clovis pour régner sous son nom et se -mettre à sa place. Ils l’ont relégué dans le ciel comme dans un palais, -et ne l’ont appelé sur la terre que pour demander à leur profit des -dîmes, des richesses, des honneurs, des plaisirs et de la puissance.’ -When Archbishop Dillon declared against the civil constitution he said -that he and his colleagues acted as gentlemen and not as theologians. -The Archbishop of Aix spoke of tithes as a voluntary offering -from the piety of the faithful. ‘As to that,’ said the Duke de la -Rochefoucault, ‘there are now forty thousand cases in the Courts.’ -Both these archbishops would have found themselves quite at home among -the spiritual peers in the House of Lords, where the same decorous -hypocrisies mingled with the same class atmosphere. For the English -bishops, though they were not libertines like the French, never learnt -so to be Christians as to forget to be aristocrats, and their religious -duties were never allowed to interfere with the demands of scholarship -or of pleasure. Perhaps the most distinguished product of this régime -was Bishop Watson of Llandaff, who invented an improved gunpowder -and defended Christianity against Paine and Gibbon. These were his -diversions; his main business was carried on at his magnificent country -seat on the banks of Windermere. He was bishop for thirty-four years, -and during the whole of that time he never lived within his diocese, -preferring to play the part of the grand seigneur planting trees in -Westmorland. He has left a sympathetic and charming account of what -he modestly calls his retirement from public life, an event not to be -confused with abdication of his see, and of how he built the palace -where he spent the emoluments of Llandaff and the long autumn of his -life. - -It was natural to men who lived in this atmosphere to see politics -through the spectacles of the aristocracy. To understand how strongly -the view that the Church existed to serve the aristocracy, and the -rest of the State through the aristocracy, was fixed in the minds of -the higher clergy, we have only to look at the case of a reformer -like Bishop Horsley. The bishop is chiefly known as a preacher, a -controversialist, and the author of the celebrated dictum that the -poor had nothing to do with the laws except to obey them. His battle -with Priestley has been compared to the encounter of Bentley and -Collins, a comparison that may not give Horsley more, but certainly -gives Priestley less than his due. When he preached before the House -of Lords on the death of Louis XVI. his audience rose and stood in -silent reverence during his peroration. The cynical may feel that it -was not difficult to inspire emotion and awe in such a congregation -on such a subject at such a time, but we know from De Quincey that -Horsley’s reputation as a preacher stood remarkably high. He was one -of the leaders of the Church in politics; for our purposes it is more -important to note that he was one of the reforming bishops. Among other -scandals he attacked the scandal of non-residence, and he may be taken -as setting in this regard the strictest standard of his time; yet he -did not scruple to go and live in Oxford for some years as tutor to -Lord Guernsey, during the time that he was Rector of Newington, as -plain a confession as we could want that in the estimation of the most -public-spirited of the clergy the nobility had the first claims on the -Church. These social sympathies were confirmed by common political -interests. The privileges of the aristocracy and of the bishops were -in fact bound up together, and both bishops and aristocracy had good -reason to shrink from breaking a thread anywhere. Perhaps the malicious -would find the most complete and piquant illustration of the relations -of the Church and the governing class in the letter written by Dr. -Goodenough to Addington, who had just made him Dean of Rochester, when -the clerkship of the Pells, worth £3000 a year, was about to become -vacant. ‘I understand that Colonel Barré is in a very precarious -state. I hope you will have the fortitude to nominate Harry to be -his successor.’ Harry, Addington’s son, was a boy at Winchester. The -father’s fortitude rose to the emergency: the dean blossomed a little -later into a bishop. - -But if the French and the English bishops both belonged to the -aristocracy in feelings and in habits, a great difference distinguishes -the rank and file of the clergy in the two countries. The French priest -belonged by circumstances and by sympathy to the peasant class. The -bishop regarded the country curé as _un vilain sentant le fumier_, and -treated him with about as much consideration as the seigneur showed -to his dependants. The priest’s quarrel with the bishop was like the -peasant’s quarrel with the seigneur: for both priest and peasant -smarted under the arrogant airs of their respective superiors, and -the bishop swallowed up the tithes as the seigneur swallowed up the -feudal dues. Sometimes the curé put himself at the head of a local -rebellion. In the reign of Louis XV. the priests round Saint-Germain -led out their flocks to destroy the game which devoured their crops, -the campaign being announced and sanctified from the pulpit. In the -Revolution the common clergy were largely on the side of the peasants. -Such a development was inconceivable in England. As the curé’s windows -looked to the village, the parson’s windows looked to the hall. When -the parson’s circumstances enabled him to live like the squire, he rode -to hounds, for though, as Blackstone tells us, Roman Canon Law, under -the influence of the tradition that St. Jerome had once observed that -the saints had eschewed such diversions, had interdicted _venationes et -sylvaticas vagationes cum canibus et accipitribus_ to all clergymen, -this early severity of life had vanished long before the eighteenth -century. He treated the calls of his profession as trifling accidents -interrupting his normal life of vigorous pleasure. On becoming Bishop -of Chester, Dr. Blomfield astonished the diocese by refusing to license -a curate until he had promised to abstain from hunting, and by the pain -and surprise with which he saw one of his clergy carried away drunk -from a visitation dinner. One rector, whom he rebuked for drunkenness, -replied with an injured manner that he was never drunk on duty. - -There were, it is true, clergymen of great public spirit and devoted -lives, and such men figure in these pages, but the Church, as a whole, -was an easy-going society, careful of its pleasures and comforts, -living with the moral ideas and as far as possible in the manner of -the rich. The rivalry of the Methodist movement had given a certain -stimulus to zeal, and the Vicar of Corsley in Wilts,[394] for example, -added a second service to the duties of the Sunday, though guarding -himself expressly against the admission of any obligation to make it -permanent. But it was found impossible to eradicate from the system -certain of the vices that belong to a society which is primarily a -class. Some of the bishops set themselves to reduce the practice of -non-residence. Porteus, Bishop of London, devoted a great part of his -charge to his clergy in 1790 to this subject, and though he pleaded -passionately for reform he cannot be said to have shut his eyes to -the difficulties of the clergy. ‘There are, indeed, two impediments -to constant residence which cannot easily be surmounted; the first -is (what unfortunately prevails in some parts of this diocese) -unwholesomeness of situation; the other is the possession of a second -benefice. Yet even these will not justify _a total and perpetual_ -absence from your cures. The unhealthiness of many places is of late -years by various improvements greatly abated, and there are now few so -circumstanced as not to admit of residence there in _some_ part of the -year without any danger to the constitution.’ Thus even Bishop Porteus, -who in this very charge reminded the clergy that they were called by -the titles of stewards, watchmen, shepherds, and labourers, never went -the length of thinking that the Church was to be expected to minister -to the poor in all weathers and in all climates. - -The exertions of the reforming bishops did not achieve a conspicuous -success, for the second of the difficulties touched on by Porteus was -insurmountable. In his _Legacy to Parsons_, Cobbett, quoting from the -_Clerical Guide_, showed that 332 parsons shared the revenues of 1496 -parishes, and 500 more shared those of 1524. Among the pluralists were -Lord Walsingham, who besides enjoying a pension of £700 a year, was -Archdeacon of Surrey, Prebendary of Winchester, Rector of Calbourne, -Rector of Fawley, perpetual Curate of Exbury, and Rector of Merton; the -Earl of Guildford, Rector of Old Alresford, Rector of New Alresford, -perpetual Curate of Medsted, Rector of St. Mary, Southampton, including -the great parish of South Stoneham, Master of St. Cross Hospital, with -the revenue of the parish of St. Faith along with it. There were three -Pretymans dividing fifteen benefices, and Wellington’s brother was -Prebendary of Durham, Rector of Bishopwearmouth, Rector of Chelsea, and -Rector of Therfield. This method of treating the parson’s profession -as a comfortable career was so closely entangled in the system of -aristocracy, that no Government which represented those interests -would ever dream of touching it. Parliament intervened indeed, but -intervened to protect those who lived on these abuses. For before 1801 -there were Acts of Parliament on the Statute Book (21 Henry VIII. c. -13, and 13 Elizabeth c. 20), which provided certain penalties for -non-residence. In 1799 a certain Mr. Williams laid informations against -hundreds of the clergy for offences against these Acts. Parliament -replied by passing a series of Acts to stay proceedings, and finally -in 1803 Sir William Scott, member for the University of Oxford, passed -an Act which allowed the bishops to authorise parsons to reside out of -their parishes. It is not surprising to find that in 1812, out of ten -thousand incumbents, nearly six thousand were non-resident. - -In the parishes where the incumbent was non-resident, if there was a -clergyman at all in the place, it was generally a curate on a miserable -pittance. Bishop Porteus, in the charge already mentioned, gives some -interesting information about the salaries of curates: ‘It is also -highly to the honour of this Diocese that in general the stipends -allowed to the curates are more liberal than in many other parts of the -kingdom. In several instances I find that the stipend for one church -only is £50 a year; for two £60 and the use of a parsonage; and in the -unwholesome parts of the Diocese £70 and even £80 (that is £40 for each -church), with the same indulgence of a house to reside in.’ Many of the -parishes did not see much of the curate assigned to them. ‘A man must -have travelled very little in the kingdom,’ said Arthur Young in 1798, -‘who does not know that country towns abound with curates who never -see the parishes they serve, but when they are absolutely forced to it -by duty.’[395] But the ill-paid curate, even when he was resident and -conscientious, as he often was, moved like the pluralist rector in the -orbit of the rich. He was in that world though not of it. All his hopes -hung on the squire. To have taken the side of the poor against him -would have meant ruin, and the English Church was not a nursery of this -kind of heroism. It is significant that almost every eighteenth-century -novelist puts at least one sycophantic parson in his or her gallery of -portraits.[396] - -In addition to the social ties that drew the clergy to the aristocracy, -there was a powerful economic hindrance to their friendship with the -poor. De Tocqueville thought that the tithe system brought the French -priest into interesting and touching relations with the peasant: a view -that has seemed fanciful to later historians, who are more impressed -by the quarrels that resulted. But De Tocqueville himself could -scarcely argue that the tithe system helped to warm the heart of the -labourer to the Church of England in cases such as those recorded in -the Parliamentary Paper issued in 1833, in which parson magistrates -sent working men to prison for refusing to pay tithes to their rector. -Day labouring men had originally been exempted from liability to pay -tithes, but just as the French Church brought more and more of the -property and industry of the State within her confiscating grasp, -so the English Parliament, from the reign of William III., had been -drawing the parson’s net more closely round the labourer. Moreover, -as we shall see in a later chapter, the question of tithes was in the -very centre of the social agitations that ended in the rising of 1830 -and its terrible punishment. In this particular quarrel the farmers and -labourers were on the same side, and the parsons as a body stood out -for their own property with as much determination as the landlords. - -In one respect the Church took an active part in oppressing the -village poor, for Wilberforce and his friends started, just before -the French Revolution, a Society for the Reformation of Manners, -which aimed at enforcing the observance of Sunday, forbidding any -kind of social dissipation, and repressing freedom of speech and of -thought whenever they refused to conform to the superstitions of the -morose religion that was then in fashion. This campaign was directed -against the license of the poor alone. There were no stocks for the -Sabbath-breakers of Brooks’s: a Gibbon might take what liberties he -pleased with religion: the wildest Methodist never tried to shackle the -loose tongues or the loose lives of the gay rich. The attitude of the -Church to the excesses of this class is well depicted in Fielding’s -account of Parson Supple, who never remonstrated with Squire Western -for swearing, but preached so vigorously in the pulpit against the -habit that the authorities put the laws very severely in execution -against others, ‘and the magistrate was the only person in the parish -who could swear with impunity.’ This description might seem to border -on burlesque, but there is an entry in Wilberforce’s diary that reveals -a state of mind which even Fielding would have found it impossible -to caricature. Wilberforce was staying at Brighton, and this is his -description of an evening he spent at the Pavilion with the first -gentleman of Europe: ‘The Prince and Duke of Clarence too very civil. -Prince showed he had read Cobbett. Spoke strongly of the blasphemy of -his late papers and most justly.’[397] We can only hope that Sheridan -was there to enjoy the scene, and that the Prince was able for once -to do justice to his strong feelings in language that would not shock -Wilberforce’s ears. - -Men like Wilberforce and the magistrates whom he inspired did not -punish the rich for their dissolute behaviour; they only found in that -behaviour another argument for coercing the poor. As they watched -the dishevelled lives of men like George Selwyn, their one idea of -action was to punish a village labourer for neglecting church on -Sunday morning. We have seen how the cottagers paid in Enclosure -Bills for their lords’ adventures at play. They paid also for their -lords’ dissipations in the loss of innocent pleasures that might have -brought some colour into their grey lives. The more boisterous the -fun at Almack’s, the deeper the gloom thrown over the village. The -Select Committee on Allotments that reported in 1843 found one of the -chief causes of crime in the lack of recreations. Sheridan at one time -and Cobbett at another tried to revive village sports, but social -circumstances were too strong for them. In this respect the French -peasant had the advantage. Babeau’s picture of his gay and sociable -Sunday may be overdrawn, but a comparison of Crabbe’s description -of the English Sunday with contemporary descriptions of Sunday as -it was spent in a French village, shows that the spirit of common -gaiety, killed in England by Puritanism and by the destruction of the -natural and easy-going relations of the village community, survived -in France through all the tribulations of poverty and famine. The -eighteenth-century French village still bore a resemblance in fact -to the mediæval English village, and Goldsmith has recorded in _The -Traveller_ his impressions of ‘mirth and social ease.’ Babeau gives -an account of a great variety of village games, from the violent -contests in Brittany for the ‘choule,’ in one of which fourteen players -were drowned, to the gentler dances and the children’s romps that -were general in other parts of France, and Arthur Young was very much -struck by the agility and the grace that the heavy peasants displayed -in dancing on the village green. Windham, speaking in a bad cause, the -defence of bull-baiting in 1800, laid stress on the contrast: ‘In the -south of France and in Spain, at the end of the day’s labour, and in -the cool of the evening’s shade, the poor dance in mirthful festivity -on the green, to the sound of the guitar. But in this country no such -source of amusement presents itself. If they dance, it must be often in -a marsh, or in the rain, for the pleasure of catching cold. But there -is a substitute in this country well known by the name of _Hops_. We -all know the alarm which the very word inspires, and the sound of the -fiddle calls forth the magistrate to dissolve the meeting. Men bred -in ignorance of the world, and having no opportunity of mixing in its -scenes or observing its manners, may be much worse employed than in -learning something of its customs from theatrical representations; but -if a company of strolling players make their appearance in a village, -they are hunted immediately from it as a nuisance, except, perhaps, -there be a few people of greater wealth in the neighbourhood, whose -wives and daughters patronize them.’[398] Thus all the influences of -the time conspired to isolate the poor, and the changes, destructive of -their freedom and happiness, that were taking place in their social and -economic surroundings, were aggravated by a revival of Puritanism which -helped to rob village life of all its natural melody and colour. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[378] _Reflections on the Revolution in France_ (fourth edition), p. -359. - -[379] Eden, vol. i. p. 579. - -[380] _Reports on Poor_, vol. ii. p. 325. - -[381] _Political Register_, vol. lxxviii. p. 710. - -[382] Hasbach, p. 131. - -[383] ‘Village,’ Book 1. - -[384] Vol. xxxviii. p. 750 ff. - -[385] Cobbett’s _Political Register_, March 17, 1821, p. 779. - -[386] Bamford, _Passages in the Life of a Radical_, p. 38. - -[387] _Rural Rides_, p. 460. - -[388] _Reflections_, p. 61. - -[389] _Poor Law Report_, 1817. - -[390] Cf. _Ibid._, 1834, p. 161. - -[391] Cf. case of apprentice, _Annual Register_, 1819, p. 195. - -[392] _Poor Law Report_, 1817; in some cases there were amicable -arrangements to keep down legal expenses; _e.g._ at Halifax (Eden), the -overseer formed a society of the officers of adjoining parishes. Cases -were referred to them, and the decision of the majority was accepted. - -[393] _Wealth of Nations_, vol. iii. p. 234. - -[394] _Life in an English Village_, by Maude F. Davies, p. 58. - -[395] _Inquiry into the State of the Public Mind among the Lower -Classes_, p. 27. - -[396] The parsons under Squire Allworthy’s roof, the parson to whom -Pamela appealed in vain, and, most striking of all, Mr. Collins in -_Pride and Prejudice_. - -[397] _Life_, vol. iv. p. 277. - -[398] _Parliamentary Register_, April 18, 1800. - - - - -CHAPTER X - -THE VILLAGE IN 1830 - - -We have described the growing misery of the labourer, the increasing -rigours of the criminal law, and the insensibility of the upper -classes, due to the isolation of the poor. What kind of a community -was created by the Speenhamland system after it had been in force for -a generation? We have, fortunately, a very full picture given in a -Parliamentary Report that is generally regarded as one of the landmarks -of English history. We cannot do better than set out the main features -of the Report of the Poor Law Commissioners of 1834, and the several -effects they traced to this system. - -The first effect is one that everybody could have anticipated: the -destruction of all motives for effort and ambition. Under this system -‘the most worthless were sure of _something_, while the prudent, the -industrious, and the sober, with all their care and pains, obtained -_only something_; and even that scanty pittance was doled out to -them by the overseer.’[399] All labourers were condemned to live on -the brink of starvation, for no effort of will or character could -improve their position. The effect on the imagination was well summed -up in a rhetorical question from a labourer who gave evidence to -a Commissioner. ‘When a man has his spirit broken what is he good -for?’[400] The Poor Law Commissioners looked at it from a different -point of view: ‘The labourer feels that the existing system, though -it generally gives him low wages, always gives him work. It gives -him also, strange as it may appear, what he values more, a sort of -independence. He need not bestir himself to seek work; he need not -study to please his master; he need not put any restraint upon his -temper; he need not ask relief as a favour. He has all a slave’s -security for subsistence, without his liability to punishment.... All -the other classes of society are exposed to the vicissitudes of hope -and fear; he alone has nothing to lose or to gain.’[401] - -But it is understating the result of the system on individual -enterprise to say that it destroyed incentives to ambition; for in some -parishes it actually proscribed independence and punished the labourer -who owned some small property. Wages under these conditions were so -low that a man with a little property or a few savings could not keep -himself alive without help from the parish, but if a man was convicted -of possessing anything he was refused parish help. It was dangerous -even to look tidy or neat, ‘ragged clothes are kept by the poor, for -the express purpose of coming to the vestry in them.’[402] The Report -of the Commissioners on this subject recalls Rousseau’s description of -the French peasant with whom he stayed in the course of his travels, -who, when his suspicions had been soothed, and his hospitable instincts -had been warmed by friendly conversation, produced stores of food from -the secret place where they had been hidden to escape the eye of the -tax-collector. A man who had saved anything was ruined. A Mr. Hickson, -a Northampton manufacturer and landowner in Kent, gave an illustration -of this. - -‘The case of a man who has worked for me will show the effect of the -parish system in preventing frugal habits. This is a hard-working, -industrious man, named William Williams. He is married, and had saved -some money, to the amount of about £70, and had two cows; he had also -a sow and ten pigs. He had got a cottage well furnished; he was a -member of a benefit club at Meopham, from which he received 8s. a week -when he was ill. He was beginning to learn to read and write, and sent -his children to the Sunday School. He had a legacy of about £46, but -he got his other money together by saving from his fair wages as a -waggoner. Some circumstances occurred which obliged me to part with -him. The consequence of this labouring man having been frugal and saved -money, and got the cows, was that no one would employ him, although -his superior character as a workman was well known in the parish. He -told me at the time I was obliged to part with him: “Whilst I have -these things I shall get no work; I must part with them all; I must be -reduced to a state of beggary before any one will employ me.” I was -compelled to part with him at Michaelmas; he has not yet got work, and -he has no chance of getting any until he has become a pauper; for until -then the paupers will be preferred to him. He cannot get work in his -own parish, and he will not be allowed to get any in other parishes. -Another instance of the same kind occurred amongst my workmen. Thomas -Hardy, the brother-in-law of the same man, was an excellent workman, -discharged under similar circumstances; he has a very industrious wife. -They have got two cows, a well-furnished cottage, and a pig and fowls. -Now he cannot get work, because he has property. The pauper will be -preferred to him, and he can qualify himself for it only by becoming a -pauper. If he attempts to get work elsewhere, he is told that they do -not want to fix him on the parish. Both these are fine young men, and -as excellent labourers as I could wish to have. The latter labouring -man mentioned another instance of a labouring man in another parish -(Henstead), who had once had more property than he, but was obliged to -consume it all, and is now working on the roads.’[403] This effect of -the Speenhamland arrangements was dwelt on in the evidence before the -Committee on Agricultural Labourers’ Wages in 1824. Labourers had to -give up their cottages in a Dorsetshire village because they could not -become pensioners if they possessed a cottage, and farmers would only -give employment to village pensioners. Thus these cottagers who had not -been evicted by enclosure were evicted by the Speenhamland system. - -It is not surprising that in the case of another man of independent -nature in Cambridgeshire, who had saved money and so could get no work, -we are told that the young men pointed at him, and called him a fool -for not spending his money at the public-house, ‘adding that then he -would get work.’[404] The statesmen who condemned the labourer to this -fate had rejected the proposal for a minimum wage, on the ground that -it would destroy emulation. - -There was one slight alleviation of this vicious system, which the -Poor Law Commissioners considered in the very different light of -an aggravation. If society was to be reorganised on such a basis -as this, it was at any rate better that the men who were made to -live on public money should not be grateful to the ratepayers. The -Commissioners were pained by the insolence of the paupers. ‘The parish -money,’ said a Sussex labourer, ‘is now chucked to us like as to a -dog,’[405] but the labourers did not lick the hand that threw it. All -through the Report we read complaints of the ‘insolent, discontented, -surly pauper,’ who talks of ‘right’ and ‘income,’ and who will soon -fight for these supposed rights and income ‘unless some step is taken -to arrest his progress to open violence.’ The poor emphasised this -view by the terms they applied to their rate subsidies, which they -sometimes called ‘their reglars,’ sometimes ‘the county allowance,’ -and sometimes ‘The Act of Parliament allowance.’ Old dusty rentbooks -of receipts and old dirty indentures of apprenticeship were handed -down from father to son with as much care as if they had been deeds of -freehold property, as documentary evidence to their right to a share -in the rates of a particular parish.[406] Of course there was not a -uniform administration, and the Commissioners reported that whilst in -some districts men were disqualified for relief if they had any wages, -in others there was no inquiry into circumstances, and non-necessitous -persons dipped like the rest into the till. In many cases only the -wages received during the last week or fortnight were taken into -account, and thus the allowance would be paid to some persons who at -particular periods received wages in excess of the scale. This accounts -for the fact stated by Thorold Rogers from his own experience that -there were labourers who actually saved considerable sums out of the -system. - -The most obvious and immediate effect was the effect which had been -foreseen without misgiving in Warwickshire and Worcestershire. The -married man was employed in preference to the bachelor, and his income -rose with the birth of each child. But there was one thing better -than to marry and have a family, and that was to marry a mother of -bastards, for bastards were more profitable than legitimate children, -since the parish guaranteed the contribution for which the putative -father was legally liable. It was easier to manage with a family than -with a single child. As one young woman of twenty-four with four -bastard children put it, ‘If she had one more she should be very -comfortable.’[407] Women with bastard children were thus very eligible -wives. The effect of the whole system on village morals was striking -and widespread, and a witness from a parish which was overwhelmed -with this sudden deluge of population said to the Commission, ‘the -eighteen-penny children will eat up this parish in ten years more, -unless some relief be afforded us.’[408] Before this period, if we are -to believe Cobbett, it had been rare for a woman to be with child at -the time of her marriage; in these days of demoralisation and distress -it became the habit. - -The effects produced by this system on the recipients of relief were -all of them such as might have been anticipated, and in this respect -the Report of the Commissioners contained no surprises. It merely -illustrated the generalisations that had been made by all Poor Law -Reformers during the last fifteen years. But the discovery of the -extent of the corruption which the system had bred in local government -and administration was probably a revelation to most people. It -demoralised not only those who received but those who gave. A network -of tangled interests spread over local life, and employers and -tradesmen were faced with innumerable temptations and opportunities -for fraud. To take the case of the overseer first. Suppose him to be -a tradesman: he was liable to suffer in his custom if he refused to -relieve the friends, or it might be the workmen of his customers. It -would require a man of almost superhuman rigidity of principle to be -willing not only to lose time and money in serving a troublesome and -unprofitable office, but to lose custom as well.[409] From the resolve -not to lose custom he might gradually slip down to the determination to -reimburse himself for ‘the vexatious demands’ on his time, till a state -of affairs like that in Slaugham came about. - -‘Population, 740. Expenditure, £1706. The above large sum of money is -expended principally in orders on the village shops for flour, clothes, -butter, cheese, etc.: the tradesmen serve the office of overseer by -turns; the two last could neither read nor write.’[410] - -If the overseer were a farmer there were temptations to pay part of -the wages of his own and his friends’ labourers out of parish money, -or to supply the workhouse with his own produce. The same temptations -beset the members of vestries, whether they were open or select. -‘Each vestryman, so far as he is an immediate employer of labour, is -interested in keeping down the rate of wages, and in throwing part of -their payment on others, and, above all, on the principal object of -parochial fraud, the tithe-owner: if he is the owner of cottages, he -endeavours to get their rent paid by the parish; if he keeps a shop, he -struggles to get allowance for his customers or debtors; if he deals -in articles used in the workhouse, he tries to increase the workhouse -consumption; if he is in humble circumstances, his own relations or -friends may be among the applicants.’[411] Mr. Drummond, a magistrate -for Hants and Surrey, said to the Committee on Labourers’ Wages in -1824, that part of the poor-rate expenditure was returned to farmers -and landowners in exorbitant cottage rents, and that the farmers always -opposed a poor man who wished to build himself a cottage on the waste. - -In the case of what was known as the ‘labour rate’ system, the members -of one class combined together to impose the burden of maintaining the -poor on the shoulders of the other classes. By this system, instead of -the labourer’s wages being made up to a fixed amount by the parish, -each ratepayer was bound to employ, and to pay at a certain rate, a -certain number of labourers, whether he wanted them or not. The number -depended sometimes on his assessment to the poor rate, sometimes on the -amount of acres he occupied (of the use to which the land was put no -notice was taken, a sheep-walk counting for as much as arable fields): -when the occupiers of land had employed a fixed number of labourers, -the surplus labourers were divided amongst all the ratepayers according -to their rental. This plan was superficially fair, but as a matter of -fact it worked out to the advantage of the big farmers with much arable -land, and pressed hard on the small ones who cultivated their holdings -by their own and their children’s labour, and, in cases where they were -liable to the rate, on the tradesmen who had no employment at which -to set an agricultural labourer. After 1832 (2 and 3 William IV. c. -96) the agreement of three-fourths of the ratepayers to such a system -was binding on all, and the large farmers often banded together to -impose it on their fellow ratepayers by intimidation or other equally -unscrupulous means: thus at Kelvedon in Essex we read: ‘There was no -occasion in this parish, nor would it have been done but for a junto of -powerful landholders, putting down opposition by exempting a sufficient -number, to give themselves the means of a majority.’[412] - -Landlords in some cases resorted to Machiavellian tactics in order to -escape their burdens. - -‘Several instances have been mentioned to us, of parishes nearly -depopulated, in which almost all the labour is performed by persons -settled in the neighbouring villages or towns; drawing from them, as -allowance, the greater part of their subsistence.’[413] This method is -described more at length in the following passage:-- - -‘When a parish is in the hands of only one proprietor, or of -proprietors so few in number as to be able to act, and to compel their -tenants to act, in unison, and adjoins to parishes in which property is -much divided, they may pull down every cottage as it becomes vacant, -and prevent the building of new ones. By a small immediate outlay -they may enable and induce a considerable portion of those who have -settlements in their parish to obtain settlements in the adjoining -parishes: by hiring their labourers for periods less than a year, they -may prevent the acquisition of new settlements in their own. They may -thus depopulate their own estates, and cultivate them by means of the -surplus population of the surrounding district.’[414] A clergyman in -Reading[415] said that he had between ten and twenty families living in -his parish and working for the farmers in their original parish, whose -cottages had been pulled down over their heads. Occasionally a big -proprietor of parish A, in order to lessen the poor rates, would, with -unscrupulous ingenuity, take a farm in parish B, and there hire for the -year a batch of labourers from A: these at the end of their term he -would turn off on to the mercies of parish B which was now responsible -for them, whilst he sent for a fresh consignment from parish A.[416] - -The Report of the Commission is a remarkable and searching picture -of the general demoralisation produced by the Speenhamland system, -and from that point of view it is most graphic and instructive. But -nobody who has followed the history of the agricultural labourer can -fail to be struck by its capital omission. The Commissioners, in their -simple analysis of that system, could not take their eyes off the -Speenhamland goblin, and instead of dealing with that system as a wrong -and disastrous answer to certain difficult questions, they treated the -system itself as the one and original source of all evils. They sighed -for the days when ‘the paupers were a small disreputable minority, -whose resentment was not to be feared, and whose favour was of no -value,’ and ‘all other classes were anxious to diminish the number of -applicants, and to reduce the expenses of their maintenance.’[417] They -did not realise that the governing class had not created a Frankenstein -monster for the mere pleasure of its creation; that they had not set -out to draw up an ideal constitution, as Rousseau had done for the -Poles. In 1795 there was a fear of revolution, and the upper classes -threw the Speenhamland system over the villages as a wet blanket -over sparks. The Commissioners merely isolated the consequences of -Speenhamland and treated them as if they were the entire problem, and -consequently, though their report served to extinguish that system, it -did nothing to rehabilitate the position of the labourer, or to restore -the rights and status he had lost. The new Poor Law was the only gift -of the Reformed Parliament to the agricultural labourer; it was an -improvement on the old, but only in the sense that the east wind is -better than the sirocco. - - * * * * * - -What would have happened if either of the other two remedies had been -adopted for the problem to which the Speenhamland system was applied, -it is impossible to say. But it is easy to see that the position of -the agricultural labourer, which could not have been worse, might have -been very much better, and that the nation, as apart from the landlords -and money-lords, would have come out of this whirlpool much stronger -and much richer. This was clear to one correspondent of the Poor Law -Commission, whose memorandum, printed in an Appendix,[418] is more -interesting and profound than any contribution to the subject made by -the Commissioners themselves. M. Chateauvieux set out an alternative -policy to Speenhamland, which, if the governing class of 1795 or the -governing class of 1834 had been enlightened enough to follow it, would -have set up a very different labouring class in the villages from the -helpless proletariat that was created by the enclosures. - -‘Mais si au lieu d’opérer le partage des biens communaux, -l’administration de la commune s’était bornée à louer pour quelques -années des parcelles des terres qu’elle possède en vaine pâture, et -cela à très bas prix, aux journaliers domiciliés sur son territoire, il -en serait resulté: - - ‘(1) Que le capital de ces terres n’aurait point été aliéné et absorbé - dans la propriété particulière. - - ‘(2) Que ce capital aurait été néanmoins utilisé pour la reproduction. - - ‘(3) Qu’il aurait servi à l’amélioration du sort des pauvres qui - l’auraient défriché, de toute la différence entre le prix du loyer - qu’ils en auraient payé, et le montant du revenu qu’ils auraient - obtenu de sa recolte. - - ‘(4) Que la commune aurait encaissé le montant de ses loyers, et - aurait augmenté d’autant les moyens dont elle dispose pour le - soulagement de ces pauvres.’ - -M. Chateauvieux understood better than any of the Commissioners, -dominated as they were by the extreme individualist economy of the -time, the meaning of Bolingbroke’s maxim that a wise minister considers -his administration as a single day in the great year of Government; but -as a day that is affected by those which went before and must affect -those which are to come after. A Government of enclosing landowners -was perhaps not to be expected to understand all that the State was in -danger of losing in the reckless alienation of common property. - -What of the prospects of the other remedy that was proposed? At first -sight it seems natural to argue that had Whitbread’s Minimum Wage Bill -become an Act of Parliament it would have remained a dead letter. -The administration depended on the magistrates and the magistrates -represented the rent-receiving and employing classes. A closer scrutiny -warrants a different conclusion. At the time that the Speenhamland -plan was adopted there were many magistrates in favour of setting a -minimum scale. The Suffolk magistrates, for example, put pressure on -the county members to vote for Whitbread’s Bill, and those members, -together with Grey and Sheridan, were its backers. The Parliamentary -support for the Bill was enough to show that it was not only in Suffolk -that it would have been adopted; there were men like Lechmere and -Whitbread scattered about the country, and though they were men of far -more enlightened views than the average J.P., they were not without -influence in their own neighbourhoods. It is pretty certain, therefore, -that if the Bill had been carried, it would have been administered in -some parts of the country. The public opinion in support of the Act -would have been powerfully reinforced by the pressure of the labourers, -and this would have meant a more considerable stimulus than might at -first be supposed, for the Report of the Poor Law Commissioners shows -that the pressure of the labourers was a very important factor in the -retention of the allowance system in parishes where the overseers -wished to abandon it, and if the labourers could coerce the local -authorities into continuing the Speenhamland system, they could have -coerced the magistrates into making an assessment of wages. The -labourers were able by a show of violence to raise wages and to reduce -prices temporarily, as is clear from the history of 1816 and 1830. -It is not too much to suppose that they could have exercised enough -influence in 1795 to induce magistrates in many places to carry out a -law that was on the Statute Book. Further, it is not unreasonable to -suppose that agricultural labourers’ unions to enforce the execution of -the law would have escaped the monstrous Combination Law of 1799 and -1800, for even in 1808 the Glasgow and Lancashire cotton-weavers were -permitted openly to combine for the purpose of seeking a legal fixing -of wages.[419] - -If assessment had once become the practice, the real struggle would -have arisen when the great prosperity of agriculture began to decline; -at the time, that is, when the Speenhamland system began to show those -symptoms of strain that we have described. Would the customary wage, -established under the more favourable conditions of 1795, have stood -against that pressure? Would the labourers have been able to keep up -wages, as critics of the Whitbread Bill had feared that they would? -In considering the answers to that question, we have to reckon with -a force that the debaters of 1795 could not have foreseen. In 1795 -Cobbett was engaged in the politics and polemics of America, and if -any member of the House of Commons knew his name, he knew it as the -name of a fierce champion of English institutions, and a fierce enemy -of revolutionary ideas; a hero of the _Anti-Jacobin_ itself. In 1810 -Cobbett was rapidly making himself the most powerful tribune that -the English poor have ever known. Cobbett’s faults are plain enough, -for they are all on the surface. His egotism sometimes seduced his -judgment; he had a strongly perverse element in his nature; his opinion -of any proposals not his own was apt to be petulant and peevish, and -it might perhaps be said of him that he generally had a wasp in his -bonnet. These qualities earned for him his title of the Contentious -Man. They would have been seriously disabling in a Cabinet Minister, -but they did not affect his power of collecting and mobilising and -leading the spasmodic forces of the poor. - -Let us recall his career in order to understand what his influence -would have been if the labourers had won their customary wage in 1795, -and had been fighting to maintain it fifteen or twenty years later. -His adventures began early. When he was thirteen his imagination -was fired by stories the gardener at Farnham told him of the glories -of Kew. He ran away from home, and made so good an impression on the -Kew gardener that he was given work there. His last coppers on that -journey were spent in buying Swift’s _Tale of a Tub_. He returned home, -but his restless dreams drove him again into the world. He tried to -become a sailor, and ultimately became a soldier. He left the army, -where he had made his mark and received rapid promotion, in order to -expose a financial scandal in his regiment, but on discovering that -the interests involved in the countenance of military abuses were -far more powerful than he had supposed, he abandoned his attempt and -fled to France. A few months later he crossed to America, and settled -down to earn a living by teaching English to French refugees. This -peaceful occupation he relinquished for the congenial excitements -of polemical journalism, and he was soon the fiercest pamphleteer -on the side of the Federals, who took the part of England, in their -controversies with the Democrats, who took the part of the Revolution. -So far as the warfare of pamphlets went, Cobbett turned the scale. The -Democrats could not match his wit, his sarcasm, his graphic and pointed -invectives, his power of clever and sparkling analysis and ridicule. -This warfare occupied him for nearly ten years, and he returned to -England in time to have his windows broken for refusing to illuminate -his house in celebration of the Peace of Amiens. In 1802 he started the -_Political Register_. At that time he was still a Tory, but a closer -study of English life changed his opinions, and four years later he -threw himself into the Radical movement. The effect of his descent on -English politics can only be compared to the shock that was given to -the mind of Italy by the French methods of warfare, when Charles VIII. -led his armies into her plains to fight pitched battles without any -of the etiquette or polite conventions that had graced the combats of -the condottieri. He gave to the Reform agitation an uncompromising -reality and daring, and a movement which had become the dying echo of -a smothered struggle broke into storm and thunder. Hazlitt scarcely -exaggerated his dæmonic powers when he said of him that he formed a -fourth estate of himself. - -Now Cobbett may be said to have spent twenty years of his life in the -effort to save the labourers from degradation and ruin. He was the only -man of his generation who regarded politics from this standpoint. This -motive is the key to his career. He saw in 1816 that the nation had to -choose between its sinecures, its extravagant army, its rulers’ mad -scheme of borrowing at a higher rate to extinguish debt, for which it -was paying interest at a low rate, its huge Civil List and privileged -establishments, the interests of the fund-holders and contractors -on the one hand, and its labourers on the other. In that conflict -of forces the labourer could not hold his own. Later, Cobbett saw -that there were other interests, the interests of landowners and of -tithe-holders, which the State would have to subordinate to national -claims if the labourer was to be saved. In that conflict, too, the -labourer was beaten. He was unrepresented in Parliament, whereas the -opposing interests were massed there. Cobbett wanted Parliamentary -Reform, not like the traditional Radicals as a philosophy of rights, -but as an avalanche of social power. Parliamentary Reform was never -an end to him, nor the means to anything short of the emancipation of -the labourer. In this, his main mission, Cobbett failed. The upper -classes winced under his ruthless manners, and they trembled before -his Berserker rage, but it is the sad truth of English history that -they beat him. Now if, instead of throwing himself against this world -of privilege and vested interests in the hopes of wringing a pittance -of justice for a sinking class, it had been his task to maintain a -position already held, he would have fought under very different -conditions. If, when prices began to fall, there had been a customary -wage in most English villages, the question would not have been whether -the ruling class was to maintain its privileges and surplus profits by -letting the labourer sink deeper into the morass, but whether it was -to maintain these privileges and profits by taking something openly -from him. It is easier to prevent a dog from stealing a bone than -to take the bone out of his mouth. Cobbett was not strong enough to -break the power of the governing class, but he might have been strong -enough to defend the customary rights of the labouring class. As it -was, the governing class was on the defensive at every point. The -rent receivers, the tithe owners, the mortgagers, the lenders to the -Government and the contractors all clung to their gains, and the food -allowance of the labourer slowly and steadily declined. - -There was this great difference between the Speenhamland system and -a fixed standard of wages. The Speenhamland system after 1812 was -not applied so as to maintain an equilibrium between the income and -expenditure of the labourer: it was applied to maintain an equilibrium -between social forces. The scale fell not with the fall of prices to -the labourer, but with the fall of profits to the possessing classes. -The minimum was not the minimum on which the labourer could live, but -the minimum below which rebellion was certain. This was the way in -which wages found their own level. They gravitated lower and lower -with the growing weakness of the wage-earner. If Cobbett had been at -the head of a movement for preserving to the labourer a right bestowed -on him by Act of Parliament, either he would have succeeded, or the -disease would have come to a crisis in 1816, instead of taking the form -of a lingering and wasting illness. Either, that is, other classes -would have had to make the economies necessary to keep the labourers’ -wages at the customary point, or the labourers would have made their -last throw before they had been desolated and weakened by another -fifteen years of famine. - -There is another respect in which the minimum wage policy would have -profoundly altered the character of village society. It would have -given the village labourers a bond of union before they had lost the -memories and the habits of their more independent life; it would have -made them an organised force, something like the organised forces that -have built up a standard of life for industrial workmen. An important -passage in Fielding’s _Tom Jones_ shows that there was material for -such combination in the commoners of the old village. Fielding is -talking of his borrowings from the classics and he defends himself -with this analogy: ‘The ancients may be considered as a rich common, -where every person who hath the smallest tenement in Parnassus hath -a free right to batten his muse: or, to place it in a clearer light, -we moderns are to the ancients what the poor are to the rich. By the -poor here I mean that large and venerable body which in English we -call the mob. Now whoever hath had the honour to be admitted to any -degree of intimacy with this mob must well know, that it is one of -their established maxims to plunder and pillage their rich neighbours -without any reluctance: and that this is held to be neither sin nor -crime among them. And so constantly do they abide and act by this -maxim, that in every parish almost in the kingdom there is a kind of -confederacy ever carrying on against a certain person of opulence -called the squire whose property is considered as free booty by all -his poor neighbours; who, as they conclude that there is no manner -of guilt in such depredations, look upon it as a point of honour and -moral obligation to conceal and to preserve each other from punishment -on all such occasions. In like manner are the ancients such as Homer, -Virgil, Horace, Cicero and the rest to be esteemed among us writers as -so many wealthy squires from whom we, the poor of Parnassus, claim an -immemorial custom of taking whatever we can come at.’[420] - -It would not have been possible to create a great labourers’ union -before the Combination Laws were repealed in 1824, but if the labourers -had been organised to defend their standard wage, they would have -established a tradition of permanent association in each village. The -want of this was their fatal weakness. All the circumstances make the -spirit of combination falter in the country. In towns men are face to -face with the brutal realities of their lives, unsoftened by any of -the assuaging influences of brook and glade and valley. Men and women -who work in the fields breathe something of the resignation and peace -of Nature; they bear trouble and wrong with a dangerous patience. -Discontent moves, but it moves slowly, and whereas storms blow up in -the towns, they beat up in the country. That is one reason why the -history of the anguish of the English agricultural labourer so rarely -breaks into violence. Castlereagh’s Select Committee in 1817 rejoiced -in the discovery that ‘notwithstanding the alarming progress which has -been made in extending disaffection, its success has been confined -to the principal manufacturing districts, and that scarcely any of -the agricultural population have lent themselves to these violent -projects.’ There is a Russian saying that the peasant must ‘be boiled -in the factory pot’ before a revolution can succeed. And if it is -difficult in the nature of things to make rural labourers as formidable -to their masters as industrial workers, there is another reason why -the English labourer rebelled so reluctantly and so tardily against -what Sir Spencer Walpole called, in the true spirit of a classical -politician, ‘his inevitable and hereditary lot.’ Village society was -constantly losing its best and bravest blood. Bamford’s description -of the poacher who nearly killed a gamekeeper’s understrapper in a -quarrel in a public-house, and then hearing from Dr. Healey that -his man was only stunned, promised the doctor that if there was but -one single hare on Lord Suffield’s estates, that hare should be in -the doctor’s stew-pot next Sunday, reminds us of the loss a village -suffered when its poachers were snapped up by a game-preserving bench, -and tossed to the other side of the world. During the years between -Waterloo and the Reform Bill the governing class was decimating the -village populations on the principle of the Greek tyrant who flicked -off the heads of the tallest blades in his field; the Game Laws, -summary jurisdiction, special commissions, drove men of spirit and -enterprise, the natural leaders of their fellows, from the villages -where they might have troubled the peace of their masters. The village -Hampdens of that generation sleep on the shores of Botany Bay. Those -who blame the supine character of the English labourer forget that his -race, before it had quite lost the memories and the habits of the days -of its independence and its share in the commons, was passed through -this sieve. The scenes we shall describe in the next chapter show that -the labourers were capable of great mutual fidelity when once they -were driven into rebellion. If they had had a right to defend and a -comradeship to foster from the first, Cobbett, who spent his superb -strength in a magnificent onslaught on the governing class, might have -made of the race whose wrongs he pitied as his own, an army no less -resolute and disciplined than the army O’Connell made of the broken -peasants of the West. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[399] Report of the Poor Law Commission, 1834, p. 243. - -[400] _Ibid._, p. 84. - -[401] _Ibid._, pp. 56-7. - -[402] Report of the Poor Law Commission, 1834, p. 244. - -[403] Report of the Poor Law Commission, 1834, pp. 78-9. - -[404] _Ibid._, p. 80. - -[405] _Ibid._, p. 291. - -[406] Report of the Poor Law Commission, 1834, p. 94. - -[407] _Ibid._, p. 172. - -[408] _Ibid._, p. 66. - -[409] Report of the Poor Law Commission, 1834, pp. 98-104. - -[410] _Ibid._, p. 100. - -[411] Report of the Poor Law Commission, 1834, p. 108. - -[412] _Ibid._, p. 210. - -[413] Report of the Poor Law Commission, 1834, p. 73. - -[414] _Ibid._, p. 157. - -[415] _Ibid._, p. 158. - -[416] _Ibid._, p. 161. - -[417] _Ibid._, p. 130. - -[418] Appendix F, No. 3, to 1st Report of Commissioners. - -[419] See Webb’s _History of Trade Unionism_, p. 59. - -[420] _Tom Jones_, Bk. XII. chap. i. - - - - -CHAPTER XI - -THE LAST LABOURERS’ REVOLT - - Where not otherwise stated the authorities for the two following - chapters are the Home Office Papers for the time (Municipal and - Provincial, Criminal, Disturbances, Domestic, etc.), the _Times_ and - local papers. - - -I - -A traveller who wished to compare the condition of the English and the -French rural populations in 1830 would have had little else to do than -to invert all that had been written on the subject by travellers a -century earlier. At the beginning of the eighteenth century England had -the prosperous and France the miserable peasantry. But by the beginning -of the nineteenth century the French peasant had been set free from -the impoverishing and degrading services which had made his lot so -intolerable in the eyes of foreign observers; he cultivated his own -land, and lived a life, spare, arduous, and exacting but independent. -The work of the Revolution had been done so thoroughly in this respect -that the Bourbons, when Wellington and the allies lifted them back on -to their throne, could not undo it. It is true that the future of the -French peasants was a subject of some anxiety to English observers, -and that M‘Culloch committed himself to the prediction that in half -a century, owing to her mass of small owners, France would be the -greatest pauper-warren in Europe. If any French peasant was disturbed -by this nightmare of the political economy of the time, he had the grim -satisfaction of knowing that his position could hardly become worse -than the position that the English labourer already occupied. He would -have based his conclusion, not on the wild language of revolutionaries, -but on the considered statement of those who were so far from -meditating revolution that they shrank even from a moderate reform of -Parliament. Lord Carnarvon said in one House of Parliament that the -English labourer had been reduced to a plight more abject than that of -any race in Europe; English landlords reproduced in the other that -very parallel between the English labourer and the West Indian negro -which had figured so conspicuously in Thelwall’s lectures. Thelwall, as -Canning reminded him in a savage parody on the Benedicite, got pelted -for his pains. Since the days of those lectures all Europe had been -overrun by war, and England alone had escaped what Pitt had called -the liquid fire of Jacobinism. There had followed for England fifteen -years of healing peace. Yet at the end of all this time the conquerors -of Napoleon found themselves in a position which they would have done -well to exchange with the position of his victims. The German peasant -had been rescued from serfdom; Spain and Italy had at least known a -brief spell of less unequal government. The English labourer alone was -the poorer; poorer in money, poorer in happiness, poorer in sympathy, -and infinitely poorer in horizon and in hope. The riches that he had -been promised by the champions of enclosure had faded into something -less than a maintenance. The wages he received without land had a lower -purchasing power than the wages he had received in the days when his -wages were supplemented by common rights. The standard of living which -was prescribed for him by the governing class was now much lower than -it had been in 1795. - -This was not part of a general decline. Other classes for whom the -rulers of England prescribed the standard had advanced during the -years in which the labourers had lost ground. The King’s Civil List -had been revised when provisions rose. The salaries of the judges -had been raised by three several Acts of Parliament (1799, 1809, and -1825), a similar course had been taken in the case of officials. Those -who have a taste for the finished and unconscious cynicism of this -age will note--recollecting that the upper classes refused to raise -wages in 1795 to meet the extra cost of living, on the ground that it -would be difficult afterwards to reduce them--that all the upper-class -officials, whose salaries were increased because living was more -expensive, were left to the permanent enjoyment of that increase. The -lives of the judges, the landlords, the parsons, and the rest of the -governing class were not become more meagre but more spacious in the -last fifty years. During that period many of the great palaces of the -English nobility had been built, noble libraries had been collected, -and famous galleries had grown up, wing upon wing. The agricultural -labourers whose fathers had eaten meat, bacon, cheese, and vegetables -were living on bread and potatoes. They had lost their gardens, they -had ceased to brew their beer in their cottages. In their work they -had no sense of ownership or interest. They no longer ‘sauntered after -cattle’ on the open common, and at twilight they no longer ‘played -down the setting sun’; the games had almost disappeared from the -English village, their wives and children were starving before their -eyes, their homes were more squalid, and the philosophy of the hour -taught the upper classes that to mend a window or to put in a brick -to shield the cottage from damp or wind was to increase the ultimate -miseries of the poor. The sense of sympathy and comradeship, which -had been mixed with rude and unskilful government, in the old village -had been destroyed in the bitter days of want and distress. Degrading -and repulsive work was invented for those whom the farmer would not -or could not employ. De Quincey, wishing to illustrate the manners of -eighteenth-century France, used to quote M. Simond’s story of how he -had seen, not very long before the Revolution, a peasant ploughing with -a team consisting of a donkey and a woman. The English poor could have -told him that half a century later there were English villages in which -it was the practice of the overseer to harness men and women to the -parish cart, and that the sight of an idiot woman between the shafts -was not unknown within a hundred miles of London.[421] Men and women -were living on roots and sorrel; in the summer of the year 1830 four -harvest labourers were found under a hedge dead of starvation, and Lord -Winchilsea, who mentioned the fact in the House of Lords, said that -this was not an exceptional case. The labourer was worse fed and worse -housed than the prisoner, and he would not have been able to keep body -and soul together if he had not found in poaching or in thieving or in -smuggling the means of eking out his doles and wages. - -The feelings of this sinking class, the anger, dismay, and despair with -which it watched the going out of all the warm comfort and light of -life, scarcely stir the surface of history. The upper classes have told -us what the poor ought to have thought of these vicissitudes; religion, -philosophy, and political economy were ready with alleviations and -explanations which seemed singularly helpful and convincing to the -rich. The voice of the poor themselves does not come to our ears. This -great population seems to resemble nature, and to bear all the storms -that beat upon it with a strange silence and resignation. But just -as nature has her power of protest in some sudden upheaval, so this -world of men and women--an underground world as we trace the distance -that its voices have to travel to reach us--has a volcanic character -of its own, and it is only by some volcanic surprise that it can speak -the language of remonstrance or menace or prayer, or place on record -its consciousness of wrong. This world has no member of Parliament, -no press, it does not make literature or write history; no diary or -memoirs have kept alive for us the thoughts and cares of the passing -day. It is for this reason that the events of the winter of 1830 have -so profound an interest, for in the scenes now to be described we have -the mind of this class hidden from us through all this period of pain, -bursting the silence by the only power at its command. The demands -presented to the farmer, the parson, and the squire this winter tell us -as much about the South of England labourer in 1830 as the cahiers tell -us of the French peasants in 1789. - - * * * * * - -We have seen that in 1795 and in 1816 there had been serious -disturbances in different parts of England. These had been suppressed -with a firm hand, but during hard winters sporadic violence and blazing -hay-stacks showed from time to time that the fire was still alive under -the ashes. The rising of 1830 was far more general and more serious; -several counties in the south of England were in state bordering on -insurrection; London was in a panic, and to some at least of those who -had tried to forget the price that had been paid for the splendour of -the rich, the message of red skies and broken mills and mob diplomacy -and villages in arms sounded like the summons that came to Hernani. -The terror of the landowners during those weeks is reflected in such -language as that of the Duke of Buckingham, who talked of the country -being in the hands of the rebels, or of one of the Barings, who said -in the House of Commons that if the disorders went on for three or -four days longer they would be beyond the reach of almost any power to -control them. This chapter of social history has been overshadowed by -the riots that followed the rejection of the Reform Bill. Every one -knows about the destruction of the Mansion House at Bristol, and the -burning of Nottingham Castle; few know of the destruction of the hated -workhouses at Selborne and Headley. The riots at Nottingham and Bristol -were a prelude to victory; they were the wild shout of power. If the -rising of 1830 had succeeded, and won back for the labourer his lost -livelihood, the day when the Headley workhouse was thrown down would be -remembered by the poor as the day of the taking of the Bastille. But -this rebellion failed, and the men who led that last struggle for the -labourer passed into the forgetfulness of death and exile. - -Kent was the scene of the first disturbances. There had been some -alarming fires in the west of the county during the summer, at -Orpington and near Sevenoaks. In one case the victim had made himself -unpopular by pulling down a cottage built on a common adjoining his -property, and turning out the occupants. How far these fires were -connected with later events it is impossible to say: the authors were -never discovered. The first riot occurred at Hardres on Sunday the -29th of August, when four hundred labourers destroyed some threshing -machines.[422] Next day two magistrates with a hundred special -constables and some soldiers went to Hardres Court, and no more was -heard of the rioters. The _Spectator_ early next year announced that it -had found as a result of inquiries that the riots began with a dispute -between farmers over a threshing machine, in the course of which a -magistrate had expressed strong views against the introduction of these -machines. The labourers proceeded to destroy the machine, whereupon, -to their surprise, the magistrate turned on them and punished them; in -revenge they fired his ricks. ‘A farmer in another village, talking of -the distress of the labourers, said, “Ah, I should be well pleased if -a plague were to break out among them, and then I should have their -carcases as manure, and right good stuff it would make for my hops.” -This speech, which was perhaps only intended as a brutal jest, was -reported; it excited rage instead of mirth, and the stacks of the -jester were soon in a blaze. This act of incendiarism was open and -deliberate. The incendiary is known, and not only has he not been -tried, he has not even been charged.’[423] Cobbett, on the other hand, -maintained that the occasion of the first riots was the importation -of Irish labourers, a practice now some years old, that might well -inflame resentment, at a time when the governing class was continually -contending that the sole cause of distress was excessive population, -and that the true solution was the removal of surplus labourers to the -colonies. - -Whatever the actual origin of the first outbreak may have been, -the destruction of machinery was to be a prominent feature of this -social war. This was not merely an instinct of violence, there was -method and reason in it. Threshing was one of the few kinds of work -left that provided the labourer with a means of existence above -starvation level. A landowner and occupier near Canterbury wrote to -the _Kent Herald_,[424] that in his parish, where no machines had been -introduced, there were twenty-three barns. He calculated that in these -barns fifteen men at least would find employment threshing corn up till -May. If we suppose that each man had a wife and three children, this -employment would affect seventy-five persons. ‘An industrious man who -has a barn never requires poor relief; he can earn from 15s. to 20s. -per week; he considers it almost as his little freehold, and that in -effect it certainly is.’ It is easy to imagine what the sight of one -of these hated engines meant to such a parish; the fifteen men, their -wives and families would have found cold comfort, when they had become -submerged in the morass of parish relief, in the reflection that the -new machine extracted for their master’s and the public benefit ten -per cent. more corn than they could hammer out by their free arms. -The destruction of threshing machines by bands of men in the district -round Canterbury continued through September practically unchecked. -By the end of the month three of the most active rioters were in -custody, and the magistrates were under the pleasant illusion that -there would be voluntary surrenders. In this they were disappointed, -and the disturbances spread over a wider area, which embraced the -Dover district. Early in October there was a riot at Lyminge, at which -Sir Edward Knatchbull and the Rev. Mr. Price succeeded in arresting -the ringleaders, and bound over about fifty other persons. Sir Edward -Knatchbull, in writing to the Home Office, stated that the labourers -said ‘they would rather do anything than encounter such a winter as the -last.’ Mr. Price had to pay the penalty for his active part in this -affair, and his ricks were fired. - -Large rewards were promised from the first to informers, these rewards -including a wise offer of establishment elsewhere, but the prize was -refused, and rick-burning spread steadily through a second month. -Threatening letters signed ‘Swing,’ a mysterious name that for the next -few weeks spread terror over England, were received by many farmers and -landowners. The machine-breakers were reported not to take money or -plunder, and to refuse it if offered. Their programme was extensive and -formidable. When the High Sheriff attended one of their meetings to -remonstrate with them, they listened to his homily with attention, but -before dispersing one of them said, ‘We will destroy the cornstacks and -threshing machines this year, next year we will have a turn with the -parsons, and the third we will make war upon the statesmen.’[425] - -On 24th October seven prisoners were tried at the East Kent Quarter -Sessions, for machine-breaking. They pleaded guilty, and were let off -with a lenient sentence of three days’ imprisonment and an harangue -from Sir Edward Knatchbull. Hitherto all attempts to discover the -incendiaries had been baffled, but on 21st October a zealous magistrate -wrote to the Home Office to say that he had found a clue. He had -apprehended a man called Charles Blow, and since the evidence was not -sufficient to warrant committal for arson, he had sent him to Lewes -Jail as a vagrant for three months. ‘In company with Blow was a girl -of about ten years of age (of the name of Mary Ann Johnson), but of -intelligence and cunning far beyond her age. It having been stated to -me that she had let fall some expressions which went to show that she -could if she pleased communicate important information, I committed -her also for the same period as Blow.’ Now the fires in question had -taken place in Kent, and the vagrants were apprehended in Sussex, -consequently the officials of both counties meddled with the matter and -between them spoilt the whole plan, for Mary Ann and her companion were -questioned by so many different persons that they were put on their -guard, and failed to give the information that was expected. Thus at -any rate, Lord Camden, the Lord-Lieutenant, explained their silence, -but he did not despair, ‘if the Parties cannot even be convicted I am -apt to think their Committal now will do good, though they may be to -be liberated afterwards, but nothing is so likely to produce alarm and -produce evidence as a Committal for a Capital Crime.’ However, as no -more is heard of Mary Ann, it may be assumed that when she had served -her three months she left Lewes Jail a sadder and a wiser child. - -Towards the end of October, after something of a lull in the middle -of the month, the situation became more serious. Dissatisfaction, -or, as some called it, ‘frightful anarchy,’ spread to the Maidstone -and Sittingbourne districts. Sir Robert Peel was anxious to take -strong measures. ‘I beg to repeat to you that I will adopt any -measure--will incur any expense at the public charge--that can -promote the suppression of the outrages in Kent and the detection -of the offenders.’ A troop of cavalry was sent to Sittingbourne. In -the last days of October, mobs scoured the country round Maidstone, -demanding half a crown a day wages and constant employment, forcing -all labourers to join them, and levying money, beer, and provisions. -At Stockbury, between Maidstone and Sittingbourne, one of these mobs -paraded a tricolour and a black flag. On 30th October the Maidstone -magistrates went out with a body of thirty-four soldiers to meet a mob -of four hundred people, about four miles from Maidstone, and laid hold -of the three ringleaders. The arrests were made without difficulty or -resistance, from which it looks as if these bands of men were not very -formidable, but the officer in command of the soldiers laid stress -in his confidential report on the dangers of the situation and the -necessity for fieldpieces, and Peel promptly ordered two pieces of -artillery to be dispatched. - -At the beginning of November disturbances broke out in Sussex, and -the movement developed into an organised demand for a living wage. By -the middle of the month the labourers were masters over almost all -the triangle on the map, of which Maidstone is the apex and Hythe -and Brighton are the bases. The movement, which was more systematic, -thorough, and successful in this part of the country than anywhere -else, is thus described by the special correspondent of the _Times_, -17th November: ‘Divested of its objectionable character, as a dangerous -precedent, the conduct of the peasantry has been admirable. There is no -ground for concluding that there has been any extensive concert amongst -them. Each parish, generally speaking, has risen _per se_; in many -places their proceedings have been managed with astonishing coolness -and regularity; there has been little of the ordinary effervescence -displayed on similar occasions. The farmers have notice to meet the -men: a deputation of two or more of the latter produce a written -statement, well drawn up, which the farmers are required to sign; the -spokesman, sometimes a Dissenting or Methodist teacher, fulfils his -office with great propriety and temper. Where disorder has occurred, -it has arisen from dislike to some obnoxious clergyman, or tithe man, -or assistant overseer, who has been trundled out of the parish in a -wheelbarrow, or drawn in triumph in a load of ballast by a dozen old -women. The farmers universally agreed to the demands they made: that -is, they were not mad enough to refuse requests which they could not -demonstrate to be unreasonable in themselves, and which were urged by -three hundred or four hundred men after a barn or two had been fired, -and each farmer had an incendiary letter addressed to him in his -pocket.’ - -There was another development of the movement which is not noted in -this account by the correspondent of the _Times_. It often happened -that the farmers would agree to pay the wages demanded by the -labourers, but would add that they could not continue to pay those -wages unless rents and tithes were reduced. The labourers generally -took the hint and turned their attention to tithes and rents, -particularly to tithes. Their usual procedure was to go in a body to -the rector, often accompanied by the farmers, and demand an abatement -of tithes, or else to attend the tithe audit and put some not unwelcome -pressure upon the farmers to prevent them from paying. - -It must not be supposed that the agitation for a living wage was -confined to the triangular district named above, though there it -took a more systematic shape. Among the Home Office Papers is a very -interesting letter from Mr. D. Bishop, a London police officer, -written from Deal on 11th November, describing the state of things in -that neighbourhood: ‘I have gone to the different Pot Houses in the -Villages, disguised among the Labourers, of an evening and all their -talk is about the wages, some give 1s. 8d. per day some 2s. some 2s. -3d.... all they say they want is 2s. 6d. per day and then they say -they shall be comfortable. I have every reason to believe the Farmers -will give the 2s. 6d. per day after a bit ... they are going to have a -meeting and I think it will stop all outrages.’ - -The disturbances in Sussex began with a fire on 3rd November at an -overseer’s in Battle. The explanation suggested by the authorities -was that the paupers had been ‘excited by a lecture lately given here -publicly by a person named Cobbett.’ Next night there was another -fire at Battle; but it was at Brede, a village near Rye, that open -hostilities began. As the rising at Brede set the fashion for the -district, it is perhaps worth while to describe it in some detail.[426] - -For a long time the poor of Brede had smarted under the insults of -Mr. Abel, the assistant overseer, who, among other innovations, had -introduced one of the hated parish carts, and the labourers were -determined to have a reckoning with him. After some preliminary -discussions on the previous day, the labourers held a meeting on 5th -November, and deputed four men to negotiate with the farmers. At the -conference which resulted, the following resolutions, drawn up by the -labourers, were signed by both parties[427]:-- - - ‘Nov. 5, 1830. At a meeting held this day at the Red Lion, of the - farmers, to meet the poor labourers who delegated David Noakes Senior, - Thomas Henley, Joseph Bryant and Th. Noakes, to meet the gentlemen - this day to discuss the present distress of the poor.... Resolution 1. - The gentlemen agree to give to every able-bodied labourer with wife - and two children 2s. 3d. per day, from this day to the 1st of March - next, and from the 1st of March to the 1st of Oct. 2s. 6d. per day, - and to have 1s. 6d. per week with three children, and so on according - to their family. Resolution 2. The poor are determined to take the - present overseer, Mr. Abell, out of the parish to any adjoining parish - and to use him with civility.’ - -The meeting over, the labourers went to Mr. Abel’s house with their -wives and children and some of the farmers, and placed the parish cart -at his door. After some hammering at the gates, Mr. Abel was persuaded -to come out and get into the cart. He was then solemnly drawn along -by women and children, accompanied by a crowd of five hundred, to the -place of his choice, Vine Hall, near Robertsbridge, on the turnpike -road, where he was deposited with all due solemnity. Mr. Abel made his -way to the nearest magistrate to lodge his complaint, while the people -of the parish returned home and were regaled with beer by the farmers: -‘and Mr. Coleman ... he gave every one of us half a pint of Beer, women -and men, and Mr. Reed of Brede High gave us a Barrel because we had -done such a great thing in the Parish as to carry that man away, and -Mr. Coleman said he never was better pleased in his life than with the -day’s work which had been done.’[428] - -The parish rid of Mr. Abel, the next reform in the new era was to be -the reduction of tithes, and here the farmers needed the help of the -labourers. What happened is best told in the words of one of the chief -actors. He describes how, a little before the tithe audit, his employer -came to him when he was working in the fields and suggested that the -labourers should see if they could ‘get a little of the tithe off’; -they were only to show themselves and not to take any violent action. -Other farmers made the same suggestions to their labourers. ‘We went -to the tithe audit and Mr. Hele came out and spoke to us a good while -and I and David Noakes and Thomas Noakes and Thomas Henley answered him -begging as well as we could for him to throw something off for us and -our poor Children and to set up a School for them and Mr. Hele said he -would see what he could do. - -‘Mr. Coleman afterwards came out and said Mr. Hele had satisfied them -all well and then Mr. Hele came out and we made our obedience to him -and he to us, and we gave him three cheers and went and set the Bells -ringing and were all as pleased as could be at what we had done.’ - -The success of the Brede rising had an immediate effect on the -neighbourhood, and every parish round prepared to deport its obnoxious -overseer and start a new life on better wages. Burwash, Ticehurst, -Mayfield, Heathfield, Warbleton and Ninfield were among the parishes -that adopted the Brede programme. Sometimes the assistant overseer -thought it wise to decamp before the cart was at his door. Sometimes -the mob was aggressive in its manners. ‘A very considerable Mob,’ -wrote Sir Godfrey Webster from Battle Abbey on 9th November, ‘to the -amount of nearly 500, having their Parish Officer in custody drawn -in a Dung Cart, attempted to enter this town at eleven o’clock this -Morning.’ The attempt was unsuccessful, and twenty of the rioters were -arrested. The writer of this letter is chiefly famous as Lady Holland’s -first husband. In this emergency he seems to have displayed great -zeal and energy. A second letter of his on 12th November gives a good -description of the state of affairs round Mayfield. ‘The Collector of -Lord Carrington’s Tithes had been driven out of the Parish and the -same Proceeding was intended to be adopted towards the Parish Officer -who fled the place, it had been intended by the Rioters to have taken -by Force this Morning as many Waggons as possible (forcibly) carried -off the Tithe Corn and distributed it amongst themselves in case of -interruption they were resolved to burn it. One of the most violent -and dangerous papers I have yet seen (a copy of which I enclose) was -carried round the 3 adjoining Parishes and unfortunately was assented -to by too many Occupiers of Land. I arrived in Time to prevent its -circulation at Mayfield a small Town tho’ populous parish 3000. By -apprehending the Bearer of the Paper who acted as Chief of the Party -and instantly in presence of a large Mob committing him for Trial I -succeeded in repressing the tumultuous action then going on, and by -subsequently calling together the Occupiers of Land, and afterwards the -Mob (composed wholly of Agricultural Labourers) I had the satisfaction -of mediating an arrangement between them perfectly to the content of -each party, and on my leaving Mayfield this afternoon tranquillity was -perfectly restored at that Place.’ The violent and dangerous paper -enclosed ran thus: ‘Now gentlemen this is wat we intend to have for a -maried man to have 2s. and 3d. per Day and all over two children 1s. -6d. per head a week and if a Man has got any boys or girls over age -for to have employ that they may live by there Labour and likewise all -single men to have 1s. 9d. a day per head and we intend to have the -rents lowered likewise and this is what we intend to have before we -leave the place and if ther is no alteration we shall proceed further -about it. For we are all at one and we will keep to each other.’ - -At Ringmer in Sussex the proceedings were marked by moderation and -order. Lord Gage, the principal landowner of the neighbourhood, knowing -that disturbances were imminent, met the labourers by appointment on -the village green. There were about one hundred and fifty persons -present. By this time magistrates in many places had taken to arresting -arbitrarily the ringleaders of the men, and hence when Lord Gage, who -probably had no such intention, asked for the leader or captain nobody -came forward, but a letter was thrown into the ring with a general -shout. The letter which Lord Gage picked up and took to the Vestry -for consideration read as follows: ‘We the labourers of Ringmer and -surrounding villages, having for a long period suffered the greatest -privations and endured the most debasing treatment with the greatest -resignation and forbearance, in the hope that time and circumstances -would bring about an amelioration of our condition, till, worn out -by hope deferred and disappointed in our fond expectations, we have -taken this method of assembling ourselves in one general body, for the -purpose of making known our grievances, and in a peaceable, quiet, -and orderly manner, to ask redress; and we would rather appeal to -the good sense of the magistracy, instead of inflaming the passions -of our fellow labourers, and ask those gentlemen who have done us the -favour of meeting us this day whether 7d. a day is sufficient for a -working man, hale and hearty, to keep up the strength necessary to -the execution of the labour he has to do? We ask also, is 9s. a week -sufficient for a married man with a family, to provide the common -necessaries of life? Have we no reason to complain that we have been -obliged for so long a period to go to our daily toil with only potatoes -in our satchels, and the only beverage to assuage our thirst the cold -spring; and on retiring to our cottages to be welcomed by the meagre -and half-famished offspring of our toilworn bodies? All we ask, then, -is that our wages may be advanced to such a degree as will enable us -to provide for ourselves and families without being driven to the -overseer, who, by the bye, is a stranger amongst us, and as in most -instances where permanent overseers are appointed, are men callous to -the ties of nature, lost to every feeling of humanity, and deaf to -the voice of reason. We say we want wages sufficient to support us, -without being driven to the overseer to experience his petty tyranny -and dictation. We therefore ask for married men 2s. 3d. per day to -the first of March, and from that period to the first of October 2s. -6d. a day: for single men 1s. 9d. a day to the first of March, and -2s. from that time to the first of October. We also request that the -permanent overseers of the neighbouring parishes may be directly -discharged, particularly Finch, the governor of Ringmer poorhouse and -overseer of the parish, that in case we are obliged, through misfortune -or affliction, to seek parochial relief, we may apply to one of our -neighbouring farmers or tradesmen, who would naturally feel some -sympathy for our situation, and who would be much better acquainted -with our characters and claims. This is what we ask at your hands--this -is what we expect, and we sincerely trust this is what we shall not be -under the painful necessity of demanding.’ - -While the Vestry deliberated the labourers remained quietly in the yard -of the poorhouse. One of them, a veteran from the Peninsular War who -had lost a limb, contrasted his situation on 9d. a day with that of the -Duke of Wellington whose ‘skin was whole’ and whose pension was £60,000 -a year. After they had waited some time, they were informed that their -demands were granted, and they dispersed to their homes with huzzas and -tears of joy, and as a sign of the new and auspicious era they broke -up the parish grindstone, a memory of the evil past.[429] - -An important feature of the proceedings in Kent and Sussex was the -sympathy of other classes with the demands of the labourers. The -success of the movement in Kent and Sussex, and especially of the -rising that began at Brede, was due partly, no doubt, to the fact that -smuggling was still a common practice in those counties, and that the -agricultural labourers thus found their natural leaders among men who -had learnt audacity, resourcefulness, and a habit of common action -in that school of danger. But the movement could not have made such -headway without any serious attempt to suppress it if the other classes -had been hostile. There was a general sense that the risings were due -to the neglect of the Government. Mr. Hodges, one of the Members for -Kent, declared in the House of Commons on 10th December that if the -Duke of Wellington had attended to a petition received from the entire -Grand Jury of Kent there would have been no disturbances.[430] - -The same spirit is displayed in a letter written by a magistrate at -Battle, named Collingwood. ‘I have seen three or four of our parochial -insurrections, and been with the People for hours alone and discussing -their matters with them which they do with a temper and respectful -behaviour and an intelligence which must interest everyone in their -favor. The poor in the Parishes in the South of England, and in Sussex -and Kent greatly, have been ground to the dust in many instances by -the Poor Laws. Instead of happy peasants they are made miserable and -sour tempered paupers. Every Parish has its own peculiar system, -directed more strictly, and executed with more or less severity or -harshness. A principal tradesman in Salehurst (Sussex) in one part -of which, Robertsbridge, we had our row the other night, said to me -these words “You attended our meeting the other day and voted with me -against the two principal Rate payers in this parish, two Millers, -paying the people in two gallons of bad flour instead of money. You -heard how saucy they were to their betters, can you wonder if they -are more violent to their inferiors? They never call a man Tom, Dick -etc. but you d----d rascal etc., at every word, and force them to take -their flour. Should you wonder that they are dissatisfied?” These -words he used to me a week before our Robertsbridge Row. Each of these -Parochial Rows differs in character as the man whom they select as -leader differs in impudence or courage or audacity or whatever you may -call it. If they are opposed at the moment, their resistance shows -itself in more or less violent outrages; personally I witnessed but -one, that of Robertsbridge putting Mr. Johnson into the cart, and that -was half an accident. I was a stranger to them, went among them and -was told by hundreds after that most unjustifiable assault that I was -safe among them as in my bed, and I never thought otherwise. One or two -desperate characters, and such there are, may at any moment make the -contest of Parish A differ from that of Parish B, but their spirit, as -far as regards loyalty and love for the King and Laws, is, I believe, -on my conscience, sound. I feel convinced that all the cavalry in the -world, if sent into Sussex, and all the spirited acts of Sir Godfrey -Webster, who, however, is invaluable here will (not?) stop this spirit -from running through Hampshire, Wiltshire, Somersetshire, where Mr. -Hobhouse, your predecessor, told me the other day that they have got -the wages for single men down to 6s. per week (on which they _cannot -live_) through many other counties. In a week you will have demands for -cavalry from Hampshire under the same feeling of alarm as I and all -here entertained: the next week from Wiltshire, Dorsetshire, and all -the counties in which the poor Rates have been raised for the payment -of the poor up to Essex and the very neighbourhood of London, where Mr. -Geo. Palmer, a magistrate, told me lately that the poor single man is -got down to 6s. I shall be over to-morrow probably at Benenden where -they are resolved not to let either Mr. Hodges’s taxes, the tithes or -the King’s taxes be paid. So I hear, and so I dare say two or three -carter boys may have said. I shall go to-morrow and if I see occasion -will arrest some man, and break his head with my staff. But do you -suppose that that (though a show of vigor is not without avail) will -prevent Somersetshire men from crying out, when the train has got to -them, we will not _live_ on 6s. per week, for living it is not, but -a long starving, and we will have tithes and taxes, and I know not -what else done away with. The only way to stop them is to run before -the evil. Let the Hampshire Magistrates and Vestries raise the wages -before the Row gets to their County, and you will stop the thing from -spreading, otherwise you will not, I am satisfied. In saying all this, -I know that I differ with many able and excellent Magistrates, and my -opinion may be wrong, but I state it to you.’ - -It is not surprising that magistrates holding these opinions acted -rather less vigorously than the central Government wished, and that -Lord Camden’s appeals to them not to let their political feelings -and ‘fanciful Crotchets’[431] interfere with their activity were -unsuccessful. But even had all the magistrates been united and eager -to crush the risings they could not act without support from classes -that were reluctant to give it. The first thought of the big landed -proprietors was to re-establish the yeomanry, but they found an -unexpected obstacle in the temper of the farmers. The High Sheriff, -after consultation with the Home Secretary, convened a meeting for -this purpose at Canterbury on 1st November, but proceedings took an -unexpected turn, the farmers recommending as a preferable alternative -that public salaries should be reduced, and the meeting adjourned -without result. There were similar surprises at other meetings summoned -with this object, and landlords who expected to find the farmers -rallying to their support were met with awkward resolutions calling -for reductions in rent and tithes. The _Kent Herald_ went so far as -to say that only the dependents of great landowners will join the -yeomanry, ‘this most unpopular corps.’ The magistrates found it equally -difficult to enlist special constables, the farmers and tradesmen -definitely refusing to act in this capacity at Maidstone, at Cranbrook, -at Tonbridge, and at Tonbridge Wells,[432] as well as in the smaller -villages. The chairman of the Battle magistrates wrote to the Home -Office to say that he intended to reduce his rents in the hope that the -farmers would then consent to serve. - -Even the Coast Blockade Service was not considered trustworthy. -‘It is the last force,’ wrote one magistrate, ‘I should resort to, -on account of the feeling which exists between them and the people -hereabouts.’[433] In the absence of local help, the magistrates had to -rely on military aid to quell a mob, or to execute a warrant. Demands -for troops from different quarters were incessant, and sometimes -querulous. ‘If you cannot send a military force,’ wrote one indignant -country gentleman from Heathfield on 14th November, ‘for God’s sake, -say so, without delay, in order that we may remove our families to -a place of safety from a district which want of support renders us -totally unable longer to defend.’[434] Troops were despatched to -Cranbrook, but when the Battle magistrates sent thither for help they -were told to their great annoyance that no soldiers could be spared. -The Government indeed found it impossible to supply enough troops. ‘My -dear Lord Liverpool,’ wrote Sir Robert Peel on 15th November, ‘since -I last saw you I have made arrangements for sending every disposable -cavalry soldier into Kent and the east part of Sussex. General Dalbiac -will take the command. He will be at Battel to-day to confer with -the Magistracy and to attempt to establish some effectual plan of -operations against the rioters.’ - -The 7th Dragoon Guards at Canterbury were to provide for East Kent; -the 2nd Dragoon Guards at Maidstone were to provide for Mid-Kent; -and the 5th Dragoon Guards at Tunbridge Wells for the whole of East -Sussex. Sir Robert Peel meanwhile thought that the magistrates should -themselves play a more active part, and he continually expressed the -hope that they would ‘meet and concert some effectual mode of resisting -the illegal demands.’[435] He deprecated strongly the action of -certain magistrates in yielding to the mobs. Mr. Collingwood, who has -been mentioned already, received a severe reproof for his behaviour -at Goudhurst, where he had adopted a conciliatory policy and let off -the rioters on their own recognisances. ‘We did not think the case a -very strong one,’ he wrote on 18th November, ‘or see any very urgent -necessity for the apprehension of Eaves, nor after Captain King’s -statement that he had not felt a blow, could we consider the assault -of a magistrate proved. The whole parish unanimously begged them off, -and said that their being discharged on their own recognisances would -probably contribute to the peace of the parish.’ - -The same weakness, or sympathy, was displayed by magistrates in the -western part of Sussex, where the rising spread after the middle -of November. In the Arundel district the magistrates anticipated -disturbances by holding a meeting of the inhabitants to fix the scale -of wages. The wages agreed on were ‘2s. a day wet and dry and 1s. 6d. a -week for every child (above 2) under 4,’ during the winter: from Lady -Day to Michaelmas 14s. a week, wet and dry, with the same allowance for -children. A scale was also drawn up for lads and young men. The mobs -were demanding 14s. a week all the year round, but they seem to have -acquiesced in the Arundel scale, and to have given no further trouble. -At Horsham, the labourers adopted more violent measures and met with -almost universal sympathy. There was a strong Radical party in that -town, and one magistrate described it later as ‘a hot Bed of Sedition.’ -Attempts were made, without success, to show that the Radicals were at -the bottom of the disturbances. The district round Horsham was in an -agitated state. Among others who received threatening letters was Sir -Timothy Shelley of Field Place. The letter was couched in the general -spirit of Shelley’s song to the men of England:-- - - ‘Men of England, wherefore plough, - For the lords who lay ye low,’ - -which his father may, or may not, have read. The writer urged him, -‘if you wish to escape the impending danger in this world and in that -which is to come,’ to go round to the miserable beings from whom he -exacted tithes, ‘and enquire and hear from there own lips what disstres -there in.’ Like many of these letters, it contained at the end a rough -picture of a knife, with ‘Beware of the fatel daggar’ inscribed on it. - -In Horsham itself the mob, composed of from seven hundred to a thousand -persons, summoned a vestry meeting in the church. Mr. Sanctuary, the -High Sheriff for Sussex, described the episode in a letter to the -Home Office on the same day (18th November). The labourers, he said, -demanded 2s. 6d. a day, and the lowering of rents and tithes: ‘all -these complaints were attended to----thought reasonable and complied -with,’ and the meeting dispersed quietly. Anticipating, it may be, -some censure, he added, ‘I should have found it quite impossible to -have prevailed upon any person to serve as special constable----most -of the tradespeople and many of the farmers considering the demands of -the people but just (and) equitable----indeed many of them advocated -(them)----a doctor spoke about the taxes----but no one backed -him----that was not the object of the meeting.’ A lady living at -Horsham wrote a more vivid account of the day’s work. She described how -the mob made everybody come to the church. Mr. Simpson, the vicar, went -without more ado, but Mr. Hurst, senior, owner of the great tithes, -held out till the mob seized a chariot from the King’s Arms and dragged -it to his door. Whilst the chariot was being brought he slipped out, -and entered the church with his two sons. All the gentlemen stood up -at the altar, while the farmers encouraged the labourers in the body of -the church. ‘Mr. Hurst held out so long that it was feared blood would -be shed, the Doors were shut till the Demands were granted, no lights -were allowed, the Iron railing that surrounds the Monuments torn up, -and the sacred boundary between the chancel and Altar overleapt before -he would yield.’ Mr. Hurst himself wrote to the Home Office to say that -it was only the promise to reduce rents and tithes that had prevented -serious riots, but he met with little sympathy at headquarters. ‘I -cannot concur,’ wrote Sir Robert Peel, ‘in the opinion of Mr. Hurst -that it was expedient or necessary for the Vestry to yield to the -demands of the Mob. In every case that I have seen, in which the mob -has been firmly and temperately resisted, they have given way without -resorting to personal violence.’ A neighbouring magistrate, who shared -Sir Robert Peel’s opinion about the affair, went to Horsham a day -or two later to swear in special constables. He found that out of -sixty-three ‘respectable householders’ four only would take the oath. -Meanwhile the difficulties of providing troops increased with the area -of disturbances. ‘I have requested that every effort may be made to -reinforce the troops in the western part of Sussex,’ wrote Sir Robert -Peel to a Horsham magistrate on 18th November, ‘and you may judge -of the difficulty of doing so, when I mention to you that the most -expeditious mode of effecting this is to bring from Dorchester _the -only_ cavalry force that is in the West of England. This, however, -shall be done, and 100 men (infantry) shall be brought from the -Garrison of Portsmouth.’ - - * * * * * - -Until the middle of November the rising was confined to Kent, Sussex -and parts of Surrey, with occasional fires and threatening letters in -neighbouring counties. After that time the disturbances became more -serious, spreading not only to the West of Sussex, but to Berkshire, -Hampshire, and Wiltshire. On 22nd November the Duke of Buckingham wrote -from Avington in Hampshire to the Duke of Wellington: ‘Nothing can be -worse than the state of this neighbourhood. I may say that this part -of the country is wholly in the hands of the rebels ... 1500 rioters -are to assemble to-morrow morning, and will attack any farmhouses where -there are threshing machines. They go about levying contributions on -every gentleman’s house. There are very few magistrates; and what -there are are completely cowed. In short, something decisive must -instantly be done.’ - -The risings in these counties differed in some respects from the rising -in Kent and Sussex. The disturbances were not so much like the firing -of a train of discontent, they were rather a sudden and spontaneous -explosion. They lasted only about a week, and were well described in -a report of Colonel Brotherton, one of the two military experts sent -by Lord Melbourne to Wiltshire to advise the magistrates. He wrote on -28th November: ‘The insurrectionary movement seems to be directed by -no plan or system, but merely actuated by the spontaneous feeling of -the peasantry and quite at random.’ The labourers went about in larger -numbers, combining with the destruction of threshing machines and the -demand for higher wages a claim for ‘satisfaction’ as they called it -in the form of ready money. It was their practice to charge £2 for -breaking a threshing machine, but in some cases the mobs were satisfied -with a few coppers. The demand for ready money was not a new feature, -for many correspondents of the Home Office note in their letters that -the mobs levied money in Kent and Sussex, but hitherto this ‘sturdy -begging,’ as Cobbett called it, had been regarded by the magistrates -as unimportant. The wages demanded in these counties were 2s. a day, -whereas the demands in Kent and usually in Sussex had been for 2s. 6d. -or 2s. 3d. Wages had fallen to a lower level in Hampshire, Berkshire -and Wiltshire. The current rate in Wiltshire was 7s., and Colonel Mair, -the second officer sent down by the Home Office, reported that wages -were sometimes as low as 6s. It is therefore not surprising to learn -that in two parishes the labourers instead of asking for 2s. a day, -asked only for 8s. or 9s. a week. In Berkshire wages varied from 7s. to -9s., and in Hampshire the usual rate seems to have been 8s. - -The rising in Hampshire was marked by a considerable destruction of -property. At Fordingbridge, the mob under the leadership of a man -called Cooper, broke up the machinery both at a sacking manufactory -and at a manufactory of threshing machines. Cooper was soon clothed in -innumerable legends: he was a gipsy, a mysterious gentleman, possibly -the renowned ‘Swing’ himself. At the Fordingbridge riots he rode -on horseback and assumed the title of Captain Hunt. His followers -addressed him bareheaded. In point of fact he was an agricultural -labourer of good character, a native of East Grimstead in Wilts, -who had served in the artillery in the French War. Some two months -before the riots his wife had robbed him, and then eloped with a -paramour. This unhinged his self-control; he gave himself up to drink -and despair, and tried to forget his misery in reckless rioting. Near -Andover again a foundry was destroyed by a mob, after the ringleader, -Gilmore, had entered the justices’ room at Andover, where the justices -were sitting, and treated with them on behalf of the mob. Gilmore also -was a labourer; he was twenty-five years old and had been a soldier. - -The most interesting event in the Hampshire rising was the destruction -of the workhouses at Selborne and Headley. Little is reported of the -demolition of the poorhouse at Selborne. The indictment of the persons -accused of taking part in it fell through on technical grounds, and -as the defendants were also the persons charged with destroying the -Headley workhouse, the prosecution in the Selborne case was abandoned. -The mob first went to Mr. Cobbold, Vicar of Selborne, and demanded -that he should reduce his tithes, telling him with some bluntness ‘we -must have a touch of your tithes: we think £300 a year quite enough -for you ... £4 a week is quite enough.’ Mr. Cobbold was thoroughly -alarmed, and consented to sign a paper promising to reduce his tithes, -which amounted to something over £600, by half that sum. The mob were -accompanied by a good many farmers who had agreed to raise wages if -the labourers would undertake to obtain a reduction of tithes, and -these farmers signed the paper also. After Mr. Cobbold’s surrender the -mob went on to the workhouse at Headley, which served the parishes of -Bramshott, Headley and Kingsley. Their leader was a certain Robert -Holdaway, a wheelwright, who had been for a short time a publican. He -was a widower, with eight small children, described by the witnesses -at his trial as a man of excellent character, quiet, industrious, and -inoffensive. The master of the workhouse greeted Holdaway with ‘What, -Holdy, are you here?’ ‘Yes, but I mean you no harm nor your wife nor -your goods: so get them out as soon as you can, for the house must -come down.’ The master warned him that there were old people and -sick children in the house. Holdaway promised that they should be -protected, asked where they were, and said the window would be marked. -What followed is described in the evidence given by the master of the -workhouse: ‘There was not a room left entire, except that in which the -sick children were. These were removed into the yard on two beds, and -covered over, and kept from harm all the time. This was done by the -mob. They were left there because there was no room for them in the -sick ward. The sick ward was full of infirm old paupers. It was not -touched, but of all the rest of the place not a room was left entire.’ -The farmers looked on whilst the destruction proceeded, and one at -least of the labourers in the mob declared afterwards that his master -had forced him to join. - -In Wiltshire also the destruction of property was not confined to -threshing machines. At Wilton, the mob, under the leadership of a -certain John Jennings, aged eighteen,[436] who declared that he ‘was -going to break the machinery to make more work for the poor people,’ -did £500 worth of damage in a woollen mill. Another cloth factory at -Quidhampton was also injured; in this affair an active part was taken -by a boy even younger than Jennings, John Ford, who was only seventeen -years old.[437] - -The riot which attracted most attention of all the disturbances in -Wiltshire took place at Pyt House, the seat of Mr. John Benett, M.P. -for the county. Mr. Benett was a well-known local figure, and had given -evidence before several Committees on Poor Laws. The depth of his -sympathy with the labourers may be gauged by the threat that he uttered -before the Committee of 1817 to pull down his cottages if Parliament -should make length of residence a legal method of gaining a settlement. -Some member of the Committee suggested that if there were no cottages -there would be no labourers, but Mr. Benett replied cheerfully enough -that it did not matter to a labourer how far he walked to his work: -‘I have many labourers coming three miles to my farm every morning -during the winter’ (the hours were six to six) ‘and they are the most -punctual persons we have.’ At the time he gave this evidence, he stated -that about three-quarters of the labouring population in his parish -of Tisbury received relief from the poor rates in aid of wages, and -he declared that it was useless to let them small parcels of land. -The condition of the poor had not improved in Mr. Benett’s parish -between 1817 and 1830, and Lord Arundel, who lived in it, described -it as ‘a Parish in which the Poor have been more oppressed and are in -greater misery as a whole than any Parish in the Kingdom.’[438] It is -not surprising that when the news of what had been achieved in Kent -and Sussex spread west to Wiltshire, the labourers of Tisbury rose -to demand 2s. a day, and to destroy the threshing machines. A mob of -five hundred persons collected, and their first act was to destroy a -threshing machine, with the sanction of the owner, Mr. Turner, who sat -by on horseback, watching them. They afterwards proceeded to the Pyt -House estate. Mr. Benett met them, parleyed and rode with them for some -way; they behaved politely but firmly, telling him their intentions. -One incident throws a light on the minds of the actors in these scenes. -‘I then,’ said Mr. Benett afterwards, ‘pointed out to them that they -could not trust each other, for any man, I said, by informing against -ten of you will obtain at once £500.’ It was an adroit speech, but -as it happened the Wiltshire labourers, half starved, degraded and -brutalised, as they might be, had a different standard of honour from -that imagined by this magistrate and member of Parliament, and the -devilish temptation he set before them was rejected. The mob destroyed -various threshing machines on Mr. Benett’s farms, and refused to -disperse; at last, after a good deal of sharp language from Mr. Benett, -they threw stones at him. At the same time a troop of yeomanry from -Hindon came up and received orders to fire blank cartridges above the -heads of the mob. This only produced laughter; the yeomanry then began -to charge; the mob took shelter in the plantations round Pyt House and -stoned the yeomanry, who replied by a fierce onslaught, shooting one -man dead on the spot,[439] wounding six by cutting off fingers and -opening skulls, and taking a great number of prisoners. At the inquest -at Tisbury on the man John Harding, who was killed, the jury returned -a verdict of justifiable homicide, and the coroner refused to grant -a warrant for burial, saying that the man’s action was equivalent to -_felo de se_. Hunt stated in the House of Commons that the foreman of -the jury was the father of one of the yeomen. - -We have seen that in these counties the magistrates took a very grave -view of the crime of levying money from householders. This was often -done by casual bands of men and boys, who had little connection with -the organised rising. An examination of the cases described before -the Special Commissions gives the impression that in point of fact -there was very little danger to person or property. A farmer’s wife -at Aston Tirrold in Berkshire described her own experience to the -Abingdon Special Commission. A mob came to her house and demanded beer. -Her husband was out and she went to the door. ‘Bennett was spokesman. -He said “Now a little of your beer if you please.” I answered “Not a -drop.” He asked “Why?” and I said “I cannot give beer to encourage -riot.” Bennett said “Why you don’t call this rioting do you?” I said -“I don’t know what you call it, but it is a number of people assembled -together to alarm others: but don’t think I’m afraid or daunted at it.” -Bennett said “Suppose your premises should be set on fire?” I said -“Then I certainly should be alarmed but I don’t suppose either of you -intends doing that.” Bennett said “No, we do not intend any such thing, -I don’t wish to alarm you and we are not come with the intention of -mischief.”’ The result of the dialogue was that Bennett and his party -went home without beer and without giving trouble. - -It was natural that when mob-begging of this kind became fashionable, -unpopular individuals should be singled out for rough and threatening -visits. Sometimes the assistant overseers were the objects of special -hatred, sometimes the parson. It is worth while to give the facts of -a case at St. Mary Bourne in Hampshire, because stress was laid upon -it in the subsequent prosecutions as an instance of extraordinary -violence. The clergyman, Mr. Easton, was not a favourite in his parish, -and he preached what the poor regarded as a harsh and a hostile sermon. -When the parish rose, a mob of two hundred forced their way into the -vicarage and demanded money, some of them repeating, ‘Money or blood.’ -Mrs. Easton, who was rather an invalid, Miss Lucy Easton, and Master -Easton were downstairs, and Mrs. Easton was so much alarmed that she -sent Lucy upstairs to fetch 10s. Meanwhile Mr. Easton had come down, -and was listening to some extremely unsympathetic criticisms of his -performances in the pulpit. ‘Damn you,’ said Daniel Simms,[440] ‘where -will your text be next Sunday?’ William Simms was equally blunt and -uncompromising. Meanwhile Lucy had brought down the half-sovereign, and -Mrs. Easton gave it to William Simms,[441] who thereupon cried ‘All -out,’ and the mob left the Eastons at peace. - -One representative of the Church was distinguished from most of the -country gentlemen and clergymen of the time by his treatment of one -of these wandering mobs. Cobbett’s letter to the Hampshire parsons, -published in the _Political Register_, 15th January 1831, contains an -account of the conduct of Bishop Sumner, the Bishop of Winchester. ‘I -have, at last, found a Bishop of the _Law_ Church to _praise_. The -facts are these: the Bishop, in coming from Winchester to his palace -at Farnham, was met about a mile before he got to the latter place, -by a band of sturdy beggars, whom some call robbers. They stopped his -carriage, and asked for some money, which he gave them. But he did not -_prosecute_ them: he had not a man of them called to account for his -conduct, but, the next day, set _twenty-four labourers to constant -work_, opened his Castle to the distressed of all ages, and supplied -all with food and other necessaries who stood in need of them. This was -becoming a Christian teacher.’ Perhaps the bishop remembered the lines -from Dryden’s _Tales from Chaucer_, describing the spirit in which the -good parson regarded the poor: - - ‘Who, should they steal for want of his relief, - He judged himself accomplice with the thief.’ - -There was an exhibition of free speaking at Hungerford, where the -magistrates sat in the Town Hall to receive deputations from various -mobs, in connection with the demand for higher wages. The magistrates -had made their peace with the Hungerford mob, when a deputation from -the Kintbury mob arrived, led by William Oakley, a young carpenter of -twenty-five. Oakley addressed the magistrates in language which they -had never heard before in their lives and were never likely to hear -again. ‘You have not such d----d flats to deal with now, as you had -before; we will have 2s. a day till Lady Day, and 2s. 6d. afterwards -for labourers and 3s. 6d. for tradesmen. And as we are here we will -have £5 before we leave the place or we will smash it.... You gentlemen -have been living long enough on the good things, now is our time and -we will have them. You gentlemen would not speak to us now, only you -are afraid and intimidated.’ The magistrates acceded to the demands -of the Kintbury mob and also gave them the £5, after which they gave -the Hungerford mob £5, because they had behaved well, and it would be -unjust to treat them worse than their Kintbury neighbours. Mr. Page, -Deputy-Lieutenant for Berks, sent Lord Melbourne some tales about -this same Kintbury mob, which was described by Mr. Pearse, M.P., as -a set of ‘desperate savages.’ ‘I beg to add some anecdotes of the mob -yesterday to illustrate the nature of its component parts. They took £2 -from Mr. Cherry a magistrate and broke his Machine. Afterwards another -party came and demanded One Pound----when the two parties had again -formed into one, they passed by Mr. Cherry’s door and said they had -taken one pound too much, which they offered to return to him which it -is said he refused--they had before understood that Mrs. Cherry was -unwell and therefore came only in small parties. A poor woman passed -them selling rabbitts, some few of the mob took some by force, the -ringleader ordered them to be restored. At a farmer’s where they had -been regaled with bread cheese and beer one of them stole an umbrella: -the ringleader hearing of it, as they were passing the canal threw him -into it and gave him a good ducking.’[442] - -In the early days of the rising in Hampshire, Wiltshire and Berkshire, -there was a good deal of sympathy with the labourers. The farmers in -many cases made no objection to the destruction of their threshing -machines. One gentleman of Market Lavington went so far as to say that -‘nearly all the Wiltshire Farmers were willing to destroy or set aside -their machines.’ ‘My Lord,’ wrote Mr. Williams, J.P., from Marlborough, -‘you will perhaps be surprised to hear that the greatest number of -the threshing machines destroyed have been put out for the Purpose by -the Owners themselves.’ The Duke of Buckingham complained that in the -district round Avington ‘the farmers have not the Spirit and in some -instances not the Wish to put down’ disturbances.[443] At a meeting in -Winchester, convened by the Mayor to preserve the peace (reported in -the _Hampshire Chronicle_ of 22nd November), Dr. Newbolt, a clergyman -and magistrate, described his own dealings with one of the mobs. The -mob said they wanted 12s. a week wages: this he said was a reasonable -demand. He acted as mediator between the labourers and farmers, and -as a result of his efforts the farmers agreed to these terms, and the -labourers returned to work, abandoning their project of a descent -on Winchester. The Mayor of Winchester also declared that the wages -demanded were not unreasonable, and he laid stress on the fact that the -object of the meeting was not to appoint special constables to come -into conflict with the people, but merely to preserve the peace. Next -week Dr. Newbolt put an advertisement into the _Hampshire Chronicle_, -acknowledging the vote of thanks that had been passed to him, and -reaffirming his belief that conciliation was the right policy.[444] At -Overton, in Hampshire, Henry Hunt acted as mediator between the farmers -and a hungry and menacing mob. Such was the fear of the farmers that -they gave him unlimited power to make promises on their behalf: he -promised the labourers that their wages should be raised from 9s. to -12s., with house rent in addition, and they dispersed in delight. - -Fortune had so far smiled upon the rising, and there was some hope of -success. If the spirit that animated the farmers, and in Kent many of -the landowners, had lasted, the winter of 1830 might have ended in an -improvement of wages and a reduction of rents and tithes throughout -the south of England. In places where the decline of the labourer had -been watched for years without pity or dismay, magistrates were now -calling meetings to consider his circumstances, and the Home Office -Papers show that some, at any rate, of the country gentlemen were -aware of the desperate condition of the poor. Unhappily the day of -conciliatory measures was a brief one. Two facts frightened the upper -classes into brutality: one was the spread of the rising, the other -the scarcity of troops.[445] As the movement spread, the alarm of the -authorities inspired a different policy, and even those landowners who -recognised that the labourers were miserable, thought that they were in -the presence of a rising that would sweep them away unless they could -suppress it at once by drastic means. They pictured the labourers as -Huns and the mysterious Swing as a second Attila, and this panic they -contrived to communicate to the other classes of society. - -Conciliatory methods consequently ceased; the upper classes substituted -action for diplomacy, and the movement rapidly collapsed. Little -resistance was offered, and the terrible hosts of armed and desperate -men melted down into groups of weak and ill-fed labourers, armed with -sticks and stones. On 26th November the _Times_ could report that -seventy persons had been apprehended near Newbury, and that ‘about -60 of the most forward half-starved fellows’ had been taken into -custody some two miles from Southampton. Already the housing of the -Berkshire prisoners was becoming a problem, the gaols at Reading and -Abingdon being overcrowded: by the end of the month the Newbury Mansion -House and Workhouse had been converted into prisons. This energy had -been stimulated by a circular letter issued on 24th November, in -which Lord Melbourne urged the lord-lieutenants and the magistrates -to use firmness and vigour in quelling disturbances, and virtually -promised them immunity for illegal acts done in discharge of their -duty. A village here and there continued to give the magistrates some -uneasiness, for example, Broughton in Hants, ‘an open village in an -open country ... where there is no Gentleman to overawe them,’[446] but -these were exceptions. The day of risings was over, and from this time -forward, arson was the only weapon of discontent. At Charlton in Wilts, -where ‘the magistrates had talked of 12s. and the farmers had given -10s.,’ a certain Mr. Polhill, who had lowered the wages one Saturday to -9s., found his premises in flame. ‘The poor,’ remarked a neighbouring -magistrate, ‘naturally consider that they will be beaten down again -to 7s.’[447] By 4th December the _Times_ correspondent in Wiltshire -and Hampshire could report that quiet was restored, that the peasantry -were cowed, and that men who had been prominent in the mobs were being -picked out and arrested every day. He gave an amusing account of the -trials of a special correspondent, and of the difficulties of obtaining -information. ‘The circular of Lord Melbourne which encourages the -magistrates to seize suspected persons, and promises them impunity if -the motives are good (such is the construction of the circular in these -parts), and which the magistrates are determined to act upon, renders -inquiries unsafe, and I have received a few good natured hints on -this head. Gentlemen in gigs and post chaises are peculiar objects of -jealousy. A cigar, which is no slight comfort in this humid atmosphere, -is regarded on the road as a species of pyrotechnical tube; and even an -eye glass is in danger of being metamorphosed into a newly invented air -gun, with which these _gentlemen_ ignite stacks and barns as they pass. -An innocent enquiry of whose house or farm is that? is, under existing -circumstances, an overt act of incendiarism.’ - -In such a state of feeling, it was not surprising that labourers were -bundled into prison for sour looks or discontented conversation. A -zealous magistrate wrote to the Home Office on 13th December after a -fire near Maidenhead, to say that he had committed a certain Greenaway -to prison on the following evidence: ‘Dr. Vansittart, Rector of -Shottesbrook, gave a sermon a short time before the fire took place, -recommending a quiet conduct to his Parishioners. Greenaway said openly -in the churchyard, we have been quiet too long. His temper is bad, -always discontented and churlish, frequently changing his Master from -finding great difficulty in maintaining a large family from the Wages -of labour.’ - -Meanwhile the rising had spread westward to Dorset and Gloucestershire, -and northward to Bucks. In Dorsetshire and Gloucestershire, the -disturbances were much like those in Wiltshire. In Bucks, in addition -to the usual agricultural rising, with the breaking of threshing -machines and the demand for higher wages, there were riots in High -Wycombe, and considerable destruction of paper-making machinery by -the unemployed. Where special grievances existed in a village, the -labourers took advantage of the rising to seek redress for them. Thus -at Walden in Bucks, in addition to demanding 2s. a day wages with 6d. -for each child and a reduction of tithes, they made a special point of -the improper distribution of parish gifts. ‘Another person said that -buns used to be thrown from the church steeple and beer given away in -the churchyard, and a sermon preached on the bun day. Witness (the -parson) told them that the custom had ceased before he came to the -parish, but that he always preached a sermon on St. George’s day, and -two on Sundays, one of which was a volunteer. He told them that he had -consulted the Archdeacon on the claim set up for the distribution of -buns, and that the Archdeacon was of opinion that no such claim could -be maintained.’ - -At Benson or Bensington, in Oxfordshire, the labourers, after -destroying some threshing machines, made a demonstration against a -proposal for enclosure. Mr. Newton, a large proprietor, had just made -one of many unsuccessful attempts to obtain an Enclosure Act for the -parish. Some thousand persons assembled in the churchyard expecting -that Mr. Newton would try to fix the notice on the church door, but as -he did not venture to appear, they proceeded to his house, and made him -promise never again to attempt to obtain an Enclosure Act.[448] - -The movement for obtaining higher wages by this rude collective -bargaining was extinguished in the counties already mentioned by the -beginning of December, but disturbances now developed over a larger -area. A ‘daring riot’ took place at Stotfold in Bedfordshire. The -labourers met together to demand exemption from taxes, dismissal of the -assistant overseer, and the raising of wages to 2s. a day. The last -demand was refused, on which the labourers set some straw alight in -a field to alarm the farmers. Mr. Whitbread, J.P., brought a hundred -special constables, and arrested ten ringleaders, after which the riot -ceased. There were disturbances in Norfolk, Suffolk, and Essex; and in -many other counties the propertied classes were terrified from time -to time by the news of fires. In Cambridgeshire there were meetings -of labourers to demand higher wages, in some places with immediate -success, and one magistrate was alarmed by rumours of a design to march -upon Cambridge itself on market day. In Devonshire Lord Ebrington -reported an agitation for higher wages with encouragement from the -farmers. He was himself impressed by the low wages in force, and had -raised them in places still quiet; a mistake for which he apologised. -Even Hereford, ‘this hitherto submissive and peaceful county,’ was not -unaffected. In Northamptonshire there were several fires, and also -risings round Peterborough, Oundle and Wellingborough, and a general -outbreak in the Midlands was thought to be imminent. Hayricks began -to blaze as far north as Carlisle. Swing letters were delivered in -Yorkshire, and in Lincolnshire the labourer was said to be awakening -to his own importance. There were in fact few counties quite free -from infection, and a leading article appeared in the _Times_ on 6th -December, in which it was stated that never had such a dangerous state -of things existed to such an extent in England, in the period of -well-authenticated records. ‘Let the rich be taught that Providence -will not suffer them to oppress their fellow creatures with impunity. -Here are tens of thousands of Englishmen, industrious, kind-hearted, -but broken-hearted beings, exasperated into madness by insufficient -food and clothing, by utter want of necessaries for themselves and -their unfortunate families.’ - -Unfortunately Providence, to whom the _Times_ attributed these -revolutionary sentiments, was not so close to the scene as Lord -Melbourne, whose sentiments on the subject were very different. On 8th -December he issued a circular, which gave a death-blow to the hope that -the magistrates would act as mediators on behalf of the labourers. -After blaming those magistrates who, under intimidation, had advised -the establishment of a uniform rate of wages, the Home Secretary went -on, ‘Reason and experience concur in proving that a compliance with -demands so unreasonable in themselves, and urged in such a manner, can -only lead, and probably within a very short period of time, to the most -disastrous results.’ He added that the justices had ‘no general legal -authority to settle the amount of the wages of labour.’ The circular -contained a promise on the part of the Government that they would adopt -‘every practicable and reasonable measure’ for the alleviation of the -labourers’ privations. - -From this time the magistrates were everywhere on the alert for the -first signs of life and movement among the labourers, and they forbade -meetings of any kind. In Suffolk and Essex the labourers who took -up the cry for higher wages were promptly thrown into prison, and -arbitrary arrests became the custom. The movement was crushed, and the -time for retribution had come. The gaols were full to overflowing, -and the Government appointed Special Commissions to try the rioters -in Hampshire, Wiltshire, Dorset, Berks, and Bucks. Brougham, who was -now enjoying the office in whose pompous manner he must have lisped -in his cradle, told the House of Lords on 2nd December, ‘Within a few -days from the time I am addressing your Lordships, the sword of justice -shall be unsheathed to smite, if it be necessary, with a firm and -vigorous hand, the rebel against the law.’ - -The disturbances were over, but the panic had been such that the -upper classes could not persuade themselves that England was yet -tranquil. As late as Christmas Eve the Privy Council gave orders to the -archbishop to prepare ‘a form of prayer to Almighty God, on account -of the troubled state of certain parts of the United Kingdom.’ The -archbishop’s composition, which was published after scores of men and -boys had been sentenced to transportation for life, must have been -recited with genuine feeling by those clergymen who had either broken, -or were about to break, their agreement to surrender part of their -tithes. One passage ran as follows: ‘Restore, O Lord, to Thy people -the quiet enjoyment of the many and great blessings which we have -received from Thy bounty: defeat and frustrate the malice of wicked and -turbulent men, and turn their hearts: have pity, O Lord, on the simple -and ignorant, who have been led astray, and recall them to a sense of -their duty; and to persons of all ranks and conditions in this country -vouchsafe such a measure of Thy grace, that our hearts being filled -with true faith and devotion, and cleansed from all evil affections, -we may serve Thee with one accord, in duty and loyalty to the King, in -obedience to the laws of the land, and in brotherly love towards each -other....’ - -We shall see in the next chapter what happened to ‘the simple and -ignorant’ who had fallen into the hands of the English judges. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[421] See Fawley, p. 279. - -[422] _Kent Herald_, September 2, 1830. - -[423] _Times_, January 3, 1831. - -[424] September 30, 1830. - -[425] _Brighton Chronicle_, October 6, quoted in _Times_, October 14. - -[426] For Brede see H. O. Papers, Extracts from Poor Law Commissioners’ -Report, published 1833, and newspapers. - -[427] They were signed by G. S. Hill, minister, by eight farmers and -the four labourer delegates. - -[428] Affidavit in H. O. Papers. - -[429] _Times_, November 25. - -[430] The petition was as follows: ‘We feel that in justice we ought -not to suffer a moment to pass away without communicating to your -Grace the great and unprecedented distress which we are enabled from -our own personal experience to state prevails among all the peasantry -to a degree not only dreadful to individuals, but also to an extent -which, if not checked, must be attended with serious consequences to -the national prosperity.’ Mr. Hodges does not mention the date, merely -stating that it was sent to Wellington when Prime Minister. - -[431] H. O. Papers. - -[432] _Ibid._ - -[433] _Ibid._ - -[434] H. O. Papers. - -[435] _Ibid._ - -[436] Transported for life to New South Wales. - -[437] Ford was capitally convicted and sentenced to transportation for -life, but his sentence was commuted to imprisonment. - -[438] H. O. Papers. - -[439] According to local tradition he was killed not by the yeomanry -but by a farmer, before the troop came up. See Hudson, _A Shepherd’s -Life_, p. 248. - -[440] Transported for life to New South Wales. - -[441] Transported for life to New South Wales. - -[442] H. O. Papers. - -[443] _Ibid._ - -[444] Ten days later, after Lord Melbourne’s circular of December 8, -Dr. Newbolt changed his tone. Writing to the Home Office he deprecated -the censure implied in that circular, and stated that his conduct -was due to personal infirmities and threats of violence: indeed he -had subsequently heard from a certain Mr. Wickham that ‘I left his -place just in time to save my own life, as some of the Mob had it in -contemplation to drag me out of the carriage, and to destroy me upon -the spot, and it was entirely owing to the interference of some of the -better disposed of the Peasantry that my life was preserved.’ - -[445] See p. 258. - -[446] H. O. Papers. - -[447] _Ibid._ - -[448] See _Oxford University and City Herald_, November 20 and 27, -1830. - - - - -CHAPTER XII - -THE LAST LABOURERS’ REVOLT - -II - - -The bands of men and boys who had given their rulers one moment of -excitement and lively interest in the condition of the poor had made -themselves liable to ferocious penalties. For the privileged classes -had set up a code under which no labourer could take a single step for -the improvement of the lot of his class without putting his life and -liberties in a noose. It is true that the savage laws which had been -passed against combination in 1799 and 1800 had been repealed in 1824, -and that even under the less liberal Act of the following year, which -rescinded the Act of 1824, it was no longer a penal offence to form a -Trades Union. But it is easy to see that the labourers who tried to -raise their wages were in fact on a shelving and most perilous slope. -If they used threats or intimidation or molested or obstructed, either -to get a labourer to join with them or to get an employer to make -concessions, they were guilty of a misdemeanour punishable with three -months’ imprisonment. They were lucky if they ran no graver risk than -this. Few of the prosecutions at the Special Commissions were under the -Act of 1825. A body of men holding a meeting in a village where famine -and unemployment were chronic, and where hardly any one had been taught -to read or write, might very soon find themselves becoming what the Act -of 1714 called a riotous assembly, and if a magistrate took alarm and -read the Riot Act, and they did not disperse within one hour, every -one of them might be punished as a felon. The hour’s interval did not -mean an hour’s grace, for, as Mr. Justice Alderson told the court at -Dorchester, within that hour ‘all persons, even private individuals, -may do anything, using force even to the last extremity to prevent the -commission of a felony.’ - -There were at least three ways in which labourers meeting together -to demonstrate for higher wages ran a risk of losing their lives, if -any of their fellows got out of hand from temper, or from drink, or -from hunger and despair. Most of the prosecutions before the Special -Commissions were prosecutions under three Acts of 1827 and 1828, -consolidating the law on the subject of offences against property and -offences against the person. Under the eighth section of one Act (7 and -8 George IV. c. 30), any persons riotously or tumultuously assembled -together who destroyed any house, stable, coach-house, outhouse, barn, -granary, or any building or erection or machinery used in carrying -on any trade or manufacture were to suffer death as felons. In this -Act there is no definition of riot, and therefore ‘the common law -definition of a riot is resorted to, and in such a case if any one of -His Majesty’s subjects was terrified there was a sufficient terror and -alarm to substantiate that part of the charge.’[449] Under the sixth -section of another Act, any person who robbed any other person of any -chattel, money, or valuable security was to suffer death as a felon. -Now if a mob presented itself before a householder with a demand for -money, and the householder in fear gave even a few coppers, any person -who was in that mob, whether he had anything to do with this particular -transaction or not, whether he was aware or ignorant of it, was guilty -of robbery, and liable to the capital penalty. Under section 12 of the -Act of the following year, generally known as Lansdowne’s Act, which -amended Ellenborough’s Act of 1803, it was a capital offence to attempt -to shoot at a person, or to stab, cut, or wound him, with intent to -murder, rob, or maim. Under this Act, as it was interpreted, if an -altercation arose and any violence was offered by a single individual -in the mob, the lives of the whole band were forfeit. This was put -very clearly by Baron Vaughan: ‘There seems to be some impression that -unless the attack on an individual is made with some deadly weapons, -those concerned are not liable to capital punishment; but it should -be made known to all persons that if the same injury were inflicted -by a blow of a stone, all and every person forming part of a riotous -assembly is equally guilty as he whose hand may have thrown it, and -all alike are liable to death.’ Under section 4 of one Act of 1827 the -penalty for destroying a threshing machine was transportation for seven -years, and under section 17 the penalty for firing a rick was death. -These were the terrors hanging over the village labourers of whom -several hundreds were now awaiting their trial. - -The temper of the judges was revealed in their charges to the Grand -Juries. In opening the Maidstone Assizes on 14th December, Mr. Justice -Bosanquet[450] declared that though there might be some distress it -was much exaggerated, and that he was sure that those whom he had -the honour to address would find it not only their duty but their -pleasure to lend an ear to the wants of the poor.[451] Mr. Justice -Taunton[452] was even more reassuring on this subject at the Lewes -Assizes: the distress was less than it had been twelve months before. -‘I regret to say,’ he went on, ‘there are persons who exaggerate the -distress and raise up barriers between different classes--who use the -most inflammatory language--who represent the rich as oppressors of -the poor. It would be impertinent in me to say anything to you as to -your treatment of labourers or servants. That man must know little of -the gentry of England, whether connected with the town or country, -who represents them as tyrants to the poor, as not sympathising in -their distress, and as not anxious to relieve their burdens and to -promote their welfare and happiness.’[453] In opening the Special -Commission at Winchester Baron Vaughan[454] alluded to the theory that -the tumults had arisen from distress and admitted that it might be -partly true, but, he continued, ‘every man possessed of the feelings -common to our nature must deeply lament it, and endeavour to alleviate -it (as you gentlemen no doubt have done and will continue to do), by -every means which Providence has put within his power.’ If individuals -were aggrieved by privations and injuries, they must apply to the -Legislature, which alone could afford them relief, ‘but it can never be -tolerated in any country which professes to acknowledge the obligations -of municipal law, that any man or body of men should be permitted to -sit in judgment upon their own wrongs, or to arrogate to themselves -the power of redressing them. To suffer it would be to relapse into -the barbarism of savage life and to dissolve the very elements by -which society is held together.’[455] The opinions of the Bench on the -sections of the Act (7 and 8 George IV. c. 30) under which men could -be hung for assembling riotously and breaking machinery were clearly -expressed by Mr. Justice Parke[456] (afterwards Lord Wensleydale) at -Salisbury: ‘If that law ceases to be administered with due firmness, -and men look to it in vain for the security of their rights, our wealth -and power will soon be at an end, and our capital and industry would -be transferred to some more peaceful country, whose laws are more -respected or better enforced.’[457] By another section of that Act -seven years was fixed as the maximum penalty for breaking a threshing -machine. Mr. Justice Alderson[458] chafed under this restriction, -and he told two men, Case and Morgan, who were found guilty at the -Salisbury Special Commission of going into a neighbouring parish and -breaking a threshing machine, that had the Legislature foreseen such -crimes as theirs, it would have enabled the court to give them a -severer sentence.[459] - -Mr. Justice Park[460] was equally stern and uncompromising in defending -the property of the followers of the carpenter of Nazareth against the -unreasoning misery of the hour. Summing up in a case at Aylesbury, in -which one of the charges was that of attempting to procure a reduction -of tithes, he remarked with warmth: ‘It was highly insolent in such men -to require of gentlemen, who had by an expensive education qualified -themselves to discharge the sacred duties of a Minister of the Gospel, -to descend from that station and reduce themselves to the situation of -common labourers.’[461] - -Few judges could resist the temptation to introduce into their charges -a homily on the economic benefits of machinery. Mr. Justice Park was -an exception, for he observed at Aylesbury that the question of the -advantages of machinery was outside the province of the judges, ‘and -much mischief often resulted from persons stepping out of their line -of duty.’[462] Mr. Justice Alderson took a different view, and the -very next day he was expounding the truths of political economy at -Dorchester, starting with what he termed the ‘beautiful and simple -illustration’ of the printing press.[463] The illustration must have -seemed singularly intimate and convincing to the labourers in the dock -who had never been taught their letters. - -Such was the temper of the judges. Who and what were the prisoners -before them? After the suppression of the riots, the magistrates could -pick out culprits at their leisure, and when a riot had involved the -whole of the village the temptation to get rid by this method of -persons who for one reason or another were obnoxious to the authorities -was irresistible. Hunt, speaking in the House of Commons,[464] quoted -the case of Hindon; seven men had been apprehended for rioting and they -were all poachers. Many of the prisoners had already spent a month in -an overcrowded prison; almost all of them were poor men; the majority -could not read or write.[465] Few could afford counsel, and it must -be remembered that counsel could not address the court on behalf of -prisoners who were being tried for breaking machines, or for belonging -to a mob that asked for money or destroyed property. By the rules of -the gaol, the prisoners at Salisbury were not allowed to see their -attorney except in the presence of the gaoler or his servant. The -labourers’ ignorance of the law was complete and inevitable. Many of -them thought that the King or the Government or the magistrates had -given orders that machines were to be broken. Most of them supposed -that if a person from whom they demanded money threw it down or gave -it without the application of physical force, there was no question -of robbery. We have an illustration of this illusion in a trial at -Winchester when Isaac Hill, junior, who was charged with breaking a -threshing machine near Micheldever, for which the maximum penalty was -seven years, pleaded in his defence that he had not broken the machine -and that all that he did ‘was to ask the prosecutor civilly for the -money, which the mob took from him, and the prosecutor gave it to him, -and that he thanked him very kindly for it,’[466] an admission which -made him liable to a death penalty. A prisoner at Salisbury, when he -was asked what he had to say in his defence to the jury, replied: -‘Now, my Lord, I ‘se got nothing to say to ’em, I doant knaow any on -’em.’[467] The prisoners were at this further disadvantage that all -the witnesses whom they could call as to their share in the conduct -of a mob had themselves been in the mob, and were thus liable to -prosecution. Thus when James Lush (who was afterwards selected for -execution) and James Toomer appealed to a man named Lane, who had just -been acquitted on a previous charge, to give evidence that they had -not struck Mr. Pinniger in a scuffle, Mr. Justice Alderson cautioned -Lane that if he acknowledged that he had been in the mob he would be -committed. Lane chose the safer part of silence.[468] In another case a -witness had the courage to incriminate himself. When the brothers Simms -were being tried for extorting money from Parson Easton’s wife, a case -which we have already described, Henry Bunce, called as a witness for -the defence, voluntarily declared, in spite of a caution from the judge -(Alderson), that he had been present himself and that William Simms did -not use the expression ‘blood or money.’ He was at once ordered into -custody. ‘The prisoner immediately sprung over the bar into the dock -with his former comrades, seemingly unaffected by the decision of the -learned judge.’[469] - -Perhaps the darkest side of the business was the temptation held -out to prisoners awaiting trial to betray their comrades. Immunity -or a lighter sentence was freely offered to those who would give -evidence. Stokes, who was found guilty at Dorchester of breaking a -threshing machine, was sentenced by Mr. Justice Alderson to a year’s -imprisonment, with the explanation that he was not transported -because ‘after you were taken into custody, you gave very valuable -information which tended greatly to further the ends of justice.’[470] -These transactions were not often dragged into the daylight, but -some negotiations of this character were made public in the trial of -Mr. Deacle next year. Mr. Deacle, a well-to-do gentleman farmer, was -tried at the Lent Assizes at Winchester for being concerned in the -riots. One of the witnesses against him, named Collins, admitted in -cross-examination that he believed he should have been prosecuted -himself, if he had not promised to give evidence against Mr. Deacle; -another witness, named Barnes, a carpenter, stated in cross-examination -that during the trials at the Special Commission, ‘he being in the -dock, and about to be put on his trial, the gaoler Beckett called -him out, and took him into a room where there were Walter Long, a -magistrate, and another person, whom he believed to be Bingham Baring, -who told him that he should not be put upon his trial if he would -come and swear against Deacle.’ When the next witness was about to be -cross-examined, the counsel for the prosecution abruptly abandoned the -case.[471] - - * * * * * - -The first Special Commission was opened at Winchester with suitable -pomp on 18th December. Not only the prison but the whole town was -crowded, and the inhabitants of Winchester determined to make the best -of the windfall. The jurymen and the _Times_ special correspondent -complained bitterly of the abnormal cost of living, the latter -mentioning that in addition to extraordinary charges for beds, 5s. -a day was exacted for firing and tallow candles, bedroom fire not -included. The three judges sent down as commissioners were Baron -Vaughan, Mr. Justice Parke, and Mr. Justice Alderson. With them were -associated two other commissioners, Mr. Sturges Bourne, of assistant -overseer fame, and Mr. Richard Pollen. The Duke of Wellington, as -Lord-Lieutenant, sat on the Bench. The Attorney-General, Mr. Sergeant -Wilde, and others appeared to prosecute for the Crown. The County took -up every charge, the Government only the more serious ones. - -There were three hundred prisoners, most of them charged with extorting -money by threats or with breaking machinery. What chance had they of a -fair trial? They started with the disabilities already described. They -were thrown by batches into the dock; the pitiless law was explained -to the jury; extenuating circumstances were ruled out as irrelevant. -‘We do not come here,’ said Mr. Justice Alderson, ‘to inquire into -grievances. We come here to decide law.’ But though evidence about -wages or distress was not admitted, the judges did not scruple to give -their own views of the social conditions which had produced these -disturbances. Perhaps the most flagrant example was provided by a trial -which happily was for a misdemeanour only. Seven men were indicted -for conspiring together and riotously assembling for the purpose of -raising wages and for compelling others to join them. The labourers of -the parish of Fawley had combined together for two objects, the first -to raise their wages, which stood at 9s. a week, the second to get rid -of the assistant overseer, who had introduced a parish cart, to which -he had harnessed women and boys, amongst others an idiot woman, named -Jane Stevens. The labourers determined to break up the cart, but they -desisted on the promise of a farmer that a horse should be bought for -it. Lord Cavan was the large landowner of the parish. He paid his men -as a rule 9s. a week, but two of them received 10s. The mob came up to -his house to demand an increase of wages: Lord Cavan was out, quelling -rioters elsewhere. Lady Cavan came down to see them. ‘Seeing you are my -neighbours and armed,’ said she, ‘yet, as I am an unprotected woman, -I am sure you will do no harm.’ The labourers protested that they -meant no harm, and they did no harm. ‘I asked them,’ said Lady Cavan -afterwards, in evidence, ‘why they rose then, there was no apparent -distress round Eaglehurst, and the wages were the same as they had been -for several years. I have been in several of their cottages and never -saw any appearance of distress. They said they had been oppressed long -and would bear it no longer.’ One man told her that he had 9s. a week -wages and 3s. from the parish, he had heard that the 3s. was to be -discontinued. With the common-sense characteristic of her class Lady -Cavan assured him that he was not improving his position by idling. -The labourers impressed the Cavan men, and went on their peaceful way -round the parish. The farmers who gave evidence for the prosecution -were allowed to assert that there was no distress, but when it came to -evidence for the defence a stricter standard of relevancy was exacted. -One witness for the prisoners said of the labourers: ‘The men were in -very great distress; many of the men had only a few potatoes in their -bag when they came to work.’ ‘The learned judges objected to this -course of examination being continued: it might happen that through -drinking a man might suffer distress.’ The Attorney-General, in his -closing speech, asserted again that the prisoners did not seem to have -been in distress. Baron Vaughan, in summing up, said that men were not -to assemble and conspire together for the purpose of determining what -their wages should be. ‘That which at first might be in itself a lawful -act, might in the event become illegal.... A respectful statement or -representation of their grievances was legal, and to which no one would -object, but the evidence, if they believed it, showed that the conduct -of this assembly was far from being respectful. No one could feel more -for the distresses of the people than he did, but he would never endure -that persons should by physical strength compel wages to be raised. -There was no country where charity fell in a purer stream than in -this. Let the man make his appeal in a proper and respectful manner, -and he might be assured that appeal would never be heard in vain.... -His Lordship spoke very highly of the conduct of Lady Cavan. She had -visited the cottages of all those who lived in the neighbourhood, she -knew they were not distressed, and she also felt confident from her -kindness to them that they would not offer her any violence.’ All seven -were found guilty; four were sentenced to six months hard labour, and -three to three months. - -Very few, however, of the cases at Winchester were simple -misdemeanours, for in most instances, in addition to asking for higher -wages, the labourers had made themselves liable to a prosecution for -felony, either by breaking a threshing machine or by asking for money. -Those prisoners who had taken part in the Fordingbridge riots, or in -the destruction of machinery near Andover, or in the demolition of -the Headley Workhouse, were sentenced to death or to transportation -for life. Case after case was tried in which prisoners from different -villages were indicted for assault and robbery. The features varied -little, and the spectators began to find the proceedings monotonous. -Most of the agricultural population of Hampshire had made itself liable -to the death penalty, if the authorities cared to draw the noose. The -three hundred who actually appeared in Court were like the men on whom -the tower of Siloam fell. - -A case to which the prosecution attached special importance arose out -of an affair at the house of Mr. Eyre Coote. A mob of forty persons, -some of whom had iron bars, presented themselves before Mr. Coote’s -door at two o’clock in the morning. Two bands of men had already -visited Mr. Coote that evening, and he had given them beer: this third -band was a party of stragglers. Mr. Coote stationed his ten servants -in the portico, and when the mob arrived he asked them, ‘What do you -want, my lads?’ ‘Money,’ was the answer. ‘Money,’ said Mr. Coote, ‘you -shan’t have.’ One of the band seemed to Mr. Coote about to strike him. -Mr. Coote seized him, nine of the mob were knocked down and taken, and -the rest fled. Six of the men were prosecuted for feloniously demanding -money. Baron Vaughan remarked that outrages like this made one wonder -whether one was in a civilised country, and he proceeded to raise its -moral tone by sentencing all the prisoners to transportation for life, -except one, Henry Eldridge, who was reserved for execution. He had -been already capitally convicted of complicity in the Fordingbridge -riots, and this attempt to ‘enter the sanctuary of Mr. Eyre Coote’s -home’ following upon that crime, rendered him a suitable ‘sacrifice to -be made on the altar of the offended justice’ of his country. - -In many of the so-called robberies punished by the Special Commissions -the sums taken were trifling. George Steel, aged eighteen, was -sentenced to transportation for life for obtaining a shilling, when -he was in liquor, from Jane Neale: William Sutton, another boy of -eighteen, was found guilty of taking 4d. in a drunken frolic: Sutton, -who was a carter boy receiving 1s. 6d. a week and his food, was given -an excellent character by his master, who declared that he had never -had a better servant. The jury recommended him to mercy, and the judges -responded by sentencing him to death and banishing him for life. George -Clerk, aged twenty, and E. C. Nutbean, aged eighteen, paid the same -price for 3d. down and the promise of beer at the Greyhound. Such cases -were not exceptional, as any one who turns to the reports of the trials -will see. - -The evidence on which prisoners were convicted was often of the most -shadowy kind. Eight young agricultural labourers, of ages varying from -eighteen to twenty-five, were found guilty of riotously assembling -in the parish of St. Lawrence Wootten and feloniously stealing £2 -from William Lutely Sclater of Tangier Park. ‘We want to get a little -satisfaction from you’ was the phrase they used. Two days later another -man, named William Farmer, was charged with the same offence. Mr. -Sclater thought that Farmer was like the man in the mob who blew a -trumpet or horn, but could not swear to his identity. Other witnesses -swore that he was with the mob elsewhere, and said, ‘Money wa want and -money wa will hae.’ On this evidence he was found guilty, and though -Mr. Justice Alderson announced that he felt warranted in recommending -that he should not lose his life, ‘yet, it was his duty,’ he continued, -‘to state that he should for this violent and disgraceful outrage be -sent out of the country, and separated for life from those friends and -connections which were dear to him here: that he should have to employ -the rest of his days in labour, at the will and for the profit of -another, to show the people of the class to which the prisoner belonged -that they cannot with impunity lend their aid to such outrages against -the peace and security of person and property.’ - -We have seen that at the time of the riots it was freely stated -that the farmers incited the labourers to make disturbances. Hunt -went so far as to say in the House of Commons that in nineteen -cases out of twenty the farmers encouraged the labourers to break -the threshing machines. The county authorities evidently thought it -unwise to prosecute the farmers, although it was proved in evidence -that there were several farmers present at the destruction of the -Headley Workhouse, and at the demonstration at Mr. Cobbold’s house. -Occasionally a farmer, in testifying to a prisoner’s character, would -admit that he had been in a mob himself. In such cases the judge -administered rebukes, but the prosecution took no action. There was, -however, one exception. A small farmer, John Boys, of the parish of -Owslebury, had thrown himself heartily into the labourers’ cause. A -number of small farmers met and decided that the labourers’ wages -ought to be raised. Boys agreed to take a paper round for signature. -The paper ran as follows: ‘We the undersigned are willing to give 2s. -per day for able-bodied married men, and 9s. per week for single men, -on consideration of our rents and tithes being abated in proportion.’ -In similar cases, as a rule, the farmers left it to the labourers to -collect signatures, and Boys, by undertaking the work himself, made -himself a marked man. He had been in a mob which extorted money from -Lord Northesk’s steward at Owslebury, and for this he was indicted for -felony. But the jury, to the chagrin of the prosecution, acquitted -him. What followed is best described in the report of Sergeant Wilde’s -speech in the House of Commons (21st July 1831). ‘Boyce was tried -and acquitted: but he (Mr. Wilde) being unable to account for the -acquittal, considering the evidence to have been clear against him, -and feeling that although the jury were most respectable men, they -might possibly entertain some sympathy for him in consequence of his -situation in life, thought it his duty to send a communication to the -Attorney-General, stating that Boyce was deeply responsible for the -acts which had taken place: that he thought he should not be allowed to -escape, and recommending that he be tried before a different jury in -the other Court. The Attorney-General sent to him (Mr. Wilde) to come -into the other Court, and the result was that Boyce was then tried and -convicted.’ In the other more complaisant Court, Farmer Boys and James -Fussell, described as a genteel young man of about twenty, living with -his mother, were found guilty of heading a riotous mob for reducing -rents and tithes and sentenced to seven years’ transportation.[472] - -This was not the only case in which the sympathies of the jury created -a difficulty. The Home Office Papers contain a letter from Dr. -Quarrier, a Hampshire magistrate, who had been particularly vigorous in -suppressing riots, stating that Sir James Parke discharged a jury at -the Special Commission ‘under the impression that they were reluctant -to convict the Prisoners which was more strongly impressed upon the -mind of the Judge, by its being reported to his Lordship that “some of -the Gosport Jurors had said, while travelling in the stage coach to -Winchester, that they would not convict in cases where the Labourers -had been driven to excess by Poverty and low Wages!” It was ascertained -that some of those empannelled upon the acquitting Jury were from -Gosport, which confirmed the learned Judge in the determination to -discharge them.’[473] - -An interesting feature of the trials at Winchester was the number of -men just above the condition of agricultural labourers who threw in -their lot with the poor: the village mechanics, the wheelwrights, -carpenters, joiners, smiths, and the bricklayers, shoemakers, shepherds -and small holders were often prominent in the disturbances. To the -judges this fact was a riddle. The threshing machines had done these -men no injury; they had not known the sting of hunger; till the time -of the riots their characters had been as a rule irreproachable. -_Nemo repente turpissimus fuit_, and yet apparently these persons had -suddenly, without warning, turned into the ‘wicked and turbulent men’ -of the archbishop’s prayer. Such culprits deserved, in the opinions -of the bench, severer punishment than the labourers, whom their -example should have kept in the paths of obedience and peace.[474] -Where the law permitted, they were sentenced to transportation for -life. One heinous offender of this type, Gregory, a carpenter, was -actually earning 18s. a week in the service of Lord Winchester. But -the most interesting instances were two brothers, Joseph and Robert -Mason, who lived at Bullington. They rented three or four acres, kept -a cow, and worked for the neighbouring farmers as well. Joseph, who -was thirty-two, had a wife and one child; Robert, who was twenty-four, -was unmarried. Between them they supported a widowed mother. Their -characters were exemplary, and the most eager malice could detect no -blot upon their past. But their opinions were dangerous: they regularly -took in Cobbett’s _Register_ and read it aloud to twenty or thirty -of the villagers. Further, Joseph had carried on foot a petition -for reform to the king at Brighton from a hundred and seventy-seven -‘persons, belonging to the working and labouring classes’ of Wonston, -Barton Stacey and Bullington, and was reported to have given some -trouble to the king’s porter by an importunate demand for an audience. -The recital of these facts gave rise to much merriment at his trial, -and was not considered irrelevant by judges who ruled out all allusions -to distress.[475] An interesting light is thrown on the history of -this petition by a fragment of a letter, written by Robert Mason to -a friend, which somehow fell into the hands of a Captain Thompson of -Longparish, and was forwarded by him to the Home Office as a valuable -piece of evidence. - - ‘_P.S._--Since I wrote the above I have saw and talked with two - persons who say “Bullington Barton and Sutton has sent a petition and - why not Longparish Hursborne and Wherwell send another.” I think as - much, to be sure if we had all signed one, one journey and expense - would have served but what is expence? Why I would engage to carry a - Petition and deliver it at St. James for 30 shillings, and to a place - like Longparish what is that? If you do send one pray do not let - Church property escape your notice. There is the Church which cost - Longparish I should think nearly £1500 yearly: yes and there is an old - established Chaple which I will be bound does not cost £25 annually. - For God sake....’ (illegible). - -The first charge brought against the Masons was that of robbing Sir -Thomas Baring’s steward of £10 at East Stretton. The money had been -taken by one of the mobs; the Masons were acquitted. They were next -put on their trial together with William Winkworth, a cobbler and a -fellow reader of Cobbett, and ten others, for a similar offence. This -time they were accused of demanding £2 or £5 from Mr. W. Dowden of -Micheldever. The Attorney-General, in opening the case, drew attention -to the circumstances of the Masons and Winkworth, saying that the -offence with which they were charged was of a deeper dye, because they -were men of superior education and intelligence. A humane clergyman, -Mr. Cockerton, curate of Stoke Cheriton, gave evidence to the effect -that if the men had been met in a conciliatory temper in the morning -they would have dispersed. Joseph Mason and William Winkworth were -found guilty, and sentenced, in the words of the judge, to ‘be cut off -from all communion with society’ for the rest of their lives. Robert -Mason was still unconvicted, but he was not allowed to escape. The next -charge against him was that of going with a mob which extorted five -shillings from the Rev. J. Joliffe at Barton Stacey. He admitted that -he had accompanied the mob, partly because the labourers had urged him -to do so, partly because he hoped that Mr. Joliffe, being accustomed to -public speaking, would be able to persuade the labourers to disperse -before any harm was done. There was no evidence to show that he had -anything to do with the demand for money. He was found guilty and -sentenced to transportation for life. When asked what he had to say -for himself, he replied, ‘If the learned Counsel, who has so painted -my conduct to you, was present at that place and wore a smock frock -instead of a gown, and a straw hat instead of a wig, he would now be -standing in this dock instead of being seated where he is.’ - - * * * * * - -Six men were reserved for execution, and told that they must expect -no mercy on this side of the grave: Cooper, the leader in the -Fordingbridge riots; Holdaway, who had headed the attack on Headley -Workhouse; Gilmore, who had entered the justices’ room in Andover -‘in rather a violent manner’ and parleyed with the justices, and -afterwards, in spite of their remonstrances, been a ringleader in the -destruction of a foundry in the parish of Upper Clatford; Eldridge, -who had taken part in the Fordingbridge riot and also ‘invaded the -sanctuary’ of Mr. Eyre Coote’s home; James Aunalls, a lad of nineteen, -who had extorted money at night with threats of a fire, from a person -whom he bade look over the hills, where a fire was subsequently seen, -and Henry Cook. Cook was a ploughboy of nineteen, who could neither -read nor write. For most of his life, since the age of ten, he had -been a farm hand. For six months before the riots he had been employed -at sawing, at 10s. a week, but at the time of the rising he was out -of work. After the riots he got work as a ploughboy at about 5s. a -week till his arrest. Like the other lads of the neighbourhood he had -gone round with a mob, and he was found guilty, with Joseph Mason, of -extorting money from William Dowden. For this he might have got off -with transportation for life, but another charge was preferred against -him. Mr. William Bingham Baring, J.P., tried, with the help of some -of his servants, to quell a riot at Northingdon Down Farm. Silcock, -who seemed the leader of the rioters, declared that they would break -every machine. Bingham Baring made Silcock repeat these words several -times and then seized him. Cook then aimed a blow at Bingham Baring -with a sledge-hammer and struck his hat. So far there was no dispute -as to what had happened. One servant of the Barings gave evidence to -the effect that he had saved his master’s life by preventing Cook from -striking again; another afterwards put in a sworn deposition to the -effect that Cook never attempted to strike a second blow. All witnesses -agreed that Bingham Baring’s hat had suffered severely: some of them -said that he himself had been felled to the ground. Whatever his -injuries may have been, he was seen out a few hours later, apparently -in perfect health; next day he was walking the streets of Winchester; -two days later he was presented at Court, and within a week he was -strong enough to administer a sharp blow himself with his stick to a -handcuffed and unconvicted prisoner, a display of zeal for which he had -to pay £50. Cook did not put up any defence. He was sentenced to death. - -Perhaps it was felt that this victim to justice was in some respects -ill chosen, for reasons for severity were soon invented. He was a -heavy, stolid, unattractive boy, and his appearance was taken to -indicate a brutal and vicious disposition. Stories of his cruelties -to animals were spread abroad. ‘The fate of Henry Cook,’ said the -_Times_ correspondent (3rd January 1831), ‘excites no commiseration. -From everything I have heard of him, justice has seldom met with a -more appropriate sacrifice. He shed some tears shortly after hearing -his doom, but has since relapsed into a brutal insensibility to his -fate.’ His age was raised to thirty, his wages to 30s. a week. Denman -described him in the House of Commons, after his execution, as a -carpenter earning 30s. a week, who had struck down one of the family of -his benefactor, and had only been prevented from killing his victim by -the interposition of a more faithful individual. This is the epitaph -written on this obscure ploughboy of nineteen by the upper classes. -His own fellows, who probably knew him at least as well as a Denman -or a Baring, regarded his punishment as murder. Cobbett tells us that -the labourers of Micheldever subscribed their pennies to get Denman’s -misstatements about Cook taken out of the newspapers. When his body was -brought home after execution, the whole parish went out to meet it, and -he was buried in Micheldever churchyard in solemn silence. - -Bingham Baring himself, as has been mentioned, happened to offend -against the law by an act of violence at this time. He was not like -Cook, a starving boy, but the son of a man who was reputed to have made -seven millions of money, and was called by Erskine the first merchant -in Europe. He did not strike his victim in a riot, but in cold blood. -His victim could not defend himself, for he was handcuffed, being taken -to prison on a charge on which he was subsequently acquitted. The man -struck was a Mr. Deacle, a small farmer who had had his own threshing -machine broken, and was afterwards arrested with his wife, by Bingham -Baring and a posse of magistrates, on suspicion of encouraging the -rioters. Deacle’s story was that Baring and the other magistrates -concerned in the arrest treated his wife with great insolence in the -cart in which they drove the Deacles to prison, and that Bingham Baring -further struck him with a stick. For this Deacle got £50 damages in an -action he brought against Baring. ‘This verdict,’ said the _Morning -Herald_, ‘seemed to excite the greatest astonishment; for most of the -Bar and almost every one in Court said, if on the jury, they would have -given at least £5000 for so gross and wanton an insult and unfeeling -conduct towards those who had not offered the least resistance; the -defendants not addressing the slightest evidence in palliation or -attempting to justify it.’ The judge, in summing up, ‘could not help -remarking that the handcuffing was, to say the least of it, a very -harsh proceeding towards a lady and gentleman who had been perfectly -civil and quiet.’ Meanwhile the case of the magistrates against the -Deacles had collapsed in the most inglorious manner. Though they had -handcuffed these two unresisting people, they had thought it wiser -not to proceed against them. Deacle, however, insisted on being tried, -and by threatening the magistrates with an action, he obliged them -to prosecute. He was tried at the Assizes, and, as we have seen, the -trial came to an abrupt conclusion under circumstances that threw the -gravest suspicion on the methods of the authorities.[476] Meanwhile -the treatment these two persons had received (and we can imagine from -their story how innocent poor people, without friends or position, -were handled) had excited great indignation, and the newspapers were -full of it. There were petitions sent up to Parliament for a Committee -of Inquiry. Now the class to which Cook was unlucky enough to belong -had never sent a single member to Parliament, but the Baring family -had five Members in the House of Commons at this very moment, one of -whom had taken part with Bingham Baring in the violent arrest of the -Deacles. The five, moreover, were very happily distributed, one of them -being Junior Lord of the Treasury in Grey’s Government and husband -of Grey’s niece, and another an important member of the Opposition -and afterwards Chancellor of the Exchequer under Peel. The Barings -therefore were in less danger of misrepresentation or misunderstanding; -the motion for a Committee was rejected by a great majority on the -advice of Althorp and Peel; the leader of the House of Commons came -forward to testify that the Barings were friends of his, and the -discussion ended in a chorus of praise for the family that had been -judged so harshly outside the walls of Parliament. - -When the Special Commission had finished its labours at Winchester, -101 prisoners had been capitally convicted; of these 6 were left for -execution. The remaining 95 were, with few exceptions, transported for -life. Of the other prisoners tried, 36 were sentenced to transportation -for various periods, 65 were imprisoned with hard labour, and 67 were -acquitted. Not a single life had been taken by the rioters, not a -single person wounded. Yet the riots in this county alone were punished -by more than a hundred capital convictions, or almost double the number -that followed the devilish doings of Lord George Gordon’s mob. The -spirit in which Denman regarded the proceedings is illustrated by his -speech in the House of Commons on the amnesty debate: ‘No fewer than -a hundred persons were capitally convicted at Winchester, of offences -for every one of which their lives might have been justly taken, -and ought to have been taken, if examples to such an extent had been -necessary.’[477] - - * * * * * - -These sentences came like a thunderclap on the people of Winchester, -and all classes, except the magistrates, joined in petitions to the -Government for mercy. The _Times_ correspondent wrote as follows:-- - - ‘WINCHESTER, Friday Morning, _7th Jan._ - - ‘The scenes of distress in and about the jail are most terrible. The - number of men who are to be torn from their homes and connexions is so - great that there is scarcely a hamlet in the county into which anguish - and tribulation have not entered. Wives, sisters, mothers, children, - beset the gates daily, and the governor of the jail informs me that - the scenes he is obliged to witness at the time of locking up the - prison are truly heart-breaking. - - ‘You will have heard before this of the petitions which have been - presented to the Home Office from Gosport, Portsmouth, Romsey, - Whitchurch, and Basingstoke, praying for an extension of mercy to - all the men who now lie under sentence of death. A similar petition - has been got up in this city. It is signed by the clergy of the Low - Church, some of the bankers, and every tradesman in the town without - exception. Application was made to the clergy of the Cathedral for - their signatures, but they refused to give them, except conditionally, - upon reasons which I cannot comprehend. They told the petitioners, - as I am informed, that they would not sign any such petition unless - the grand jury and the magistracy of the county previously affixed - their names to it. Now such an answer, as it appears to me, is an - admission on their part that no mischief would ensue from not carrying - into effect the dreadful sentence of the law; for I cannot conceive - that if they were of opinion that mischief would ensue from it, they - would sign the petition, even though it were recommended by all the - talent and respectability of the Court of Quarter Sessions. I can - understand the principles on which that man acts, who asserts and - laments the necessity of vindicating the majesty of the law by the - sacrifice of human life; but I cannot understand the reasons of those - who, admitting that there is no necessity for the sword of justice to - strike the offender, decline to call upon the executive government to - stay its arm, and make their application for its mercy dependent on - the judgment, or it may be the caprice, of an influential aristocracy. - Surely, of all classes of society, the clergy is that which ought not - to be backward in the remission of offences. They are daily preaching - mercy to their flocks, and it wears but an ill grace when they are - seen refusing their consent to a practical application of their own - doctrines. Whatever my own opinion may be, as a faithful recorder - of the opinions of those around me, I am bound to inform you, that, - except among the magistracy of the county, there is a general, I had - almost said a universal, opinion among all ranks of society, that no - good will be effected by sacrificing human life.’[478] - -This outburst of public opinion saved the lives of four of the six men -who had been left for execution. The two who were hung were Cooper -and Cook. But the Government and the judges were determined that the -lessons of civilisation should not be wanting in impressiveness or in -dignity. They compelled all the prisoners who had been condemned by -the Commission to witness the last agonies of the two men whom public -opinion had been unable to rescue. The account given in the _Times_ -of 17th January shows that this piece of refined and spectacular -discipline was not thrown away, and that the wretched comrades of -the men who were hanged suffered as acutely as Denman or Alderson -themselves could have desired. ‘At this moment I cast my eyes down -into the felons’ yard, and saw many of the convicts weeping bitterly, -some burying their faces in their smock frocks, others wringing their -hands convulsively, and others leaning for support against the wall -of the yard and unable to cast their eyes upwards.’ This was the last -vision of English justice that each labourer carried to his distant -and dreaded servitude, a scene that would never fade from his mind. -There was much that England had not taught him. She had not taught him -that the rich owed a duty to the poor, that society owed any shelter -to the freedom or the property of the weak, that the mere labourer -had a share in the State, or a right to be considered in its laws, or -that it mattered to his rulers in what wretchedness he lived or in -what wretchedness he died. But one lesson she had taught him with such -savage power that his simple memory would not forget it, and if ever -in an exile’s gilding dreams he thought with longing of his boyhood’s -famine-shadowed home, that inexorable dawn would break again before -his shrinking eyes and he would thank God for the wide wastes of the -illimitable sea. - - * * * * * - -The Special Commission for Wiltshire opened at Salisbury on 2nd -January 1831. The judges were the same as those at Winchester; the -other commissioners were Lord Radnor, the friend of Cobbett, and Mr. T. -G. B. Estcourt. Lord Lansdowne, the Lord-Lieutenant, sat on the bench. -The foreman of the Grand Jury was Mr. John Benett, who has already -figured in these pages as the proprietor whose property was destroyed -and the magistrate who committed the culprits. There were three hundred -prisoners awaiting trial. - -The method in which the prosecutions were conducted in Wiltshire, -though it did not differ from the procedure followed in Hampshire and -elsewhere, provoked some criticism from the lawyers. The prosecutions -were all managed by the county authorities. The clerks of the -committing magistrates in the different districts first took the -depositions, and then got up all the prosecutions in their capacity of -solicitors to the same magistrates prosecuting as county authorities, -to the exclusion of the solicitors of the individual prosecutors. -Further, all the prosecutions were managed for the county by a single -barrister, who assisted the Attorney-General and left no opening for -other members of the Bar. The counsel for one of the prisoners objected -to this method, not only on the ground of its unfairness to the legal -profession, but on the wider ground of the interests of justice. For -it was inconsistent with the impartiality required from magistrates -who committed prisoners, that they should go on to mix themselves up -with the management of the prosecution; in many cases these magistrates -served again as grand jurors in the proceedings against the prisoners. -Such procedure, he argued ‘was calculated to throw at least a strong -suspicion on the fair administration of justice.’ These protests, -however, were silenced by the judges, and though the Attorney-General -announced that he was willing that the counsel for the magistrates -should retire, no change was made in the arrangements. - -The Salisbury prisoners were under a further disadvantage peculiar, -it is to be hoped, to that gaol. They were forbidden to see their -attorney except in the presence of the gaoler or his servants. This -rule seems to have been construed by the authorities in a manner that -simplified considerably the task of the prosecution. The facts of the -case of James Lush, condemned to death on two charges of extorting -money in a mob, were made public by Hunt in a letter to the _Times_, -22nd January 1831. Lush was a very poor man, but when first committed -he sent for an attorney and made a full confession. ‘This confession, -so confidentially made to his attorney (by an extraordinary rule of -the gaol) the legal adviser was compelled to submit to the inspection -of the gaoler, which paper he kept in his hands for several days and -in all human probability, this document, or a copy of it, was either -submitted to the inspection of the judge, or placed in the hands of -the prosecutor, the Crown Solicitor, or the Attorney-General: when -this man was called up for trial, such was his extreme poverty, that -he could not raise a guinea to fee counsel, and he was left destitute, -without legal advice or assistance.’ The Attorney-General could only -answer this charge in the House of Commons by declaring that he had no -recollection of any such circumstance himself, and that no gentleman of -the Bar would avail himself of information obtained in such a manner. -Lush could not distinguish these niceties of honour, or understand why -his confession should be examined and kept by the gaoler unless it -was to be used against him, and it is not surprising that he thought -himself betrayed. It is only fair to Lord Melbourne to add that when -Hunt drew his attention to this iniquitous rule in Salisbury Gaol he -had it abolished. - -The cases tried were very similar to those at Winchester; batch after -batch of boys and men in the prime of life were brought up to the dock -for a brief trial and sentence of exile. Such was the haste that in one -case at least the prisoners appeared with the handcuffs still on their -wrists, a circumstance which elicited a rebuke from the judge, and -an excuse of overwork from the gaoler. Amongst the first cases eight -prisoners, varying in age from seventeen to thirty, were sentenced to -transportation for life for doing £500 worth of damage at Brasher’s -cloth mill at Wilton. Thirteen men were transported for seven years and -one for fourteen years for breaking threshing machines on the day of -the Pyt House affray. Mr. John Benett was satisfied with this tale of -victims in addition to the man killed by the yeomanry, and refrained -from prosecuting for the stones thrown at him. For this he took great -credit in the House of Commons, and no doubt it was open to him to -imitate Bingham Baring’s friends, and to talk of that kind of outrage -as ‘murder.’ - -At Salisbury, as at Winchester, evidence about distress and wages was -ruled out by the judges whenever possible; thus when twelve men, nine -of whom were afterwards transported for seven years, were being tried -for breaking a threshing machine on the farm of a man named Ambrose -Patience, the cross-examination of Patience, which aimed at eliciting -facts about wages and distress, was stopped by the court on the ground -that in a case of this sort such evidence was scarcely regular; it was -intimated, however, that the court would hear representations of this -kind later. But some light was thrown incidentally in the course of -the trials on the circumstances of the prisoners. Thus one of the Pyt -House prisoners urged in his defence: ‘My Lord, I found work very bad -in my own parish for the last three years, and having a wife and three -children to support I was glad to get work wherever I could get it. I -had some work at a place four miles from my house.’ He then described -how on his way to work he was met by the mob and forced to join them. -‘It is a hard case with me, my Lord; I was glad to get work though I -could earn only seven shillings per week, and it cost me a shilling a -week for iron, so that I had only six shillings a week to support five -persons.’ Another prisoner, Mould of Hatch, was stated by Lord Arundel -to be very poor: he had a wife and six children, of whom one or two had -died of typhus since his committal. They had nothing to live on but -what they got at Lord Arundel’s house. The benevolent Lord Arundel, or -the parish, must have supported the survivors indefinitely, for Mould -was exiled for seven years. Barett again, another of these prisoners, -was supporting himself, a wife, and a child on 5s. a week. The usual -rate of wages in Wiltshire was 7s. a week. - -Evidence about the instigation of the labourers by those in good -circumstances was also ruled out, and much that would be interesting -in the history of the riots has thus perished. When six men were being -prosecuted for breaking a threshing machine on the farm of Mr. Judd at -Newton Toney, counsel for the defence started a cross-examination of -the prosecutor designed to show that certain landowners in the parish -had instigated the labourers to the outrages, but he was stopped by Mr. -Justice Alderson, who declared that such an inquiry was not material to -the issue, which was the guilt or innocence of the prisoners. If the -prisoners were found guilty these circumstances would be laid before -the court in mitigation of punishment. However strong the mitigating -circumstances in this case were, the punishment was certainly not -mitigated, for all six men were sentenced to the maximum penalty of -seven years’ transportation. In a similar case in Whiteparish it -came out in the evidence that Squire Bristowe had sent down buckets -of strong beer, and that Squire Wynne, who was staying with Squire -Bristowe, was present at the breaking of the machine. In the affair at -Ambrose Patience’s farm already mentioned, the defence of the prisoners -was that Farmer Parham had offered them half a hogshead of cider if -they would come and break his machine, whilst in another case three -men were acquitted because one of the witnesses for the prosecution, -a young brother of the farmer whose property had been destroyed, -unexpectedly disclosed the fact that his brother had said to the mob: -‘Act like men, go and break the machine, but don’t go up to the house.’ - -The proportion of charges of extorting money was smaller at Salisbury -than at Winchester: most of the indictments were for breaking machines -only. In some instances the prosecution dropped the charge of robbery, -thinking transportation for seven years a sufficient punishment for -the offence. Three brothers were sentenced to death for taking half a -crown: nobody received this sentence for a few coppers. In this case -the three brothers, William, Thomas, and John Legg, aged twenty-eight, -twenty-one, and eighteen, had gone at midnight to the kitchen door -of the house of Mrs. Montgomery, wife of a J.P., and asked the -manservant for money or beer. The man gave them half a crown, and they -thanked him civilly and went away. A curious light is thrown on the -relations between robbers and the robbed in the trial of six men for -machine-breaking at West Grimstead: the mob of fifty persons asked the -farmer for a sovereign, he promised to pay it next day, whereupon one -of the mob, a man named Light who was his tenant, offered to pay the -sovereign himself and to deduct it from the rent. - -At Salisbury, as at Winchester, the fate of the victims depended -largely on the character given to the prisoners by the local gentry. -This was especially the case towards the end when justice began to -tire, and a good many charges were dropped. Thus Charles Bourton was -only imprisoned for three months for breaking a threshing machine, -whilst John Perry was transported for seven years for the same offence. -But then John Perry had been convicted seven or eight times for -poaching. - -In Wiltshire, as in Hampshire, the judges were particularly severe -to those prisoners who were not agricultural labourers. A striking -instance is worth quoting, not only as illustrating this special -severity, but also because it shows that the judges when inflicting the -maximum penalty of seven years’ transportation for machine-breaking -were well aware that it was tantamount to exile for life. Thomas -Porter, aged eighteen, a shepherd, Henry Dicketts, aged nineteen, a -bricklayer’s labourer, Aaron Shepherd, aged forty (occupation not -stated), James Stevens, aged twenty-five, an agricultural labourer, and -George Burbage, aged twenty-four, also an agricultural labourer, were -found guilty of machine-breaking at Mr. Blake’s at Idmiston. Stevens -and Burbage escaped with two years’ and one year’s imprisonment with -hard labour, respectively, and the following homily from Mr. Justice -Alderson to think over in prison: ‘You are both thrashers and you might -in the perversion of your understanding think that these machines are -detrimental to you. Be assured that your labour cannot ultimately be -hurt by the employment of these machines. If they are profitable to -the farmer, they will also be profitable ultimately to the labourer, -though they may for a time injure him. If they are not profitable to -the farmer he will soon cease to employ them.’ The shepherd boy of -eighteen, the bricklayer’s labourer of nineteen, and their companion of -forty were reserved for a heavier penalty: ‘As to you, Aaron Shepherd, -I can give you no hope of remaining in this country. You Thomas Porter, -are a shepherd, and you Henry Dicketts, are a bricklayer’s labourer. -You have nothing to do with threshing machines. They do not interfere -with your labour, and you could not, even in the darkness of your -ignorance, suppose that their destruction would do you any good.... I -hope that your fate will be a warning to others. You will leave the -country, all of you: you will see your friends and relations no more: -for though you will be transported for seven years only, it is not -likely that at the expiration of that term you will find yourselves in -a situation to return. You will be in a distant land at the expiration -of your sentence. The land which you have disgraced will see you no -more: the friends with whom you are connected will be parted from you -for ever in this world.’ - -Mr. Justice Alderson’s methods received a good deal of attention in -one of the Salisbury trials, known as the Looker case. Isaac Looker, -a well-to-do farmer, was indicted for sending a threatening letter to -John Rowland: ‘Mr. Rowland, Haxford Farm, Hif you goes to sware against -or a man in prisson, you have here farm burnt down to ground, and thy -bluddy head chopt off.’ Some evidence was produced to show that Isaac -Looker had asserted in conversation that it was the magistrates and -the soldiers, and not the mobs, who were the real breakers of the -peace. But this did not amount to absolute proof that he had written -the letter: to establish this conclusion the prosecution relied on the -evidence of four witnesses; the first had quarrelled with Looker, and -had not seen his writing for four or five years; the second denied that -there had been any quarrel, but had not been in the habit of speaking -to the prisoner for five or six years, or seen his writing during that -time; the third had not had ‘much of a quarrel’ with him, but had not -seen his writing since 1824; the fourth was the special constable who -found in Looker’s bureau, which was unlocked and stood in the kitchen -where the family sat, a blank piece of paper that fitted on to the -piece on which the letter was written. More witnesses were called for -the defence than for the prosecution, and they included the vestry -clerk of Wimborne, an ex-schoolmaster; all of these witnesses had known -Looker’s writing recently, and all of them swore that the threatening -letter was not in his writing. Mr. Justice Alderson summed up against -the prisoner, the jury returned a verdict of guilty, and sentence of -transportation for life was passed upon Looker in spite of his vehement -protestations of innocence. ‘I cannot attend to these asseverations,’ -said Mr. Justice Alderson, ‘for we all know that a man who can be -guilty of such an offence as that of which you have been convicted, -will not hesitate to deny it as you now do. I would rather trust to -such evidence as has been given in your case, than to the most solemn -declarations even on the scaffold.’ - -The learned judge and the jury then retired for refreshment, when a -curious development took place. Edward, son of Isaac Looker, aged -eighteen years, came forward and declared that he had written the -letter in question and other letters as well. He wrote a copy from -memory, and the handwriting was precisely similar. He explained that -he had written the letters without his father’s knowledge and without -a thought of the consequences, in order to help two cousins who were -in gaol for machine-breaking. He had heard people say that ‘it would -get my cousins off if threatening letters were written.’ He had let his -father know in prison that he had written the letters, and had also -told his father’s solicitor. Edward Looker was subsequently tried and -sentenced to seven years’ transportation: Isaac’s case was submitted to -the Home Secretary for pardon. - -Although, as we have said, the Government, or its representatives, grew -rather more lenient towards the end of the proceedings at Salisbury, -it was evidently thought essential to produce some crime deserving -actual death. The culprit in this case was Peter Withers, a young man -of twenty-three, married and with five children. His character till -the time of the riots was exemplary. He was committed on a charge of -riot, and briefed a lawyer to defend him for this misdemeanour. Just -before the trial came on the charge was changed, apparently by the -Attorney-General, to the capital charge of assaulting Oliver Calley -Codrington with a hammer. His counsel was of course unprepared to -defend him on this charge, and, as he explained afterwards, ‘it was -only by the humane kindness of the Attorney-General who allowed him -to look at his brief that he was aware of all the facts to be alleged -against his client.’ Withers himself seemed equally unprepared; when -asked for his defence he said that he would leave it to his counsel, as -of course he had arranged to do when the charge was one of misdemeanour -only. - -The incident occurred in an affray at Rockley near Marlborough. Mr. -Baskerville, J.P., rode up with some special constables to a mob of -forty or fifty men, Withers amongst them, and bade them go home. They -refused, declaring that they did not care a damn for the magistrates. -Mr. Baskerville ordered Mr. Codrington, who was a special constable, to -arrest Withers. A general mêlée ensued, blows were given and received, -and Codrington was hit by a hammer thrown by Withers. Withers’ own -version of the affair was that Codrington attacked him without -provocation in a ferocious manner with a hunting whip, loaded with -iron at the end. Baskerville also struck him. He aimed his hammer at -Codrington and it missed. Codrington’s horse then crushed him against -the wall, and he threw his hammer a second time with better aim. There -was nothing in the evidence of the prosecution to discredit this -version, and both Baskerville and Codrington admitted that they might -have struck him. Codrington’s injuries were apparently more serious -than Bingham Baring’s; it was stated that he had been confined to bed -for two or three days, and to the house from Tuesday to Saturday, and -that he had a scar of one and a half inches on the right side of his -nose. No surgeon, however, appeared as a witness, and the hammer was -not produced in court. Withers was found guilty and reserved, together -with Lush, for execution. - -The special correspondent of the _Times_ who had been present at -Winchester made an interesting comparison between the Hampshire and -the Wiltshire labourers on trial (8th January 1831). The Wiltshire -labourers he described as more athletic in appearance and more hardy -in manner. ‘The prisoners here turn to the witnesses against them with -a bold and confident air: cross-examine them, and contradict their -answers, with a confidence and a want of common courtesy, in terms of -which comparatively few instances occurred in the neighbouring county.’ -In this behaviour the correspondent detected the signs of a very low -state of moral intelligence. - - * * * * * - -When the time came for the last scene in court there was no trace of -the bold demeanour which had impressed the _Times_ correspondent during -the conduct of the trials. For the people of Wiltshire, like the people -of Hampshire, were stunned by the crash and ruin of this catastrophic -vengeance. The two men sentenced to death were reprieved, but one -hundred and fifty-four men and boys were sentenced to transportation, -thirty-three of them for life, the rest for seven or fourteen years, -with no prospect of ever returning to their homes. And Alderson and -his brother judges in so punishing this wild fling of folly, or -hope, or despair, were not passing sentence only on the men and boys -before them: they were pronouncing a doom not less terrible on wives -and mothers and children and babes in arms in every village on the -Wiltshire Downs. One man begged to be allowed to take his child, -eight months old, into exile, for its mother had died in childbirth, -and it would be left without kith or kin. He was told by the judge -that he should have remembered this earlier. The sentence of final -separation on all these families and homes was received with a frenzy -of consternation and grief, and the judges themselves were affected -by the spectacle of these broken creatures in the dock and round the -court, abandoned to the unchecked paroxysms of despair.[479] ‘Such a -total prostration of the mental faculties by fear,’ wrote the _Times_ -correspondent, ‘and such a terrible exhibition of anguish and despair, -I never before witnessed in a Court of Justice.’ ‘Immediately on the -conclusion of this sentence a number of women, who were seated in court -behind the prisoners, set up a dreadful shriek of lamentation. Some of -them rushed forward to shake hands with the prisoners, and more than -one voice was heard to exclaim, “Farewell, I shall never see you more.”’ - -‘The whole proceedings of this day in court were of the most afflicting -and distressing nature. But the laceration of the feelings did not end -with the proceedings in court. The car for the removal of the prisoners -was at the back entrance to the court-house and was surrounded by -a crowd of mothers, wives, sisters and children, anxiously waiting -for a glance of their condemned relatives. The weeping and wailing -of the different parties, as they pressed the hands of the convicts -as they stepped into the car, was truly heartrending. We never saw -so distressing a spectacle before, and trust that the restored -tranquillity of the country will prevent us from ever seeing anything -like it again.’ - -The historian may regret that these men do not pass out before him in -a cold and splendid defiance. Their blind blow had been struck and it -had been answered; they had dreamt that their lot might be made less -intolerable, and the governing class had crushed that daring fancy for -ever with banishment and the breaking of their homes; it only remained -for them to accept their fate with a look of stone upon their faces -and a curse of fire in their hearts. So had Muir and Palmer and many -a political prisoner, victims of the tyrannies of Pitt and Dundas, -of Castlereagh and Sidmouth, gone to their barbarous doom. So had -the Lantenacs and the Gauvains alike gone to the guillotine. History -likes to match such calm and unshaken bearing against the distempered -justice of power. Here she is cheated of her spectacle. Outwardly it -might seem a worse fate for men of education to be flung to the hulks -with the coarsest of felons: for men whose lives had been comfortable -to be thrust into the dirt and disorder of prisons. But political -prisoners are martyrs, and martyrs are not the stuff for pity. However -bitter their sufferings, they do not suffer alone: they are sustained -by a Herculean comradeship of hopes and of ideas. The darkest cage is -lighted by a ray from Paradise to men or women who believe that the -night of their sufferings will bring a dawn less cold and sombre to -mankind than the cold and sombre dawn of yesterday. But what ideas -befriended the ploughboy or the shepherd torn from his rude home? What -vision had he of a nobler future for humanity? To what dawn did he -leave his wife or his mother, his child, his home, his friends, or his -trampled race? What robe of dream and hope and fancy was thrown over -his exile or their hunger, his poignant hour of separation, or their -ceaseless ache of poverty and cold - - ‘to comfort the human want - From the bosom of magical skies’? - - * * * * * - -The three judges who had restored respect for law and order in -Wiltshire and Hampshire next proceeded to Dorchester, where a Special -Commission to try the Dorsetshire rioters was opened on 11th January. -The rising had been less serious in Dorset than in the two other -counties, and there were only some fifty prisoners awaiting trial on -charges of machine-breaking, extorting money and riot. The Government -took no part in the prosecutions; for, as it was explained in a letter -to Denman, ‘the state of things is quite altered; great effect has -been produced: the law has been clearly explained, and prosecutions -go on without the least difficulty.’[480] Baron Vaughan and Mr. -Justice Parke had given the charges at Winchester and Salisbury: it -was now the turn of Mr. Justice Alderson, and in his opening survey -of the social conditions of the time he covered a wide field. To the -usual dissertation on the economics of machinery he added a special -homily on the duties incumbent on the gentry, who were bidden to -discourage and discountenance, and if necessary to prosecute, the -dangerous publications that were doing such harm in rural districts. -But their duties did not end here, and they were urged to go home and -to educate their poorer neighbours and to improve their conditions. -The improvement to be aimed at, however, was not material but moral. -‘Poverty,’ said Mr. Justice Alderson, ‘is indeed, I fear, inseparable -from the state of the human race, but poverty itself and the misery -attendant on it, would no doubt be greatly mitigated if a spirit of -prudence were more generally diffused among the people, and if they -understood more fully and practised better their civil, moral and -religious duties.’ - -The Dorsetshire labourers had unfortunately arrived at the precipitate -conclusion that a spirit of prudence would not transform 7s. a week -into a reasonable livelihood. They used no violence beyond breaking up -the threshing machines. ‘We don’t intend to hurt the farmer,’ they told -the owner of one machine, ‘but we are determined that the land shall -come down, and the tithes, and we will have more wages.’ When money -was taken it seems to have been demanded and received in an amicable -spirit. The sums asked for were often very small. Sentence of death was -pronounced on two men, Joseph Sheppard and George Legg, for taking 2s. -from Farmer Christopher Morey at Buckland Newton. The mob asked for -money, and the farmer offered them 1s.: they replied that they wanted -1s. 6d., and the farmer gave them 2s. Sheppard’s character was very -good, and it came out that he and the prosecutor had had a dispute -about money some years before. He was transported, but not for life. -Legg was declared by the prosecutor to have been ‘saucy and impudent,’ -and to have ‘talked rough and bobbish.’ His character, however, was -stated by many witnesses, including the clergyman, to be exemplary. -He had five children whom he supported without parish help on 7s. a -week: a cottage was given him but no fuel. Baron Vaughan was so much -impressed by this evidence that he declared that he had never heard -better testimony to character, and that he would recommend a less -severe penalty than transportation. But Legg showed a lamentable want -of discretion, for he interrupted the judge with these words: ‘I would -rather that your Lordship would put twenty-one years’ transportation -upon me than be placed in the condition of the prosecutor. I never said -a word to him, that I declare.’ Baron Vaughan sardonically remarked -that he had not benefited himself by this observation. - -The tendency to give less severe punishment, noticed in the closing -trials at Salisbury, was more marked at Dorchester. Nine men were -let off on recognisances and ten were not proceeded against: in the -case of six of these ten the prosecutor, one Robert Bullen, who had -been robbed of 4s. and 2s. 6d., refused to come forward. But enough -sharp sentences were given to keep the labourers in submission for the -future. One man was transported for life and eleven for seven years: -fifteen were sentenced to various terms of imprisonment; seven were -acquitted. It was not surprising that the special correspondent of the -_Times_ complained that such meagre results scarcely justified the -pomp and expense of a Special Commission. In the neighbouring county -of Gloucester, where the country gentlemen carried out the work of -retribution without help from headquarters, seven men were transported -for fourteen years, twenty for seven years, and twenty-five were -sentenced to terms of imprisonment ranging from six months to three -years. All of these sentences were for breaking threshing machines. - -The disturbances in Berks and Bucks had been considered serious enough -to demand a Special Commission, and Sir James Alan Park, Sir William -Bolland and Sir John Patteson were the judges appointed. The first of -the two Berkshire Commissions opened at Reading on 27th December. The -Earl of Abingdon, Lord-Lieutenant of the County, and Mr. Charles Dundas -were the two local commissioners. Mr. Dundas has figured already in -these pages as chairman of the meeting at Speenhamland. One hundred and -thirty-eight prisoners were awaiting trial at Reading: they were most -of them young, only eighteen being forty or over. The rest, with few -exceptions, varied from seventeen to thirty-five in age, and must have -lived all their lives under the Speenhamland system. - -It is impossible to compare the accounts of the Special Commissions in -Berks and Bucks with those in Hampshire and Wiltshire without noticing -a difference in the treatment of the rioters. The risings had been -almost simultaneous, the offences were of the same character, and the -Commissions sat at the same time. The difference was apparent from -the first, and on 1st January the _Times_ published a leading article -pleading for uniformity, and pointing out that the Berkshire Commission -was ‘a merciful contrast’ to that at Winchester. The cause is probably -to be found in the dispositions and characters of the authorities -responsible in the two cases. The country gentlemen of Berkshire, -represented by a man like Mr. Dundas, were more humane than the country -gentlemen of Hampshire, represented by men like the Duke of Wellington -and the Barings; Mr. Gurney, the public prosecutor at Reading, was more -lenient than Sir Thomas Denman, and the Reading judges were more kindly -and considerate than the judges at Winchester. Further, there had been -in Berkshire little of the wild panic that swept over the country -houses in Hampshire and Wiltshire. The judges at Reading occasionally -interjected questions on the prisoners’ behalf, and in many cases they -did not conceal their satisfaction at an acquittal. Further, they had -a more delicate sense for the proprieties. Contrary to custom, they -asked neither the Grand Jury nor the magistrates to dinner on the first -day, being anxious, we are told, to free the administration of justice -‘from the slightest appearance of partiality in the eyes of the lower -classes.’ The Lord Chancellor and Lord Melbourne had been consulted and -had approved. - -It must not be supposed that Mr. Justice Park’s theories of life and -social relationships differed from those of his brothers at Winchester. -In his address to the Grand Jury he repudiated with indignation -the ‘impudent and base slander ... that the upper ranks of society -care little for the wants and privations of the poor. I deny this -positively, upon a very extensive means of knowledge upon subjects of -this nature. But every man can deny it who looks about him and sees -the vast institutions in every part of the kingdom for the relief of -the young and the old, the deaf and the lame, the blind, the widow, -the orphan----and every child of wretchedness and woe. There is not a -calamity or distress incident to humanity, either of body or of mind, -that is not humbly endeavoured to be mitigated or relieved, by the -powerful and the affluent, either of high or middling rank, in this -our happy land, which for its benevolence, charity, and boundless -humanity, has been the admiration of the world.’ The theory that the -rich kept the poor in a state of starvation and that this was the cause -of the disturbances, he declared later to be entirely disproved by the -conduct of one of the mobs in destroying a threshing machine belonging -to William Mount, Esq., at Wasing, ‘Mr. Mount having given away £100 -no longer ago than last winter to assist the lower orders during that -inclement season.’ - -A feature of the Reading Commission was the difficulty of finding -jurymen. All farmers were challenged on behalf of the prisoners, and -matters were at a deadlock until the judges ordered the bystanders to -be impannelled. - -The earlier cases were connected with the riots in Hungerford. Property -in an iron foundry had been destroyed, and fifteen men were found -guilty on this capital charge. One of the fifteen was William Oakley, -who now paid the penalty for his £5 and strong language. But when the -first cases were over, Mr. Gurney began to drop the capital charge, and -to content himself, as a rule, with convictions for breaking threshing -machines. One case revealed serious perjury on one side or the other. -Thomas Goodfellow and Cornelius Bennett were charged with breaking a -threshing machine at Matthew Batten’s farm. The prisoners produced four -witnesses, two labourers, a woman whose husband was in prison for the -riots, and John Gaiter, who described himself as ‘not quite a master -bricklayer,’ to prove that Matthew Batten had encouraged the riots. The -first three witnesses declared that Batten had asked the rioters to -come and break his machine in order to serve out his landlord and Mr. -Ward, and had promised them victuals and £1. Batten and his son, on the -other hand, swore that these statements were false. The prisoners were -found guilty, with a recommendation to mercy which was disregarded. -Goodfellow, who was found guilty of breaking other machines as well, -was sentenced to fourteen, and Cornelius Bennett to seven years’ -transportation. The judge spoke of their scandalous attempt to blacken -the character of a respectable farmer: ‘it pleased God however that the -atrocious attempt had failed.’ It would be interesting to know what -were the relations between Matthew Batten and his landlord. - -On the last day of the trials Mr. Gurney announced that there would be -no more prosecutions for felony, as enough had been done in the way of -making examples. Some interesting cases of riot were tried. The most -important riot had taken place as early as 19th November, and the hero -of the proceedings was the Rev. Edward Cove, the venerable Vicar of -Brimpton, one of the many parson magistrates. A mob had assembled in -order to demand an increase of wages, and it was met by Mr. Cove and -his posse of special constables. On occasions like this, Mr. Gurney -remarked, we become sensible of the great advantages of our social -order. Mr. Cove without more ado read the Riot Act; the mob refused -to disperse; his special constables thereupon attacked them, and a -general mêlée followed in which hard blows were given and taken. No -one attempted to strike Mr. Cove himself, but one of his companions -received from a rioter, whom he identified, a blow rivalling that given -to Mr. Bingham Baring, which beat the crown of his hat in and drove the -rim over his eyes: it was followed by other and more serious blows on -his head and body. The counsel for the defence tried to show that it -was distress that had caused the rioters to assemble, and he quoted a -remark of the Chairman of Quarter Sessions that the poor were starved -almost into insurrection; but all evidence about wages was ruled out. -The court were deeply impressed by this riot, and Mr. Justice Park -announced that it had alarmed him and his fellow judges more ‘than -anything that had hitherto transpired in these proceedings.’ ‘Had one -life been lost,’ he continued, ‘the lives of every individual of the -mob would have been forfeited, and the law must have been carried into -effect against those convicted.’ As it was, nobody was condemned to -death for his share in the affray, though the more violent, such as -George Williams, alias ‘Staffordshire Jack,’ a ‘desperate character,’ -received heavier penalties for machine-breaking in consequence. - -Three men were reserved for execution: William Oakley, who was told -that as a carpenter he had no business to mix himself up in these -transactions; Alfred Darling, a blacksmith by trade, who had been found -guilty on several charges of demanding money; and Winterbourne, who had -taken part in the Hungerford affair in the magistrates’ room, and had -also acted as leader in some cases when a mob asked for money. In one -instance the mob had been content with £1 instead of the £2 for which -it had asked for breaking a threshing machine, Winterbourne remarking, -‘we will take half price because he has stood like a man.’ - -Public opinion in Berkshire was horrified at the prospect of taking -life. Petitions for mercy poured in from Reading, including one from -ladies to the queen, from Newbury, from Hungerford, from Henley, and -from other places. Two country gentlemen, Mr. J. B. Monck and Mr. -Wheble, made every exertion to save the condemned men. They waited with -petitions on Lord Melbourne, who heard them patiently for an hour. They -obtained a reprieve for Oakley and for Darling, who were transported -for life; Winterbourne they could not save: he was hung on 11th -January, praying to the last that his wife, who was dangerously ill of -typhus, might die before she knew of his fate. - -Fifty-six men were sentenced to transportation from -Reading--twenty-three for life, sixteen for fourteen years, seventeen -for seven years: thirty-six were sent to prison for various terms. - -The same commissioners went on to Abingdon where proceedings opened on -6th January. Here there were only forty-seven prisoners, all but two of -whom were agricultural labourers, most of them very young. The cases -resembled those tried at Reading, but it is clear that the evidence -of Mrs. Charlotte Slade, whose conduct we have already described, and -her method of dealing with the rioters, made a great impression on Mr. -Justice Park and his colleagues, and opened their eyes to the true -perspective of the rhetorical language that had assumed such terrifying -importance to other judges. One young labourer, Richard Kempster by -name, who was found guilty of breaking a threshing machine, had carried -a black-and-red flag in the mob, and when arrested had exclaimed, ‘be -damned if I don’t wish it was a revolution, and that all was a fire -together’: it is easy to imagine the grave homily on the necessity of -cutting such a man off for ever from his kind that these words would -have provoked from the judges at Winchester. Mr. Justice Park and -his colleagues sentenced Kempster to twelve months’ imprisonment. At -Abingdon only one man was sentenced to be transported; Thomas Mackrell, -an agricultural labourer of forty-three. Another, Henry Woolridge, -had sentence of death commuted to eighteen months’ imprisonment. -Thirty-five others were sent to prison for various terms. - -The same three judges proceeded to Aylesbury to try the Buckinghamshire -rioters. The chief event in this county had been the destruction of -paper-making machinery at Wycombe. The Commission opened on 11th -January: the Duke of Buckingham and Mr. Maurice Swabey were the local -commissioners. There were one hundred and thirty-six prisoners to -be tried, almost all young and illiterate: only eighteen were forty -years of age or over. Forty-four men and boys were found guilty of -the capital charge of destroying paper machinery. Most of the other -prisoners who were charged with breaking threshing machines were -allowed to plead guilty and let off on their own recognisances, or -else the charge was not pressed. An exception was made in a case in -which some members of a mob had been armed with guns. Three men who had -carried guns were sent to transportation for seven years, and thirteen -others involved were sent to prison for two years or eighteen months. -Several men were tried for rioting, and those who had combined a demand -for increased wages with a request for the restoration of parish -buns were sent to prison for six weeks.[481] One more trial is worth -notice, because it suggests that even in Buckinghamshire, where the -general temper was more lenient, individuals who had made themselves -obnoxious were singled out for special treatment. John Crook, a miller, -was indicted with four others for riotously assembling and breaking a -winnowing machine at Mr. Fryer’s at Long Crendon. As Crook was charged -with a misdemeanour his counsel could address the jury, and we learn -from his speech that Crook had been kept in prison since 2nd December, -though £2000 had been offered in bail and many other prisoners had -been allowed out. The explanation, it was argued, was to be found in -the fact that Crook had come into some property which qualified him to -hold a gun licence and to kill game. He was sentenced to three months’ -imprisonment without hard labour, and to pay a fine of £10. - -Thirty-two men in all were sent to prison for the agricultural -disturbances in addition to the three sentenced to transportation. -Forty-two of those concerned in the breaking of paper-making machinery -received sentence of death, but their punishment was commuted to life -transportation for one, seven years’ transportation for twenty-two, and -imprisonment for various terms for the rest. Two men were reserved for -execution. One, Thomas Blizzard, was thirty years old, with a wife and -three children. His character was excellent. At the time of the riots -he was a roundsman, receiving 1s. a day from the overseer’s and 1s. -6d. a week from a farmer. He told his employer at Little Marlow that -he would take a holiday to go machine-breaking, for he would endure -imprisonment, or even transportation, rather than see his wife and -children cry for bread. John Sarney, the other, was fifty-six years -old and had a wife and six children: he kept a small beer-shop and his -character was irreproachable. Petitions on behalf of the two men were -signed extensively, and the sentence was commuted to transportation for -life. The Aylesbury sentences seem lenient in comparison with those -given at Salisbury and Winchester, but they did not seem lenient to -the people in the district. ‘Pen cannot describe,’ wrote a _Times_ -correspondent, ‘the heart-rending scene of despair, misery and want, -prevailing at Flackwell-Heath, the residence of the families of the -major part of the misguided men now incarcerated at Aylesbury.’ The -same correspondent tells of a benevolent Quaker, who had become rich as -a maker of paper, helping these families by stealth. - - * * * * * - -The work of the Special Commissions was now over. Melbourne had -explained in Parliament that they had been set up ‘to expound the law’ -and to bring home to the ignorant the gravity of their crimes against -social order. In spite of the daily imposition of ferocious punishments -on poachers and thieves, the poor apparently did not know in what -letters of blood the code against rioting and discontent was composed. -These three weeks had brought a lurid enlightenment into their dark -homes. In the riots, as we have seen, the only man who had been -killed was a rioter, killed according to the reports of the time by a -yeomanry soldier, according to local tradition by a farmer, and for -that offence he had been refused Christian burial. On the other side, -not a single person had been killed or seriously wounded. For these -riots, apart from the cases of arson, for which six men or boys were -hung, aristocratic justice exacted three lives, and the transportation -of four hundred and fifty-seven men and boys,[482] in addition to -the imprisonment of about four hundred at home. The shadow of this -vengeance still darkens the minds of old men and women in the villages -of Wiltshire, and eighty years have been too short a time to blot out -its train of desolating memories.[483] Nobody who does not realise what -Mr. Hudson has described with his intimate touch, the effect on the -imagination and the character of ‘a life of simple unchanging action -and of habits that are like instincts, of hard labour in sun and rain -and wind from day to day,’ can ever understand what the breaking of all -the ties of life and home and memory meant to the exiles and to those -from whose companionship they were then torn for ever. - - * * * * * - -We have said that one feature of the rising was the firing of stacks -and ricks and barns. This practice was widespread, and fires broke -out even in counties where the organised rising made little progress. -Associations for the detection of incendiaries were formed at an -early stage, and immense rewards were offered. Yet not a single case -of arson was tried before the Special Commissions, and the labourers -kept their secret well. Many of the governing class in the early days -persuaded themselves that the labourers had no secret to keep, and -that the fires were due to any one except the labourers, and to any -cause except distress. Perhaps the wish was father to the thought, -for as the _Times_ observed, persons responsible for grinding the -faces of their labourers preferred to think the outrages the work of -strangers. Sometimes it was smugglers, suffering from the depression in -their trade: sometimes it was foreigners: sometimes it was mysterious -gentlemen in gigs, driving furiously about the country, led by Captain -Swing, scattering fireballs and devastation. These were the fashionable -theories in the House of Lords, although Richmond reminded his brother -peers that there had been a flood of petitions representing the -sufferings of the labourers from the very beginning of the year, and -that the House of Lords had not thought it necessary to give them the -slightest attention. Lord Camden ascribed the outrages to the French -spirit, and argued that the country was enjoying ‘what was undeniably -a genial autumn.’ The Duke of Wellington took the same view, denying -that the troubles were due to distress: the most influential cause of -disturbances was the example, ‘and I will unhesitatingly say the bad -and the mischievous example, afforded by the neighbouring States.’ -Eldon remarked that many of the prisoners taken in the riots were -foreigners, a point on which Melbourne undeceived him. The speakers who -regarded the disturbances in the south of England as the overflow of -the Paris Revolution had no positive evidence to produce, but they had -a piece of negative evidence which they thought conclusive. For if the -labourers knew who were the incendiaries, they would surely have given -information. In some cases a reward of £1000 with a free pardon for -all except the actual author was waiting to be claimed, ‘and yet not -one of the miserable beings have availed themselves of the prospect of -becoming rich.’ - -Some eleven cases of arson were tried at the Assizes in Essex, Kent, -Sussex, and Surrey: all the prisoners were agricultural labourers and -most of them were boys. Eight were convicted, often on very defective -evidence, and six were executed. One of the eight, Thomas Goodman, a -boy of eighteen, saved his life by declaring in prison that the idea -had been put into his head by a lecture of Cobbett’s. Two brothers of -the name of Pakeman, nineteen and twenty years old, were convicted on -the evidence of Bishop, another lad of eighteen, who had prompted -them to set fire to a barn, and later turned king’s evidence ‘after -a gentleman in the gaol had told him of the big reward.’ This fire -seems to have been a piece of bravado, as no doubt many others were, -for Bishop remarked, as the three were sitting under a hedge after -lighting the barn, ‘who says we can’t have a fire too, as well as -them at Blean?’ The two boys, who had never been taught to read or -write, scandalised the public by displaying a painful indifference -to the ministrations of the chaplain, and dying without receiving -the sacrament.[484] A half-witted boy of fourteen, Richard Pennells, -was tried at Lewes for setting fire to his master’s haystack for a -promise of sixpence from a man who was not discovered. His master, who -prosecuted, remarked that he was ‘dull of apprehension, but not so much -as not to know right from wrong.’ The boy, who had no counsel, offered -no defence, and stood sobbing in the dock. The jury found him guilty, -with a recommendation to mercy on account of his youth and imperfect -understanding. Sentence of death was recorded, but he was told that his -life would be spared. - -These same Lewes Assizes, conducted by Mr. Justice Taunton, afforded -a striking example of the comparative treatment of different crimes. -Thomas Brown, a lad of seventeen, was charged with writing the -following letter to Lord Sheffield, ‘Please, my Lord, I dont wise to -hurt you. This is the case al the world over. If you dont get rid of -your foreign steward and farmer and bailiff in a few days time--less -than a month--we will burn him up, and you along with him. My writing -is bad, but my firing is good my Lord.’ Lord Sheffield gave evidence -as to the receipt of the letter: the prisoner, who had no counsel, was -asked by the judge if he would like to put any questions, and he only -replied that he hoped that his lordship would forgive him. The judge -answered that his lordship had not the power, and sentenced Brown to -transportation for life.[485] Later on in the same Assizes, Captain -Winter, a man of sixty, captain of a coasting vessel, was tried for -the murder of his wife, who had been killed in a most brutal manner. -He had been hacking and wounding her for four hours at night, and she -was last seen alive at half past two in the morning, naked and begging -for mercy. Her body was covered with wounds. The man’s defence was -that he came home drunk, that he found his wife drunk, and that he had -no knowledge of what followed. To the general surprise Captain Winter -escaped with a verdict of manslaughter. ‘The prisoner,’ wrote the -_Times_ correspondent, ‘is indebted for his life to the very merciful -way in which Mr. Justice Taunton appeared to view the case, and the -hint which he threw out to the jury, that the parties might have had -a quarrel, in which case her death by the prisoner would amount to -manslaughter only.’ - - * * * * * - -When the disturbances began, the Duke of Wellington was Prime Minister, -and Sir Robert Peel Home Secretary. But in November 1830 Wellington, -who had made a last effort to rally the old Tories, sulking over his -surrender on Catholic Emancipation, by some sudden thunder against -Reform, had been beaten on the Civil List and resigned. Reform was -inevitable, and with Reform the Whigs. Thus, towards the close of the -year of the Revolution that drove Charles X. from France, Lord Grey -became Prime Minister, to carry the measure which as Charles Grey, -lieutenant of Charles Fox, he had proposed in the House of Commons in -1793, a few months after Louis XVI. had lost his head in the Revolution -which had maddened and terrified the English aristocracy. Fortune -had been sparing in her favours to this cold, proud, honourable and -courageous man. She had shut him out from power for twenty-three years, -waiting to make him Prime Minister until he was verging on seventy, and -all the dash and ardour of youth had been chilled by disappointment -and delay. But she had reserved her extreme of malice to the end, for -it was her chief unkindness that having waited so long she did not -wait a little longer. Grey, who had been forty-four years in public -life, and forty-three in opposition, took office at the moment that -the rising passed into Hampshire and Wiltshire, and thus his first act -as Prime Minister was to summon his colleagues to a Cabinet meeting to -discuss, not their plans for Parliamentary Reform, but the measures to -be taken in this alarming emergency. After a lifetime of noble protest -against war, intolerance, and repression, he found himself in the toils -and snares of the consequences of a policy in which war, intolerance, -and repression had been constant and conspicuous features. And those -consequences were especially to be dreaded by such a man at such a -time. - -Grey became Prime Minister to carry Reform, and Reform was still -enveloped to many minds in the wild fancies and terrors of a Jacobin -past. To those who knew, conscious as they were of their own modest -purposes and limited aim, that their accession to power boded to many -violence, confusion, and the breaking up of the old ways and life of -the State, it was maddening that these undiscerning peasants should -choose this moment of all others for noise and riot. The struggle for -Reform was certain to lead to strife, and it was hard that before -they entered upon it England should already be in tumult from other -causes. Moreover, Grey had to reckon with William IV. So long as he -could remember, the Court had been the refuge of all that was base -in English politics, and it was a question whether Liberal ideas had -suffered more from the narrow and darkened mind of George III. or the -mean and incorrigible perfidy of George IV. In comparison with his -father, the new king had the wisdom of a Bentham or an Adam Smith; in -comparison with his brother, he had the generous and loyal heart of a -Philip Sidney or a Falkland. But seen in any less flattering mirror, he -was a very ordinary mortal, and Grey had known this jolly, drinking, -sailor prince too long and too well to trust either his intellect or -his character, under too fierce or too continuous a strain. These -riots tried him severely. No sooner was William on his throne than -the labourers came out of their dens, looking like those sansculottes -whose shadows were never far from the imagination of the English upper -classes. The king’s support of Reform was no violent enthusiasm, and -the slightest threat of disorder might disturb the uneasy equilibrium -of his likes and fears. In the long run it depended on the will of this -genial mediocrity--so strangely had Providence mixed caprice and design -in this world of politics--whether or not Reform should be carried, -and carried without bloodshed. Throughout these months then, the king, -always at Melbourne’s elbow, trying to tempt and push the Government -into more drastic measures, was a very formidable enemy to the cause of -moderation and of justice. - -These influences were strong, and there was little to counteract them. -For there was nobody in the world which Grey and Melbourne alike -inhabited who could enter into the minds of the labourers. This is -readily seen, if we glance at two men who were regarded as extreme -Radicals in the House of Commons, Hobhouse and Burdett. Each of these -men had served the cause of Reform in prison as well as in Parliament, -and each with rather ridiculous associations; Hobhouse’s imprisonment -being connected with the ballad inspired by the malicious and disloyal -wit of his friend and hero, Byron, and Burdett’s with the ludicrous -scene of his arrest, with his boy spelling out Magna Charta on his -knee. It is difficult for those who have read Hobhouse’s _Diaries_ -to divine what play of reason and feeling ever made him a Radical, -but a Radical he was, an indefatigable critic of the old régime, and -in particular of such abuses as flogging in the army. Burdett was a -leader in the same causes. To these men, if to any, the conduct of -the labourers might have seemed to call for sympathy rather than for -violence. But if we turn to Hobhouse’s _Diary_ we see that he was -never betrayed into a solitary expression of pity or concern for the -scenes we have described, and as for Burdett, he was all for dragooning -the discontented counties and placing them under martial law. And -even Radnor, who as a friend of Cobbett was much less academic in his -Radicalism, sat on the Wiltshire Commission without making any protest -that has reached posterity. - -All the circumstances then made it easy for Grey and his colleagues -to slip into a policy of violence and repression. They breathed an -atmosphere of panic, and they dreaded the recoil of that panic on their -own schemes. Yet when all allowance is made for this insidious climate, -when we remember that no man is so dangerous as the kind man haunted -by the fear of seeming weak, at a moment when he thinks his power of -doing good depends on his character for strength; when we remember, -too, the tone of Society caught between scare and excitement, the -bad inspiration of the Court, the malevolent influence of an alarmed -Opposition, the absorbing interest of making a ministry, the game apart -from the business of politics, it is still difficult to understand how -men like Grey and Holland and Durham could ever have lent themselves to -the cruelties of this savage retribution. When first there were rumours -of the intention of the Government to put down the riots with severe -measures, Cobbett wrote a passage in which he reviewed the characters -of the chief ministers, Grey with his ‘humane disposition,’ Holland -‘who never gave his consent to an act of cruelty,’ Althorp ‘who has -never dipped his hand in blood,’ Brougham ‘who with all his half Scotch -crotchets has at any rate no blood about him,’ to show that the new -ministers, unlike many of their Tory predecessors, might be trusted to -be lenient and merciful. Two of these men, Grey and Holland, had made a -noble stand against all the persecutions of which Tory Governments had -been guilty, defending with passion men whose opinions they regarded -with horror; if any record could justify confidence it was theirs. -Unfortunately the politician who was made Home Secretary did not share -in this past. The common talk at the time of Melbourne’s appointment -was that he was too lazy for his office; the real criticism should have -been that he had taken the side of Castlereagh and Sidmouth in 1817. -As Home Secretary he stopped short of the infamous measures he had -then approved; he refused to employ spies, and the Habeas Corpus was -not suspended. But nobody can follow the history of this rising, and -the history of the class that made it, without recognising that the -punishment which exiled these four hundred and fifty labourers is a -stain, and an indelible stain, on the reputation of the Government that -lives in history on the fame of the Reform Bill. It is difficult to -believe that either Fox or Sheridan could have been parties to it. The -chief shame attaches to Melbourne, who let the judges do their worst, -and to Lansdowne, who sat beside the judges on the Salisbury bench, but -the fact that the Prime Minister was immersed in the preparation of a -reform, believed by his contemporaries to be a revolution, does not -relieve him of his share of the odium, which is the due of Governments -that are cruel to the weak, and careless of justice to the poor. - -One effort was made, apart from the intercession of public opinion, -to induce the Government to relax its rigours. When the panic had -abated and the last echo of the riots had been stilled by this summary -retribution, a motion was proposed in the House of Commons for a -general amnesty. Unhappily the cause of the labourers was in the hands -of Henry Hunt, a man whose wisdom was not equal to his courage, and -whose egregious vanity demoralised and spoilt his natural eloquence. -If those who were in close sympathy with his general aims could not -tolerate his manners, it is not surprising that his advocacy was a -doubtful recommendation in the unsympathetic atmosphere of the House -of Commons. He was a man of passionate sincerity, and had already -been twice in prison for his opinions, but the ruling class thinking -itself on the brink of a social catastrophe, while very conscious of -Hunt’s defects, was in no mood to take a detached view of this virtue. -The debate, which took place on the 8th of February 1831, reflects -little credit on the House of Commons, and the division still less, -for Hume was Hunt’s only supporter. The chief speakers against the -motion were Benett of Wiltshire, George Lamb, brother of Melbourne and -Under-Secretary at the Home Office, and Denman, the Attorney-General. -Lamb amused himself and the House with jests on the illiterate letter -for writing which the boy Looker was then on the high seas, and Denman -threw out a suggestion that Looker’s father had had a share in the -boy’s guilt. Denman closed his speech by pouring scorn on those who -talked sentimentality, and declaring that he would ever look back with -pride on his part in the scenes of this memorable winter. - -So far the Government had had it all their own way. But in their -anxiety to show a resolute front and to reassure those who had -suspected that a reform Government would encourage social disorder by -weakness, Lord Grey and his colleagues were drawn into a scrape in -which they burnt their fingers rather badly. They decided to prosecute -two writers for inciting the labourers to rebel. The two writers were -Richard Carlile and William Cobbett. Carlile was the natural prey for -a Government in search of a victim. He had already spent six or seven -years of his lion-hearted life in prison for publishing the writings -of Paine and Hone: his wife, his sister, and his shopman had all paid -a similar penalty for their association, voluntary or involuntary, -with his public-spirited adventures. The document for which he stood -in the dock at the Old Bailey early in January 1831 was an address to -the agricultural labourers, praising them for what they had done, and -reviewing their misfortunes in this sentence: ‘The more tame you have -grown, the more you have been oppressed and despised, the more you have -been trampled on.’ Carlile defended himself in a speech that lasted -four hours and a half. The jury disagreed, but after several hours they -united on a verdict of acquittal on the charge of bringing the Crown -into contempt, and of guilty on the charge of addressing inflammatory -language to the labouring classes. He was sentenced to imprisonment for -two years, to pay a fine, and to find sureties. - -Cobbett’s trial was a more important event, for whereas Carlile was the -Don Quixote of liberty of mind, Cobbett was a great political force, -and his acquittal would give a very serious shock to the prestige of -the Government that attacked him. The attention of the authorities -had been called to Cobbett’s speeches very early in the history of the -riots, and the Home Office Papers show that appeals to the Government -to prosecute Cobbett were the most common of all the recommendations -and requests that poured into Whitehall from the country. Some of these -letters were addressed to Sir Robert Peel, and one of them is endorsed -with the draft of a reply: ‘My dear Sir,--If you can give me the name -of the person who heard Cobbett make use of the expression to which you -refer you would probably enable me to render no small public service by -the prosecution of Cobbett for sedition.--Very faithfully Yours, Robert -Peel.’ - -In an evil moment for themselves, Peel’s successors decided to take -action, not indeed on his speeches, but on his articles in the -_Political Register_. The character of those articles might perhaps be -described as militant and uncompromising truth. They were inflammatory, -because the truth was inflammatory. Nobody who knew the condition -of the labourers could have found in them a single misstatement or -exaggeration. The only question was whether it was in the public -interest to publish them in a time of disturbance. From this point of -view the position of the Government was seriously weakened by the fact -that the _Times_ had used language on this very subject which was not -one whit less calculated to excite indignation against the rich, and -the _Times_, though it was the organ of wealthy men, was in point of -fact considerably cheaper to buy than the _Register_, the price of -which Cobbett had raised to a shilling in the autumn of 1830. But this -was not the only reason why the Government was in danger of exposing -itself to a charge of malice in choosing Cobbett for a prosecution. -The unrest in the southern counties had been due to a special set of -economic causes, but there was unrest due to other causes in other -parts of England. It was not the misery of ploughboys and labourers -in Hampshire and Kent that had made Wellington and Peel decide that -it was unsafe for the King to dine at the Guildhall in the winter of -1830: the Political Unions, which struck such terror into the Court and -the politicians, were not bred in the villages. There was a general -and acute discontent with extravagant government, with swollen lists -and the burden of sinecures, with the whole system of the control of -the boroughs and its mockery of representation. Now in such a state -of opinion every paper on the side of reform might be charged with -spreading unrest. Statistics of sinecures, and pensions, and the fat -revenues of bishopricks, were scattered all over England, and the -facts published in every such sheet were like sparks thrown about near -a powder magazine. The private citizens who wrote to the Home Office -in the winter of 1830 mentioned these papers almost as often as they -mentioned Cobbett’s lectures. Many of these papers were based on a -pamphlet written by Sir James Graham, First Lord of the Admiralty -in the very Government that prosecuted Cobbett. One of the Barings -complained in the House of Commons in December 1830, that the official -papers on offices and sinecures which the Reform Government had itself -presented to Parliament to satisfy public opinion of its sincerity in -the cause of retrenchment were the cause of mischief and danger. At -such a time no writer, who wished to help the cause of reform, could -measure the effects of every sentence so nicely as to escape the charge -of exciting passion, and the Government was guilty of an extraordinary -piece of folly in attacking Cobbett for conduct of which their own -chief supporters were guilty every time they put a pen to paper. - -The trial took place in July 1831 at the Guildhall. It was the great -triumph of Cobbett’s life, as his earlier trial had been his great -humiliation. There was very little of the lion in the Cobbett who -faltered before Vicary Gibbs in 1810; there was very little of the lamb -in the Cobbett who towered before Denman in 1831. And the court that -witnessed his triumph presented a strange scene. The trial had excited -intense interest, and Cobbett said that every county in England was -represented in the company that broke, from time to time, into storms -of cheering. The judge was Tenterden, the Chief Justice, who, as a -bitter enemy of reform, hated alike accusers and accused. Six members -of the Cabinet, the Prime Minister himself and the Lord Chancellor, -Melbourne and Durham, Palmerston and Goderich listened, from no choice -of their own, to the scathing speech in which Cobbett reviewed their -conduct. Benett of Pyt House was there, a spectre of vengeance from one -Commission, and the father of the boy Cook of Micheldever, a shadow of -death from another. All the memories of those terrible weeks seemed -to gather together in the suspense of that eager crowd watching this -momentous encounter. - -Denman, who prosecuted, employed a very different tone towards Cobbett -from the tone that Perceval had used at the first of Cobbett’s trials. -Perceval, when prosecuting Cobbett for some articles on Ireland in -the _Register_ in 1803, asked the jury with the patrician insolence -of a class that held all the prizes of life, ‘Gentlemen, who is Mr. -Cobbett? Is he a man writing purely from motives of patriotism? _Quis -homo hic est? Quo patre natus?_’ No counsel prosecuting Cobbett -could open with this kind of rhetoric in 1831: Denman preferred to -describe him as ‘one of the greatest masters of the English language.’ -Denman’s speech was brief, and it was confined mainly to a paraphrase -of certain of Cobbett’s articles and to comments upon their effect. -It was no difficult task to pick out passages which set the riots -in a very favourable light, and emphasised the undoubted fact that -they had brought some improvement in the social conditions, and that -nothing else had moved the heart or the fears of the ruling class. -But the speech was not long over before it became evident that -Cobbett, like another great political defendant, though beginning as -the accused, was to end as the accuser. His reply to the charge of -exciting the labourers to violence was immediate and annihilating. -In December 1830, after the publication of the article for which -he was now being tried, Brougham, as President of the Society for -the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, had asked and obtained Cobbett’s -leave to reprint his earlier ‘Letter to the Luddites,’ as the most -likely means of turning the labourers from rioting and the breaking -of machines. There stood the Lord Chancellor in the witness-box, in -answer to Cobbett’s subpœna, to admit that crushing fact. This was a -thunderclap to Denman, who was quite ignorant of what Brougham had -done, and, as we learn from Greville, he knew at once that his case -was hopeless. Cobbett passed rapidly from defence to attack. Grey, -Melbourne, Palmerston, Durham, and Goderich had all been subpœna’d in -order to answer some very awkward questions as to the circumstances -under which Thomas Goodman had been pardoned. The Lord Chief Justice -refused to allow the questions to be put, but at least these great -Ministers had to listen as Cobbett told the story of those strange -transactions, including a visit from a parson and magistrates to a ‘man -with a rope round his neck,’ which resulted in Goodman’s unexplained -pardon and the publication of a statement purporting to come from -him ascribing his conduct to the incitement at Cobbett’s ‘lacture.’ -Cobbett destroyed any effect that Goodman’s charge might have had -by producing a declaration signed by one hundred and three persons -present at the lecture--farmers, tradesmen, labourers, carpenters, -and shoemakers--denying that Cobbett had made the statement ascribed -to him in Goodman’s confession, one of the signatories being the -farmer whose barn Goodman had burnt. He then proceeded to contrast the -treatment Goodman had received with the treatment received by others -convicted of incendiarism, and piecing together all the evidence of -the machinations of the magistrates, constructed a very formidable -indictment to which Denman could only reply that he knew nothing of -the matter, and that Cobbett was capable of entertaining the most -absurd suspicions. On another question Denman found himself thrown on -the defensive, for he was now confronted with his own misstatements -in Parliament about Cook, and the affidavits of Cook’s father present -in court. Denman could only answer that till that day no one had -contradicted him, though he could scarcely have been unaware that the -House of Commons was not the place in which a Minister’s statement -about the age, occupation, pay, and conduct of an obscure boy was -most likely to be challenged. Denman made a chastened reply, and the -jury, after spending the night at the Guildhall, disagreed, six voting -each way. Cobbett was a free man, for the Whigs, overwhelmed by the -invective they had foolishly provoked, remembered, when too late, the -wise saying of Maurice of Saxony about Charles V.: ‘I have no cage big -enough for such a bird,’ and resisted all the King’s invitations to -repeat their rash adventure. To those who have made their melancholy -way through the trials at Winchester and Salisbury, at which rude boys -from the Hampshire villages and the Wiltshire Downs, about to be tossed -across the sea, stood shelterless in the unpitying storm of question -and insinuation and abuse, there is a certain grim satisfaction in -reading this last chapter and watching Denman face to face, not with -the broken excuses and appeals of ignorant and helpless peasants, but -with a volleyed thunder that swept into space all his lawyer’s artifice -and skill. Justice plays strange tricks upon mankind, but who will say -that she has not her inspirations? - - * * * * * - -One more incident has to be recorded in the tale of suppression. -The riots were over, but the fires continued. In the autumn of 1831 -Melbourne, in a shameful moment, proposed a remedy borrowed from the -evil practices which a Tory Parliament had consented at last to forbid. -The setting of spring guns and man-traps, the common device of game -preservers, had been made a misdemeanour in 1826 by an Act of which -Suffield was the author. Melbourne now proposed to allow persons who -obtained a license from two magistrates to protect their property by -these means. The Bill passed the House of Lords, and the _Journals_ -record that it was introduced in the House of Commons, but there, let -us hope from very horror at the thought of this moral relapse, silently -it disappears. - - * * * * * - -When Grey met Parliament as Prime Minister he said that the Government -recognised two duties: the duty of finding a remedy for the distress -of the labourers, and the duty of repressing the riots with severity -and firmness. We have seen how the riots were suppressed; we have now -to see what was done towards providing a remedy. This side of the -picture is scarcely less melancholy than the other; for when we turn -to the debates in Parliament we see clearly how hopeless it was to -expect any solution of an economic problem from the legislators of the -time. Now, if ever, circumstances had forced the problem on the mind of -Parliament, and in such an emergency as this men might be trusted to -say seriously and sincerely what they had to suggest. Yet the debates -are a mêlée of futile generalisations, overshadowed by the doctrine -which Grey himself laid down that ‘all matters respecting the amount -of rent and the extent of farms would be much better regulated by the -individuals who were immediately interested than by any Committee of -their Lordships.’ One peer got into trouble for blurting out the truth -that the riots had raised wages; another would curse machinery as -vigorously as any labourer; many blamed the past inattention of the -House of Lords to the labourers’ misery; and one considered the first -necessity of the moment was the impeachment of Wellington. Two men had -actual and serious proposals to make. They were Lord King and Lord -Suffield. - -Both of these men are striking figures. King (1776-1833) was an -economist who had startled the Government in 1811 by calling for the -payments of his rents in the lawful coin of the realm. This dramatic -manœuvre for discrediting paper money had been thwarted by Lord -Stanhope, who, though in agreement with King on many subjects, strongly -approved of paper money in England as he had approved of assignats in -France. Lord Holland tells a story of how he twitted Stanhope with -wanting to see history repeat itself, and how Stanhope answered with -a chuckle: ‘And if they take property from the drones and give it to -the bees, where, my dear Citoyen, is the great harm of that?’ King -was always in a small minority and his signature was given, together -with those of Albemarle, Thanet, and Holland, to the protest against -establishing martial law in Ireland in 1801, which was written with -such wounding directness that it was afterwards blackened out of the -records of the House of Lords, on the motion of the infamous Lord -Clare. But he was never in a smaller minority than he was on this -occasion when he told his fellow landlords that the only remedy for the -public distress was the abolition of the Corn Laws. Such a proposal -stood no chance in the House of Lords or in the House of Commons. -Grey declared that the abolition of the Corn Laws would lead to the -destruction of the country, and though there were Free Traders among -the Whigs, even nine years after this Melbourne described such a policy -as ‘the wildest and maddest scheme that has ever entered into the -imagination of man to conceive.’ - -Suffield (1781-1835), the only other politician with a remedy, is -an interesting and attractive character. Originally a Tory, and -the son of Sir Harbord Harbord, who was not a man of very tender -sensibilities, Suffield gradually felt his way towards Liberalism. He -was too large-minded a man to be happy and at ease in an atmosphere -where the ruling class flew instinctively in every crisis to measures -of tyranny and repression. Peterloo completed his conversion. From -that time he became a champion of the poor, a fierce critic of the -Game Laws, and a strong advocate of prison reform. He is revealed in -his diary and all the traditions of his life as a man of independence -and great sincerity. Suffield’s policy in this crisis was the policy -of home colonisation, and its fate can best be described by means of -extracts from a memoir prepared by R. M. Bacon, a Norwich journalist -and publicist of importance, and printed privately in 1838, three years -after Suffield had been killed by a fall from his horse. They give a -far more intimate and graphic picture of the mind of the Government -than the best reported debates in the records of Parliament. - -We have seen in a previous chapter that there had been at this time a -revival of the movement for restoring the land to the labourers. One -of the chief supporters of this policy was R. M. Bacon, who, as editor -of the _Norwich Mercury_, was in close touch with Suffield. Bacon set -out an elaborate scheme of home colonisation, resembling in its main -ideas the plan sketched by Arthur Young thirty years earlier, and this -scheme Suffield took up with great enthusiasm. Its chief recommendation -in his eyes was that it applied public money to establishing labourers -with a property of their own, so that whereas, under the existing -system, public money was used, in the form of subsidies from the rates, -to depress wages, public money would be used under this scheme to -raise them. For it was the object of the plan to make the labourers -independent of the farmers, and to substitute the competition of -employers for the competition of employed. No other scheme, Suffield -used to maintain, promised any real relief. If rents and taxes were -reduced the farmer would be able, but would not be compelled, to give -better wages: if taxes on the labourers’ necessaries were reduced, -the labourers would be able to live on a smaller wage, and as long as -they were scrambling for employment they were certain to be ground -down to the minimum of subsistence. The only way to rescue them from -this plight was to place them again in such a position that they were -not absolutely dependent on the farmers. This the Government could do -by purchasing land, at present waste, and compelling parishes, with -the help of a public loan, to set up labourers upon it, and to build -cottages with a fixed allotment of land. - -Suffield’s efforts to persuade the Government to take up this -constructive policy began as soon as Grey came into office. His -first letters to Bacon on the subject are written in November. The -opposition, he says, is very strong, and Sturges Bourne and Lansdowne -are both hostile. On 17th November he writes that a peer had told him -that he had sat on an earlier committee on this subject with Sturges -Bourne, as chairman, and that ‘those who understood the subject best -agreed with Malthus that vice and misery alone could _cure_ the evil.’ -On 19th November he writes that he has had a conference with Brougham, -with about the same success as his conference with Lansdowne and -Sturges Bourne. On the 23rd he writes that he has been promised an -interview at the Home Office; on the 25th ‘no invitation from Lord -Melbourne----the truth is he cannot find one moment of leisure. The -Home Office is distracted by the numerous representations of imminent -danger to property, if not to life, and applications for protection.’ -Later in the same day he writes that he has seen both Grey and -Melbourne: ‘I at once attacked Grey. I found him disposed to give every -possible consideration to the matter. He himself has in Northumberland -seen upon his own property the beneficent effects of my plan, namely -of apportioning land to cottagers, but he foresaw innumerable -difficulties.’ A House of Lords Committee had been appointed on the -Poor Laws at the instance of Lord Salisbury, and Suffield hoped to -persuade this committee to report in favour of his scheme. He therefore -pressed Grey to make a public statement of sympathy. Grey said ‘he -would intimate that Government would be disposed to carry into effect -any measure of relief recommended by the Committee; very pressed but -would call Cabinet together to-morrow.’ The interview with Melbourne -was very different. ‘Next I saw Lord Melbourne. “Oppressed as you -are,” said I, “I am willing to relieve you from a conference, but you -must say something on Monday next and I fear you have not devoted much -attention to the subject.” “I understand it perfectly,” he replied, -“and that is the reason for my saying nothing about it.” “How is this -to be explained?” “Because I consider it hopeless.” “Oh, you think -with Malthus that vice and misery are the only cure?” “No,” said Lord -Melbourne, “but the evil is in numbers and the sort of competition that -ensues.” “Well then I have measures to propose which may meet this -difficulty.” “Of these,” said Lord Melbourne, “I know nothing,” and -he turned away from me to a friend to enquire respecting outrages.’ -Suffield concludes on a melancholy note: ‘The fact is, with the -exception of a few individuals, the subject is deemed by the world -a bore: every one who touches on it is a bore, and nothing but the -strongest conviction of its importance to the country would induce me -to subject myself to the indifference that I daily experience when I -venture to intrude the matter on the attention of legislators.’ - -A fortnight later Suffield was very sanguine: ‘Most satisfactory -interview with Melbourne: thinks Lord Grey will do the job in the -recess.’ But the sky soon darkens again, and on the 27th Suffield -writes strongly to Melbourne on the necessity of action, and he adds: -‘Tranquillity being now restored, all the farmers are of course -reducing their wages to that miserable rate that led to the recent -disturbances.’ Unhappily the last sentence had a significance which -perhaps escaped Suffield. Believing as he did in his scheme, he -thought that its necessity was proved by the relapse of wages on the -restoration of tranquillity, but vice and misery-ridden politicians -might regard the restoration of tranquillity as an argument for -dropping the scheme. After this the first hopes fade away. There is -strong opposition on the Select Committee to Suffield’s views, and he -is disappointed of the prompt report in favour of action which he -had expected from it. The Government are indisposed to take action, -and Suffield, growing sick and impatient of their slow clocks, warns -Melbourne in June that he cannot defend them. Melbourne replies that -such a measure could not be maturely considered or passed during the -agitation over the Reform Bill. Later in the month there was a meeting -between Suffield and Melbourne, of which unfortunately no record is -preserved in the Memoir, with the result that Suffield declared in -Parliament that the Government had a plan. In the autumn of 1831 an -Act was placed on the Statute Book which was the merest mockery of all -Suffield’s hopes, empowering churchwardens or overseers to hire or -lease, and under certain conditions to enclose, land up to a limit of -fifty acres, for the employment of the poor. It is difficult to resist -the belief that if the riots had lasted longer they might have forced -the Government to accept the scheme, in the efficacy of which it had -no faith, as the price of peace, and that the change in temperature -recorded in Suffield’s _Diary_ after the middle of December marks the -restoration of confidence at Whitehall. - - * * * * * - -So perished the last hope of reform and reparation for the poor. The -labourers’ revolt was ended; and four hundred and fifty men had spent -their freedom in vain. Of these exiles we have one final glimpse; it is -in a letter from the Governor of Van Diemen’s Land to Lord Goderich: -‘If, my Lord, the evidence, or conduct, of particular individuals, -can be relied on as proof of the efficiency or non-efficiency of -transportation, I am sure that a strong case indeed could be made -out in its favour. I might instance the rioters who arrived by the -_Eliza_, several of whom died almost immediately from disease, induced -apparently by despair. A great many of them went about dejected and -stupefied with care and grief, and their situation after assignment was -not for a long time much less unhappy.’[486] - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[449] Russell, _On Crimes and Misdemeanours_, p. 371. - -[450] Sir J. B. Bosanquet (1773-1847). - -[451] _Times_, December 15, 1830. - -[452] Sir W. E. Taunton (1773-1835). - -[453] The _Times_ on December 25 quoted part of this charge in a -leading article with some sharp strictures. - -[454] Sir John Vaughan (1769-1839). - -[455] _Times_, December 21, 1830. - -[456] Sir James Parke (1782-1868). - -[457] _Times_, January 3, 1831. - -[458] Sir E. H. Alderson (1787-1857). - -[459] _Times_, January 6, 1831. Cf. letter of Mr. R. Pollen, J.P., -afterwards one of Winchester Commissioners, to Home Office, November -26: ‘It may be worth considering the law, which exempts all _Threshing -Machines_ from capital punishment, should such scenes as these occur -again amongst the agricultural classes. I confess I view with great -regret that they have found the mode of combining, which I had hoped -was confined to the manufacturing classes.’ - -[460] Sir J. A. Park (1763-1838). - -[461] _Times_, January 15, 1831. - -[462] _Ibid._, January 12, 1831. - -[463] _Ibid._ - -[464] February 8, 1831. - -[465] There are no statistics for Wilts, Hants, Bucks, and Dorsetshire -prisoners. At Reading out of 138 prisoners 37 could read, and 25 of the -37 could also write. At Abingdon, out of 47, 17 could read, and 6 of -them could also write. In Wilts and Hants the proportion was probably -smaller, as the people were more neglected. - -[466] _Times_, December 24, 1830. - -[467] _Ibid._, January 8, 1831. - -[468] _Times_, January 7, 1831. - -[469] _Ibid._, December 24, 1830. Henry Bunce was transported for life -to New South Wales. - -[470] _Ibid._, January 14. - -[471] Cobbett, _Political Register_, vol. lxxiii. p. 535, and local -papers. - -[472] Fussell’s sentence was commuted to imprisonment. Boys was sent to -Van Diemen’s Land. - -[473] H. O. Papers, Municipal and Provincial. Hants, 1831, March 24. - -[474] As early as November 26, Mr. Richard Pollen, Chairman of Quarter -Sessions and afterwards a commissioner at Winchester, had written to -the Home Office, ‘I have directed the Magistrates’ attention very -much to the class of People found in the Mobs many miles from their -own homes, Taylors, Shoemakers etc., who have been found always very -eloquent, they are universally politicians: they should be, I think, -selected.’--H. O. Papers. - -[475] For a full account of the incident, including the text of the -petition and list of signatures, see Cobbett’s _Two-penny Trash_, July -1, 1832. - -[476] See p. 277. - -[477] February 8, 1831. - -[478] _Times_, January 8, 1831. The _Times_ of the same day contains an -interesting petition from the Birmingham Political Union on behalf of -all the prisoners tried before the Special Commissions. - -[479] The scene is still vividly remembered by an old woman over ninety -years of age with whom Mr. Hudson spoke. - -[480] H. O. Papers, Disturbance Entry-Book, Letter of January 3, 1831. - -[481] See p. 268. - -[482] Three boats carried the convicts, the _Eliza_ and the _Proteus_ -to Van Diemen’s Land, the _Eleanor_ to New South Wales. The list of the -prisoners on board shows that they came from the following counties:-- - - Berks, 44 - Bucks, 29 - Dorset, 13 - Essex, 23 - Gloucester, 24 - Hampshire, 100 - Hunts, 5 - Kent, 22 - Norfolk, 11 - Oxford, 11 - Suffolk, 7 - Sussex, 17 - Wilts, 151 - --- - TOTAL, 457 - -If this represents the total, some sentences of transportation must -have been commuted for imprisonment; possibly some rioters were sent -later, for Mr. Potter MacQueen, in giving evidence before the Committee -on Secondary Punishments, spoke of the six hundred able-bodied men -who had been transported in consequence of being concerned in the -Swing offences.--Report of Committee, p. 95. Four years later Lord -John Russell, as Home Secretary, pardoned 264 of the convicts, in 1836 -he pardoned 86 more, and in 1837 the survivors, mostly men sentenced -for life or for fourteen years, were given pardons conditional on -their ‘continuing to reside in Australia for the remainder of their -sentences.’ No free passages back were granted, and Mr. Hudson states -that very few, not more than one in five or six, ever returned.--_A -Shepherd’s Life_, p. 247. - -[483] See Hudson, _Ibid._ - -[484] See _Annual Register_ and local papers. - -[485] He was sent to Van Diemen’s Land. It is only fair to Lord -Sheffield to say that he applied in vain to Lord Melbourne for a -mitigation of the life sentence. See Criminal Entry-Book, H. O. Papers. - -[486] Correspondence on Secondary Punishment, March 1834, p. 23. - - - - -CHAPTER XIII - -CONCLUSION - - -A row of eighteenth-century houses, or a room of normal -eighteenth-century furniture, or a characteristic piece of -eighteenth-century literature, conveys at once a sense of satisfaction -and completeness. The secret of this charm is not to be found in any -special beauty or nobility of design or expression, but simply in an -exquisite fitness. The eighteenth-century mind was a unity, an order; -it was finished, and it was simple. All literature and art that really -belong to the eighteenth century are the language of a little society -of men and women who moved within one set of ideas; who understood each -other; who were not tormented by any anxious or bewildering problems; -who lived in comfort, and, above all things, in composure. The classics -were their freemasonry. There was a standard for the mind, for the -emotions, for the taste: there were no incongruities. When you have a -society like this, you have what we roughly call a civilisation, and -it leaves its character and canons in all its surroundings and its -literature. Its definite ideas lend themselves readily to expression. -A larger society seems an anarchy in contrast; just because of its -escape into a greater world it seems powerless to stamp itself on -wood or stone; it is condemned as an age of chaos and mutiny, with -nothing to declare. In comparison with the dishevelled century that -follows, the eighteenth century was neat, well dressed and nicely -appointed. It had a religion, the religion of quiet common sense and -contentment with a world that it found agreeable and encouraging; it -had a style, the style of the elegant and polished English of Addison -or Gibbon. Men who were not conscious of any strain or great emotion -asked of their writers and their painters that they should observe in -their art the equanimity and moderation that were desirable in life. -They did not torture their minds with eager questions; there was no -piercing curiosity or passionate love or hatred in their souls; they -all breathed the same air of distinguished satisfaction and dignified -self-control. English institutions suited them admirably; a monarchy so -reasonable nobody could mind; Parliament was a convenient instrument -for their wishes, and the English Church was the very thing to keep -religion in its place. What this atmosphere could produce at its best -was seen in Gibbon or in Reynolds; and neither Gibbon nor Reynolds -could lose themselves in a transport of the imagination. To pass from -the eighteenth century to the Revolt, from Pope to Blake, or from -Sheridan to Shelley, is to burst from this little hothouse of sheltered -and nurtured elegance into an infinite wild garden of romance and -mystery. For the eighteenth century such escape was impossible, and if -any one fell into the fatal crime of enthusiasm, his frenzy took the -form of Methodism, which was a more limited world than the world he had -quitted. - -The small class that enjoyed the monopoly of political power and social -luxuries, round whose interests and pleasures the State revolved, -consisted, down to the French war, of persons accustomed to travel, to -find amusement and instruction in foreign galleries and French salons, -and to study the fashions and changes of thought, and letters and -religion, outside England; of persons who liked to surround themselves -with the refinements and the decorations of life, and to display their -good taste in collecting old masters, or fine fragments of sculpture, -or the scattered treasures of an ancient library. Perhaps at no time -since the days when Isabella d’Este consoled herself for the calamities -of her friends and relatives with the thought of the little Greek -statues that were brought by these calamities into the market, has -there been a class so keenly interested in the acquisition of beautiful -workmanship, for the sake of the acquisition rather than for the sake -of the renown of acquiring it. The eighteenth-century collectors -bought with discernment as well as with liberality: they were not the -slaves of a single rage or passion, and consequently they enriched -the mansions of England with the achievements of various schools. -Of course the eighteenth century had its own fashion in art, and no -admiration is more unintelligible to modern taste than the admiration -for Guercino and Guido Reni and the other seventeenth-century painters -of Bologna. But the pictures that came across the Channel in such great -numbers were not the products of one school, or indeed the products of -one country. Dutch, Flemish, French, Italian, they all streamed into -England, and the nation suddenly found itself, or rather its rulers, -very rich in masterpieces. The importance of such a school of manners -as this, with its knowledge of other worlds and other societies, its -interest in literature and art, its cosmopolitan atmosphere, can -only be truly estimated by those who remember the boorish habits of -the country gentlemen of the earlier eighteenth century described by -Fielding. With the French war this cosmopolitan atmosphere disappeared. -Thenceforth the aristocracy were as insular in their prejudices -as any of their countrymen, and Lord Holland, who preserved the -larger traditions of his class, provoked suspicion and resentment by -travelling in Spain during the Peninsular War.[487] - -But if the art and literature of the eighteenth century show the -predominance of a class that cultivated its taste outside England, and -that regarded art and literature as mere ministers to the pleasure -of a few,[488] they show also that that class had political power -as well as social privileges. There is no art of the time that can -be called national either in England or in France, but the art of -eighteenth-century England bears a less distant relation to the English -people than the art of eighteenth-century France to the people of -France, just in proportion as the great English houses touched the -English people more closely than Versailles touched the French. English -art is less of mere decoration and less of mere imitation, for, though -it is true that Chippendale, Sheraton, and the Adam brothers were -all in one sense copying the furniture of other countries--Holland, -China, France--they all preserved a certain English strain, and it was -the flavour of the vernacular, so to speak, that saved their designs -from the worst foreign extravagance. They were designing, indeed, for -a class and not for a nation, but it was for a class that had never -broken quite away from the life of the society that it controlled. -The English aristocracy remained a race of country gentlemen. They -never became mere loungers or triflers, kicking their heels about a -Court and amusing themselves with tedious gallantries and intrigues. -They threw themselves into country life and government, and they were -happiest away from London. The great swarms of guests that settled on -such country seats as Holkham were like gay and boisterous schoolboys -compared with the French nobles who had forgotten how to live in the -country, and were tired of living at Versailles. If anything could -exceed Grey’s reluctance to leave his great house in Northumberland -for the excitements of Parliament, it was Fox’s reluctance to leave -his little house in Surrey. The taste for country pleasures and for -country sports was never lost, and its persistence explains the -physical vitality of the aristocracy. This was a social fact of great -importance, for it is health after all that wins half the battles of -classes. No quantity of Burgundy and Port could kill off a race that -was continually restoring its health by life in the open air; it did -not matter that Squire Western generally spent the night under the -table if he generally spent the day in the saddle. This inheritance of -an open-air life is probably the reason that in England, in contrast -to France and Italy, good looks are more often to be found in the -aristocracy than in other classes of society. - -It was due to this physical vigour that the aristocracy, corrupt and -selfish though it was, never fell into the supreme vice of moral -decadence. The other European aristocracies crumbled at once before -Napoleon: the English aristocracy, amidst all its blunders and errors, -kept its character for endurance and fortitude. Throughout that long -struggle, when Napoleon was strewing Europe with his triumphs and, as -Sheridan said, making kings the sentinels of his power, England alone -never broke a treaty or made a surrender at his bidding. For ten years -Pitt seems the one fixed point among the rulers of Europe. It is not, -of course, to be argued that the ruling class showed more valour and -determination than any other class of Englishmen would have shown: the -empire-builders of the century, men of daring and enterprise on distant -frontiers, were not usually of the ruling class, and Dr. Johnson once -wrote an essay to explain why it was that the English common soldier -was the bravest of the common soldiers of the world. The comparison -is between the English aristocracy and the other champions of law and -order in the great ordeal of this war, and in that comparison the -English aristocracy stands out in conspicuous eminence in a Europe of -shifting and melting governments. - -The politics of a small class of privileged persons enjoying an -undisputed power might easily have degenerated into a mere business of -money-making and nothing else. There is plenty of this atmosphere in -the eighteenth-century system: a study merely of the society memoirs -of the age is enough to dissipate the fine old illusion that men of -blood and breeding have a nice and fastidious sense about money. Just -the opposite is the truth. Aristocracies have had their virtues, but -the virtue of a magnificent disdain for money is not to be expected in -a class which has for generations taken it as a matter of course that -it should be maintained by the State. At no time in English history -have sordid motives been so conspicuous in politics as during the days -when power was most a monopoly of the aristocracy. No politicians -have sacrificed so much of their time, ability, and principles to the -pursuit of gain as the politicians of the age when poor men could only -squeeze into politics by twos or threes in a generation, when the -aristocracy put whole families into the House of Commons as a matter -of course, and Burke boasted that the House of Lords was wholly, and -the House of Commons was mainly, composed for the defence of hereditary -property. - -But the politics of the eighteenth century are not a mere scramble -for place and power. An age which produced the two Pitts could not be -called an age of mere avarice. An age which produced Burke and Fox -and Grey could not be called an age of mere ambition. The politics of -this little class are illuminated by the great and generous behaviour -of individuals. If England was the only country where the ruling -class made a stand against Napoleon, England was the only country -where members of the ruling class were found to make a stand for the -ideas of the Revolution. Perhaps the proudest boast that the English -oligarchy can make is the boast that some of its members, nursed as -they had been in a soft and feathered world of luxury and privilege, -could look without dismay on what Burke called the strange, wild, -nameless, enthusiastic thing established in the centre of Europe. The -spectacle of Fox and Sheridan and Grey leading out their handful of -Liberals night after night against the Treason and Sedition Bills, at a -time when an avalanche of terror had overwhelmed the mind of England, -when Pitt, Burke, and Dundas thought no malice too poisoned, Gillray -and Rowlandson no deforming touch of the brush too brutal, when the -upper classes thought they were going to lose their property, and the -middle classes thought they were going to lose their religion, is one -of the sublime spectacles of history. This quality of fearlessness -in the defence of great causes is displayed in a fine succession -of characters and incidents; Chatham, whose courage in facing his -country’s dangers was not greater than his courage in blaming his -country’s crimes; Burke, with his elaborate rage playing round the -dazzling renown of a Rodney; Fox, whose voice sounds like thunder -coming over the mountains, hurled at the whole race of conquerors; -Holland, pleading almost alone for the abolition of capital punishment -for stealing before a bench of bishops; a man so little given to -revolutionary sympathies as Fitzwilliam, leaving his lord-lieutenancy -rather than condone the massacre of Peterloo. If moral courage is the -power of combating and defying an enveloping atmosphere of prejudice, -passion, and panic, a generation which was poor in most of the public -virtues was, at least, conspicuously rich in one. Foreign policy, the -treatment of Ireland, of India, of slaves, are beyond the scope of -this book, but in glancing at the class whose treatment of the English -poor has been the subject of our study, it is only just to record -that in other regions of thought and conduct they bequeathed a great -inheritance of moral and liberal ideas: a passion for justice between -peoples, a sense for national freedom, a great body of principle by -which to check, refine, and discipline the gross appetites of national -ambition. Those ideas were the ideas of a minority, but they were -expressed and defended with an eloquence and a power that have made -them an important and a glorious part of English history. In all this -development of liberal doctrine it is not fanciful to see the ennobling -influence of the Greek writers on whom every eighteenth-century -politician was bred and nourished. - -Fox thought in the bad days of the war with the Revolution that his -own age resembled the age of Cicero, and that Parliamentary government -in England, undermined by the power of the Court, would disappear -like liberty in republican Rome. There is a strange letter in which, -condoling with Grey on his father’s becoming a peer, he remarks that -it matters the less because the House of Commons will soon cease to be -of any importance. This prediction was falsified, and England never -produced a Cæsar. There is, however, a real analogy in the social -history of the two periods. The English ruling class corresponds to -the Roman senatorial order, both classes claiming office on the same -ground of family title, a Cavendish being as inevitable as a Claudius, -and an Æmilius as a Gower. The _equites_ were the second rank of the -Roman social aristocracy, as the manufacturers or bankers were of the -English. A Roman _eques_ could pass into the senatorial order by -holding the quæstorship; an English manufacturer could pass into the -governing class by buying an estate. The English aristocracy, like the -Roman, looked a little doubtfully on new-comers, and even a Cicero or a -Canning might complain of the freezing welcome of the old nobles; but -it preferred to use rather than to exclude them. - -In both societies the aristocracy regarded the poor in much the -same spirit, as a problem of discipline and order, and passed on to -posterity the same vague suggestion of squalor and turbulence. Thus -it comes that most people who think of the poor in the Roman Republic -think only of the great corn largesses; and most people who think of -the poor in eighteenth-century England think only of the great system -of relief from the rates. Mr. Warde Fowler has shown how hard it is to -find in the Roman writers any records of the poor. So it is with the -records of eighteenth-century England. In both societies the obscurity -which surrounded the poor in life has settled on their wrongs in -history. For one person who knows anything about so immense an event -as the disappearance of the old English village society, there are -a hundred who know everything about the fashionable scenes of high -politics and high play, that formed the exciting world of the upper -classes. The silence that shrouds these village revolutions was not -quite unbroken, but the cry that disturbed it is like a noise that -breaks for a moment on the night, and then dies away, only serving to -make the stillness deeper and more solemn. The _Deserted Village_ is -known wherever the English language is spoken, but Goldsmith’s critics -have been apt to treat it, as Dr. Johnson treated it, as a beautiful -piece of irrelevant pathos, and his picture of what was happening in -England has been admired as a picture of what was happening in his -discolouring dreams. Macaulay connected that picture with reality in -his ingenious theory, that England provided the village of the happy -and smiling opening, and Ireland the village of the sombre and tragical -end. One enclosure has been described in literature, and described by -a victim, John Clare, the Northamptonshire peasant, who drifted into -a madhouse through a life of want and trouble. Those who recall the -discussions of the time, and the assumption of the upper classes that -the only question that concerned the poor was the question whether -enclosure increased employment, will be struck by the genuine emotion -with which Clare dwells on the natural beauties of the village of -his childhood, and his attachment to his home and its memories. But -Clare’s day was brief and he has few readers.[489] In art the most -undistinguished features of the most undistinguished members of the -aristocracy dwell in the glowing colours of a Reynolds; the poor have -no heirlooms, and there was no Millet to preserve the sorrow and -despair of the homeless and dispossessed. So comfortably have the rich -soothed to sleep the sensibilities of history. These debonair lords who -smile at us from the family galleries do not grudge us our knowledge of -the escapades at Brooks’s or at White’s in which they sowed their wild -oats, but we fancy they are grateful for the poppy seeds of oblivion -that have been scattered over the secrets of their estates. Happy the -race that can so engage the world with its follies that it can secure -repose for its crimes. - -De Quincey has compared the blotting out of a colony of Alexander’s in -the remote and unknown confines of civilisation, to the disappearance -of one of those starry bodies which, fixed in longitude and latitude -for generations, are one night observed to be missing by some wandering -telescope. ‘The agonies of a perishing world have been going on, -but all is bright and silent in the heavenly host.’ So is it with -the agonies of the poor. Wilberforce, in the midst of the scenes -described in this volume, could declare, ‘What blessings do we enjoy -in this happy country; I am reading ancient history, and the pictures -it exhibits of the vices and the miseries of men fill me with mixed -emotions of indignation, horror and gratitude.’ Amid the great distress -that followed Waterloo and peace, it was a commonplace of statesmen -like Castlereagh and Canning that England was the only happy country in -the world, and that so long as the monopoly of their little class was -left untouched, her happiness would survive. That class has left bright -and ample records of its life in literature, in art, in political -traditions, in the display of great orations and debates, in memories -of brilliant conversation and sparkling wit; it has left dim and meagre -records of the disinherited peasants that are the shadow of its wealth; -of the exiled labourers that are the shadow of its pleasures; of the -villages sinking in poverty and crime and shame that are the shadow of -its power and its pride. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[487] See a remarkable letter from Lord Dudley. ‘He has already been -enough on the Continent for any reasonable end, either of curiosity -or instruction, and his availing himself so immediately of this -opportunity to go to a foreign country again looks a little too much -like distaste for his own.’--Letters to Ivy from the first Earl of -Dudley, October 1808. - -[488] See on this subject a very interesting article by Mr. L. March -Phillipps in the _Contemporary Review_, August 1911. - -[489] Helpstone was enclosed by an Act of 1809. Clare was then sixteen -years old. His association with the old village life had been intimate, -for he had tended geese and sheep on the common, and he had learnt the -old country songs from the last village cowherd. His poem on Helpstone -was published in 1820. - - - - -APPENDIX A (1) - - The information about Parliamentary Proceedings in Appendix A is taken - from the _Journals_ of the House of Commons or of the House of Lords - for the dates mentioned. The place where the Award is at present - enrolled is given, where possible, under the heading ‘Award.’ A - Return, asked for by Sir John Brunner, was printed February 15, 1904, - of Inclosure Awards, deposited with Clerks of the Peace or of County - Councils. - - -ARMLEY, LEEDS, YORKS.--ENCLOSURE ACT, 1793 - - -AREA.--About 175 acres. - - -NATURE OF GROUND.--Waste Ground, called Armley Moor or Common. - - -PARLIAMENTARY PROCEEDINGS.--_February 21, 1793._--Petition for -enclosure from ‘several of the Owners of Lands within the Manor and -Township of Armley,’ stating that this parcel of waste ground is, -in its present state, incapable of improvement. Leave given, bill -presented March 15. - -_March 28._--Petition against the bill from various owners and -proprietors of Messuages, Cottages, Lands and Tenements who ‘by virtue -thereof, or otherwise, have an indisputable Right of Common upon the -said Moor,’ stating that ‘they conceive that an Inclosure of the said -Moor and Waste Ground would be productive of no Advantage to any -of the Proprietors claiming a Right of Common thereon, but, on the -contrary, would very materially injure and prejudice their respective -Estates in the said Townships, by laying upon the said Township the -Burthen of making, maintaining, and repairing the necessary new Roads, -which must be set out to a considerable Extent over the said Moor and -Waste Ground, and also by increasing the Poors Rate, inasmuch as the -Petitioners conceive that the Inhabitants of the said Town of Armley, -who are very numerous, and principally poor Manufacturers of broad -Woollen Cloth, receive considerable Benefit and Advantage from the -present open State of the said Moor and Waste Ground, particularly in -having Tenters and Frames to stretch and dry their Cloth, Warps, and -Wool, after it has been dyed, put up and fixed upon the said Moor and -Waste Ground, which Privileges and Advantages have hitherto conduced to -alleviate the Distresses and Hardships of the said poor Manufacturers -in the said Township of Armley, and which, if the said Inclosure takes -Place, they will be totally deprived of and reduced to Poverty and -Want.’ The Petition was ordered to be heard on second reading. - -_April 9._--Bill read a second time. House informed that Petitioners -declined to be heard on second reading. The Petition was referred to -the Committee. - -_April 17._--(1) Petition against the bill from John Taylor, giving -same reasons as last petition. (2) Petition from various master -manufacturers of broad woollen cloth in Armley against the bill, -stating that, as the Moor only contains about 160 Acres, inclosure -which involves division ‘amongst so great a Number of Claimants in -small Allotments,’ and also ‘the heavy and unavoidable Expenses of -obtaining the Act, surveying, dividing, inclosing, and improving’ -will confer little or no Benefit on the proprietors, whereas it will -certainly deprive the poor Manufacturers, who are very numerous, of (1) -the Privileges and Advantages of fixing their Tenters, etc., ‘which -they and their Ancestors have hitherto enjoyed’; and (2) ‘of that -Pasturage upon the said Common which they have hitherto much depended -upon.’ Both Petitions to be heard at Report stage; (3) Petition against -the bill from various owners and proprietors who ‘at the Instance of -several other Owners of Lands’ signed a petition for inclosure, ‘under -an Idea, that the Inclosure would meet with the Approbation of, and -be of general Utility to the Inhabitants of the said Town,’ but now -finding that this idea was mistaken, and that Inclosure would be of -general disadvantage, ask that their names should be erased, and that -if the bill is brought in, they should be heard against it. Petition -referred to Committee. Petitioners to be heard, ‘if they think fit’ -(‘they’ ambiguous, might be Committee or Petitioners). - - -REPORT AND ENUMERATION OF CONSENTS.--_April 29._--Wilberforce reported -from the Committee; Standing Orders complied with, Committee had -considered the two petitions referred to them (apparently they had not -heard Counsel), and had found that the Allegations of the Bill were -true, and that the parties concerned had given their consent ‘(except -the Owners of Land of the Annual Value of £172, 8s. 2d. who refused to -sign the Bill; and also, except the Owners of Lands of the Annual Value -of £35, 15s. 9d., who declared themselves neuter; and that the Whole of -the Land entitled to Right of Common is of the Annual Value of £901, -12s. 1d.).’ There is nothing to suggest that the petitioners against -the bill were heard at this stage. The Bill passed Commons and Lords. -Royal Assent, June 3, 1793. - - -MAIN FEATURES OF ACT.--(Private, 33 George. III. c. 61.) - - -COMMISSIONERS.--One only. William Whitelock of Brotherton, Yorks, -Gentleman. He is also to act as surveyor. Vacancy to be filled, if -necessary, by ‘the major part in value’ of those interested in the -Common. An arbitrator is to be appointed by the Recorder of Leeds. - - -PAYMENT TO COMMISSIONER.--£1, 11s. 6d. for each working day. As -surveyor, his remuneration is to be settled by the Recorder of Leeds. - -CLAIMS.--The Commissioner is to hear and to determine upon all claims, -but if any one is dissatisfied the matter can be referred to the -Arbitrator, whose decision is final. If the appeal is vexatious, the -Arbitrator can award costs against the appellant. The Arbitrator’s -decision is final except in respect of matters of Title which can still -be tried at law. - - -SYSTEM OF DIVISION--SPECIAL PROVISIONS: - -_Provisions for Lord of the Manor._--(1) The equivalent in value of -one-sixteenth of the whole in lieu of his right in the soil. - -(2) His other manorial rights to continue as before, including his -mineral rights, but he is forbidden to ‘enter into or damage any House, -Garden, or Pleasure Ground’ hereafter made on the Common, and if he -damages property he must pay for satisfaction either a yearly rent of -£3 an acre or part of an acre actually used and damaged, or else make -such compensation as shall be awarded by two indifferent persons, one -chosen by the Lord of the Manor, the other by the person who sustains -the damage. If these two cannot agree, they must choose an Umpire whose -decision is to be final. - -(3) The Lord of the Manor is to have the use of a spring in the close -belonging to Samuel Blackburn. - -_Provisions for Tithe Owners._--None. - -_Provisions for the Poor._--(1) Allotment to Cottagers of 8-1/2 acres -in six or more distinct and separate places, as near as possible to the -Cottages on or adjoining the Common ‘which shall for ever hereafter -remain open and uninclosed, and shall be used and enjoyed by the -Occupiers of the several Cottages or Dwelling Houses now or hereafter -to be built within the said Township of Armley, for the setting up and -using of Tenters, Stretchers for Warp, Wool Hedges,’ etc., under the -direction of the Minister, Chapel Wardens, and Overseers. No buildings -are to be erected on this ground, and no rent paid for the use of it; -no roads or paths may be made through it, and no buildings erected -within 20 yards on the South or West. - -(2) Allotment to the Poor.--2 acres, to be vested in the Minister, -Chapel Wardens, and Overseers, and used for a Poor House, School House, -and for the benefit of a School master. Until used for these purposes, -the rent and profits are to go towards the Poor Assessment. - -_Allotment for Stone_ for roads, etc.--5 acres (for the making and -repairing of highways and private roads). - -_Allotment of Residue._--To be divided out amongst the persons having -right of common according to their several rights and interests, -quantity, quality, and situation considered, provided ‘that in case -it shall be determined that the Owners of any Messuages or Cottages, -or Scites of Messuages and Cottages, are entitled to Right of Common -on the said Common or Waste Ground, then that the said Commissioner -... shall award and allot such Parcels of the Common and Waste Ground -to the Owners of such Messuages or Cottages, as have been erected for -Sixty Years and upwards, unless the same shall have been erected upon -the Scite of an ancient Messuage or Cottage, as to him ... shall appear -a fair Compensation for such Right,’ and in making this allotment he -is not to pay any regard to the value of these Messuages and Cottages -one to another, except with reference to the Quantity of land. If any -allottee is dissatisfied with his share, he can appeal for arbitration -to the Recorder of Leeds, whose decision is to be final, except in -cases where the question concerns any Right of Common claimed ‘for -or in respect of any ancient Houses or Scites of Houses, Lands or -Grounds,’ when there may be an appeal at law, if notice is given within -a specified time. Allotments must be accepted within 6 months after -award. Failure to accept excludes allottee from all benefits. (Saving -clause for infants, etc.). - - -INCROACHMENTS.--(1) Incroachments 60 years old and more to be treated -as old inclosures with right of common, except such Incroachments as -have been made by or for the Curate of Armley for the time being. -(2) Incroachments from 40 to 60 years old to remain with possessors -but not to confer any right of common. (3) Incroachments made within -40 years to be deemed part of the Common to be divided, but to be -allotted to present holders as part of their allotments. But if -they do not lie adjoining the incroacher’s ancient estates then the -Commissioner can allot them to anyone, giving ‘adequate Satisfaction -for any Improvement’ to the incroacher. The above does not apply to two -inclosures made by Stephen Todd, Esqr. and by Joseph Akeroyd which are -to be allotted to them respectively under their present indentures of -lease. - - -FENCING.--To be done by allottees under the Commissioner’s directions. -_Exception._--The allotment of 2 acres for the poor is to be fenced -and enclosed at the expense of the other proprietors. If allottees -refuse to fence, the Commissioner can do it for them and charge them, -ultimately distraining. To protect the young quickset, no sheep or -lambs are to be depastured in allotments for 7 years, unless special -fences are made, and no cattle, sheep or lambs are to graze in the -roads and ways for 10 years. - - -EXPENSES.--To be paid by the proprietors in such proportion as the -Commissioner decides. The Commissioner’s accounts are to be entered in -a book, and produced when 5 proprietors require it. To meet expenses, -allotments may be mortgaged in some cases, with consent of the -Commissioner, up to 60s. an acre. - - -COMPENSATION TO OCCUPIERS.--All leases, as regards right of common and -other rights on the waste ground for 21 years and under to be null -and void, the lessor making such satisfaction to the lessee as the -Commissioner thinks a fit equivalent. - - -ROADS.--Commissioners have full power to set out and stop up roads and -footpaths. - - -POWER OF APPEAL.--To Quarter Sessions only, and not in cases where -the Commissioner’s or Arbitrator’s decision is said to be final; or -where some other provision is made, _e.g._ to Recorder of Leeds about -allotments. - - -AWARD.--Not with Clerk of the Peace or of County Council or in Record -Office. - - -APPENDIX A (2) - -ASHELWORTH, GLOUCESTER.--ENCLOSURE ACT, 1797 - - -AREA.--Not given in Act. Commonable Land of every kind stated in -Petition (see below) as 310 Acres in all. - - -NATURE OF GROUND.--‘Open and Common Fields, Meadows, and Pastures, -Commonable and intermixed Lands, and a Tract of Waste Ground, being -Part and Parcel of a Common called Corse Lawn,[490] and also a Plot, -Piece, or Parcel of Land or Ground, on the Eastern Side of the said -Parish,[491] adjoining to, and lately Part of the Parish of Hasfield -... but now Part of the Parish of Ashelworth’. - - -PARLIAMENTARY PROCEEDINGS.--_February 21, 1797._--Petition for -enclosure from various owners of lands and estates. March 24, Bill read -first time. - -_April 7, 1797._--Petition from various Landowners and Owners of Mease -Places, against the bill, stating ‘That there are only about 310 Acres -of Commonable Land belonging to Land Owners of the said Parish, of -which 148 Acres are Meadow Land, called the _Upper Ham_, lying in the -Manor of _Hasfield_, the Right of Common upon which belongs exclusively -to the Petitioners (and some others) as Owners of Fifty Five Mease -Places within the said Parish, and the Petitioners are the Owners of -Thirty-four of such Mease Places; and that the Remainder of the said -Commonable Land consists of a Common Meadow, called _Lonkergins Ham_, -containing about eight Acres (upon which Six Persons have a Right of -Common) and about 150 Acres of Waste Land, Part of a Tract of Land -called Corse Lawn, upon which Waste Land all the Land Owners of the -said Parish are entitled to a Right of Common; and that the several -Estates within the said Parish, lie very compact and convenient, and -many of such Estates are exempt from the Payment of Great Tithes; -and that of the Remainder of such Estates the Great Tithes (except a -Portion of which the Vicar was endowed) belong to Charles Hayward Esq., -who is Lord of the Manor of Ashelworth, and Owner of an Estate in the -said Parish; and that there is no one Object in the Bill sufficient, -under the Circumstances of the Case, to justify the enormous Expences -which will attend the obtaining and carrying it into Execution, -but that, on the Contrary, it is fraught with great Evil, and will -be extremely injurious to the Petitioners,’ and asking that the -Petitioners may be permitted to examine Witnesses and to be heard by -their Counsel against the bill. - -Petitioners to be heard on Second reading. - -_April 10._--Second reading of bill. House informed that Petitioners -did not wish to be heard at that stage. Bill committed. Petitioners to -be heard when Bill reported if they think fit. - - -REPORT AND ENUMERATION OF CONSENTS.--_May 3, 1797._--Mr. Lygon reported -from the Committee that the Standing Orders were complied with; that -the allegations were true; and that the Parties concerned had consented -to the satisfaction of the Committee ‘(except the Owners of Property -assessed to the Land Tax at £11, 0s. 5d., and that the whole of the -Property is assessed at £86, 14s. 10d.) and that no Person appeared -before the Committee to oppose the Bill.’ (Nothing about hearing -Petitioners.) Bill passed both Houses with some amendments. In the -House of Lords an amendment was made about referring the quarrel -between the Vicar of Ashelworth and the Rector of Hasfield on the -subject of tithes to arbitration. Royal Assent, June 6, 1797. - - -MAIN FEATURES OF ACT.--(Private, 37 George III. c. 108.) - - -COMMISSIONERS.--Three appointed. Richard Richardson of Bath: Francis -Webb of Salisbury: Thomas Fulljames of Gloucester, Gentlemen. Two to be -a quorum. Surveyor to be appointed by Commissioners. Vacancies, both -Commissioners and Surveyors, to be filled up by remaining Commissioners -from persons not interested. If they fail to fill up, ‘the major part -in value’ of the Proprietors and Persons interested can do so. - - -PAYMENT TO COMMISSIONERS.--2 guineas each working day. Survey to be -made, unless the existing one seems satisfactory and correct. - - -SPECIAL CLAUSES.--It is enacted ‘That all Fields or Inclosures -containing the Property of Two or more Persons within One Fence, and -also all Inclosures containing the Property of One Person only, if -the same be held by or under different Tenures or Interests, shall be -considered as Commonable Land, and be divided and allotted accordingly.’ - -Also ‘all Homesteads, Gardens, Orchards, old Inclosures, and other -Lands and Grounds,’ shall, with the consent of their proprietors or -Trustees, ‘be deemed and considered to be open and uninclosed Land for -the Purpose of the Division and Allotment hereby intended,’ provided -that Charles Hayward has to get Bishop of Bristol’s consent. - - -CLAIMS.--All claims to be delivered in writing at first and second -Meeting, and no claim to be received after second Meeting, except for -some special cause allowed by Commissioners. Commissioners to hold -a subsequent meeting and give account in writing of what claims are -admitted and rejected. - -Persons whose claims are rejected can bring an action on a feigned -issue against some other Proprietor. Verdict to be final and -conclusive. If Plaintiff wins, Commissioners pay costs; if Defendant -wins, Plaintiff pays. Action must be brought within a specified time (3 -months). - -_Exceptions._--(1) If the Commissioners disallow the claim of the Dean -and Chapter of Westminster to the Right of Soil in ‘A,’ then the Dean -and Chapter may bring an action within 12 months against the Bishop of -Bristol and Charles Hayward for ascertaining the rights of soil. Costs -to be paid by losers. - -(2) If the Commissioners allow the above claim, then the Bishop of -Bristol or Charles Hayward can bring an action _mutatis mutandis_. - -Also, If any dispute or difference arises between the Parties -interested in the inclosure ‘touching or concerning the respective -Shares, Rights, and Interests which they or any of them shall claim’ -in the land to be inclosed, ‘or touching and concerning the respective -Shares and Proportions’ which they ought to have, the Commissioners -have power to examine and determine the same; their determination to be -‘final, binding and conclusive upon and to all Parties.’ Commissioners -can on request of person who wins his point assess costs on person who -loses it, and ultimately distrain on his goods. - -_Exception._--Commissioners to have no jurisdiction about Titles. - -Tithe owners are to send in their claims with all particulars. -Commissioners’ determination to be final ‘(if the Parties in Dispute -think proper and agree thereto)’; but not to affect power to try titles -at law. - - -SYSTEM OF DIVISION--SPECIAL PROVISIONS: - -_Lord of the Manor._--(1) The Bishop of Bristol is Lord of the Manor of -Ashelworth (except ‘A’ and ‘B’), and Charles Hayward is his lessee. He -is to have such part as Commissioners judge full compensation, to be -‘not less than 1/15’ of the Waste Land to be inclosed. - -(2) Dean and Chapter of Westminster and also the Bishop of Bristol -claim Right of Soil in ‘A,’ whichever establishes his claim to have not -less than 1/15 of ‘A.’ - -(3) John Parker Esq., is Lord of Manor of ‘B’: to have not less than -1/15 of ‘B’. - -_Tithe Owners._--Allotment to be made from land about to be inclosed -for all tithes on all land (including present inclosures), as -follows:-- - -Not less in value than One Fifth of Arable Land. Not less in value than -One Ninth of Meadow or Pasture Ground, Homesteads, Gardens, Orchards -and Woodlands. Where Tithes only partially due, full equivalent to be -given. - -The Vicar of Ashelworth and the Rector of Hasfield can have their -disputed rights to tithes of ‘B’ settled by Arbitration. - -Owners of old inclosures who have not large enough allotments to pay -their due proportion of the tithe allotments, are to pay a lump sum of -money instead; _unless_ the Commissioners deem it convenient to allot -part of the old inclosures to the tithe owners instead; in which case -the land so set out is to ‘be deemed Part of the Lands to be divided, -allotted, and inclosed by virtue of this Act.’ - -Full equivalent to the Vicar for his Glebe Lands and their right of -Common. - -_For Stone, Gravel_, etc.--From 2 to 3 acres; ‘to be used and enjoyed -in Common’ by proprietors and inhabitants, ‘for the Purpose only of -getting Stone, Gravel, or other Materials for making and repairing the -Roads and Ways within the said Parish.’ Herbage of above to be allotted -to whomsoever Commissioners direct, or for some general, parochial or -other use. - -_To Proprietors of Cottages._--Every proprietor or owner of a cottage -and land of the annual value of £4 or under is to have from 1/2 acre to -2 acres ‘as they the said Commissioners shall think proper.’ - -_Allotment of Residue._--Amongst the various persons interested -according to their respective rights and interests. Allotments to be as -near homestead or old inclosure as conveniently may be. If two or more -persons with allotments of not more than 2 acres each want to have the -same laid together in order to avoid the expence of inclosing, they are -to give notice to the Commissioners, and the Commissioners are then -to put these allotments together ‘and in and by their Award to direct -how and in what manner such small Allotments shall be cultivated, and -in what Manner and Proportion, and with what Cattle the same shall be -stocked, depastured and fed, during the Time the same shall lie open to -each other,’ and if at any time the Major part of proprietors of the -small Allotments wish it, they are to be inclosed. - -Award with full particulars of allotments and of orders and regulations -for putting Act in execution to be drawn up, and to be ‘binding and -conclusive upon and to all Persons, to all Intents and Purposes -whatsoever.’ - -Allotments to be of same tenure as property in virtue of which they are -given. Allotments must be accepted within 6 months; if allottee fails -to accept, the Commissioners can put in a salaried Bailiff or Receiver -to manage allotment till allottee accepts, when any surplus profits are -to be handed over to allottee. (Saving clause for infants, etc.). - - -FENCING.--To be done by respective allottees according to -Commissioners’ directions. - -_Exceptions._--(1) In the case of allotments to Trustees for parochial -or charitable purposes, the Commissioners are to deduct a portion for -these allottees’ share of fencing and expenses. This deducted land -is to be divided amongst other proprietors. The Commissioners do the -fencing. - -(2) Glebe and Tithe Allotments to be fenced by other proprietors, and -the fences to be kept in repair for 7 years at expense of persons named -by the Commissioners. - -If an allottee fails to fence, his neighbour can complain to a J. P. -(not interested) and obtain an order to do it and charge expenses on -allottee, or else enter and receive rents. - -If any allottee has an unfair share of fencing the Commissioners can -equalise matters. No sheep or lambs to be kept in any inclosure for 7 -years, unless special fences are made. No sheep or lambs ever to be -kept in the roads. - - -EXPENSES.--Part of the Common or Waste Land to be sold to defray -expenses. If the money so raised is not sufficient, ‘the deficiency -shall be paid, borne, and defrayed’ by the various proprietors -(excluding the Tithe owners and the Lords of the Manor for their -respective allotments) in such proportion as the Commissioners direct. - -Land may be mortgaged up to 40s. an acre. - -Money advanced for Act to have 5 per cent. interest. - -Commissioners must keep accounts, which must be open to inspection. - - -ROADS.--Commissioners to set out roads, ways and footpaths, all others -to be stopped up. But no turnpike road to be interfered with. - - -COMPENSATION.--Leases at rack-rent to be void; owners paying or -receiving such satisfaction as the Commissioners think right. - -Compensation (under Commissioners’ direction) to be paid by new -allottee to former owner for timber, underwood, etc., or else former -owner can enter and cut down, unless Commissioners direct that trees -etc. are not to be cut. - - -ARRANGEMENTS BETWEEN ACT AND AWARD.--Commissioners to have full power -to direct the course of husbandry. - - -POWER OR APPEAL.--To Quarter Sessions only, and not in cases ‘where the -Orders, Directions and Determinations of the said Commissioners are -directed to be conclusive, binding and final.’ - - -AWARD.--Date, August 24, 1798. With Clerk of Peace or of County -Council, Gloucester. - - -APPENDIX A (3) - -CHESHUNT.--ENCLOSURE ACT, 1799 - - -AREA.--2741 Acres. - - -NATURE OF GROUND.--Common Fields and common Lammas meadows about 1555 -acres; A common called Cheshunt Common about 1186 acres. - - -PARLIAMENTARY PROCEEDINGS.--_February 23, 1799._--Petition for -enclosure from Sir George William Prescott Bt. (Lord of the Manor), the -Rev. Joseph Martin (Tithe owner), Oliver Cromwell, William Tatnall and -others. Leave given. Bill read twice; committed April 25. - -_May 7, 1799._--Petition against the bill from various proprietors of -Lands and Common Rights setting forth ‘That a very great Proportion -of such Open Fields and Commonable Lands are of so bad a Quality, as -to be incapable of any Improvement equivalent to the Expenses of the -Inclosure; and that the said Commons in their present State, are well -fitted for the breeding of Sheep and Support of lean Stock, and that -many of the Inhabitants of the said Parish, who, by reason of their -Residence and Occupation of small Tenements, have Rights of Common, -are enabled, by the lawful Enjoyment of such Common Rights, to support -themselves and their Families; but, as almost all the said Commons lie -at the extreme Edge of the Parish, and are subject to very numerous -and extensive Common Rights, any Allotments of the said Commons to -the lesser Commoners must be too small, and too distant from their -Habitations, to be of any substantial Use to them, which Inconveniences -are now prevented by the Use of general Herdsmen; and that the -Inclosure of the said Open Fields and other Commonable Lands would be, -in many other Respects highly injurious to the Rights and Interests of -the Petitioners.’ Petitioners to be heard before the Committee. All to -have voices. - - -REPORT AND ENUMERATION OF CONSENTS.--_May 24._--Mr. Baker reported -from the Committee that they had heard Counsel for the Petitioners; -that the allegations were true; that the Parties concerned had given -their consent to the bill, and also to the changing of one of the -Commissioners named therein ‘(except the Proprietors of 314 Acres -and 19 Perches of Land, who refused to sign the Bill; and also, the -Proprietors of 408 Acres, 3 Roods and 22 Perches who were neuter; -and that the whole Property belonging to Persons interested in the -Inclosure consists of 6930 Acres, or thereabouts).’ - -Bill passed both Houses. June 13, Royal Assent. - - -MAIN FEATURES OF ACT.--(Private, 39 George III. c. 75.) - - -COMMISSIONERS.--Three appointed. - -(1) John Foakes of Gray’s Inn, Gentleman representing the Lord of the -Manor. - -(2) Richard Davis of Lewknor, Oxford, Gentleman representing the -Impropriator of the Great Tithes. - -(3) Daniel Mumford, of Greville St., Hatton Gardens, Gentleman, -representing the other Proprietors of Estates with Right of Common or a -major part in value. Two to be a quorum. Vacancies to be filled up by -the parties represented from persons not interested in the enclosure. -Surveyor appointed, Henry Craster of Cheshunt. - - -PAYMENT.--Commissioners, Surveyor, and Clerk or Agent to Commissioners -each to have 2 guineas a day for each working day. - - -CLAIMS.--All claims with particulars of tenure, etc., to be handed in -at specified times; claimants must give such particulars ‘as shall be -necessary to describe such Claims with as much Precision as they can.’ -No claim to be received afterwards, unless for some special cause. -Commissioners’ determination on claims to be final and conclusive, if -no objection is made. If objection is made, the objector can (1) try -the matter at law on a feigned issue; or (2) submit the question to 2 -arbitrators, the claimant naming one arbitrator, the objector naming -the other. If the arbitrators disagree, they can name an umpire, whose -decision is final and conclusive. Commissioners can award costs. -Commissioners to have no jurisdiction over matters of title which can -be tried at law. - - -SYSTEM OF DIVISION--SPECIAL PROVISIONS: - -_To Lords of the Manor._--(7 of them.) - -(1) Sir G. W. Prescott of Cheshunt. - -(2) Rev. J. Martin of the Manors of the Rectory of Cheshunt. - -(3) Anne Shaw, widow, of the Manors of Andrews and Le Mott. - -(4) Francis Morland of the Manors of Theobalds, Tongs, Clays, Clarks, -Dareys, Cross-Brookes, and Cullens. - -(5) Robert William Sax, and - -(6) Mary Jane Sax, and - -(7) Joseph Jackson, of the Manors of Beaumont and Perriers. - -So much ‘as shall in the Judgment of the said Commissioners be an -adequate Compensation and Satisfaction’ for their Rights and Interests. - -_Tithe Owners._--One-fifth of arable or tillage, and one-ninth of the -other land to be divided which is subject to tithes. - -Above to be divided between Impropriator of Great Tithes and Vicar. - -For Glebe Lands, a full equivalent. If any owner of old inclosed land -who has no land in the common fields, but possesses a Right of Common -over Cheshunt Common, wishes it, part of his allotment can (with the -tithe owner’s consent) be set aside and given to the tithe owners, and -his Land will be free of tithes for ever. - -_For Stone and Gravel_, etc.--2 Acres, to be used in common by -proprietors and tenants, for their own use and also for the roads. - -_For Cottagers._--An allotment of 100 Acres, exclusive of Roads, to -be vested in the Lord of the Manor, the Vicar, Churchwardens, and -Overseers, ‘for the Use of the Occupiers of Houses or Cottages within -the said Parish already having Right of Common, without more than -One Rood of Land belonging to and used with the same as a Garden or -Orchard, the Yearly Rent of which, at the Time of passing this Act, -shall not exceed Six Pounds, without paying any thing for such Use.’ - -The number of the Houses with their rents and the number of cattle are -to be described in the Award. No one else is to send cattle on to the -100 acres. - -These cottagers are also to have the herbage of the 2-acre allotment -for stone and gravel. - -_Allotment of Residue._--Amongst the various persons interested in -proportion to their various rights and interests, Quantity, Quality, -and Situation considered. - -Small allotments may, on application of allottees, if Commissioners -think proper, be laid together, and enjoyed in common under -Commissioners’ direction. - -Each Copyholder of all the Manors is to have a separate and distinct -allotment. If any allottee is dissatisfied with his allotment, he can -send in a complaint to the Commissioners, who are to hear and determine -the matter; their determination is to be final and conclusive. - -The Award is to be final and conclusive. If any allottee fails to -accept his allotment, or molests another in accepting, he is to be -‘divested of all Right, Estate, and Interest whatsoever’ in the Lands -to be divided. - -The tenure of the allotment to be that of the estate in virtue of which -it is given. - - -INCROACHMENTS.--Not mentioned. - - -FENCING.--Not specifically mentioned, but from clauses _re_ tithe -owners, etc., must be done at allottee’s expense. - -Beasts, cattle, etc., not to be depastured on the new allotments for 7 -years unless special fences made, or a proper person sent to look after -cattle. - -Tithe owners’ allotments to be fenced, and fencing kept in repair for 7 -years by the other proprietors. - -The 100-acre allotment for cottagers to be fenced at the expense of the -owners of the residue of the common. Mortgage up to £2 an acre allowed -for expense of fencing. - - -EXPENSES.--To be borne by all owners and proprietors (except the Rector -and the Vicar, in regard to their Glebe and Tythe Allotments) in -proportion to their shares, at an equal pound rate to be fixed by the -Commissioners. If allottees fail to pay, Commissioners can distrain or -enter and receive rents, etc. - -Commissioners must keep accounts which must be open to inspection. If -they receive more money than is needed, the surplus is to go to the -Poor Rates. - - -COMPENSATION.--All rack-rent leases to be void, the owners giving the -tenants ‘reasonable Satisfaction’; but where it seems more equitable to -the Commissioners, the allotment can be held by the tenant during his -lease at a rent to the owner fixed by the Commissioners. - -Satisfaction for crops and for ploughing, manuring and tilling to be -given by new allottee. - - -ARRANGEMENTS BETWEEN ACT AND AWARD.--Commissioners to have full power -to direct the course of husbandry. - - -ROADS.--Commissioners to have full power to set out and to stop up -roads and footpaths (except that they are not to make them over -‘Gardens, Orchards, Plantations, and other Private Grounds’), and if -ancient footways or paths are stopped up, the owners of old inclosed -land, for whose accommodation it is done, are to pay something towards -the general expenses of the act. - - -POWER OF APPEAL.--To Quarter Sessions only, and not when Commissioners’ -or others’ determination is said to be final and conclusive. - - -AWARD.--Enrolled at Westminster, February 27, 1806. Record Office. - - -MAIN FEATURES OF AWARD:-- - - Whole area divided out including roads, some old - inclosures and homesteads given up to be _a._ _r._ _p._ - allotted, 2,667 2 33 - ------------ - Tithe owners in various allotments including 106 - acres for exonerating old inclosures, and 1-3/4 _a._ _r._ _p._ - acre for Vicar’s Glebe and Right of Common, 474 1 13 - - The Lord of the Manor (Sir G. B. Prescott) and - the trustees of the late Lord of the Manor, - including 38-3/4 acres or 1/18 for manorial rights, 438 0 24 - - Mrs. Anne Shaw, 376 2 7 - Oliver Cromwell, Esq., 107 3 29 - Occupiers of Cottages, 100 0 0 - Gravel Pits, 1 3 13 - -The remainder (excluding roads) is allotted amongst 213 allottees:-- - - From 50-100 acres 4 } - From 30-50 acres 3 } Above 10 acres 23 - From 10-30 acres 16 } - - From 1-10 acres 141 - - From 1/2-1 acre 37 } - From 1/4-1/2 acre 8 } Below 1 acre 49 - Below 1/4 acre 4 } - --- - 213 - --- - -The Award shows that there must have been 86 owners of the 1555 acres -of Open Fields and Lammas Meadows as 86 allottees receive allotments in -lieu of land. Of these 86, 63 receive allotments of under 10 acres in -lieu of their land. (13 from 5-10 acres, 37 from 1-5 acres, 13 below 1 -acre.) - - -AMENDING ACT _re_ the 100 Acres Allotment, 1813. - - -PARLIAMENTARY PROCEEDINGS.--_November 6, 1813._--Petition from the Lord -of the Manor, the Vicar, Churchwardens and Overseers for amending Act. - - -REPORT AND ENUMERATION OF CONSENTS.--_November 20, 1813._--Reported -that the parties concerned had consented except 9 Persons with right of -common who refused, and 3 who were neuter; the total number of persons -having right of common being 183. - - -MAIN FEATURES OF AMENDING ACT.--(Local and Personal, 54 George III. c. -2.) - - -NEW ARRANGEMENTS RESPECTING 100-ACRE ALLOTMENT.--The Commissioners had -set out the 100 Acres for the use of certain occupiers, who were to -be entitled to turn out on May 12 till February 2 either 1 Horse or 2 -Cows or other Neat Cattle, or 7 Sheep; ‘And whereas, partly owing to -the great Extent of the said Parish of Cheshunt, and to the Distance -at which the greater Part of the Cottages or Houses, mentioned in -the Schedule to the said Award, are situated from the said Plot or -Allotment of One hundred Acres, and partly to the Inability of most -of the Occupiers of such Cottages or Houses to maintain or keep any -Horses, Cows, or other Neat Cattle or Sheep, the Persons for whose -Benefit and Advantage such Plot or Allotment of Land was intended, -derive little if any Advantage therefrom; but the Herbage of such Plot -or Allotment of Land is consumed by the Cattle of Persons having no -Right to depasture the same’; it is enacted that the Trustees are to -have power to let out the 100 Acres to one or more tenants for not more -than 21 years, ‘at the best and most improved yearly Rent or Rents -that can at the Time be reasonably had and obtained for the same. The -proceeds of the rents (when expenses are paid, see below) are to be -divided among the occupiers of the houses and cottages mentioned in the -Schedule. - - -EXPENSES.--The Allotment is to be mortgaged up to £500 for the expenses. - -To repay the mortgage £50 is to be set aside from the rents yearly. - -Interest at 5% on the sum borrowed is to be paid from the rents. - - -APPENDIX A (4) - -CROYDON, SURREY.--ENCLOSURE ACT, 1797 - - -AREA.--2950 acres. - - -NATURE OF GROUND.--Open and Common Fields, about 750 acres, Commons, -Marshes, Heaths, Wastes and Commonable Woods, Lands, and Grounds about -2200 acres. - - -PARLIAMENTARY PROCEEDINGS.--_November 7, 1796._--Petition for enclosure -from Hon. Richard Walpole, John Cator, Esq., Richard Carew, Esq., John -Brickwood, Esq., and others. Leave given; bill presented May 8, 1797; -read twice and committed. - -_May 18, 1797._--(1) Petition against the bill from Richard Davis and -others, as prejudicial to their rights and interests; (2) Petition -against it from James Trecothick, Esq. Both petitions to be heard -before Committee. May 26, Petition against the bill from Richard Davis -and others stating ‘that the said Bill goes to deprive the Inhabitants -of the said Parish and the Poor thereof in particular, of certain -ancient Rights and Immunities granted to them (as they have been -informed) by some, or one, of the Predecessors of His present Majesty, -and that the said Bill seems calculated to answer the Ends of certain -Individuals.’ - -Petitioners to be heard when the Bill was reported. - -_June 7._--Petition of various inhabitants of Croydon against the bill; -similar to last petition. To be heard when Bill reported. - - -REPORT AND ENUMERATION OF CONSENTS.--_June 19._--Lord William Russell -reported from the Committee, standing orders complied with, that the -Petitions had been considered, allegations true; parties concerned had -given their consent to the satisfaction of the Committee, ‘(except the -Owners of 230 Acres 2 Roods and 25 Perches of Inclosed Land, and 67 -Acres 1 Rood and 31 Perches of Common Field Land, who refused to sign -the Bill; and also the Owners of 225 Acres 1 Rood and 34 Perches of -Inclosed Land, and 7 Acres 3 Roods and 5 Perches of Common Field Land, -who, on being applied to, returned no Answer; and that the Whole of the -Land consists of 6316 Acres and 37 Perches of Inclosed Land, and 733 -Acres 1 Rood and 39 Perches of Common Field Land, or thereabouts)....’ - -The same day (June 19) petition from various Freeholders, Copyholders, -Leaseholders and Inhabitant Householders of Croydon stating that the -promoters of the bill have named Commissioners without consulting the -persons interested ‘at an open and public meeting,’ and that since -the Archbishop of Canterbury as Lord of the Soil of the Wastes has -named one Commissioner (James Iles of Steyning, Gentleman) the other -two Commissioners ought, ‘in common Justice and Impartiality’ to be -nominated by the proprietors of lands and the Parish at large; and as -they understand that the Tithe owners and other Proprietors wish John -Foakes, named in the bill, to remain a Commissioner, asking leave -to nominate as the third Thomas Penfold of Croydon, Gentleman. Lord -William Russell proposed to recommit the bill in order to consider this -petition, but obtained only 5 votes for his motion against 51. - -The Bill passed Commons. - -In the Lords a Petition was read July 4, 1797, against the Bill from -the Freeholders, Copyholders, Leaseholders and Inhabitant-Freeholders -of Croydon, praying their Lordships, ‘To take their Case into their -most serious Consideration.’ Petition referred to Committee. - -_July 10, 1797._--Bill passed Lords in a House of 4 Peers. (Bishop of -Bristol, Lords Walsingham, Kenyon, and Stewart of Garlies.) - -[3 of these had been members of the Committee of 6 to whom the Bill was -committed.] - -Royal Assent, July 19. - - -MAIN FEATURES OF ACT.--(Private, 37 George III. c. 144.) - - -COMMISSIONERS.--Three appointed. (1) James Iles of Steyning, Sussex; -(2) John Foakes of Gray’s Inn; (3) Thomas Crawter of Cobham, Gentlemen. - -The first represents the Archbishop of Canterbury, Lord of the Manor -of Croydon, the other two represent the proprietors of estates with -right of common (the Archbishop excluded) ‘or the major part in value’ -(such value to be collected from the rentals in land tax assessments). -Vacancies to be filled up by the parties represented. New Commissioners -not to be interested in the inclosure. Two Surveyors appointed by name: -vacancies to be filled up by Commissioners. - - -PAYMENT TO COMMISSIONERS.--2 guineas a day. Surveyors to be paid what -the Commissioners think ‘just and reasonable.’ - - -CLAIMS.--To be delivered in at the meeting or meetings advertised for -the purpose. None to be received after, except for some special cause. -Claimants must send in claims ‘in Writing under their Hands, or the -Hands of their Agents, distinguishing in such Claims the Tenure of the -Estates in respect whereof such Claims are made, and stating therein -such further Particulars as shall be necessary to describe such Claims -with Precision.’ The Commissioners are to hold a meeting to hear and -determine about claims, and if no objections are raised, then their -determination is final and conclusive. If objections are raised, then -any one person whose claim is disallowed, or any three persons who -object to the allowance of some one else’s claim, can proceed to trial -at the Assizes on a feigned issue. The verdict of the trial is to be -final. Due notice of trial must be given and the allotment suspended. -The Commissioners cannot determine on questions of title which may -still be tried at law. - - -SYSTEM OF DIVISION--SPECIAL PROVISIONS: - -_Provisions for Lord of the Manor._--The Archbishop of Canterbury is -Lord of the Manor of Croydon and also of Waddon, and there are six -other Lords whose manors lie either wholly or partly within the parish, -_i.e._ (1) Robert Harris, Esq., of Bermondsey; (2) Richard Carew, -Esq., of Norbury; (3) John Cator, Esq., of Bensham; (4) William Parker -Hamond, Esq., of Haling; (5) James Trecothick, Esq., of Addington, -otherwise Temple, who also claims for Bardolph and Bures. (6) The -Warden and Poor of the Hospital of Holy Trinity (Whitgift Foundation) -of Croham. Each of these 7 Lords is to have one-eighteenth of the -Commons and Wastes lying within his Manor. But whereas James Trecothick -claims some quit-rents in the Manor of Croydon, if he makes good his -claim to the Commissioners, then the Archbishop’s eighteenth is to be -divided between James Trecothick and the Archbishop, and this is to -be taken by James Trecothick as his whole share as Lord of a Manor. -The Archbishop can also have part of Norwood Common in lieu of his due -share of Norwood woodlands. - -Manorial rights, save Right of Soil, continue as before. - -Compensation for the timber in Norwood Woodlands is to be fixed by the -Commissioners and paid by the allottees to the Archbishop. - -_Provision for Tithe Owners._--For Rectorial Tithes, such parcel or -parcels as Commissioners judge to be full equivalent. - -Whereas the Archbishop claims that Norwood Woodlands (295 acres) -are exempt from all tithes, this claim is to be determined by the -Commissioners or at law, and if not found good, another parcel to be -set out as full equivalent. - -But the tithe allotments in all are not to equal in value more than -one-ninths of the Commons, marshes etc. - -For Vicar’s tithes over Norwood Common, an equivalent parcel of land. - -_Provisions for the Poor._--If the inhabitants of Croydon prove their -claim to Rights of Common on Norwood Common, and in Norwood Commonable -Woods to the satisfaction of the Commissioners, or before a Court (if -it is tried at law) then the Commissioners are to set out from the -Commons, Wastes, etc., as much land as they judge to be equivalent to -such right, ‘having particular Regard to the Accommodation of Houses -and Cottages contiguous to the said Commons, etc.,’ and this land is -to remain common, for the use of the inhabitants of Croydon, subject -to the right of getting gravel from it. Suppose, however, that the -inhabitants’ claim is not allowed, or if allowed does not equal 215 -acres of common in value: even then the Commissioners are to set out -215 acres for the above purpose. These 215 acres are to be vested in -the Vicar, Churchwardens, Overseers, and 6 Inhabitants chosen at a -Vestry meeting. These trustees can inclose as much as a seventh part -and let it on lease for 21 years. They are to manage the common with -regard to stint, etc., and to dispose of rents. - -_Allotment of Residue._--The open common fields, commons, marshes, -etc., to be divided amongst the several persons ‘according to their -respective Rights and Interests,’ due regard being paid to Quality, -Quantity, and Situation, and the allotments being placed as near the -Homesteads, etc., as is consistent with general convenience. - -All houses erected 20 years and more before the Act, and the Sites of -all such houses to be considered as ancient messuages entitled to right -of common, with the exception of houses built on encroachments, the -owners of which are to have whatever allotment the Commissioners think -fair and reasonable. - -The Commissioners are to give notice of a place where a schedule -of allotments can be inspected and of a meeting where objections -can be heard. The Commissioners are to hear complaints, but their -determination is to be binding and conclusive on all parties. - -When the award is drawn up ‘the said Allotments, Partitions, Divisions, -and Exchanges, and all Orders, and Directions, Penalties, Impositions, -Regulations and Determinations so to be made as aforesaid, in and by -such Award or Instrument, shall be, and are hereby declared to be -final, binding and conclusive unto and upon all Persons interested in -the said Division and Inclosure.’ Persons who refuse to accept within -an appointed time, or who molest others who accept, are ‘divested of -all Right of Possession, Right of Pasturage and Common, and all other -Right, Estate and Interest whatsoever in the allotments.’ Allotments -are to be of the same tenure as the estates in right of which they are -given. Copyhold allotments in the Manors of Croydon and Waddon can be -enfranchised by the Commissioners at the request of the allottees, a -part of such allotments being deducted and given to the Archbishop for -compensation. Allotments may be laid together if the different owners -wish it. - - -INCROACHMENTS.--Those made within 6 months not to count. Those of 20 -years old and over to remain with present possessor, but not to confer -right to an allotment. - -Encroachments under 20 years old, (1) if the encroacher has a right to -an allotment, then it shall be given to him as whole or part of that -allotment (not reckoning the value of buildings and improvements); -(2) if the allotment to which he has a right is unequal in value to -the encroachment, or if he has no right to an allotment, he can pay -the surplus or the whole price at the rate of £10 an acre; (3) if the -encroacher cannot or will not purchase, the Commissioners are to allot -him his encroachment for which he is to pay rent at the rate of 12s. -an acre a year for ever, such rent being apportioned to whomever the -Commissioners direct as part of their allotment. - -Provisions are also made for giving encroachers allotments elsewhere -instead, in certain cases. - - -FENCING.--To be done by allottees. If the proportion of fencing to -be done by any allottee is unfair, the Commissioners have power to -equalise it. _Exception._--(1) The allotment to Rector for Tithes which -is to be fenced at the expense of or by the person or persons whom the -Commissioners appoint; (2) The allotments belonging to certain estates -leased out at reserved rents by the Archbishop and by Trinity Hospital -for 21 years, are to be fenced by the lessees; to compensate lessees -new leases are to be allowed; (3) Allotments to Charity Estates (except -Trinity Hospital) are to have a part deducted from them and be fenced -by the Commissioners. If any proprietor refuses to fence, his neighbour -can, on complaint to a J.P., obtain an order or an authorisation to -enter, do the fencing, and take the rents till it is paid for. - -Guard fences to protect the quickset are allowed. - -_Penalty for damaging fences_ from 40s. to £10. The owner of the -damaged fence may give evidence. Half the penalty goes to the informer -and half to the owner. But if the owner informs, the whole penalty goes -to the Overseer. - -Estates may be mortgaged up to 40s. an acre to meet expenses of -fencing. Roads are not to be depastured for 10 years. - - -EXPENSES.--To meet all expenses (including the lawsuits on feigned -issues) part of the Commons, Wastes, etc., are to be sold by public -auction. Private sales are also authorised, but no one person may buy -privately more than 2 acres; except that if James Trecothick, Esq., so -wishes, the Commissioners are to sell him by private contract part of -Addington Hills at what they judge a fair and reasonable price. - -Any surplus is to be paid to the Highways or Poor Rates within 6 months -after award. Commissioners are to keep Accounts, which must be open to -Inspection. - -Common Rights and Interests may be sold before the execution of the -award by allottees except the Archbishop, the Vicar, Trinity Hospital, -and Trustees for Charitable purposes. - - -COMPENSATION TO OCCUPIERS.--In the case of leases at rack-rent the -Commissioners are to set out the allotment to the owner, but the owner -is to pay fair compensation to the tenant for loss of right of common, -either by lowering his rent or by paying him a gross sum of money as -the Commissioners direct. _Exception._--If the Commissioners think it a -more equitable course they may allot the allotment to the tenant during -his lease, and settle what extra rent he shall pay in respect of the -owner’s expense in fencing, etc. - -Satisfaction for crops, ploughing, tilling, manuring, etc. is to be -given in cases where the ground is allotted to a new possessor. - - -ROADS.--Commissioners have power to set out and shut up roads (turnpike -roads excluded), footpaths, etc., but if they shut up a footpath -through old inclosed land, the person for whose benefit it is shut is -to pay such compensation as the Commissioners decide, the money going -towards the Expenses of the Act. - - -POWER OF APPEAL.--To Quarter Sessions only, and not in cases, _e.g._ -claims and allotment, where the Commissioners’ decisions are final and -conclusive or a provision for trial at law is made. - - -ARRANGEMENTS BETWEEN ACT AND AWARD.--As soon as the Act is passed the -Commissioners are to have sole direction of the course of husbandry. -Exception.--They are not to interfere with Thomas Wood and Peter Wood, -Gentlemen, in their cultivation of such parts of the common fields of -Waddon as are leased to them by the Archbishop. (Four years of the -lease are still to run.) - - -AWARD.--Date, March 2, 1801. Clerk of Peace or of County Council, -Surrey. - - -AMENDING ACT, 1803.--(Private, 43 George III. c. 53.) - -Passed in response to a petition (February 16, 1803) from the Vicar, -Churchwardens, Overseers, and other inhabitants of Croydon, stating -that whereas the Commissioners have set out 237 acres 2 roods for the -inhabitants of Croydon, instead of 215 acres, doubts have arisen as to -whether this land is vested in trustees as was directed to be done with -the 215 acres. - - -MAIN FEATURES.--The 237 acres 2 roods to be treated as the 215 acres. -Land up to 5 acres to be sold to defray cost of this new Act; any -surplus to go to Use and Benefit of Poor, any deficit to be made up by -rents or sale of gravel. - - -NOTE ON RESULTS.--Third Report of Select Committee on Emigration, -1826-7, p. 369. Dr. Benjamin Wills stated that as the result of the -loss of common rights suffered under the Bill, he had seen some 900 -persons summoned for the Poor Rate. ‘By the destruction of the common -rights, and giving no remuneration to the poor man, a gentleman has -taken an immense tract of it and converted it into a park: a person in -the middling walk of life has bought an acre or two; and though this -common in its original state was not so valuable as it has been made, -yet the poor man should have been consulted in it; and the good that it -was originally to him was of such a nature that, destroying that, has -had an immense effect.’ - - -APPENDIX A (5) - -HAUTE HUNTRE, LINCS.--ENCLOSURE ACT, 1767 - - -AREA.--22,000 Acres ‘more or less.’ - - -NATURE OF GROUND.--Haute Huntre, Eight Hundred or Holland Fen and other -commonable places adjacent. - -Owners and Proprietors of Houses and Toftsteads in the following 11 -Parishes or Townships have Right of Common:--Boston West, Skirbeck -Quarter, Wyberton, Frampton, Kirton, Algarkirke, Fosdyke, Sutterton, -Wigtoft, Swineshead, and Brothertoft; and also in a place called Dog -Dyke in the Parish of Billinghay. - - -PARLIAMENTARY PROCEEDINGS.--_December 4, 1766._--Petition for enclosure -from various owners and proprietors with right of common, asking that -the fen shall be divided up into specific allotments for each Town. -Leave given. Bill read first time, December 9. - -_March 4, 1767._--Long petition against the bill from (1) the Master, -Fellows and Scholars of Trinity College, Cambridge, which College -is Impropriator of the Great Tythes, and Patron of the Vicarage of -Swineshead, (2) the Rev. John Shaw, Patron and Rector of Wyberton, (3) -Zachary Chambers, Esq., Lord of the Manor of Swineshead, and others. -The petition gave a history of the movement for enclosure. On August -26, 1766, a meeting of several gentlemen and others was held at the -Angel Inn, Sleaford, at which a resolution was passed that a Plan or -Survey of the fen with a return of the Houses etc., with Right of -Common should be made before a bill was brought in. On October 16, -1766, a public meeting of several proprietors was held at Sleaford at -which some of those present proposed to read a bill for dividing and -inclosing the fen; the great majority however of those present objected -to this course, and requested and insisted that as no Survey had been -produced, nothing further should be done till the following spring, -‘but notwithstanding the said Request, some few of the said Proprietors -then present proposed that a Petition for the said Bill might then be -signed; which Proposition being rejected by a considerable Majority, -the said few Proprietors declared their Resolution to sign such a -Petition, as soon as their then Meeting was broke up, without any -Resolutions being concluded upon, or the Sentiments of the Majority of -the Proprietors either entered down or paid any Regard to, and without -making any Adjournment of the said Meeting; and that, soon after the -said Meeting broke up, some of the Proprietors present at the said -Meeting signed the Petition, in consequence of which the said Bill hath -been brought in.’ The petitioners also pointed out that the petition -for enclosure was signed by very few proprietors except those in Boston -West, and requested that no further measures should be taken till next -session, and that meanwhile the Survey in question should be made, and -suggested that the present bill was in many respects exceptionable, and -asked to be heard by Counsel against the bill as it now stood. Petition -to lie on table till second reading. - -_March 6, 1767._--Bill read second time and committed. Petition -referred to Committee. - -_March 21._--Petition against the bill from Sir Charles Frederick, -Knight of the Bath, sole owner of Brothertoft, where there are 51 -Cottages or Toftsteads with right of common. Referred to Committee. - -_March 27._--Petition against the bill from Sir Gilbert Heathcote, -Bart. and others; bill injurious to interests. Referred to Committee. - - -REPORT AND ENUMERATION OF CONSENTS.--_April 29, 1767._--Lord Brownlow -Bertie reported from the Committee; Committee had heard Counsel in -favour of the first petition and considered the other two; that the -Allegations of the Bill were true; and that the Parties concerned had -given their consent to the Bill to the satisfaction of the Committee -‘(except 94 Persons with Right of Common and Property of the Annual -Value of £3177, 2s. 6d. who refused, and except 53 Persons with Right -of Common and Property of the Annual Value of £694, 10s. who could not -be found, and except 40 Persons with Right of Common and Property of -the Annual Value of £1310, 0s. 6d. who declared they were indifferent, -and that the whole Number of Persons with Right of Common is 614, and -the whole Property of the Annual Value of £23,347, 8s.).’ Several -amendments were made in the Bill and it was sent up to the Lords. -In the Lords, petitions against it were received from Sir Gilbert -Heathcote (May 7) and Samuel Reynardson, Esq. (May 14), both of which -were referred to the Committee. Several amendments were made, including -the insertion of a clause giving the Proprietors or Occupiers the same -right of common over the Parish allotment as they already had over the -whole. Royal Assent, June 29, 1767. - - -MAIN FEATURES OF ACT.--(Private, 7 George III. c. 112.) - - -COMMISSIONERS.--Five are to be appointed; they are to be chosen by -eleven persons, each representing one of the eleven townships. These -eleven persons are to be elected in each township by the owners and -proprietors of Houses, Toftsteads, and Lands which formerly paid -Dyke-reeve assessments; except in the case of Brothertoft, where Sir -Charles Frederick, as sole owner and proprietor, nominates the person. -No person interested in the inclosure is to be chosen as Commissioner, -and in addition to the usual oath of acting ‘without favour or -affection’ the Commissioners are required to take the following oath:-- - -‘I, A. B., do swear, that I am neither Proprietor nor Occupier of, -nor, to the best of my Knowledge, am I concerned as Guardian, Steward -or Agent for any Proprietor of any Houses, Toftsteads, or Lands within -any of the Parishes of’ (names given) ‘or for any Person to whom any -Allotment is to be made by virtue of the said Act.’ - -Three Commissioners are a quorum. Vacancies are to be filled by the -11 persons elected as before. If they fail to do so, the remaining -Commissioners can nominate. Survey to be made by persons appointed -by the Commissioners, and number of present Houses and Toftsteads to -be recorded except in Boston West and Brothertoft. Edward Draper of -Boston, Gentleman, to be Clerk. - - -PAYMENT.--Commissioners each to have £210 and no more. Two guineas to -be deducted for each day’s absence. - - -CLAIMS.--Nothing is said about sending in claims, as the survey giving -the Houses, etc., does instead. If any difference or dispute arise -between parties interested in the division with respect to shares, -rights, interests, and proportions, the Commissioners are to hear them, -and their determination is to be binding and conclusive. - - -SYSTEM OF DIVISION--SPECIAL PROVISIONS: - -_To Lords of the Manor._--Zachary Chambers, Esq., is Lord of the Manor -of Swineshead; Charles Anderson Pelham, Esq., is Lord of the Manor of -Frampton. These two are intitled jointly to the soil of the fen, and -Charles Anderson Pelham, Esq., is also intitled ‘to the Brovage or -Agistment’ of 480 head of cattle on the fen every year. - -(1) Zachary Chambers, Esq., is to have 120 Acres in one piece in a part -called Brand End in lieu of his rights of soil and of all mines and -quarries of what nature whatsoever. - -(2) Charles Anderson Pelham, Esq., is to have 120 Acres in one piece, -near Great Beets, for his rights of soil and of mines and quarries.[492] - -Charles Anderson Pelham, Esq., is also to have in lieu of his right of -Brovage a parcel of the same number of acres that were given by an Act -of 9 James I. to the Lords of the Manor of Swineshead for Brovage. - -_Tithe Owners._--Not mentioned. - -_Allotment of Residue._--After part has been sold for expenses (see -below) and after allotment to the Lords of the Manor, the residue is -to be divided amongst the eleven townships and Dog Dyke in proportion -and according to the number of Houses and Toftsteads in each parish. -For Brothertoft and Dog Dyke there are special arrangements; in -the ten remaining townships or parishes, the following method is -to be pursued:--For each House or Tenement there must be 4 acres, -and for each Toftstead 2 acres allowed; when this proportion has -been set out, the remainder is to be shared out in proportion to -the Dyke-reeve assessments before the passing of a recent drainage -Act. Quantity, Quality, and Situation are to be considered. _Special -provision._--Boston West is to have the same proportion of fen as -Frampton. - -The share that each of the above ten townships receives is to be the -common fen belonging to the township or parish, subject to the same -common rights as the present fen, and is to be contiguous to the -township. - -_Brothertoft and Dog Dyke allotments._--The allotment for Brothertoft -is to be half as many acres as are allotted to Boston West, and is to -go to Sir Charles Frederick, sole owner and proprietor, and to be near -Brothertoft. - -The Allotment to Dog Dyke is to be calculated in reference to the share -that Brothertoft receives. Each House or Toftstead in Dog Dyke is to -have 2/3 of the proportion that each House or Toftstead in Brothertoft -is assigned. The Dog Dyke Allotment is to go to Earl Fitzwilliam, the -sole owner, and is to be near the Earl’s gardens. - -If any half-year lands, and other inclosed lands, directed to be sold -(see Expenses) remain unsold, these are to be sold and the leases are -to be allotted to the parishes in such proportions as the Commissioners -direct. - -An award is to be drawn up and its provisions are binding and -conclusive. - - -FENCING.--Each township’s share is to be divided by an 8-feet wide -ditch and a quick hedge, and guarded with a fence and rail 4-1/2 feet -high, with double bars of fir or deal and with oak posts; the fence -and the rail are to be nailed or mortified together. The Commissioners -do this fencing out of the money raised for defraying the expenses of -the Act, but each township is to keep up its fences according to the -Commissioners’ directions. The fences, etc., are to be made within 18 -months. - -_Penalty_ for wilfully and maliciously cutting, breaking down, burning, -demolishing, or destroying any division fence: - - 1st offence (before 2 J.P.’s), fine of £5 to £20, or from 1 to 3 - months in House of Correction. - - 2nd offence (before 2 J.P.’s), fine of £10 to £40, or from 6 to 12 - months in House of Correction. - - 3rd offence (before Quarter Sessions), transportation for 7 years as a - felon. - - -EXPENSES.--To defray all expenses the Commissioners can-- - -(1) sell the Right of Acreage or Common upon certain specified -half-year lands,[493] _e.g._ The Frith, Great Beets, Little Beets, the -Mown Rakes, etc., to the owners and proprietors of these lands. If the -owners refuse to buy or do not pay enough to cover the expenses of the -Act, the Commissioners can-- - -(2) sell part of the Fen. In this case the first land to be sold is -Coppin Sykes Plot, Ferry Corner Plot, Pepper Gowt Plot, and Brand End -Plot; the next land, Gibbet Hills. - -As Coppin Sykes Plot, etc., belong to the Commissioners of two Drainage -Acts, the drainage Commissioners can as compensation charge rates on -the respective townships instead, and if any township refuses to pay, -they can inclose a portion of its allotment, but not for tillage. - -_Penalty for taking turf or sod_ after Act. - -Culprit can be tried before one J.P., and fined from 40s. to £10, -or, if he or she fails to pay, be given hard labour in the House of -Correction for 1 to 3 months, or till the penalty is paid. Notice of -this penalty is to be fixed on Church and Chapel Doors and published in -newspapers. - - -POWER OF APPEAL.--To Quarter Sessions only, and not in cases where the -Commissioners’ decisions are said to be final and conclusive. - - -AWARD.--Date, May 19, 1769. With Clerk of Peace or County Council, -Lincoln. - -From _Annual Register_, 1769, p. 116 (Chronicle for July 16): - -‘Holland Fen, in Lincolnshire, being to be inclosed by act of -parliament, some desperate persons have been so incensed at what they -called their right being taken from them, that in the dead of night -they shot into the windows of several gentlemen whom they thought -active in procuring the act for inclosure; but happily no person has -been killed.’ - - -AMENDING ACT, 1770. - - -PARLIAMENTARY PROCEEDINGS.--_January 25, 1770._--Petition for an -amending Act from the Commissioners who carried out the previous one; -stating that ‘the Posts and Rails for many Miles in the Division -Fences, which have been erected pursuant to the Directions of the said -Act, have been pulled down, and the greatest Part thereof destroyed, -together with great Part of the Materials for completing the said -Fencing,’ and asking for leave to take down the Fencing and to make -wide ditches instead. - -Leave given. Bill passed both Houses and received Royal Assent. - - -MAIN FEATURES OF AMENDING ACT.--(Private, 10 George III. c. 40.) - -The Commissioners are empowered to take down the posts and rails, and -to make ditches 10 feet wide and 5 feet deep as boundaries instead. - -The Posts and Rails are to be sold, and the proceeds are to defray -the expenses of this Act and the costs of the Commissioners. The -Commissioners are to have a sum of £31, 10s. each as payment, with 2 -guineas deducted for each day’s absence. - -Edward Draper, Clerk to the Commissioners, is to be repaid up to £1000, -his costs in prosecuting fence-destroyers. - -If any proprietor has already made ditches wide enough, he is to be -repaid his proportion. - -Any surplus is to be handed over to Drainage Commissioners. - - -NOTES:-- - - Act. Award. - Boston West division was enclosed in 1771 1772 - Algarkirke cum Fosdyke „ 1771 - Frampton „ „ „ 1784 - Kirton „ „ „ 1772 1773 - Skirbeck „ „ „ 1771 1772 - Swineshead „ „ „ 1773 1774 - Sutterton „ „ „ 1772 1773 - Wigtoft „ „ „ 1772 1773 - Wyberton „ „ „ 1789 - - -APPENDIX A (6) - -KNARESBOROUGH FOREST.--ENCLOSURE ACT, 1770 - - -AREA.--About 20,000 acres. - - -NATURE OF GROUND.--Open, Commonable or Waste Lands. - - -PARLIAMENTARY PROCEEDINGS.--_February 8, 1770._--Petition for enclosure -from several freehold and copyhold tenants within the Forest; stating -that the said tracts are of little advantage now, whereas it would -be of public utility to have them divided into just allotments and -enclosed. Leave given, bill presented, read twice, March 19; committed -March 28. Petition against the bill from ‘a very great Number of the -Freeholders, and Customary or Copyhold Tenants having Right of Common,’ -stating that the bill contains provisions very injurious to the -petitioners and others. Referred to the Committee. - - -REPORT AND ENUMERATION OF CONSENTS.--_May 7, 1770._--Lord Strange -reported from the Committee that the allegations of the bill were true, -that no person had appeared before the Committee to oppose the bill, -and that ‘the Parties concerned had given their Consent’ ‘(except the -Proprietors of Land in the Seven Lower Constableries, assessed to -the Land Tax at £47, 2s. 3d. per Annum, and the Proprietors of Land -in the Four Higher Constableries assessed to the Land Tax at £118, -3s. 6-3/4d., and that the whole of the Assessment in the Seven Lower -Constableries, and for Estates of several Persons adjoining, being -within the District called the Forest, in virtue whereof Right of -Common is enjoyed, amounts to £497, 1s. 4-1/2d., and in the Four High -Hamlets to £183, 9s. 8d.).’ - -The bill passed both Houses and received the Royal Assent on May 19. - - -MAIN FEATURES OF ACT.--(Private, 10 George III. c. 94.) - - -COMMISSIONERS.--Five appointed. William Hill of Tadcaster, Gentleman; -Joseph Butter of Bowthorp, Surveyor; William Chippendale of Ripley, -Surveyor; John Flintoff of Boroughbridge, Surveyor; Thomas Furness of -Otley, Gentleman. Vacancies to be filled up by remaining Commissioners. -Three are a quorum. - - -ARBITRATORS.--Nine appointed by name. Two can act. Vacancies to be -filled up by Commissioners from barristers. - - -SURVEYORS.--Three named, two of them are also Commissioners. Vacancies -to be filled up by Commissioners. - - -PAYMENT TO COMMISSIONERS, ARBITRATORS AND SURVEYORS.--Nothing stated. - - -CLAIMS.--All claims to be delivered in at the first, second or third -meeting; claims must be in writing and must specify and contain ‘an -Account and Description of the Messuage or Messuages, antient Building -or Buildings, and Lands’ in respect of which the claim is made, and -also the name or names of the person or persons in actual possession. -For a month after the third meeting all claims are to be open to the -inspection of other claimants. Failure to deliver in ‘such Writing and -Account as aforesaid’ at the first three meetings debars the would-be -claimant from all right to allotment, ‘Infancy, Coverture, Lunacy, or -any other general legal Impediment whatsoever of or in any such Person -in anywise notwithstanding.’ - -If claims are duly made and no objection raised to them by any -person, they are to be allowed finally and conclusively at the -fourth meeting; and no right so allowed can be disputed afterwards. -Supposing objections are made by any two other claimants or by any -Commissioner present, then the matter is to be referred to two or more -of the arbitrators whose decision is to be final and conclusive. If -unreasonable, unjust, frivolous or vexatious claims or objections are -made, the Arbitrators can assess the costs on the maker. - -In deciding on claims, 40 years’ enjoyment of commonage is to be -considered to confer a right, when it is enjoyed in respect of owning -ancient messuages, etc., whether situated within or without the limits -of the Forest (save and except in respect of Commonage by Vicinage). - -The quantity and the value of the lands in virtue of which claims are -made, are to be adjudged by the Commissioners, and such judgment is to -be final and conclusive, but no ancient Messuage or Building or Scite -thereof is to be allowed at greater value than any other. - -Disputes between landlords and tenants are to be referred to the -Arbitrators, and their award is to be final and conclusive. - - -SYSTEM OF DIVISION--SPECIAL PROVISIONS: - -_Provisions for the Lord of the Manor_ (the King).--(1) One-tenth part -of the whole, after allotments for Stone Quarries, watering places -and roads have been deducted; ‘the said Tenth Part to consist of a -proportionable Share of the best and worst kind of Land as near as may -be.’ - -(2) All incroachments made within 40 years, and held by persons not -entitled to right of common; but see Incroachments. - -(3) The King’s rights to Mines, Minerals, and Quarries (except Stone -Quarries) are not to be prejudiced, but he or his lessee is to pay -reasonable satisfaction for any damage done, such satisfaction to -be determined by 2 or more J.P.’s, or, if the parties are still -dissatisfied, by a Jury of 12. - -_Provisions for Tithe Owners._--Such portions as the Commissioners -shall adjudge to be ‘full Recompence and Satisfaction.’ - -_For Stone Quarries, Watering Places, and Roads._--Such allotment as -the Commissioners think requisite. - -_For Harrogate Stray._--‘Whereas there are within the constableries -of Bilton with Harrowgate and Beckwith with Rosset, or One of them, -certain Wells or Springs of medicinal Waters, commonly called -Harrowgate Spaws, to which during the Summer Season great Numbers of -Persons constantly resort to receive the Benefit of the said Waters -to the great Advantage and Emolument of Tradesmen, Farmers, and other -Persons in that Neighbourhood, and the Persons resorting to the said -Waters now have the Benefit of taking the Air upon the open Part of -the said Constableries,’ it is enacted that 200 acres of land near the -said springs shall be set apart and left free and open for ever. The -Freeholders and Copyholders within the said Constableries are to have -right of pasture on these 200 acres, the stint being regulated by the -Commissioners, and such right of common being taken as part of their -respective allotments. - -_For the Poor._--None. - -_Allotment of Residue._--To be allotted to the Persons entitled to -commonage ‘in Proportion to the real Value of their several and -respective Messuages, Lands, and Tenements’ in respect of which they -are entitled. Quality and situation to be considered in settling the -Quantum. Allotments must be accepted within six months after award (see -also Fencing). - -Award to be drawn up with all particulars, but nothing is specifically -said about its being final. It is to be Evidence in Courts of Law. - -Stone Quarries are to be vested in the landholders. Allotments to -be of the same tenure as the property in virtue of which they are -given. Timber is to belong to copyholders as if they were freeholders. -Disputes arising in the execution of the Act, which do not affect the -persons in general interested in the Inclosure, can, if all the Parties -concerned in the particular dispute wish it, be referred to some other -Arbitrator or Arbitrators not mentioned in the Act, and his or their -decision is to be final. - - -INCROACHMENTS.--(1) Incroachments 40 years old and upwards, with all -buildings thereon, to be absolute property of persons in possession; -but Copyhold. - -(2) Incroachments made within 40 years. - -(_a_) If incroachers are also owners who have a right of common, then -the incroachments are to be given as their respective allotments -(reckoning the value of the land only). If any particular incroachment -is bigger than the allotment to which the incroacher is entitled, the -surplus ground is to be treated as ordinary distributable ground. - -(_b_) If incroachers are not entitled to right of common, then their -incroachments, together with all the buildings on them, are to go -to the King as Lord of the Manor; But whereas these incroachments -‘consist chiefly of Buildings and Inclosures which have been erected -and inclosed, or are held and enjoyed by poor Persons who have, by -their own Industry and Labour, built and improved the same, or by -Persons who have been at considerable Charges therein,’ His Majesty -is graciously pleased to grant Leases for 40 years in possession, ‘to -the End no Person whatsoever may be removed from or deprived of his, -her, or their present Possessions.’ These leases are to hold good even -though not amounting to one-third of the improved annual value of the -incroachments. After 40 years, full rents must be taken. _Exception_ to -(2 _b_).--Small incroachments made for Workhouses, for cottages of Poor -chargeable to the Parish, or for Free Schools, are to be assigned to -Trustees for benefit of the users. - -In spite of above provisions any Incroachments which the Commissioners -think fit can be set out for roads, ditches, or fences, etc. - - -FENCING.--In the paragraph about selling land for expenses it says -that the Ring fences to be made by Commissioners, but elsewhere it -says fencing to be done by allottees under Commissioners’ directions. -_Exception._--Tithe allotments which are to be fenced by other -proprietors, and certain other cases. If allottees do not fence, -Commissioners do it for them and charge. If any persons think their -allotments not worth fencing, then two or more of them whose allotments -are contiguous can agree to leave them unenclosed, provided that within -12 months they set up a good stone wall or other substantial Fence -between their allotments and those of others. They must keep this wall -or fence in repair always. - -No sheep or goats to be kept for 7 years in any Inclosure adjoining a -boundary fence, unless a special wall or Pale-fence is provided. - - -EXPENSES.--To be defrayed by sale at auction of parcels of land. -Any surplus to be distributed amongst allottees in proportion to -allotments. But if a Majority in Value of the persons interested do -not wish any land sold, they can signify the same in writing, and can -deposit a sufficient sum of money for the purposes of the Act with the -Commissioners, and then the provisions for sale cease. Mortgages, in -certain cases up to 50s. an acre, to meet expenses are allowed. - - -ROADS.--In Award, Commissioners are to give orders for laying out -roads, etc. - - -COMPENSATION TO OCCUPIERS.--None. - - -POWER OF APPEAL.--To Quarter Sessions only, and not in cases where -decisions are said to be final and conclusive. - - -AWARD.--June 25, 1775. Duchy of Lancaster. - - -AMENDING ACT, 1774.--(Private, 14 George III. c. 54.) - - -PARLIAMENTARY PROCEEDINGS.--_February 21, 1774._--Petition from Sir -Bellingham Graham, Bart., Walter Masterman, Esq., and others stating -that the land to defray expenses is not yet sold, and asking for -an amending Act to enable the Petitioners and others to pay their -respective shares instead of the land being sold. Leave given and -bill brought in. March 23, 1774, Petition from Mary Denison of Leeds, -widow, and her heirs, who had ‘neglected to deliver her Claim of Common -Right within the Time limited by the said Act, of which Neglect the -Petitioners were not acquainted till after the Third Meeting of the -Commissioners; soon after which the Petitioners caused a Claim to be -made and delivered, but the said Commissioners refused to accept the -same,’ asking for relief. Petition referred to the Committee, with -instructions that they have power to make provision in the bill. - -_March 25._--Petition from several persons asking relief on same -grounds as Ellen Oxley (see April 15 below). - -Petition from various persons asking that their allotments may be near -within their townships. - -_April 14._--Petition from Daniel Lascelles, Esq., Sir Savile Slingsby, -Oliver Coghill, Esq., and the Rev. William Roundell stating that -they sent in claims as owners of rights of common; that these claims -were referred to the Arbitrators; and that ‘it was discovered that -Mistakes were made in the Description of such Tenements, or some Parts -therof; and that, notwithstanding the said Errors arose merely from -Inadvertency, and in no respect altered the Merits of the Petitioners’ -Claims, the Arbitrators did not think fit to permit the Petitioners to -rectify the same,’ but disallowed the claims. The Petitioners ask for -reconsideration. - -_April 15._--Petitions from Rev. Thomas Collins who through -‘Inadvertency’ had neglected to deliver in his claim of common right in -respect of two Copyhold Messuages within the specified time, and from -Francis Bedford, ditto, _re_ copyhold close. - -_April 15._--Petition from Ellen Oxley and John Clarke, stating that -they preferred claims of common rights to the Commissioners; that -these claims were objected to and referred to the Arbitrators, who -heard divers claims, several of which they disallowed; that as Ellen -Oxley and John Clarke could not produce such evidence as was required -by the Arbitrators in support of their claims, they withdrew them; -that subsequently a Verdict was produced and read in evidence to the -Arbitrators, by means of which similar claims were allowed. - -Bill passed both Houses. Royal Assent. - - -MAIN FEATURES OF AMENDING ACT.--(Private, 14 George III. c. 54.) - -New Commissioner added, Richard Richardson (who was one of the -Surveyors under the former Act). - - -EXPENSES.--Commissioners can set out allotments without abatement for -sale to 48 persons named, and other allottees who give notice. In the -case of these allottees, the Commissioners are to settle their quota of -charges and assess them accordingly. - -The Commissioners in rendering their account may charge one guinea -a day for loss of time, and 10s. a day for expenses. The surveyors’ -charges must be ‘reasonable and moderate.’ The Commissioners must give -an account before they call for payment, and the account is to be open -to inspection at the charge of 6d. - - -CLAIMS.--The claims of 32 persons named, which have been disallowed -or withdrawn (1) for want of evidence; (2) for misnomers; (3) for -failure to deliver in time, are to be reconsidered. Such claims must -be delivered in at the first meeting, and must not be greater than -they were before. They can be referred on appeal to the Arbitrators as -before, but the appellant must now give security for costs in case the -appeal fails. - - -INCROACHMENTS.--As some encroachments of over 40 years standing are -found to have no right of common (and so cannot contribute their share -to the Tithe Allotment), tithes can be charged on these in the form of -rent charges. - - -POWER OF APPEAL.--To Quarter Sessions in respect of the Commissioners’ -accounts, if any person interested thinks any item unreasonable, and no -satisfactory explanation is forthcoming. - - -AWARD (for 2 Acts).--June 25, 1775. Duchy of Lancaster. - -From the Award we learn as follows:-- - -Over 2751 Acres were sold to meet the expenses of the Act. - -The King received 2344 acres. - -The tithe owners received 4694 acres odd. - -The remainder was divided amongst over 700 different persons and -bodies. The allottees’ shares varied from as much as 1386 acres -(Devisees of Sir John Ingelby, Bart.) down to a few perches. - -The amount that went to trustees for the use of the poor, including the -various small incroachments (for schools, workhouses, etc.), which were -allowed to stand was about 32 acres. - - -NOTES ON AFTER-HISTORY.--_Annals of Agriculture_, vol. xxvii. p. -292.--In 1793 Arthur Young bought an estate in Knaresborough Forest -of about 4400 acres; 4000 acres of this was waste land, let out at a -rental of 6d. an acre; 2751 acres of the estate were copyhold, and had -been sold to pay the expenses of inclosure. The rest had formed part of -the King’s allotment, and was hired on a long lease. On the 400 acres -of cultivated land there were 3 farmhouses. The game of the waste was -let for £30 a year; peats dug from it produced £6 to £8 a year, and -Arthur Young calculated that one Scotch wether could be supported per -acre. - - -APPENDIX A (7) - -LALEHAM.--ENCLOSURE ACT, 1774 - - -AREA.--(From Award), 918 Acres. - - -NATURE OF GROUND.--‘Several large and open Fields,’ ‘and likewise -certain Wastes and Commons.’ - - -PARLIAMENTARY PROCEEDINGS.-- - - -FIRST ATTEMPT, JANUARY 31, 1767.--Petition from Sir James Lowther, Lord -of the Manor, and from ‘divers owners’ for enclosure of the open fields -and commons, and also of ‘a large Pasture called Laleham Burway.’ Leave -given, but bill dropped after first reading. - -_Second attempt, December 7, 1767._--Petition for enclosure from Sir -James Lowther alone, on behalf of himself and others. Leave given; bill -prepared by Mr. Anthony Bacon and Mr. Fuller, read twice and committed -(December 14) to Mr. Bacon, Mr. Jenkinson, Sir James Lowther, and -others. - -_December 21, 1767._--Petition against the bill from various persons, -being Owners, Proprietors and Occupiers entitled to Rights of Common, -and also Owners of Cow Gates on Laleham Burway, setting forth ‘that -the Inclosure sought by the said Bill is contrary to the general Sense -and Opinion of the Petitioners and others, who compose a Majority in -Number of the Owners or Proprietors of, or Persons interested’ in the -Inclosure, and also stating that the meadow of Laleham Burway is not -within the Manor of Laleham, but has been proved by a trial at law to -be part of the Manor of Chertsey Beaumont. Petitioners to be heard on -Report. - - -REPORT AND ENUMERATION OF CONSENTS.--_December 21, 1767_ (same -day).--Mr. Anthony Bacon reported from the Committee that the -Allegations of the Bill were true, and ‘that the Parties concerned had -given their Consent to the Bill, to the Satisfaction of the Committee -(except the Proprietors of Estates, who are entitled to Right of Common -in the said Manor, who are rated to the Poors Rate to the Amount of -£8, 2s. 0d. per Annum; and also the Proprietors of Estates, who are -intitled to Right of Common in the said Manor, who are rated to the -Poors Rate to the Amount of 15s. per Annum, who, being applied to, -refused to sign the Bill, but declared they would not oppose the same; -and that the whole of the Estates, in the said Manor, are rated to -the Poors Rate to the Amount of £27, 6s. 6d. or thereabouts; and that -the Proprietors of Eighty-six Cow Pastures or Farines, had refused to -give their Consent to the said Bill; and that the whole Number of Cow -Pastures, or Farines, are 292-1/2); and that no Person appeared before -the Committee to oppose the said Bill.’ - -The consideration of the Report was put off several times; February -25, 1768, a debate on the subject, resumed on February 29, with the -result that the Bill was defeated. - -_Third Attempt, February 28, 1774._--Petition from various owners and -occupiers for enclosure of Laleham and of Laleham Burway. Leave given. -Bill read first time March 18. - -_March 22._--Petition against the bill from various owners and -proprietors of certain Messuages, Cottages, Farmsteads, Lands and -Rights of Common, and also owners of Cattle gates on Laleham Burway, -setting forth that the ‘Bill is contrary to the general Sense and -Opinion of the Petitioners and others, who compose a great Majority -of the real Owners and Proprietors of, or Persons interested in, the -Lands and Grounds intended to be inclosed: and that the Petitioners -conceive that the said Bill, if passed into a Law, will in general be -injurious to all the Petitioners, and in particular highly burthensome -and oppressive to such of them who enjoy small and inconsiderable -Rights and Interests therein.’ The Petition again pointed out that -Laleham Burway was not in the Manor of Laleham, and that apart from -that fact, ‘Inclosure would render the Enjoyment thereof’ inconvenient -if not impracticable. To be heard by Counsel on second reading. On -April 15 came another Petition from William Barwell, Esq., and other -proprietors in and near Chertsey, opposing the enclosure of Laleham -Burway as detrimental to the proprietors thereof and to the inhabitants -in general of Chertsey, and suggesting that it is ‘calculated only for -the private Emolument of some One or few’ of the proprietors. Petition -to lie on table. - -_May 20._--Bill read a second time. Both above Petitions read and -Counsel against the Bill heard and several witnesses examined. Bill -committed. - - -REPORT AND ENUMERATION OF CONSENTS.--_June 7, 1774._--Mr. Norton -reported from the Committee, that the allegations were true and that -the parties concerned had consented ‘(except the Owners of 13 Houses -intitled to Right of Common and the Proprietors of Lands rated to the -Land Tax of £35, 4s. 6d. per Annum who refused to sign the Bill, and -also except the Proprietors of Lands rated to the Land Tax at 9s. per -Annum who could not be found; and that the whole Number of Houses -having Right of Common is 80, and the whole of the said Lands are rated -to the Land Tax at £168, 2s. 6d. per Annum).’ - -A Clause was offered to be added to the Bill, for giving an Appeal -to Quarter Sessions,[494] and this was agreed to. Other clauses to -restrain the Commissioners from setting out a road over Laleham South -Field and for saving the rights of tithe owners were also added. - -The Bill passed both Houses and received the Royal Assent, June 22, -1774. - - -MAIN FEATURES OF ACT.--(Private, 14 George III. c. 114.) - - -COMMISSIONERS.--Three appointed:--Ralph Gowland, Esq., of Laleham; -Thomas Jackman of Guildford; Henry Brumbridge of Thorpe. - -Two a quorum. Vacancies to be filled by remaining Commissioners from -persons not interested in allotments or division. - -Surveyor or surveyors to be appointed by Commissioners. - - -PAYMENT.--Nothing stated. - -A special clause enacting that they are to make the division and -allotment on or before December 24, 1774, ‘or as soon after as -conveniently may be done.’[495] - - -CLAIMS.--All claims to be delivered in writing with particulars of -right or title in respect of which claim is made at 1st or 2nd meeting. -If any claim is objected to at 1st, 2nd, or 3rd meeting by another -claimant then the Commissioners can hear and determine, and their -determination is final and binding. _Exception._--If a claimant refuses -to refer the matter to the Commissioners, then he or she can bring -an action at law against the objector on an issue to be settled if -necessary by the officer of the Court. But if the claimant whose claim -is objected to fails to bring the action, and still refuses to refer -the question to the Commissioners, then (after 3 months) he loses all -his rights. - -There is also a clause ‘for the better settling the Rights and Claims -of all the said parties so interested and concerned as aforesaid’ by -which it is enacted that in case any difference touching rights and -claims arises between any of the parties so interested and concerned, -the Commissioners have power to hear and finally determine the same, -‘which Determination shall be binding and conclusive to all Parties.’ - - -SYSTEM OF DIVISION--SPECIAL PROVISIONS: - -_Lord of the Manor_ (Sir James Lowther).--No special provision -mentioned, but see Award. - -Clause to say that the Lord of the Manor’s rights are not to be -prejudiced by the Act ‘(except such Common of Pasture, or other Rights -of Common, as can or may be claimed by or belonging to him).’ - -_Tithe Owners._--Nothing in the Act to affect any right or title to -tithes. - -_Provision for the Poor._--Nothing mentioned, but see Award. - -_Allotment._--The Commissioners are to make the allotments amongst the -several persons ‘intitled to any Lands, Grounds, Right of Common or -other Property,’ in proportion to ‘the real value of their several and -respective Shares and Interests and Right of Common or other Property -through and over the said Common Fields, or other the Premises to be -allotted and divided.’ Quantity, Quality and Convenience are to be -considered. The Commissioners are to draw up an Award as soon as is -convenient after allotment, and ‘the several Allotments, Partitions -and Divisions so made’ in and by the Award ‘shall be and are hereby -declared to be binding and conclusive unto and upon all and every the -several Parties interested in the said open and common Fields, common -Pastures, and commonable Lands.’ Allotments must be accepted within 12 -months after award. (Saving clause for infants, etc.) Failure to accept -excludes allottee from all benefits in lands and estates allotted to -any other person, and the Commissioners can appoint a Bailiff or rent -receiver with full power to manage the allotment in question, any -surplus of profits to go to the original allottee who has refused to -accept--until he changes his mind and accepts it. - -Allotments are to be of the same tenure as the estates for which they -are claimed. The Herbage of the Lanes and Public Roads to be allotted -to such person or persons as the Commissioners direct. - -A special clause to exempt Laleham Burway from division. - - -INCROACHMENTS.--Not mentioned. - - -FENCING.--No instructions given; except that when an allotment abuts on -the highway, the fences are to be kept up by the owner. - - -EXPENSES.--To be paid by the ‘Owners and Proprietors and Persons -interested of and in the said Lands and Grounds’ in such proportion as -the Commissioners decide. If persons refuse to pay, Commissioners can -distrain or else enter on allotment and take rents. Allotments may be -mortgaged up to 40s. an acre. - - -COMPENSATION TO OCCUPIERS AND OTHERS.--Leases at rack-rent ‘shall cease -and be totally extinguished’ if Commissioners give notice; the owner -giving such compensation to the tenant as the Commissioners direct. - -Underwoods, hedges, shrubs, etc., are not to be grubbed up or destroyed -before allotment without special permission from the Commissioners, but -are to remain for the benefit of the allottee, the allottee paying the -former owner such compensation as the Commissioners direct. - -Also, If any land with woods, underwoods, hedges, shrubs, etc., is -allotted to someone who does not already hold it, then the first -owner may enter and fell, grub up and cut down the underwood, hedges, -etc., and take them away, unless the same have been allotted by the -Commissioners to the new owner. - - -POWER OF APPEAL.--Only with respect to roads, and then to Quarter -Sessions only. - - -ARRANGEMENTS BETWEEN ACT AND AWARD.--Not mentioned. - - -AWARD.--Date, 1803. Record Office. During the 29 years between the Act -and the Award 10 Commissioners were concerned, (A) Ralph Gowland, (B) -Thomas Jackman, (C) Henry Brumbridge, (D) George Wheatley, (E) John -Baynes Garforth, (F) Sir Philip Jennings Clarke, (G) Richard Penn, -(H) Sir William Gibbons (see Stanwell), (I) Thomas Chapman, (J) George -Kinderley, as follows:-- - -C refused to act straight away. A then appointed D. B refused to sit -in 1781. A and D appointed E. A died 1787. D and E appointed F. F died -1788. D and E appointed G. D died 1802. E and G were desirous of being -discharged from acting further. H was ‘duly appointed.’ E and G refused -to act. H appointed I and J. H, I and J gave the award. - -_Distribution of Land._--918 acres odd, exclusive of roads, were -divided out as follows:-- - - Acres. - - _Lord Lowther_[496] (including 18-1/2 for his rights of soil), 626-1/2 - _Six other owners_ (in shares varying from 68-1/4 to John - Coggan, Martha his wife, to 16-1/4 to the Vicar, 223-1/4 - _Twenty-three owners_ (in shares varying from 7-1/2 acres, Messrs. - Blackwell and Elson, to 16 perches John Goodwin, 51-1/4 - Churchwardens and Overseers for the Poor (see below), 13 - Gravel Pit, 4 - ------- - 918 - -The destiny of the 13 acres vested in the Churchwardens and Overseers -is described thus: they are ‘for the use of the poor of Laleham, as a -compensation for their loss of Common, the said 13 acres in lieu of the -herbage of the roads the use of which by the poor was thought might -be injurious to the young quick by the grazing of their cattle on the -roads, and as the Majority of the Proprietors have agreed’ to give up -this 13 acres as an equivalent for the Herbage, the Herbage is given to -the proprietors instead. - -The Churchwardens and Overseers may do one of two things with the 13 -acres plot, they may (1) lease it out for 21 years at ‘the best and -greatest rent’ to a parishioner: (the plan shows the 13 acres to have -been wedged in between Lord Lowther’s fields), or (2) ‘if they should -think it more advantageous to the parish to raise a certain sum of -money upon it for the Purpose of erecting a Workhouse’ they may let it -out for 60 years. - - -APPENDIX A (8) - -LOUTH, LINCOLNSHIRE.--ENCLOSURE ACT, 1801 - - - AREA.--In Petition for Enclosure, about 1770 Acres. - In Act „ „ 1854 „ - In Award „ „ 1701 „ - - -NATURE OF GROUND.--‘Open Common Fields, Meadows, Pastures, and other -Commonable Lands and Waste Grounds.’ - -Description from Eden, vol. ii. p. 395 (June 1795).--‘Most of the -land belonging to this town lies in 2 large common fields, which are -fallowed and cropped alternately: in several parts of these common -fields there are large tracts of waste land, upon which a great number -of poor people summer each a cow, which in winter go at large in these -fields. The Poor complain heavily of the farmers, saying, “That they -encroach on their property”; and the farmers say, “That the Poor take -the opportunity of eating their corn with their cattle.” Tithes are -here taken in kind.’ - - -PARLIAMENTARY PROCEEDINGS.--_March 11, 1801._--Petition for enclosure -from various persons, owners, or interested in estates in Louth. Leave -given. Bill read twice, and committed on June 5. Same day, Petition -of various Freeholders and Proprietors of old inclosed land against -the bill; setting forth that there are ‘now more than 750 acres of old -inclosed Meadows and Pasture Lands very contiguous to the Town; and -that the Soil of these Open Fields is best adapted for Wheat and Beans, -of which it produces excellent Crops alternately, and is in a very high -State of Cultivation; and that there is no Waste Land, as the Commons -are a very rich Pasture, which keep a large Quantity of Cattle, the -Property of a great many industrious People, who have Common Rights, -and are enabled by their Common Rights to maintain their Families, -and increase the Population and Prosperity of the Town of Louth’; and -asking the House either to reject the Bill ‘or not to suffer that Part -thereof to pass into a Law, which would compel the Petitioners to -relinquish Part of their Old Inclosed Land against their Consent, but -permit them to remain subject to the Tythes they have hitherto paid.’ -Petition referred to the Committee. All to have Voices. - - -REPORT AND ENUMERATION OF CONSENTS.--_June 17, 1801._--Mr. Annesley -reported from the Committee that the Standing Orders had been complied -with; that the allegations were true; and that the parties concerned -had consented ‘(except the Proprietors of Messuages, Cottages and -Toftsteads, having Right of Common of the Annual Value of £465, 10s. -who refused to sign the Bill, and also except the Proprietors of -Messuages, Cottages and Toftsteads having Right of Common of the Annual -Value of £177, 15s. who were neuter; and that the Whole of the Property -interested in the Inclosure is of the Annual Value of £1670, 12s.).’ -The Bill passed both Houses. Royal Assent, June 24, 1801. - - -MAIN FEATURES OF ACT.--(Local and Personal, 41 George III. c. 124.) - - -COMMISSIONERS.--Three appointed. (1) John Renshaw of Owthorpe, Notts, -gentleman, on behalf of Tithe owners; - -(2) Isaac Leatham of Barton-le-Street, Yorks, gentleman, on behalf of -the majority in value of the proprietors of common fields, meadows and -commonable Lands and Waste Grounds (tithe owners excluded); - -(3) John Parkinson of Asgarby, Lincs, gentleman, on behalf of the -majority in value of the proprietors of ancient inclosures and of -Common Right Houses and Toftsteads (tithe owners excluded). - -Two to be a quorum. Vacancies to be filled by the party represented -from persons ‘not interested in the inclosure.’ - -Surveyor appointed by name. Vacancy to be filled by majority in value -of all those interested. - - -PAYMENT TO COMMISSIONERS.--2 guineas each a day. Surveyor to be paid -what Commissioners think fit. - - -CLAIMS.--All claims to be delivered in with full particulars at -meetings held for the purpose; no claims to be received afterwards -except for some special cause. Full notice of a meeting to examine -claims to be given. Commissioners can determine on claims, but if any -claimant is dissatisfied with their determination he or she can try -the matter at law by bringing an action on a feigned issue against any -person interested in the Lands. Jury’s Verdict to be final. Defendant’s -costs to be borne by all or some of the persons interested, as the -Commissioners determine. If no notice of such action is given, then the -determination of the Commissioners on claims is final and conclusive. -But the Commissioners are not to determine on questions of title which -can be tried at law. Such suits are not to impede inclosure, and the -allotment is to be set out to the person in possession. Claimants in -respect of Messuages, Cottages, Tofts, or Toftsteads need not prove -usage of Right of Common. - - -SYSTEM OF DIVISION--SPECIAL PROVISIONS: - -_The Lord of the Manor_ (_i.e._ The Warden and Six Assistants of the -Town of Louth and Free School of King Edward the Sixth) to have one -twentieth in value of the Waste Lands and other Lands which are not the -separate Property of any Person or Persons; in particular a piece of -Common called _Julian Bower_ with the Trees on it is to be included as -part of the Allotment. - -_Tithe Owners._--(1) The Worshipful Roger Kedington, M.A., Prebendary -of the Prebendal of Louth in Lincoln, impropriator of the Rectory of -Louth, and patron of Vicarage; (2) William Hutton, Esq., lessee of -above for 3 Lives; (3) Rev. Wolley Jolland, Vicar of Louth, entitled to -Vicarage House and Garden and also to a Right of Common, and to small -Tythes. - -(1) Allotments which Commissioners consider equal in value and a full -Compensation for present unenclosed Glebe Lands and Rights of Common. - -(2) Such pieces of the Lands and Grounds to be enclosed (of every -kind) as shall equal in value 1/5 part of all the open, arable and -tillage land ‘(although the same may be occasionally used in Meadow or -Pasture)’ ‘and which are not Waste Lands.’ - -(3) Such pieces of the Lands and Grounds to be enclosed as shall, in -Commissioners’ judgment, equal in value all the Great and Small Tythes -and other Ecclesiastical Dues on ancient Inclosed Arable and Tillage -Lands. - -(4) Such pieces of the Lands and Grounds to be enclosed as shall equal -in value 1/8 part of all the ancient enclosed Meadow and Pasture Lands, -Grounds and Homesteads ‘(not being Glebe Lands, consecrated Burying -Grounds, or Orchards or Gardens),’ and of the Near East Field, Far East -Field, Great Roarings, Butter Closes, and all other open and commonable -Meadow or Pasture Lands, Commons and Grounds to be inclosed which are -subject to tithes and ecclesiastical dues. - -_Arrangements for Owners of Old Inclosures._--(See Petition on March -11, 1801). Owners of old Inclosures who have not sufficient allotments -in the land to be inclosed, to contribute from them their proportion -of the above Tithe allotments, can _either_ have part of their old -inclosures allotted instead (with their consent) _or_ pay such gross -sum of money towards the expenses of the Act as the Commissioners -direct, whilst a portion of the land to be inclosed is given to the -tithe owner. - -After this Act the only Tithes which remain are those for Gardens and -Orchards, and Tithes of Mills, Pigs, Poultry, Bees and Honey; also -Surplice Fees, Easter Offering and Mortuaries are untouched. - -_For Repair of Roads._--Sufficient pieces or parcels to be vested in -the Surveyor of Highways. - -_For Fairs._--A piece of ground called ‘The Quarry’ is to be allotted -to the Lords of the Manor for the holding of Fairs. - -_Provision for the Poor._--None. - -_Allotment of Residue._--Amongst the various persons interested with -due regard to Quantity, Quality and Situation. No undue Preference -to be shown. The open fields to be allotted to their present owners, -unless the owners ask for allotment elsewhere. - -If an allottee is dissatisfied with his allotment, the Commissioners -must hear his complaints, but their determination is final till the -Award is made. - -The Award is to be drawn up and read over to the Proprietors and all -the orders and directions, penalties, impositions, regulations and -determinations of the Award are to be final, binding and conclusive on -all parties. - -If an allottee refuses to accept or molests anyone else who accepts, he -or she must pay the penalties decided on by the Commissioners. - -The tenure of allotments is to be the same as that of the estate in -virtue of which they are claimed. - -The grass on the road allotment is to be allotted to such person or -persons as the Commissioners direct, or else be applied for some -general, Parochial, or other use. - -No person is to graze cattle, dig, cultivate or plant in any road or -way under penalty of a fine of £3. - - -INCROACHMENTS.--Incroachments 20 years old and over are to stand. -Incroachments made within 20 years are to be treated as part of the -Commons to be divided, but, if the Commissioners think it fit and -convenient they can be allotted to the person in possession, without -considering the value of erections or improvements (1) as the whole -or part of his allotment; (2) as his allotment, the allottee paying -such extra sum of money as the Commissioners think fit (this is -supposing the allotment he is entitled to is less in value than the -incroachment); (3) for such sum of money as the Commissioners think fit -(this is supposing he is not entitled to any allotment). - -_But_ if the Commissioners do not think it fit and convenient to allot -an incroachment to the person in possession, they may (1) sell it at -public auction and apply the money to the purposes of the Act; (2) -allot it to someone else, in which case a ‘reasonable’ sum of money -is to be given to the dispossessed owner, the new allottee paying the -whole or part of it. - - -FENCING.--To be done by the several proprietors as the Commissioners -direct. - -_Exception._--(1) The Tithe Owners’ allotments are to be fenced by the -other proprietors. - -(2) In the case of allotments to Churchwardens, Overseers or Colleges, -Chantries, Charities, etc., the Commissioners are to fence, deducting -such portion of the allotments as is equal to the expenses of fencing -and to these allottees’ share of the expenses of the Act. - -The portion deducted is to be divided amongst the other Proprietors who -have to pay the expenses. - -If any allottee refuses to fence, the Commissioners can do it and -charge the expenses on the allotment, appointing a Bailiff to receive -rents and money. - - -EXPENSES.--The expenses of the Act are to be defrayed by all the -Proprietors benefited in proportion to the value of their allotments, -_except_ the Lords of the Manor and the Tithe owners in respect of -their special allotments, and except the holders in trust for public -bodies. (These last have had a portion deducted. See Fencing.) - -The cost of the survey of the land to be inclosed is to be borne -by those interested in it, and the cost of the survey of the old -inclosures by the proprietors of old inclosures. - -Mortgages are allowed under certain conditions (except to Tithe owners) -up to £4 an acre. - -Commissioners are to keep accounts which must be open to inspection. A -penalty is specified for failure to keep them. Money amounting to £50 -is to be paid in to a Banker. - -Proprietors (tithe owners excepted) can sell their Common Rights or -allotments before the Award. - - -COMPENSATION.--(1) Leases at Rack Rent of any land to be inclosed, -either alone or together with any Messuages, Cottages, Toftsteads, -etc., to be void; the proprietor paying the lessee such satisfaction -as the Commissioners direct. _Exception._--No lease of any Messuage, -Cottage, Toftstead, Lands, Hereditaments or ancient Estate in respect -of which allotment is made for Right of Common is to be void; but the -allotments made to these are to belong to the proprietors who must pay -to the lessees such satisfaction as the Commissioners direct. - -(2) Satisfaction (adjudged by the Commissioners) is to be given for -standing crops by the new allottee, unless the owner of the crops likes -to come and reap them. - -Satisfaction is also to be given to the occupier for ploughing, -tilling and manuring, but no Swarth 6 years old is to be ploughed till -allotments are entered on. - -(3) If any trees, shrubs, etc., go with the ground to a new proprietor, -the old proprietor is to be paid their valuation (as judged by the -Commissioners). - - -ARRANGEMENTS BETWEEN ACT AND AWARD.--The Commissioners are to have -absolute power to determine the course of husbandry. - - -ROADS.--Commissioners to have power to set out and stop up roads and -footpaths (turnpike roads excepted), but are to give notice in a local -newspaper _re_ public carriage roads, and any person who thinks himself -or herself aggrieved can appeal to Quarter Sessions whose decision is -final. - -If an ancient road or path is shut up, the person for whose -accommodation it is shut up may be required by the Commissioners to pay -compensation either (1) to person or persons injured or (2) for general -expenses of the Act. - - -POWER OF APPEAL.--To Quarter Sessions only, and not where -Commissioners’ determinations are said to be final. - - -AWARD.--Date, 1806. Record Office. - - -MAIN FEATURES OF AWARD:-- - - - _a._ _r._ _p._ - Whole Area divided out, 1701 3 21 - ----------- - Tithe Owners (various allotments), in all, 584 3 6[497] - One of the tithe holders also receives, 24 3 4 - The Lords of the Manor, 109 2 4[498] - Lords of the Manor, as Guardians of the - Free School, 69 3 19 - Allotments for repairing roads, 2 0 3 - For Fairs, 4 1 12 - ----------- - 795 1 8 - ----------- - - The remainder is divided out amongst 130 allottees:-- - - From 50-100 acres 4 } - From 30-50 acres 7 } - From 10-30 acres 10 } Above 10 acres 21 - -- } - 21 } - -- From 1-10 acres 42 - - From 1/2 acre-1 acre 22 } - From 1/4 acre-1/2 acre 10 } - Below 1/4 acre 35[499] } Below 1 acre 67 - -- } --- - 67 } 130 - -- --- - -The smallest allotments are, Ann Metcalf, Spinster, 14 perches, which -she must fence on the N. and W. sides; Ann Hubbard, Widow, 15 perches, -which she must fence on the S. and W. sides. - -These, like the other small allotments, are in lieu of Right of Common -and all other Interest. - - -APPENDIX A (9) - -SIMPSON, BUCKS.--ENCLOSURE ACT, 1770 - - -AREA.--Not specified anywhere. The annual value unenclosed is stated to -be £773, so the acreage was probably over 1500. - - -NATURE OF GROUND.--Open and Common Fields, Lammas Grounds and Pastures. - - -PARLIAMENTARY PROCEEDINGS.-- - -_First Attempt, December 13, 1762._--Petition from Walden Hanmer, -Esq., Lord of the Manor, William Edge, Gentleman, and other owners -and proprietors, stating that the holdings are at present intermixed -and dispersed, that the land in its present state is in great measure -incapable of Improvement, and that if it were divided and inclosed -great Benefit would accrue, and asking for leave to bring in a Bill to -enclose. Leave was given, and the Bill passed its second reading and -was sent to Committee. On March 16, 1763, came a petition against it -from John Goodman and Nicholas Lucas, Gentlemen, and other owners and -proprietors against the bill, ‘alleging that the Petitioners are Owners -and Proprietors of Four Fifth Parts, and upwards, of the said Fields, -Grounds, and Pastures, so intended to be inclosed, and of several -Rights and Privileges incident thereto,’ stating that the bill would -be greatly detrimental to all of them and ‘tend to the Ruin of many of -them,’ and asking to be heard by Counsel against the bill. Petition to -be heard when the bill was reported. - - -REPORT AND ENUMERATION OF CONSENTS.--_March 25, 1763._--Mr. Lowndes -reported from the Committee, that the allegations were true and that -‘the Parties concerned had given their Consent to the Bill, to the -Satisfaction of the Committee (except Michael Woodward, Nicholas Lucas, -senior, Lewis Goodman, who, being asked to sign a Bill testifying their -Consent, and whose Interest in the said Lands and Grounds amounts to -£31 a Year, or thereabouts, but the Witness could not ascertain the -Interest of the said Lewis Goodman and Thomas Goodman, said that they -had no Objection to the Inclosure, but did not care to sign, and also -except Luke Goodman and Edward Chad, whose Interest in the said Lands -and Grounds is £16 a Year; Edward Chad said he was by no means for -it, and Luke Goodman said, he would neither meddle nor make; and also -except Joseph Etheridge, a Minor, whose Interest in the said Lands and -Grounds is £38 a Year; and Mary Etheridge, his Guardian whose Interest -in the said Lands and Grounds is £16 a Year, said, she never was for -it, as being a Woman, and having nobody to look after her Fencing; and -also except ---- Loughton, John Goodman, and Son, whose Interest in -the said Lands and Grounds is £24 a Year; John Goodman said, he would -lose his Life before he would lose his Land; his Son said, he did not -care to meddle; and also except John Goodman, who, being asked to -sign a Bill, testifying his Consent, and whose Interest in the said -Lands and Grounds is £55 a year, said he would not sign it; and except -Sear Newman, whose Interest in the said Lands and Grounds amounts to -£30 a Year, who said he had no Objection to it, but did not care to -meddle or make, upon Account of his Father being so much against it; -and it appeared to your Committee, by Articles of Agreement, dated -the 31st Day of December, 1761, that the said John Goodman and Sear -Newman did thereby consent and agree to an Inclosure of all the Open -and Commonable Fields, Lands, Cow Pasture, and Fields, within the -said Parish of Simpson, and to pay their respective Proportions of -the Expence of an Act of Parliament; and other the necessary Expences -attending the same; and also except John Newman, whose Interest in the -said Lands and Grounds is £30 a Year, who said he would not sign it; -and also except Nicholas Lucas the younger, whose Interest in the said -Fields is £36 a Year, who said he had no Objection to sign, if the -Cow Pasture had been left open; and also except Daniel Lucas, whose -Interest in the said Lands and Grounds is £25 a Year, who refused -signing; and also except George Wilkes, whose Interest in the said -Lands and Grounds is £1, 10s. a Year, who said he had no Occasion -to sign, because he had agreed with Mr. Hanmer for the Purchase of -his Commons; and also except Richard Goodman, Edward Ashwell, for a -Minor, Edward Cooke and John Fox, whose Interest in the said Lands -and Grounds together amounts to £5, 10s. a Year, who were not applied -to; and also except Sarah Hawes, Widow, who is lately dead; and also -except George Stone, whose Interest in the said Lands and Grounds is -£3 a Year, who was not applied to, because he had sold his Interest to -Mr. Hanmer, who has consented to the Bill; and also except Six out of -Eight of the Feoffees of Lands belonging to the Poor of Simpson, which -Lands are of the yearly Value of £24: and also except the Feoffees of -certain Charity Lands and Grounds, of the yearly Value of £16; William -Cooper, one of the Feoffees, being asked to sign a Bill testifying his -Consent, said he was against it; and that the yearly Value of the said -Lands and Grounds, in the said Fields, Cow Pasture, Common Meadows, -Lammas Grounds, and Waste Grounds, amounts to Seven Hundred Ninety-nine -Pounds, Fifteen Shillings, or thereabouts;)....’ - -After the Report was read, Counsel was heard for the Petitioners -against the Bill, but the Bill was read a third time and sent up to the -Lords. March 29, it was read a second time, and a Petition against it -from John Goodman, John Newman, Nicholas Lucas and others was received. -April 14, Lord St. John of Bletsoe reported it without amendments from -the Committee, but it was defeated on its third reading. - -_Second Attempt, January 15, 1765._--Walden Hanmer, Esquire, the -Rector, and others again petitioned for enclosure. Leave was given to -bring in a bill, but nothing came of it. - -_Third Attempt, February 6, 1770._--Walden Hanmer, Esquire, and others -again petitioned for enclosure. Leave was given, and a bill read twice -and sent to Committee. - -_March 6, 1770._--‘A Petition of the Major Part of the Owners and -Proprietors’ against the Bill, stating ‘that the Petitioners are very -well satisfied with the Situation and Convenience of their respective -Lands and Properties in their present uninclosed State,’ and that the -Bill will do them great Injury. - - -REPORT AND ENUMERATION OF CONSENTS.--_March 6, 1770_ (same day).--Mr. -Kynaston reported that the allegations were true, and that the Parties -concerned had consented to the Bill ‘to the Satisfaction of the -Committee,’ with the following exceptions--Five Persons with property -of the annual value of £192, 10s.; Sear Numan, with property of annual -value of £20, 15s., ‘who said he must do as his Father would have -him’; John Lucas the younger, with property of the annual value of -15s.; George Cross, ‘who would not say any Thing,’ with property of -the annual value of £5; Elizabeth Mead, ‘who said she should sell when -inclosed,’ with property of the annual value of £2, 10s.; and Five -Persons, who said they would not oppose the Bill, with property of the -annual value of £77, 10s. The annual value of ‘the whole of the Estates -in the said Fields intended to be inclosed’ was given as £773. The -Bill passed the Commons and the Lords, where a petition against it was -considered. It received the Royal Assent on March 29, 1770. - - -MAIN FEATURES OF ACT.--(Private, 10 George III. c. 42.) - - -COMMISSIONERS.--Three appointed. (1) The Rev. John Lord of Drayton -Parslow, Clerk; (2) Thomas Harrison of Stoney Stratford, Gentleman; (3) -Francis Burton of Aynho, Northamptonshire, Gentleman. Two a quorum. -Vacancies to be filled up by remaining Commissioner or Commissioners -from persons ‘not interested in the Division and Inclosure.’ No -particulars of payment. - -A survey to be made by a surveyor nominated by Commissioners. - - -CLAIMS.--The Commissioners are ‘to hear and finally determine’ any -differences about Interests and Rights. - - -SYSTEM OF DIVISION--SPECIAL PROVISIONS: - -_Provisions for Lord of the Manor._--None (as there seems to have been -no common or waste ground concerned). - -His manorial rights, right of common excepted, to go on as before. - -_Provisions for Tithe Owners._--The Rector to have (1) such parcels of -Land as shall be a full equivalent of his glebe lands and common Right; -(2) 1/7 part of all the rest, ‘Quantity as well as Quality considered,’ -as full compensation for all Tithes. - -In the case of old inclosures which have allotments, the Commissioners -can give him either part of these or part of the owner’s allotment in -place of tithes, and in case of old inclosures, etc., which have no -allotment, they remain subject to Tithes. - -The Rector is exonerated from keeping a Bull and a Boar. - -_Provision for Gravel_, _Sand_, _etc._--See Allotment of Residue. - -_Provision for Poor._--None. - -_Allotment of Residue._--As soon as is convenient after the survey is -made, the Commissioners are to set out and allot the land in proportion -to the respective interests and right of common of the claimants, -‘having a due Regard to the Situation and Convenience, as well as to -the Quantity and Quality of the Lands and Grounds.’ The award, which -contains their decision, is to be final and conclusive. - -Allotments must be accepted within 12 calendar months. Failure to -accept excludes the allottee from all Benefits under the Act. (Saving -clause for infants, etc.) - -If material is needed for the roads, the surveyors may, under an -order from two J. P.’s not interested in the inclosure, enter on any -allotment and take it, except where the allotment is a garden, park, -orchard, paddock, wood, or ground planted with an avenue of trees for -the ornament of any House. - - -INCROACHMENTS.--Not mentioned; as no common. - - -FENCING.--To be done ‘at the proper Costs and Charges’ of the -respective allottees, as directed by the Commissioners, except in the -case of the Rector, whose allotment is to be fenced for him by the -other proprietors, and whose fences, if they abut on a highway, are -to be kept up by the other proprietors for 7 years. The fencing of all -allotments must be carried out within 12 months after the Award, and -if any person refuse to fence, the Commissioners, on complaint of a -neighbour, can do the fencing and charge it to the recalcitrant owner, -distraining on his goods, if necessary. If any one proprietor has more -than his fair share of fencing to do, then the Commissioners can make -the other proprietors pay something towards it. If any allotment abuts -on a common field, fencing is not compulsory. - - -EXPENSES.--These are to be paid by the Owners and Proprietors ‘by an -equal Pound Rate according to the Value of the Lands and Grounds each -Person shall have allotted to him.’ Proprietors are allowed to mortgage -their allotments up to 40s. an acre in order to meet expenses. - - -COMPENSATION TO OCCUPIERS.--All rack-rent leases are to be null and -void, the owners making such satisfaction to the tenants as the -Commissioners think reasonable. - - -ROADS.--Commissioners to have full power to set out and shut up roads, -footpaths, etc. - - -POWER OF APPEAL.--To Quarter Sessions only; and not in cases where -the Commissioners’ decisions are final and conclusive, as, _e.g._, on -claims and allotments. - - -ARRANGEMENTS BETWEEN ACT AND AWARD.--Directly the Act is passed, till -the allotments are made, the Commissioners are to have ‘the sole, -intire and absolute Management, Order and Direction’ of all the land -with regard to cultivation, flocks, etc., any usage to the contrary -notwithstanding. - - -AWARD.--Bucks, with Clerk of the Peace or Clerk of the Council. Date, -April 26, 1771. - - -APPENDIX A (10) - -STANWELL.--ENCLOSURE ACT, 1789 - - -AREA.--According to Act ‘by Estimation about 3000 Acres,’ but Award -gives 2126 Acres only. - - -NATURE OF GROUND.--‘Large open fields, Arable and Meadow Grounds, and -Lammas Lands, about 1621 acres, and also several Commons, Moors and -Waste Lands,’ about 505 acres (unstinted). - - -PARLIAMENTARY PROCEEDINGS.-- - -_First Attempt, December 12, 1766._--Petition for Enclosure from the -Lord of the Manor, the Impropriator of the Great Tythes, the Vicar, and -the most considerable Proprietors. Leave given. Bill read first time, -January 27, 1767. - -_February 18, 1767._--Petition against the bill from various ‘Owners -or Occupiers of Cottages or Tenements in the parish of Stanwell,’ -setting forth ‘that the Petitioners in Right of their said Cottages and -Tenements are severally intitled to Common of Pasture for their Cattle -and Sheep upon all the said Commons, Moors, and Waste Lands, at all -Times of the Year, except for Sheep, without any Stint whatsoever, as -also a Right of intercommoning their Cattle and Sheep, with those of -the Tenants of divers other Manors, at all Times in the Year, upon the -large Common called _Hounslow Heath_: and the Petitioners in the Rights -aforesaid, are also intitled to and do enjoy Common of Turbary on the -said Commons and Heath, and that the Lord of the Manor of Stanwell -lately caused part of the said Moors within the said Parish, to be -fenced in, and inclosed with Pales for his own sole and separate Use, -without the Consent of the Petitioners and other Persons intitled to a -Right of Common therein, which said Pales have been since pulled down -by several of the Petitioners and others, against whom several Actions -have been commenced by the Lord of the said Manor, in order to try the -Petitioners’ said Right of Common therein, all which Actions are now -depending; and that the Petitioners apprehend, and believe, in case -the said Bill should pass into a Law, the Legality of the Petitioners’ -said Rights will be left to the Determination of Commissioners -unqualified to judge of the same: and that in case the Petitioners’ -said Rights should be allowed by such Commissioners, that no adequate -Compensation in Land will or can be awarded to the Petitioners for the -same: and that the dividing and inclosing the said Commons, Moors, and -Waste Lands within the said Parish, will greatly injure and distress -many....’ Another petition was presented on the same day from George -Richard Carter, Esq., Samuel Clark, Esq., Jervoise Clark, Esq., John -Bullock, Esq., and several others, being owners and proprietors of -Farms and Lands in the parish of Stanwell, setting forth that the -Petitioners, as also the Owners of near 100 Cottages or Tenements -within the said Parish, and their respective Tenants are entitled to -right of pasture as in the petition given above, and stating that -inclosing will be attended with great inconvenience. - -On February 26 came yet another petition from owners and occupiers in -the parishes of Harmondsworth, Harlington, Cranford, Heston, Isleworth, -Twickenham, Teddington, Hampton, Hanworth, Feltham, and East Bedfont in -Middlesex, setting forth that the Commons and Waste Lands in the parish -of Stanwell were part of Hounslow Heath, over which the petitioners had -right of pasture, and stating that if the part of the Heath in Stanwell -parish were inclosed it would be very injurious to all the owners and -occupiers in the parish of Stanwell, except to the Lord of the Manor, -and would also be prejudicial to the petitioners. - -All these petitions were ordered to lie on the table till the second -reading, which took place on February 26. Counsel was heard for and -against the Bill; the motion that the Bill should be committed was -defeated by 34 to 17 votes, and thus the farmers were able to parade -along Pall Mall with cockades in their hats.[500] - -_Second Attempt, February 20, 1789._--Petition from the Lord of the -Manor (Sir William Gibbons), the Vicar and others for enclosure. Leave -given. Bill read twice. - - -REPORT AND ENUMERATION OF CONSENTS.--_March 30, 1789._--Sir William -Lemon reported from the Committee that the Standing Orders had been -complied with; that the allegations were true, and that the parties -concerned had given their consent ‘(except the Proprietors of Estates -of the Annual Value of £164, 14s. or thereabouts who refused to sign -the Bill, and also except the Proprietors of £220, 5s. 8d. per Annum or -thereabouts who did not chuse to sign the Bill, but made no Objection -to the Inclosure, and also except some small Proprietors of about £76 -per Annum who could not be found, and that the whole Property belonging -to Persons interested in the Inclosure amounts to £2,929, 5s. 4d. per -annum or thereabouts).’ Bill passed both Houses. Royal Assent, May 19, -1789. - - -MAIN FEATURES OF ACT.--(Private, 29 George III. c. 15.) - - -COMMISSIONERS.--Edward Hare of Castor, Northampton, Gentleman; -William Young of Chancery Lane, Gentleman; Richard Davis of Lewknor, -Oxford, Gentleman. Two a quorum. Vacancies to be filled by remaining -Commissioners from persons not interested in the Inclosure. - - -SURVEYOR.--One named. Vacancy to be filled by Commissioners. - - -PAYMENT TO COMMISSIONERS.--£2, 2s. for each working day. Nothing about -Surveyor’s pay. - -Special clause that certain Surveys already made may be used. - - -CLAIMS.--All claims about Right of Common ‘and all Differences and -Disputes which shall arise between the Parties interested, or claiming -to be interested in the said intended Division and Inclosure, or any of -them concerning their respective Rights, Shares, and Interests in the -said open Fields, arable and meadow Grounds, and Lammas Lands, Commons, -Moors, and Waste Grounds, or their respective Allotments, Shares and -Proportions which they, or any of them ought to have’ in the division, -are to be heard and determined by the Commissioners. This determination -is to be binding and conclusive on all parties; except with regard to -matters of Title which can be tried at law. - - -SYSTEM OF DIVISION--SPECIAL PROVISIONS: - -(1) _Lords of the Manor_ (Sir William Gibbons, Thomas Somers Cocks, -Esq., and Thomas Graham, Esq.).--One sixteenth part of the residue of -the Moors and Waste Lands, when roads and allotment for gravel have -been deducted. - -(2) _Tithe Owners._--Not to be prejudiced by the Act. Land still to be -liable to tithes as before. - -(3) _Gravel Pits._--For roads and for use of inhabitants; not more than -3 acres. - -(4) _Provision for Poor._--Such parcel as the Commissioners think -proper (‘not exceeding in the whole 30 Acres’). To be vested in the -Lords of the Manor, the Vicar, Churchwardens, and Overseers, and to be -let out, and the rents and profits thereof to be given for the benefit -of such occupiers and inhabitants as do not receive parish relief, -or occupy lands and tenements of more than £5 a year, or receive any -allotment under the Act. - -_Allotment of Residue._--The land to be divided among the various -persons interested ‘in proportion and according (Quantity, Quality and -Situation considered) to their several and respective Shares, Rights, -and Interests therein.’ If the Commissioners think that any of the -allotments in the common fields are too small to be worth enclosing -they may lay such proprietors’ allotments together. - -_Certain principles to be followed._--Owners of cottage commons who -are also proprietors of lands in the open fields are to have their -allotment in virtue of their Right of Common added to the other -allotment to which they are entitled. - -Owners of cottage commons who do not possess land in the open fields as -well, are to have their allotments put all together for a cow common, -with such stint as the Commissioners decide. But if they wish for -separate allotments they may have them. - -Allotments must be accepted within six months after award. Failure to -accept excludes allottee from all ‘Benefit Advantage’ by this Act, and -also from all estate right or interest in any other allotment. (Saving -clause for infants, etc.) - -The award is to be drawn up; ‘and the Award, and all Orders, -Directions, Regulations, and Determinations therein contained, and -thereby declared, shall be binding and conclusive to and upon all -Persons whomsoever.’ Tenure of allotments to be that of estates -in virtue of which they are granted. Copyhold allotments can be -enfranchised if wished, the Commissioners deducting a certain amount as -compensation for Lord of the Manor. Allottees lose all Right of Common -on any common in adjoining parishes. - - -INCROACHMENTS.--Not mentioned in Act. - - -EXCHANGES.--Allowed (as always). Also former exchanges can be confirmed -by the Commissioners ‘notwithstanding any legal or natural Incapacity -of any Proprietor or Owner having made any such Exchanges.’ - - -FENCING.--To be done by allottees. If any person has an undue -proportion Commissioners have power to equalise. - -_Exceptions._--(1) Fences of cow common allotment for those who have -Cottage Common only (see above), which are to be made and kept in -repair by the other proprietors; but if these allottees choose to have -separate allotments they must fence them themselves. - -(2) Allotment for the Poor (30 acres).--To be fenced by other -proprietors. - -(3) Allotments to charities, ditto. - -If any allottee refuses to fence or keep fences in repair his neighbour -can complain to a J.P. ‘not interested’ in the inclosure, and the J.P. -can either make an order, or else empower the complainant to enter and -carry the work out at the charge of the owner. - - -EXPENSES.--Part of the Commons and Wastes to be sold by auction to -cover expenses. Any surplus to be laid out by Commissioners on some -lasting improvements; any deficit to be made up by proprietors as -Commissioners direct. - -Commissioners are to keep accounts which must be open to inspection. - -To meet expenses allotments may be mortgaged up to 40s. an acre. - - -COMPENSATION TO OCCUPIERS.--Leases at rack or extended rents of any of -the land to be inclosed by this Act to be void, owners paying tenants -such compensation as Commissioners direct. Satisfaction is also to be -given for standing crops, for ploughing, manuring, and tilling. - - -ARRANGEMENTS BETWEEN THE ACT AND AWARD.--The Commissioners are to -direct the course of husbandry ‘as well with respect to the Stocking as -to the Plowing, Tilling, Cropping, Sowing, and Laying down the same.’ - - -ROADS.--Full power to set out roads and footpaths and to shut up -others. Turnpike roads excluded. - - -POWER OF APPEAL.--None. - - -AWARD.--Record Office. - -From the Award we learn as follows:-- - -14 parcels of land, containing in all over 123 acres were sold to cover -expenses for £2512. - -31-1/2 acres are allotted to the Lords of the Manor (Sir William -Gibbons, Thomas Somers Cocks, and Thomas Graham) in lieu of their -rights as Lords of the Soil. - -490 acres to Sir William Gibbons in trust for himself and the other -Lords of the Manor in lieu of all other claims (freehold lands, rights -of common, etc.). - -69 acres to the mortgagees of the late Sir J. Gibbons. - -6 acres to the Trustees of the late Sir J. Gibbons. - -400 acres to Edmund Hill, Esq. (who also bought 117 acres of the land -sold to defray costs). - -100 acres to Henry Bullock, Esq. - -72 acres to Thomas Hankey, Esq. - -45 acres to Jervoise Clark Jervoise, Esq. - -Allotments of from 20 to 40 acres to eleven other allottees. - -Allotments of from 10 to 20 acres to twelve allottees. - -Allotments of from 12 perches to 9 acres to seventy-nine allottees. - -Twenty-four of these smaller allotments (including six of less than -2 acres) are given in lieu of open field property; the remaining -fifty-five are given in compensation for common rights of some sort or -other. - -Sixty-six cottages appear as entitling their owners to -compensation.[501] Of these 66, 16 belong to Henry Bullock and 8 to -Sir William Gibbons, and the remaining 42 to 38 different owners. The -allotments to cottages vary from a quarter of an acre (John Merrick) to -over an acre (Anne Higgs). The owners of cottage commons only had their -allotments separately and not in common. - - -APPENDIX A (11) - -WAKEFIELD, YORKS.--ENCLOSURE ACT, 1793 - - -AREA.--2300 acres ‘or thereabouts.’ - - -NATURE OF GROUND.--Open Common Fields, Ings, Commons, Waste Grounds, -within the townships of Wakefield, Stanley, Wrenthorpe, Alverthorpe, -and Thornes. - - -PARLIAMENTARY PROCEEDINGS.--_January 23, 1793._--Petition from several -owners and proprietors for enclosure. Leave given to prepare bill. -January 28, Wilberforce presented it; February 18, it was committed to -Wilberforce, Duncombe and others. - -_February 28._--Petition against the bill from the Earl of Strafford, -stating that the bill will greatly affect and prejudice his property. -Petition referred to Committee. - -Same day, Petition against the bill from several Persons, being Owners -of Estates and Occupiers of Houses in the Town and Parish of Wakefield. -‘Setting forth, That, if the said Bill should pass into a Law, as it -now stands, the same will greatly affect and prejudice the Estates -and Property of the Petitioners, (viz.), their being deprived of the -Benefit they now receive from the Pasturage of the Ings, from the -12th of August to the 5th of April, and for which they cannot receive -any Compensation adequate thereto, as well as the Restrictions which -exclude the Inhabitants from erecting Buildings on Land that may be -allotted to them for Twenty, Forty, and Sixty Years, on different Parts -of Westgate Common, as specified in the said Bill.’ This petition also -was referred to the Committee. - - -REPORT AND ENUMERATION OF CONSENTS.--_March 12._--Wilberforce reported -from the Committee that the Standing Orders had been complied with, -that they had considered the first Petition (Lord Strafford’s), (no -one had appeared to be heard on behalf of the second Petition), -that they found the allegations of the Bill true, that ‘the Parties -concerned’ had given their consent to the Bill, and also to adding -one Commissioner to the three named in the Bill ‘(except the Owners -of Estates whose Property in the Lands and Grounds to be divided and -inclosed is assessed to the Land Tax at £5 per Annum or thereabouts, -who refused to sign the Bill; and also, except the Owners of Estates -whose Property in the said Lands and Grounds is assessed to the Land -Tax at about £51 per Annum, who have either declared themselves -perfectly indifferent about the Inclosure, or not given any Answer to -the Application made to them respecting it; and that the whole Property -belonging to Persons interested in the Inclosure is assessed to the -Land Tax at £432 per Annum, or thereabouts ...).’ - -Bill passed Commons and Lords. March 28, Royal Assent. - - -MAIN FEATURES OF ACT.--(Private, 33 George III. c. 11.) - - -COMMISSIONERS.--Four appointed. (1) Richard Clark of Rothwell Haigh, -Gentleman; (2) John Renshaw of Owthorp, Notts, Gentleman; (3) John -Sharp of Gildersome, Yorks, Gentleman; (4) William Whitelock of -Brotherton, Yorks, Gentleman; the first representing the Duke of Leeds, -the second the Earl of Strafford (no doubt this was the Commissioner -added in Committee), and the other two representing the Majority in -Value of the Persons interested. Any vacancy to be filled up by the -party represented, and new Commissioners to be ‘not interested in the -said Inclosure.’ Three to be a quorum. In case of dispute and equal -division of opinion amongst the Commissioners, an Umpire is appointed -(Isaac Leatham of Barton, Gentleman); the decision of Commissioners and -Umpire to be final and conclusive. - - -PAYMENT TO COMMISSIONERS.--2 guineas each for each working day. The -Surveyors (2 appointed) to be paid as Commissioners think fit. - - -CLAIMS.--All claims with full particulars of the nature and tenure of -the property on behalf of which the claim is made are to be handed -in at the 1st or 2nd meeting of the Commissioners; no claim is to be -received later except for some special cause; and the determination of -the Commissioners as to the various claims is to be binding and final. -There are, however, three exceptions to the above, (1) Persons claiming -in virtue of Messuages and Tofts need not prove usage of common; (2) -Any Person who is dissatisfied with regard to his own or some one -else’s claim, may give notice in writing, and the Commissioners are -then to take Counsel’s opinion on the matter. The Commissioners are -to choose the Counsel, who is to be ‘not interested in the Premises.’ -The Commissioners may also on their own responsibility take Counsel’s -opinion at any time they think proper; Counsel’s opinion is to be -final. The costs are to be paid by the party against whom the dispute -is determined, or otherwise as the Commissioners decide; (3) The Earl -of Strafford is exempted from specifying particulars of Tenure in -making his claim, for there are disputes on this subject between the -Duke and the Earl, ‘which Matters in Difference the said Duke and Earl -have not agreed to submit to the Consideration or Determination of the -said Commissioners.’ The Commissioners need not specify the tenure of -the Earl’s share in making their award, and if the Duke and Earl go to -law about their dispute and the matter is settled in a Court of Equity, -then the Commissioners are to make a second special Award for them. - - -SYSTEM OF DIVISION--SPECIAL PROVISIONS: - -_Provisions for the Lord of the Manor_--‘the Most Noble Francis, Duke -of Leeds.’-- - -(1) Such part of the Commons and Waste Grounds as is ‘equal in Value -to One full Sixteenth Part thereof in lieu of and as a sufficient -Recompence for his Right to the Soil of the said Commons and Waste -Grounds, and for his Consent to the Division and Inclosure thereof; - -(2) An allotment of the Commons and Waste Grounds to be (in the -judgment of the Commissioners) a fair compensation for his Coney -Warrens which are to be destroyed; - -(3) An allotment equal in value (in the judgment of the Commissioners) -to £40 a year as compensation for the reserved Rents he has been -receiving from persons who have made incroachments during the last 20 -years; - -(4) An allotment or allotments of not more than 5 acres in the whole, -to be awarded in such place as the Duke or his Agents appoint, close -to one of his stone quarries, as compensation for the right given by -the Act to other allottees of the Common of getting stone on their -allotments; - -(5) The value of all the timber on allotments from the common is to be -assessed by the Commissioners, and paid by the respective allottees to -the Duke. If they refuse to pay, the Duke may come and cut down the -timber ‘without making any Allowance or Satisfaction whatsoever to the -Person or Persons to whom any such Allotment shall belong, for any -Injury to be done thereby’; - -(6) The Duke’s power to work Mines and to get all Minerals is not to be -interfered with by anything in this Act but the ‘Owners or Proprietors -of the Ground wherein such Pits or Soughs shall be made, driven, or -worked, or such Engines, Machines or Buildings erected, or such Coals -or Rubbish laid, or such Ways, Roads or Passages made and used,’ are -to have a ‘reasonable Satisfaction for Damages.’ The payment of the -reasonable Satisfaction however is not to fall on the Duke, but on all -the allottees of the Commons and Waste Grounds who are to meet together -in the Moot Hall and appoint a salaried officer to settle the damages -and collect the money by a rate raised according to the Poor Rate -of the previous year. If the claimant and the officer fail to agree, -arbitrators, and ultimately an umpire, can be appointed. - -_Provisions for Tithe Owners._--A fair allotment is to be given to -the Vicar in compensation for his small Tythes. In cases where the -allottees have not enough land to contribute their due share to the -tithe allotment, they have to pay a yearly sum instead. - -_For Stone and Gravel_, _etc._--Suitable allotments for stone and -gravel, etc., to be made ‘for the Use and Benefit’ of all allottees -‘for the Purpose of getting Stone, Sand, Gravel, or other Materials -for making and repairing of the public Roads and Drains’; but these -allotments are not to include any of the Duke’s or of his tenants’ -stone quarries. - -_Provision for the Poor._--None. - -_Allotment of Residue._--(1) The open fields are to be divided out -amongst the present proprietors in proportion to their present value -and with regard to convenience; unless any owner of open-field land -specially asks for an allotment elsewhere; (2) The owners of Ings are -to have Ings allotted to them, unless they wish for land elsewhere; (3) -The Commons and Waste grounds are first to have the various allotments -to the Lord of the Manor and the Vicar specified above, and also the -allotment for Stone and Gravel for roads deducted from them, and then -the residue is to be allotted ‘among the several Persons (considering -the said Duke of Leeds as one) having Right of Common in or upon the -said Commons and Waste Grounds’ in the following fashion; one half is -to be divided among the Owners or Proprietors of Messuages, Cottages -or Tofts with Right of Common, according to their several Rights and -Interests; the other half, together with the rest and residue of Land -to be divided, is to be allotted among the Owners or Proprietors of -open common fields, Ings, and old inclosed Lands according to their -several rights and interests ‘without any undue Preference whatsoever.’ -The Commissioners are also directed to pay due regard to situation -and to putting the different allotments of the same person together. -Allotments are to be of the same tenure, _i.e._ freehold or copyhold, -as the holdings in respect of which they are claimed, but no fines are -to be taken on account of the allotment. - -With respect to the allottees of allotments on Westgate Moor, a special -clause (see petition on January 23) is inserted. They are forbidden to -put up any House, Building or Erection of any kind on one part for 20, -on another for 40, on another for 60, years, unless the Duke consents, -the object being ‘thereby the more advantageously to enable the said -Duke, his Heirs and Assigns, to work his Colliery in and upon the same -Moor.’ - -The award, with full particulars of allotments, etc., is to be drawn -up and is to be ‘final, binding, and conclusive upon all Parties and -Persons interested therein.’ - -If any person (being Guardian, etc., tenant in tail or for life of -lessee, etc.) fails to accept and fence, then Commissioners can do -it for him and charge; if he still refuses, Commissioners can lease -allotment out and take rent till Expenses are paid. - - -INCROACHMENTS.--Incroachments 20 years old are to stand; those made -within 20 years are to be treated as part of the Commons to be divided, -but they are, if the Commissioners think it fit and convenient, to be -allotted to the person in possession without considering the value of -erections and improvements. Three contingencies for allotment to the -person in possession are provided for;--(1) if he is entitled to an -allotment, his incroachment is to be treated as part or the whole of -his allotment; - -(2) If his incroachment is of greater value than the allotment he -is entitled to, then he is to pay whatever extra sum of money the -Commissioners judge right; - -(3) If he is not entitled to any allotment at all, then he has to pay -the price set on his incroachment by the Commissioners. - -If the Commissioners do not allot an incroachment to the person in -possession, they may sell it at public auction and apply the money -to the purposes of the Act, or they may allot it to someone not in -possession, in which case a ‘reasonable’ sum of money is to be given to -the dispossessed owner, the new allottee paying the whole or part of it. - -The above provisions apply to the ordinary incroachers; the Duke has -special arrangements. If he has made any new incroachments during -the last 20 years in addition to any older incroachments, these new -incroachments are to be valued by the Commissioners, and the Duke is -to have them either as part of his allotment or for a money payment, -as he chooses; also ‘whereas the Tenants of the said Duke of Leeds of -the Collieries on the said Commons and Waste Lands ... have from Time -to Time erected Fire Engines, Messuages, Dwelling Houses, Cottages and -other Buildings upon the said Commons and Waste Lands, and made several -other Conveniences thereon for the Use and Accommodation of the said -Collieries, and the Persons managing and working the same, a great Part -of which have been erected and made within the last Twenty Years, these -are not to be treated like other incroachments, but are to ‘be and -continue the absolute Property of the said Duke of Leeds, his Heirs and -Assigns, in as full and ample Manner’ as if the erections had been made -more than 20 years before. - - -FENCING.--All allotments are to be fenced at the expense of their -several proprietors ‘in such Manner, Shares and Proportions as the said -Commissioners shall ... direct’ with the following exceptions--(1) -the Vicar’s allotment for small Tithes is to be fenced by the other -proprietors; (2) the allotments to Hospitals, Schools, and other public -Charities are to have a certain proportion deducted from them to cover -the cost of fencing. Allottees who refuse to fence can be summoned -before a J.P. by their neighbours, and the J.P. (who is not to be -interested in the Enclosure) can make an order compelling them to fence. - -To protect the new hedges, it is ordered that no sheep or lambs are to -be turned out in any allotment for 7 years, unless the allottee makes -special provision to protect his neighbour’s young quickset, and no -beasts, cattle or horses are to be turned into any roads or lanes where -there is a new-growing fence. - - -EXPENSES.--Part of the Commons and Waste Grounds is to be sold to -cover the expences; if the proceeds do not cover the costs the residue -is to be paid by the allottees in proportion to their shares, and -any surplus is to be divided among them, But Hospitals, Schools, and -Public Charities are exempted from this payment, a portion of their -allotments, in fact, having been already deducted in order to pay -their share of Expenses. The Commissioners are to keep an account of -Expenses, which is to be open to inspection. The owners of Ings are to -pay a sum of money in return for the extinction of the right of Eatage -(referred to by the Petitioners) on their land from August 12 to April -5; and this money is to be applied for the purposes of the Act. - -If allottees find the expenses of the Act and of fencing more than they -can meet, they are allowed (with the consent of the Commissioners) -to mortgage their allotments up to 40s. an acre. If they dislike -this prospect, they are empowered by the Act, at any time before the -execution of the Award, to sell their rights to allotment in respect of -any common right. - - -COMPENSATION TO OCCUPIERS.--Occupiers are to pay a higher rent in -return for the loss of the use of common rights. The clause runs -as follows:--‘That the several Persons who hold any Lands or other -Estates, to which a Right of Common upon the said Commons and Waste -Grounds is appurtenant or belonging, or any Part of the said Open -Common Fields or Inclosures, by virtue of any Lease, of which a longer -Term than One Year is unexpired, shall and are hereby required to -pay to their respective Landlords such Increase of Rent towards the -Expences such Landlords will be respectively put to in Consequence of -this Act, as the said Commissioners shall judge reasonable, and shall -by Writing under their Hands direct or appoint, having Regard to the -Duration of such respective Leases, and to the probable Benefit which -will accrue to such respective Lessees by Reason of the said Inclosure.’ - - -ROADS.--Commissioners to have full power to set out and shut up roads -and footpaths (turnpike roads excepted). - - -POWER OF APPEAL.--To Quarter Sessions only, and not in any cases where -the Commissioners’ decisions are final, binding, or conclusive, as -they are, _e.g._ on claims (except the Earl of Strafford’s) and on -allotments. - - -AWARD.--Not with Clerks of Peace or of County Council, or in Record -Office. - - -APPENDIX A (12) - -WINFRITH NEWBURGH, DORSET.--ENCLOSURE ACT, 1768 - - -AREA.--2254 Acres or thereabouts. - - -NATURE OF GROUND.--Common Fields, Meadow Grounds, Sheep Downs, Commons, -Common Heaths, and other Waste Grounds. - -(In Report, Common Arable Fields and Common Meadows = 1218 acres.) - - -PARLIAMENTARY PROCEEDINGS.--_December 1, 1767._--Petition for enclosure -from Edward Weld, Esq., George Clavell, Esq., Benjamin Thornton, Clerk, -William Weston, Clerk, John Felton, Gentleman, and others. Leave -given; bill read twice and committed on December 11 to a Committee of -42 members in addition to the members for Dorset, Somerset, Devon and -Cornwall. All to have Voices. January 25, 1768, Petition from persons -being Freeholders, Proprietors of Estates or otherwise interested, -against the bill stating ‘that if the said Bill should pass into a -Law the Estates of the Petitioners and others in the said Parish -will be greatly injured, and several of them must be totally ruined -thereby; and that some of the Petitioners, by Threats and Menaces, -were prevailed upon to sign the Petition for the said Bill; but upon -Recollection, and considering the impending Ruin they shall be subject -to by the Inclosure, beg Leave now to have Liberty to retract from -their seeming Acquiescence in the said Petition,’ and ask to be heard -by Counsel against the Bill. Petition referred to the Committee. - -_January 29, 1768._--Mr. Bond reported from the Committee that there -was an erasure in the prayer of the said Petition and asked for -instructions. A fresh Committee of 36 members (many of whom were also -members of the other Committee) was appointed to examine into the -question of how the erasure was made, and whether it was previous or -subsequent to the signing. This Committee was ordered to report to the -House, but there is no record of its report. - - -REPORT AND ENUMERATION OF CONSENTS.--_February 2, 1768._--Mr. Bond -reported from the Committee that the allegations were true, and that -the ‘Parties concerned’ had given their consent ‘(except Four Persons -who could not be found whose Property in the Common Meadows to be -inclosed amounts to Five Acres, Three Roods, Twenty Three Perches -and a half; and also except Four other Persons who, when applied to -for their Consent to the Bill, refused to sign, though they declared -they had no Objection, and whose Property in the Common Meadows to be -inclosed amounts to Four Acres, One Rood, Thirty Eight Perches; and -also except Six Persons whose Property in the Common Arable Fields -and Common Meadows to be inclosed mounts to One hundred and twenty -two Acres, Thirty Three Perches, who refused to sign the Bill; and -also, except Three Persons, whose Property in the Common Arable Fields -and Common Meadows, to be inclosed, amounts to One hundred and seven -Acres, Twenty Three Perches, who hold under Copies of Court Roll, -granted on Condition that they would join in any Act or Deed for the -dividing and inclosing the said Common Fields, and Meadows, and other -Commonable Lands within the said Manor, when thereto requested by the -Lord of the said Manor; and that the whole Number of Acres in the said -Common Arable Fields and Common Meadows is One thousand, Two hundred -and eighteen, Twenty Eight Perches and a half, and that the Rector of -Winfrith Newburgh and Vicar of Campden, who are intitled to all the -Great and Small Tithes arising out of the said Common Arable Fields and -Common Meadows have consented thereto).’ - -_February 2, 1768_ (same day).--Another Petition against the bill from -Freeholders, Proprietors and Persons otherwise interested stating -that the Inclosure is ‘contrary to the general Sense of the Persons -interested therein,’ and will be ‘injurious to the Property of the -Petitioners and others, the smaller Landholders within the said Parish, -some of whom must, in the Petitioners’ Judgment, be totally ruined -thereby.’ Petitioners to be heard when Report considered. - -_February 3, 1768._--Report considered. House informed that no Counsel -attended. Report read. Clause added settling the expenses to be paid -by Copyholders and Lessees for Lives. Bill sent to Lords. February -9, Committed. Same day, Petition against it from various persons as -‘contrary to the general Sense of the Persons interested therein.’ -Referred to Committee. February 12, Lord Delamer reported from the -Committee without amendment. February 24, Royal Assent. - - -MAIN FEATURES OF ACT.--(Private, 8 George III. c. 18.) - - -COMMISSIONERS.--Seven appointed. (1) John Bond, Esq., of Grange; (2) -David Robert Mitchell, Esq., of Dewlish; (3) Nathaniel Bond, Esq., of -West Lulworth; (4) Thomas Williams, Esq., of Herringstone; (5) William -Churchill, Esq., of Dorchester; (6) George Lillington of Burngate, -Gentleman; (7) Joseph Garland of Chaldon, Gentleman; all of Dorset. - -Sometimes 3, sometimes 4 a quorum. Vacancies to be filled up by -remaining Commissioners from persons not interested in the land to be -inclosed. - -Survey to be made if Commissioners ‘shall think the same necessary.’ - - -PAYMENT.--Nothing stated. - - -CLAIMS.--Commissioners to examine into and determine on all claims; -and ‘in case any Difference or Dispute shall arise between all or -any of the Parties interested in the said Division and Inclosure, -with respect to the Premises, or any Matter or Thing herein contained -or consequent thereon, or in relation thereunto, the same shall be -adjusted and finally determined between the said Parties, and every -of them, by the said Commissioners, or any Three or more of them.’ -Commissioners can examine witnesses on oath, ‘and the Determinations of -the said Commissioners, or any Three or more of them therein, shall be -binding and conclusive to all and every the said Parties....’ - - -SYSTEM OF DIVISION--SPECIAL PROVISIONS: - -_Lords of the Manor_ (Edward Weld, Esq., of Winfrith Newburgh; George -Clavell, Esq., of Langcotts and East Fossell).--No special provision -for allotment. Their Manorial Rights are not to be prejudiced by Act -except as regards ‘the Mines, Delves, and Quarries lying within and -under such Parts, Shares, and Proportions of the said Common Fields, -Meadow Grounds, Sheep Downs, Commons, Common Heaths and other Waste -Grounds, as shall or may be allotted and assigned to the several other -Freeholders and Owners of Lands’ within these Manors ‘or to any Person -or Persons not having any Lands within the said In-Parish or Manors, -or within the Precincts thereof as aforesaid, in Lieu of or as an -Equivalent for such Right or Claim as aforesaid; and other than and -except such Common of Pasture and other Common Rights as can or may be -claimed by or belonging to the Lord or Lords of the said Manors in and -upon the Premises so intended to be divided and inclosed as aforesaid.’ - -_Tithe Owners._--Tithe owners to have the same rights to Tithes over -the land about to be inclosed as they have over the lands already -inclosed. - -If arable land is converted to pasture on inclosure (for Dairy Cows or -Black Cattle) then allottees shall pay an annual 3s. an acre to tithe -owners as compensation for corn tithes. Allotments given in virtue of -estates which are Cistertian Lands, are to be deemed Cistertian Lands -too, _i.e._ to have same exemption from tithes, but any Cistertian -Lands which are allotted are to be under the same obligations for -tithes as the estates in virtue of which they are allotted. - -_Provision for the Poor._--None. - -_Provision for Fuel Allotment._--Commissioners are to ascertain and -determine all Rights of Common over the land to be enclosed, and are -then to set out such part or parts ‘as shall appear to them to be -sufficient, and to be conveniently situate for the preserving and -raising Furze, Turf, or other Fuel, for the Use of the several Persons’ -who shall appear to the Commissioners to be intitled to a Right of -Common. - -_Allotment of Residue._--Amongst all persons who appear to the -Commissioners to be intitled to a Right of Common, or to have or be -intitled to any other Property in the said Common Fields, etc., in such -proportions as the Commissioners judge right ‘without giving any undue -Preference,’ and with due regard to Quality, Quantity, and Situation. - -But the following Rules are to be observed with regard to proportions:-- - -(1) Common Fields and Sheep Downs are to be divided ‘by and according -to the Parts and Proportions of the Arable Lands lying in the said -Common Fields, where the said Parties respectively now are, or, at the -Time of such Allotments so as aforesaid to be made shall be intitled -to.’ - -(2) Meadow Grounds, Commons, Common Heaths, and other Waste Grounds -to be divided ‘according to the Sum or Sums of money which the said -Parties and each of them now stand charged with towards the Relief of -the Poor of the said Parish’ in respect of their lands which have right -of common. - -_Special Clause._--In case it appears to the Commissioners that any -persons who have no land, nevertheless have a right of common, then -the Commissioners can allot such person such part of the land to be -inclosed as they think an equivalent for such right of common. In order -to prevent all Differences and Disputes, the Commissioners are to draw -up an Award, and this Award shall be binding and conclusive to all and -every Person and Persons interested. Failure to accept within 6 months -excludes allottee from all benefit and advantage of this Act, and -also ‘from any Estate, Interest or Right of Common, or other Property -whatsoever’ in any other allotment. (Saving clause for infants, etc.) - - -INCROACHMENTS.--Not mentioned. - - -FENCING, etc.--To be done by allottees in such proportions as -Commissioners direct. Such directions to be put in award, and to be -final and binding. Fences to be made within 12 months, or some other -convenient space of time. - -If an allottee fails to fence, his neighbour can complain to a J.P. -(not interested in the inclosure), who can authorise complainant to do -it, and either charge defaulter or to enter on premises and receive -rents till expenses paid. _Exception._--Allotment of Copyholders and -leaseholders for one or more lives are to be fenced partly by the Lord -of the Manor and partly by the allottees in such proportion as the -Commissioners (or 4 of them) direct. - - -EXPENSES.--(1) Expenses of obtaining and passing the Act to be borne by -the Lords of the Manor. - -(2) Expenses of carrying out the Act (survey, allotment, Commissioners’ -charges, etc.) to be borne by the several allottees in proportion to -the Quantity of Land allotted to them, or otherwise as Commissioners -direct. _Exception._--Tithe owners’ share to be borne by the Lords of -the Manor. Commissioners can distrain for payment. - -Trustees, Tenants in Tail or for Life may mortgage up to 40s. an acre. - - -COMPENSATION.--Leases and agreements at Rack Rent to be void, owners -making such compensation to Lessees as Commissioners judge right. - - -ROADS.--Commissioners have power to set out and shut up roads and -footpaths. - - -POWER OF APPEAL.--To Quarter Sessions only, and not when Commissioners’ -determination said to be final. - - -AWARD.--August 17, 1771. With Dorset Clerk of Peace or of County -Council. - - -APPENDIX A (13) - -QUAINTON.--ATTEMPTED ENCLOSURE, 1801 - - -PARLIAMENTARY PROCEEDINGS.--_March 20, 1801._--Petition for enclosures -from ‘several persons.’ Leave given. Earl Temple, Sir William Young, -and Mr. Praed to prepare bill. - -_April 2._--Bill read first time. - -_April 13._--Petition from various proprietors of Lands, Common Rights, -and other Hereditaments against the bill, stating that enclosure ‘would -be attended with an Expence to the Proprietors far exceeding any -Improvement to be derived therefrom.’ Ordered to be heard on second -reading. - -_April 15._--Bill read second time. Petitioners declined to be heard. -Bill committed to Mr. Praed, Earl Temple, etc. - -_April 21._--Petition against the bill from various proprietors stating -‘that the Proprietors of the said Commonable Lands are very numerous, -and the Shares or Properties belonging to most of them are so small -that the proposed Division and Inclosure would be attended with an -Expence far exceeding any Improvement to be derived therefrom; and -that a great Majority in Number of the said Proprietors dissent to the -said Bill, and the Proprietors of more than One-third, and very nearly -One-half Part in Value, of the Lands to be inclosed, also dissent -thereto; and that many of the Clauses and Provisions in the said Bill -are also highly injurious’ to the petitioners. - -Referred to the Committee. All to have voices. - - -REPORT AND ENUMERATION OF CONSENTS.--_June 12._--Mr. Praed reported -from the Committee that the Standing Orders had been complied with, -that the allegations were true, and that the Parties concerned had -given their consent (except the owners of Estates assessed to the Land -Tax at £39, 12s. 6-1/4d. who refused to sign the bill, and the owners -of Estates assessed at £3, 10s. 0d. who were neuter; and that the whole -of the Estates ‘interested’ were assessed at £246, 8s. 6d.). - -Same day.--Petition against the bill from Richard Wood on behalf of -himself and other proprietors who were parties to the former petition, -Richard Wood being the only one left in London, setting forth ‘that -the said Bill proposes to inclose only a Part of the said Parish of -Quainton, consisting of 3 open Arable Fields, and about 280 Acres of -Commonable Land, lying dispersedly in, or adjoining to the said Open -Fields, the rest of the said Parish being Old inclosed Lands’; that the -agent for the bill had given the Committee a statement (1) of the names -of the persons interested; (2) of the amount at which these persons -were assessed to the Land Tax for their property throughout the parish, -according to which statement it appeared, first, that of the 34 persons -interested, ‘not being Cottagers,’ 8 assented, 4 were neuter, and 22 -dissented; but that, second, as stated in terms of Land Tax Assessment, -£203, 5s. 11-3/4d. assented, and £39, 12s. 6-1/4d. dissented; that -this statement was wrong inasmuch as the proprietors of old inclosed -lands had in respect of old inclosures no rights over the commonable -lands, and that therefore no old inclosed land could rank as property -‘interested’ in the inclosure. The petitioners gave the following -enumeration of Consents as the correct one; whole quantity of land in -the Open Fields, ‘in respect of which only a Right of Common could be -claimed,’ 42-1/4 yard lands:-- - - Land belonging to those who assented, 21-3/4 yard lands - „ „ dissented, 19-1/2 „ - „ „ were neutral, 1 yard land - -or in terms of annual value-- - - Assenting, £406 10 0 - Dissenting, 370 0 0 - Neutral, 37 0 0 - -The petitioners further stated that their Counsel had offered to call -witnesses before the Committee to prove the above facts; that the agent -for the bill had retorted that old inclosed lands had a right in the -Commons, although he did not pretend that such right had ever been -enjoyed, or produce any witness to show that it had ever been claimed, -but supported his claim by quoting a clause in the bill by which it -was proposed that the Rector’s Tithes for the old inclosures as well -as the new should be commuted for an allotment of land; and that the -Committee refused to hear the evidence tendered by the petitioners’ -Counsel. This Petition was referred to the Committee to whom the bill -was recommitted, and the bill was dropped. - - -APPENDIX A (14) - - -SUBSEQUENT HISTORY OF KING’S SEDGMOOR - -In 1775, Mr. Allen, Member of Parliament for Bridgwater, tried to -get an enclosure bill passed. ‘Sanguine of success, and highly -impressed with the idea of its importance, he purchased a large -number of rights, and having obtained a signature of consents, went to -Parliament; but not having interest enough in the House to stem the -torrent of opposition, all his delusive prospects of profit vanished, -and he found himself left in a small but respectable minority.’[502] -No further attempt was made till 1788, when a meeting to consider -the propriety of draining and dividing the moor, was held at Wells. -‘At this meeting Sir Philip Hales presided; and after much abuse and -opposition from the lower order of commoners, who openly threatened -destruction to those who supported such a measure, the meeting was -dissolved without coming to any final determination. - -‘The leading idea was, however, afterwards pursued, with great -assiduity, by Sir Philip, and his agent Mr. Symes of Stowey; and by -their persevering industry, and good management,’[503] application was -again made to Parliament in 1791. - - -PARLIAMENTARY PROCEEDINGS.--_February 18, 1791._--Petition from several -Owners and Proprietors for a bill to drain and divide the tract of -waste ground of about 18,000 acres called King’s Sedgmoor. Petitioners -point out that the moor is liable to be overflowed, ‘and thereby the -same is not only less serviceable and useful to the Commoners, but -also, by reason of the Vapours and Exhalations which arise from thence, -the Air of the circumjacent Country is rendered less salubrious’; also -that it would be ‘beneficial, as well to the wholesomeness of the -neighbouring Country as also to the Profitableness of the Pasturage of -the said Moor’ if it were drained and divided into Parochial or other -large allotments. The House was also informed that the expense of the -undertaking was not proposed to be levied by Tolls or Duties upon the -Parties interested. - -Leave given. Mr. Philips and Sir John Trevelyan to prepare. February -28. Bill committed to Mr. Philips, Mr. Templar, etc. - - -REPORT AND ENUMERATION OF CONSENTS.--_March 7._--Mr. Philips reported -that the Standing Orders had been complied with, that the allegations -were true, and that the parties concerned had consented ‘(except the -Owners of 107 Rights on the said Moor, who declared themselves neuter -in respect to the Bill; and also except the Owners of 84 Rights, who -declared themselves against the Bill; and that the whole of the Rights -on the said Moor consist of 1740, or thereabouts; and that no Person -appeared before the Committee to oppose the Bill).’ - -The Bill passed Commons, March 9; Lords, April 15. Royal Assent, May 13. - -Billingsley, after describing the attempts to enclose Sedgmoor, remarks -(p. 192): ‘I have been thus particular in stating the progress of this -business merely to show the impropriety of calling public meetings with -a view of gaining signatures of consent or taking the sense of the -proprietors in that way. At all publick meetings of this nature which I -ever attended noise and clamour have silenced sound sense and argument. -A party generally attends with a professed desire to oppose, and truth -and propriety have a host of foes to combat. Whoever therefore has -an object of this kind in view let him acquire consent by _private -application_; for I have frequently seen the good effects thereof -manifested by the irresistible influence of truth when coolly and -quietly administered; and it has frequently happened that men hostile -to your scheme have by dispassionate argument not only changed their -sentiment but become warm partisans in that cause which at first they -meant to oppose.’ - -The task of Sir Philip and Mr. Symes in acquiring consents by the -cool and quiet administration of truth must have been considerably -lightened by the fact that Parliament anticipated the Commissioners -with extraordinary accuracy in disregarding 55% of the claims. The -Commissioners, says Billingsley, investigated 4063 claims, of which -only 1798 were allowed. The Parliamentary Committee had asserted that -there were 1740 rights, ‘or thereabouts.’ - -The Act for draining and dividing King’s Sedgmoor is not, so far as we -have been able to discover, amongst the printed Statutes. - -Particulars of the expenses are given by Billingsley (p. 196), who -estimates the area at 12,000 acres:-- - - £ _s._ _d._ - To act of parliament and all other incidental expenses, 1,628 15 0 - Interest of money borrowed, 3,239 4 11 - Commissioners, 4,314 7 8 - Clerk, 1,215 19 0 - Surveyor, 908 12 6 - Printers, 362 6 3 - Petty expenses, 575 11 1 - Land purchased, 2,801 4 11 - Drains, sluices, bridges and roads, 15,418 2 8 - Awards and incidentals, 1,160 0 8 - ------------ - £31,624 4 8 - ------------- - -About 700 acres were sold to discharge the expenses. - -The drainage and division into parochial allotments was a preliminary -to enclosure of the different parochial shares, which was of course -made easier by the fact that 55% of the claims had already been -disallowed. In the years 1796, ’97, and ’98, fourteen Enclosure Acts -for the different parishes were passed. - -(Butleigh and Woollavington, 1796. Aller, Ashcott, Compton Dundon, -Higham, Othery, Moorlinch, Somerton, Street, and Weston Zoyland, 1797. -Bridgwater, Chedjoy, and Midellzoy, 1798.) - -Billingsley estimated that the total cost of subdividing parochial -allotments would be £28,000. - -He also estimated that the value of the land rose from 10s. to 35s. an -acre. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[490] Referred to below as ‘A’. - -[491] Referred to below as ‘B’. - -[492] Note that the compensation to the Lords of the Manor added -together comes to less than one ninety-first part of the soil. - -[493] _I.e._ lands over which there is right of common for half the -year between Michaelmas and Lady Day or Lammas and Lady Day. - -[494] This referred to roads only, see Act. - -[495] It took twenty-nine years. - -[496] Sir James Lowther, afterwards Lord Lowther, who had originally -petitioned for enclosure, had died in 1802. He was succeeded by his -cousin, Wordsworth’s patron. - -[497] These allotments were fenced by the other proprietors and did not -bear any of the expenses of the Act. - -[498] Including 8 acres 1 rood 5 perches for rights of soil. - -[499] Nine of them women. - -[500] See p. 55. - -[501] See Petition, p. 379, where nearly a hundred are said to do so. - -[502] Billingsley’s _Somerset_, p. 191. - -[503] _Ibid._, pp. 191-2. - - - - -APPENDIX B - -BEDFORDSHIRE.--CLOPSHILL, 1795.[504] - - -FAMILY OF SIX PERSONS. - - _Expences by the Week_-- £ _s._ _d._ - Bread, flour, or oatmeal, 0 7 6 - Yeast and salt, 0 0 3 - Thread and worsted, 0 0 2 - Bacon or other meat, 0 1 6 - Tea, sugar, and butter, 0 0 10-1/2 - Soap, 0 0 5 - Candles, 0 0 5 - Beer, 0 0 7 - ------------ - Total of the Week, £0 11 8-1/2 - ------------ - Amount per Annum, £30 8 10 - Rent, 1 10 0 - Wood, 1 12 6 - Cloaths, 2 2 0 - Sickness, 0 5 0 - --------- - Total Expences per Annum, £35 18 4 - --------- - _Earning per Week_-- - The man, £0 7 6 - The woman, 0 1 6 - The children, 0 4 0 - --------- - Total of the Week, £0 13 0 - --------- - Total Earnings per Annum, £33 16 0 - --------- - _N.B._--‘The Harvest earnings not included: they go a great - way towards making up the deficiency.’ - - -DORSET.--SHERBORNE, 1789.[505] - - -FAMILY OF FIVE PERSONS. - - _Expences per Week_-- £ _s._ _d._ - Bread, 0 3 0 - Salt, 0 0 1-1/2 - Meat, 0 0 8 - Tea, etc., 0 0 2[506] - Cheese, 0 0 7 - Milk, 0 0 4 - Soap, 0 0 2-1/2 - Candles, 0 0 6 - Thread, etc., 0 0 1 - --------- - Total, £0 5 8 - ========= - Amount per Annum, £14 14 8 - Rent, 2 0 0 - Fuel, 3 18 0 - Clothes, etc., 1 0 0 - --------- - Total Expences per Annum, £21 12 8 - ========= - _Earnings per Week_-- - The man, £0 6 0 - The woman, 0 2 6 - --------- - Total, £0 8 6 - ========= - Total Earnings per Annum, £22 2 0 - ========= - - -HAMPSHIRE.--LONG PARISH, 1789.[507] - -FAMILY OF SIX PERSONS. - - _Expences per Week_-- £ _s._ _d._ - Bread or Flour, 0 5 0 - Yeast and Salt, 0 0 3 - Bacon or other Meat, 0 1 0 - Tea, Sugar, and Butter, 0 0 6 - Cheese, 0 0 5 - Soap, Starch, and Blue, 0 0 2 - Candles, 0 0 2 - Thread, Thrum, and Worsted, 0 0 3 - --------- - Total, £0 7 9 - ========= - Amount per Annum, £20 3 0 - - Rent, Fuel (‘both very high and - scarce’), Clothes, - Lying-in, etc., 7 0 0 - --------- - Total Expences per Annum, £27 3 0 - ========= - _Earnings per Week_-- - The man, £0 8 0 - The woman, 0 1 0 - --------- - Total, £0 9 0 - ========= - Total Earnings per Annum, £23 8 0 - ========= - - -HERTS.--HINKSWORTH, 1795.[508] - -FAMILY OF SIX PERSONS. - - _Expences by the Week_-- £ _s._ _d._ - Bread, flour, or oatmeal, 0 10 5 - Heating the oven, 0 0 4 - Yeast and salt, 0 0 4 - Bacon or pork, 0 3 4 - Tea, sugar, and butter, 0 1 9-1/2 - Soap, 0 0 5 - Cheese, 0 0 7-1/2 - Candles, 0 0 4 - Small beer, 0 0 6-3/4 - Milk, 0 0 4 - Potatoes, 0 1 3 - Thread and worsted, 0 0 4 - ------------ - Total of the Week, £1 0 0-1/2 - ============ - Amount per Annum, £52 2 2 - Rent, 2 0 0 - Cloaths, 6 5 10 - Fuel, coal, wood, etc., 3 15 3 - Births and burials, 1 3 6 - --------- - Total Expences per Annum, £65 6 9 - ========= - _Earnings per Week_-- - The man, £0 9 2-3/4 - The woman, 0 1 6 - The children, 0 4 8 - ------------ - Total of the Week, £0 15 4-3/4 - ============ - Total Earnings per Annum, £40 0 7 - - ============ - - -NORTHAMPTONSHIRE.--CASTOR, 1794.[509] - -FAMILY OF SIX PERSONS. - - _Expences per Week_-- £ _s._ _d._ - Bread and Flour, 0 4 3 - Salt, 0 0 1 - Meat, 0 1 6 - Tea, Sugar, and Butter, 0 1 1 - Cheese (sometimes), 0 0 5 - Soap 1/4 lb., Starch, etc., 0 0 2-1/2 - Candles 1/2 lb., Thread, etc., 0 0 6 - ------------ - Total, £0 8 0-1/2 - ============ - - Amount per Annum, 20 18 2 - Rent, 1 15 0 - Fuel and coals, 1 10 0 - Clothing, 2 15 0 - Lying-in, loss of time, etc., 1 10 0 - --------- - Total Expenses per Annum, £28 8 2 - ========= - _Earnings per Week_-- - The man, £0 7 6 - The woman, 0 0 10 - The children, 0 0 4 - --------- - Total, £0 8 8 - ========= - Total Earnings per Annum, £22 10 8 - ========= - - _N.B._--To the earnings may be added what is got by gleaning. - - -NORFOLK.--DISS, 1793.[510] - -FAMILY OF SIX PERSONS. - - _Expences by the Week_-- £ _s._ _d._ - Bread, flour or oatmeal, 0 4 7-1/2 - Yeast and salt, 0 0 2 - Bacon or other meat, 0 0 3 - Tea, sugar, and butter, 0 0 9-1/4 - Soap, 0 0 2-1/4 - Candles, 0 0 3 - Cheese, 0 0 5-1/2 - Milk, 0 0 6 - Potatoes, 0 0 6 - Thread and worsted, 0 0 2 - ------------ - Total per Week, £0 7 10-1/2 - ============ - Total per Annum, £20 9 6 - Rent, 3 3 0 - Fuel, 1 4 0 - Cloaths, 2 3 0 - Births, burials, sickness, 0 10 0 - --------- - Total Expenses per Annum, £27 9 6 - ========= - _Earnings per Week_-- - The Man, £0 9 0 - The Woman, 0 1 0 - The Children, 0 1 6 - --------- - Total, £0 11 6 - ========= - Total Earnings per Annum, £29 18 0 - ========= - - _N.B._--In 1795 the earnings of this family were the same but - their expenses had risen to £36, 11s. 4d. On bread they spent - 8s. a week instead of 4s. 7-1/2d. - - -FOOTNOTES: - -[504] Eden, vol. iii. p. cccxxxix. - -[505] Davies, p. 152. - -[506] Davies puts 1-1/2d., but this is probably a slip. - -[507] Davies, p. 166. - -[508] Eden, vol. iii. p. cccxlii. - -[509] Davies, p. 176. - -[510] Eden, vol. iii. p. cccxlvi. - - - - -CHIEF AUTHORITIES - - - _Journals of House of Commons_ for period. - - _Journals of House of Lords_ for period. - - Reports of Parliamentary Debates for period in _Parliamentary - Register_, _Parliamentary History_, _Senator_ and _Parliamentary - Debates_. - - _Statutes, Public and Private_ for period. - - _Enclosure Awards_ in Record Office or Duchy of Lancaster. - - _Home Office Papers_ in Record Office. - - _Parliamentary Papers_ for period; specially-- - - FOR ENCLOSURES-- - -Report from Select Committee on Standing Orders relating to Private -Bills, 1775. - -Report from Select Committee on Waste Lands. Ordered to be printed -December 23, 1795. - -Report from Select Committee on Waste Lands, 1797. - -Report from Select Committee on Means of Facilitating Inclosure, 1800. -(Deals specially with Expense). - -Report from Select Committee on Constitution of Select Committees on -Private Bills, 1825. - -Report from Select Committee on Commons Inclosure, 1844. - - FOR POOR LAWS-- - -Report from Select Committee on Poor Laws, 1817. - -Report from Lords Committee on Poor Laws, 1818. - -Report from Select Committee on Poor Laws, 1819. - -Report from Select Committee on Relief of Able-Bodied from the Poor -Rate, 1828. - -Report from Lords on Poor Law, 1828. - -Documents in possession of Poor Law Commissioners, 1833. - -Report of Poor Laws Commissioners, 1834 - - FOR GAME LAWS, CRIME, AND PUNISHMENT-- - -Report from Select Committee on Game Laws, 1823. - -Report from Lords Committee on Game Laws, 1828. - -Report from Select Committee on Criminal Commitments and Convictions, -1827. - -Report from Select Committee on Criminal Commitments and Convictions, -1828. - -Return of Convictions under the Game Laws from 1827-30. - -Report from Select Committee on Secondary Punishments, 1831. - -Report from Select Committee on Secondary Punishments, 1832. - -Report from Select Committee on Transportation, 1838. - - FOR OTHER SOCIAL QUESTIONS-- - -Report from Select Committee on Agricultural Distress, 1821. - -Report from Select Committee on Labourers’ Wages, 1824. - -Reports from Select Committee on Emigration, 1826-7. - -Report from Select Committee on Agriculture, 1833. - -Report from Select Committee on Allotment System, 1843. - -Publications of Board of Agriculture. - -_General Report on Enclosures_, 1808. - -_Report on the Agricultural State of the Kingdom_, 1816. - -_Agricultural Surveys_ of different Counties, by various writers, -alluded to in text as _Bedford Report_, _Middlesex Report_, etc. - - -_Annual Register_ for period. - -_Annals of Agriculture_, 1784-1815 (46 vols.). - -Cobbett’s _Political Register_, 1802-35. - -_The Tribune_ (mainly Thelwall’s lectures), 1795-6. - -Reports of the Society for Bettering the Condition and Improving the -Comforts of the Poor, (5 vols.), 1795-1808. - -Ruggles, Thomas, _History of the Poor_, 1793 (published first in -_Annals of Agriculture_). - -Davies, David, _The Case of Labourers in Husbandry stated and -considered_, 1795. - -Eden, Sir Frederic Morton, _The State of the Poor or An History of the -Labouring Classes in England_, 1797. - -The Works of Arthur Young, William Marshall, and other contemporary -writers on agriculture and enclosures; see list in Hasbach, _History of -the English Agricultural Labourer_. - -Cobbett’s _Works_. - -Dunkin’s _History of Oxfordshire_. - -_Carlisle Papers, Historical MSS. Commission._ - -_Memoir of Lord Suffield_, by R. M. Bacon, 1838. - -_Life of Sir Samuel Romilly_, 1842. - - -MODERN AUTHORITIES - - Babeau, A., _Le Village sous l’ancien Régime_. - - Curtler, W. H. R., _A Short History of English Agriculture_. - - Eversley, Lord, _Commons, Forests, and Footpaths_. - - Hasbach, Wilhelm, _History of the English Agricultural Labourer_. - - Hirst, F. W., and Redlich, J., _Local Government in England_. - - Hobson, J. A., _The Industrial System_. - - Hudson, W. H., _A Shepherd’s Life_. - - Jenks, E., _Outlines of Local Government_. - - Johnson, A. H., _The Disappearance of the Small Landowner_. - - Kovalewsky, M., _La France Économique et Sociale à la Veille de la - Révolution_. - - Levy, H., _Large and Small Holdings_. - - Mantoux, P., _La Révolution Industrielle_. - - Porritt, E., _The Unreformed House of Commons_. - - Scrutton, T. E., _Commons and Common Fields_. - - Slater, G., _The English Peasantry and the Enclosure of Common Fields_. - - Smart, W., _Economic Annals of the Nineteenth Century_. - - De Tocqueville, _L’ancien Régime_. - - Vinogradoff, P., _The Growth of the Manor_. - - Webb, S. and B., _English Local Government_.--_The Parish and the - County._ - - ---- _English Local Government_.--_The Manor and the Borough._ - - - - -INDEX - - - Abel, Mr., 248. f. - - Abingdon, 267; - Special Commission at, 305 f. - - Abingdon, Lord, and Otmoor, 88, 91; - on Special Commission, 302. - - Abree, Margaret and Thomas, 109 _n._ - - Adam, the brothers, 327. - - Addington, H. _See_ Sidmouth. - - ---- Stephen, 31, 44. - - Addington Hills, 48. - - Addison, 325. - - Aglionby, Mr., M.P., 53. - - Agriculture, and enclosure, 36; - during French war, 166 ff.; - Brougham on, 171. - - Aix, Archbishop of, 217. - - Albemarle, Lord, 321. - - Aldborough, 9. - - Alderson, Justice, on Special Commissions, 272, 275, 277, 278, 281, - 290, 293, 295, 298, 300; - and Looker case, 295 f. - - Allotments, and enclosure, 84 ff.; - experiments, 154 ff.; - hostility of farmers to, 159 f.; - M. Chateauvieux on, 232 f.; - Suffield’s scheme in 1830, 322 ff. - - Almack’s, 68, 70. - - Althorp, Lord, 190, 202, 288; - Cobbett on, 313. - - America, farmers in, 212; - Cobbett in, 235. - - Amnesty Debate, 314. - - Andover, 260, 280, 285. - - Appeal, against enclosure award, 59 f. - - Arbuthnot, J., 37, 81. - - Aristocracy, contrast between English and French, 1 ff.; - control over all English institutions, 7 ff.; - Burke on, 24 f.; - characteristics, Chapter xiii. - - Armley (enclosure), 51, 59, 60, and Appendix A (1). - - Arson, in 1830, 243 ff., 268 f.; - penalties for, 273; - trials for, 309 f. - - Artaxerxes, 70. - - Arthur, Sir George (Governor of Van Diemen’s Land), 205, 324. - - Arundel, 256. - - Arundel, Lord, 261, 293. - - Ash, 183. - - Ashbury (enclosure), 43 _n._ - - Ashelworth (enclosure), 46, 50, 59, 98, and Appendix A (2). - - Astley, Sir E., 71. - - Aston, Tirrold, 263. - - Atkins, Elizabeth, 102. - - Attorney-General. _See_ Denman. - - Aunalls, James, 285. - - Austen, Jane, 214. - - Avington, 258, 265. - - Award, enclosure, 60. - - Aylesbury, 132; - riots in 1795, 121; - Special Commission, 275, 306 f. - - Azay le Rideau, 3. - - - Babeau, M., 1, 215, 223. - - Bacon, R. M., 321. - - Bagehot, W., 36. - - Bagshot Heath, 40. - - Bailiffs, 160, 213. - - Baily, Mr., 97 _n._ - - Baker, Mr., M.P., and Settlement, 153. - - Bakewell, 36. - - Bamford, S., 213, 238. - - Bampfylde, Copleston Warre, 65. - - Barett, 293. - - Baring, Bingham, 292, 304; - and Cook 286; - and Deacle case, 278, 287. - - ---- Sir Thomas, 187, 192, 284. - - Barings, the, 243, 288, 302, 317. - - Barkham, 82. - - Barnes, 277. - - ---- Common, 31. - - Barré, Colonel, 219. - - Barton Stacey, 284, 285. - - Basingstoke, 162 _n._, 289. - - Baskerville, Mr., J.P., 297. - - Bath, 121, 127, 130 _n._, 190 _n._ - - Bathurst, Lord, 56. - - Batten, Matthew, 303. - - Battersea, 30. - - Battle, 248, 250, 253, 255, 256. - - Beaconsfield, 135. - - Beckett (the gaoler), 277. - - Beckley, 88 f., 91. - - Bedford, 152. - - ---- Gaol, account of prisoners in, 193. - - Belgrave, Lord, 143. - - Benett, John, M. P., and 1830 rising, 261, 291, 292, 315; - at Cobbett’s trial, 317. - - Bennett, 263. - - ---- Cornelius, 303 f. - - Benson or Bensington, 268. - - Bentham, 203, 312; - on enclosure, 40; - on Pitt’s Bill, 150. - - Bentley, 218. - - Berkeley, Bishop, 175. - - Berkshire, 30; - 1830 rising in, 258 ff.; - prisoners, 308 _n._ - - ---- Bread Act. _See_ Speenhamland. - - Bernard, Scrope, 132. - - ---- Sir Thomas, on Lord Winchilsea’s allotments, 128, 155, 158 f.; - on minimum wage, 143; - on removals, 154 _n._ - - Betts, John, 102. - - Bicester, 99 _n._ - - Billingsley, J., 37, 61 _n._, 98 _n._ - - Birdingbury, 100. - - Birmingham, 115. - - Bishop, Daniel, on poaching, 192, 196; - on 1830 rising, 248. - - Bishop, 310 f. - - Bishops, the, comparison of French and English, 217; - reforming, 218, 219. - - Bishopstone (Wilts), (enclosure), 51. - - Bishops Walthams, 159. - - Bishton, Mr., 38. - - Blackstone, 187, 203, 219; - on common rights, 29, 31; - on gleaning, 108. - - Blake, Mr., of Idmiston, 295. - - ---- William, 326. - - Blean, 310. - - Blizzard, Thomas, 307. - - Blomfield, Bishop, 219. - - Blow, Charles, 246. - - Board of Agriculture, and enclosures, 74 ff., 84; - questions to correspondents, 135, 176. - - Bocking, 118. - - Bolingbroke, Lord (author of _Patriot King_), 207. - - ---- ---- and Sedgmoor, 65. - - Bolland, Mr. Justice, 302. - - Bolnhurst (enclosure), 32. - - Bologna, 326. - - Booby, Lady, 18. - - Borderers. _See_ Squatters. - - Boroughs, disputes about franchise, 8; - Scot and lot, 8; - potwalloper, 9; - burgage, 9; - corporation, 10; - freemen, 11. - - Bosanquet, Mr. Justice, 95, 274. - - Boston, 10. - - Boswell, Will, 102. - - Botany Bay, 239. - - Bourton, Charles, 294. - - Boys, John (agriculturist), 160. - - ---- ---- (farmer, in 1830 rising), 282 f. - - Bradley, 116 _n._ - - Bragge, Mr., M.P., 44 _n._ - - Bramshott, 260. - - Brandon, 177. - - Braunston (enclosure), 43 _n._ - - Bread, wheaten and mixed, 124, 126. - _See also_ Diet. - - Brede, parish rising at, 248 ff. - - Brighton, 223, 247, 284. - - Brimpton, 304. - - Bristol, 12, 121, 152, 243. - - Bristowe, Squire, 293. - - Brittany, 224. - - Broad Somerford, 85. - - Brocklehurst, Mr., 38. - - Brooks’s, 68 _n._, 69, 222, 332. - - Brotherton, Colonel, 259. - - Brougham, Henry, 302, 322; - on agriculture, 171; - on J.P.’s, 191; - on increase of commitments, 200; - on criminal courts, 202; - on 1830 rising, 270; - Cobbett on, 313; - at Cobbett’s trial, 317 f. - - Broughton, 267. - - Brown, Rev. Mr., 43 _n._ - - ---- Thomas, 310. - - Bryan, Elizabeth, 102. - - Bryant, Joseph, 249. - - Buckingham, 183; - and 1830 rising, 268; - prisoners, 308 _n._ - - ---- Duke of, 18; - and rising of 1830, 243, 258, 265, 306. - - Buckland Newton, 301. - - Budgets, 111, 120, Appendix B. - - Bulcamp, House of Industry, 147 _n._ - - Bull-baiting, 57. - - Bullen, Robert, 301. - - Bullington, 284. - - Bully. _See_ Bolingbroke. - - Bunce, Henry, 277. - - Buns, parish, 268. - - Burbage, George, 295. - - Burdett, Sir F., 313. - - Burdon, Mr., M.P., 142. - - Burgage boroughs, 9. - - Burgundy, Duke of, 4. - - Burke, 7, 14, 103, 203, 329, 330; - on the aristocracy, 24; - on Parliamentary representation, 75; - on regulating wages, 135; - philosophy of social life, 208, 210; - on French Assembly, 215. - - Burkhead, Charles, 102. - - Burley on the Hill, 155. - - Burn, Dr., 115, 117. - - Burnet, 40. - - Burnham, 214. - - Burwash, 250. - - Bury St. Edmunds, 177, 192. - - Buxton, Mr., M.P., 142, 143, 153, 210. - - Byron, 313. - - - Cabinet System established, 6. - - Cade, Jack, 13. - - Cæsar, 170, 330. - - Cambridge, 269. - - _Cambridge Modern History_, 87 _n._ - - Cambridgeshire, 177, 184, 269. - - Camden, 202. - - Camden, Lord, 246, 255, 309. - - Canning, 202, 210, 241, 331, 332. - - Canterbury, 244, 255, 256. - - Canterbury, Archbishop of, 190 _n._, 204; - prayer in 1830, 270. - - Capes, W. W., 159 _n._ - - Capital offences, and Private Bill Committees, 64. - - Carbery, Lord, 43 _n._ - - Carlile, Richard, prosecution in 1831, 315. - - Carlisle, 11, 121, 269. - - Carlisle, Lord, and Sedgmoor, 66 ff. - - Carlyle, 216. - - Carmarthen, 152. - - Carnarvon, Lord, 240. - - Carr, Elizabeth, 102. - - Carrington, Lord, 84, 155, 156, 250. - - Carter, James, 86. - - ---- John, 86, 102. - - Cartmel (enclosure), 50. - - Carus Wilson, Mr., 38, 42 _n._ - - Case, 275. - - Castlereagh, 238, 299, 314, 332. - - Cavan, Lord and Lady, 279 f. - - Certificates (under Settlement Laws), 113, 115 ff., 158. - - Chancellor, Lord. _See_ Brougham. - - Charles I., and enclosures, 34. - - ---- V., 319. - - ---- VIII., 235. - - ---- X., 311. - - Charlton (Otmoor), 89, 93. - - ---- (Wilts), 287. - - Chateauvieux, M., 233 f. - - Chatham, Lord, 329, 330. - - Cheese, dearness of, 129 _n._ - - Chenonceaux, 3. - - Cherry, Mr., J.P., 265. - - Cheshunt (enclosure), 58 _n._, 59, 86, 98 _n._, and Appendix A (3). - - Chester, 152. - - Chester, Charles, 43 _n._ - - Children, employment of, 141 f.; - punishment of, 200 f. - - Chinon, 3. - - Chippendale, 327. - - Christian, Mr., 178. - - Chudleigh, 121. - - Church, the (_see also_ Clergy), 326; - and enclosure, 56, 76 f., 168; - and tithes, 167 f.; - and the poor, 216 ff. - - Churchill, Lord, 94 f. - - Cicero, 238, 331. - - Cinque Ports, 12. - - Claims, presentation of, under enclosure Acts, 63. - - Clare, Lord, 321. - - ---- John, 331, 332 _n._ - - Clarke, Marcus, 199, 205. - - ---- Tom, 216. - - Clergy, non-residence of the, 214, 220; - and the poor, 216 ff.; - association with governing class, 219; - salaries of curates, 221; - and tithes, 222. - - Clerk, George, 281. - - Clive, 206. - - Clough, John and Thomas, 200. - - Cobbett, William, 40, 127, 184 _n._, 189 _n._, 191, 228, 278 _n._, - 284, 285, 291, 309; - on enclosures, 35; - on unpaid magistrates, 62; - on tea, 128; - on allotments, 154, 159, 173; - on Whitbread’s 1807 scheme, 180 f.; - description of labourers, 185; - on relations of rich to poor, 211; - on change in farming, 212 f.; - on parsons, 220; - George IV. on, 223; - and village sports, 223; - description of, 234 f.; - and 1830 rising, 244, 248, 259, 264, 287; - on Whig ministers, 313; - trial in 1831, 315 ff. - - Cobbold, Rev. Mr., 260, 282. - - Cockerton, Rev. Mr., 285. - - Codrington, O. C., 297. - - Coke, Lord, 21. - - ---- of Norfolk, 36; - and spring guns, 196; - and Game Laws, 196 _n._, 198. - - Colchester, 10, 15. - - Coleman, Mr., 249 f. - - Collingwood, Mr., J.P., 253, 256. - - Collins, A., 218. - - ---- (in Deacle case), 277. - - Combination Laws, 234, 238, 272. - - Commissioners, Enclosure, 43; - power of, 58 f.; - appointment of, 60 ff., 73. - - Commissioners. _See_ Poor Law Commission. - - Commoners, character of, 37 ff.; - at Otmoor, 88 f.; - theory of rights of, 92. - - Common fields, extent of, in 1688, 26; - system of cultivation, 28; - managed by manor courts, 30; - varieties in system, 30, 31 _n._; - Sir R. Sutton’s Act, 31; - ownership of, 32; - subdivision of property in, 33; - position of labourers under system, 33 f., 159; - disadvantages of, 36 f.; - relation to old enclosures, 42. - - Common land, three uses of term, 28. - - Commons, relation to village economy, 27, 103; - alleged deleterious effects of, on commoners, 37 f.; - commoners’ own views on subject, 39; - aesthetic objections to, 40. - - Common rights, 29, 31, 32; - legal decision about inhabitants, 32; - claims for, on enclosure, 63; - at Otmoor, 92. - - Consents, proportion required for enclosure, 49 ff.; - how assessed, 50 ff.; - how obtained, 51 f.; - _see also_ King’s Sedgmoor, 66 ff. - - Cook, Henry, 286 f., 290, 317, 319. - - Cooper, 259, 285, 290. - - ---- and others, 95. - - Coote, Eyre, 280, 285. - - Copenhagen, 178 _n._ - - Copyholders, position of, 22, 23, 28 f., 51. - - Corn Laws, 321. - - Cornwall, 28 _n._ - - Corporation boroughs, 10. - - Corsley (Wilts), 220. - - Cottagers, 28 ff.; - position before enclosure, 31; - and enclosure, 52 f.; - presentment of claims by, 63; - results of enclosure on, 97, 100 ff.; - and allotments, 155 ff. - - Cotswolds, 40. - - Coulson, Mr., 97 _n._ - - Councils, French, under Regency, 2. - - Cove, Rev. Mr., J. P., 304. - - Coventry, 78, 119. - - Coventry, Lord, 56. - - Cows, loss of, on enclosure, 100 f., 127; - Raunds commoners on benefit of, 39; - and allotments, 155 ff.; - and settlement, 178 f. - - Cox, William, 102. - - Coxe, Mr., M.P., 65. - - Coxhead, Mr., M.P., 142. - - Crabbe, 223; - on workhouse, 147; - on roundsmen, 165; - on poachers, 194; - on poor, 212. - - Cranbrook, 255 f. - - Craven, Lord, 43 _n._ - - Creevey, 139, 209. - - Cricklade, 185. - - Croke, Sir Alex., 89 f., 92, 94, 96. - - Croker, 10. - - Cromwell, Oliver, 22; - and enclosures, 35. - - Crook, John, 306. - - Croxton, 43 _n._ - - Croydon (enclosure), 48, 59, 63, 199 _n._, and Appendix A (4). - - Curtler, W. H. R., 172, 175 _n._ - - Curwen, Mr., M.P., 130, 158 _n._, 195, 198, 213. - - - Dalbiac, General, 256. - - Darling, Alfred, 305. - - Davenant, 26 _n._ - - Davies, Rev. David, his book, 82, 85; - on fuel, 107, 131 f.; - on rise in prices, 110; - his budgets, 111, 120, 122, and Appendix B; - on mixed bread, 126; - on milk, 127; - on tea, 128 f.; - on minimum wage, 136 f.; - on land for labourers, 82, 154. - - ---- Miss M. F., 220 _n._ - - Dawson, Hannah, 121. - - Deacle, Mr., and the Deacle case, 277 f., 287 f. - - Deal, 248. - - Debates in Parliament, on Private Enclosure Bills, 55 f.; - on General Enclosure Bills, 77; - on Whitbread’s Bill, 140 ff.; - on Pitt’s Poor Law Bill, 149; - on Settlement, 153; - on rising of 1830, 314 f., 320. - - Deddington, 119, 122. - - Deerhurst, Lord, 197. - - Defoe, Daniel, 6. - - De Grey, Mr., 71 f. - - Demainbray, Rev. S., 85. - - Denman, Lord, on J.P.’s, 19; - and 1830 rising, 278, 282, 288, 290, 291, 302; - and Cook, 287, 319; - and Lush, 292; - and amnesty debate, 315; - and Cobbett’s trial, 317 ff. - - De Quincey, 218, 242, 332. - - Derby, 117 _n._ - - Derby, Brooker, 102. - - _Deserted Village, The_, 331. - - D’Este, Isabella, 326. - - De Tocqueville, 1, 5, 14, 24, 222. - - Devon, 28 _n._, 269. - - Dicketts, Henry, 295. - - Diderot, 4. - - Diet, of labourer, 111, 123 ff.; - attempt to introduce cheap cereals, 124; - soup, 125; - tea, 128 f. - - Dillon, Archbishop, 217. - - Disraeli, 103. - - Domestic industries, 107. - - _Doomsday Book_, 91. - - Dorchester, Special Commission at, 275, 300 f. - - Dorset, 185; - 1830 rising, 268; - prisoners, 308 _n._ - - Dover, 245. - - Dowden, W., 285 f. - - Downton, 9. - - Drake, Sir F., 68. - - Drummond, Mr., 230. - - Dryden, 169, 264. - - Dubois, 2. - - Dudley, Lord, 327 _n._ - - Dundas, Charles, 141; - and Speenhamland, 161 f.; - on Special Commission, 302. - - ---- Henry, 141, 299, 329. - - Dunkin, on Otmoor, 88 ff.; - on Merton, 99. - - Dunmow, 135 f. - - Dunn, Ann, 102. - - Dunwich, 11 f. - - Durham, 11. - - Durham, Lord, 209, 313, 317, 318. - - Dyott, Sir W., 201. - - - Ealing, 124. - - East Grimstead, 260. - - ---- Grinstead, 11. - - ---- Retford, 12. - - ---- Stretton, 284. - - Easton, Rev. Mr., and family, 263, 277. - - Eaves, 256. - - Ebrington, Lord, 269. - - Eden, Sir F. M., 31; - and enclosure, 49, 78, 82, 117; - his book, 82, 210; - and gleaning, 107; - budgets, 111 and Appendix B; - on Settlement Laws, 113 f., 116, 118 _n._ ff.; - and food riots, 122; - on diet, 123-132 _passim_; - on workhouses, 147; - on roundsmen, 148 _n._ and 164; - on Speenhamland meeting, 162; - his ideal poor woman, 208 f.; - on rich and poor, 210. - - _Edinburgh Review_, 185, 197. - - Egleton, 155. - - Egremont, Lord, 155. - - Eldon, Lord, 20, 204, 309. - - _Eleanor_, the, 308 _n._ - - Eliot, 10. - - _Eliza_, the, 324. - - Elizabeth, Queen, 8, 21. - - Ellenborough, Lord, 189, 196, 202, 204, 273. - - Ellison, Mr., M.P., 143, 153. - - Ely, 178. - - Enclosures, and productivity, 26, 40; - by voluntary agreement, 28 _n._; - extent of, before eighteenth century, 34; - motives for, 35; - extent of Parliamentary enclosure, 41 f.; - Parliamentary procedure, 43 ff.; - consents required, 49 ff.; - Lord Thurlow on Parliamentary procedure, 53 f.; - local procedure, 58 ff.; - General Enclosure Bills, 74 ff.; - Act of 1801, 77, 84; - hostility of poor to, 78 f.; - criticism of methods, 81 ff.; - provision for poor, 85 f.; - results on village, Chap. v.; - effects on relationship of classes, 211. - - Encroachments, by squatters, 31; - treatment of, under enclosure, 103. - - Engrossing of farms, 32, 81, 211. - - Entail. _See_ Family Settlements. - - Epsom, 147. - - Erskine, 139. - - Essex, 184, 269; - prisoners, 308 _n._ - - Estcourt, Thomas, 156. - - ---- T. G. B., 198, 200 _n._, 291. - - _Evelina_, 211. - - Eversley, Lord, 32 _n._ - - Ewbanks, 104. - - Expenses of enclosure, 97 f. - _See also_ Fees. - - Eycon, Elizabeth, 102. - - - Falkland, 312. - - Fane, Mr., M.P., 90. - - Farmers implicated in 1830 rising, 248 f., 265, 282. - - ---- large, gained by enclosure, 97; - and milk, 127; - and allotments, 159; - divided from labourers, 212; - Cobbett on, 212 f. - - ---- small, ruined by enclosure, 97 ff.; - and milk, 127 f.; - and other classes, 211; - Cobbett on, 212 f. - - Farmer, William, 281. - - Farm servants, 28, 31. - - Farnham, 185, 235, 264. - - Fawley, 242 _n._, 278 ff. - - Fees for Enclosure Bills, 76. - - Felony, counsel in cases of, 201. - - Fencing, cost of, 97, 98 _n._, 101; - penalties for breaking, 199 _n._ - - Fencott, 89. - - Fénelon, 3. - - Fielding, 187, 327; - on village life, 18 f., 33; - on lawyers, 63, 216; - his scheme for the poor, 151; - on solidarity of poor, 237. - - Finch, Mr., 252. - - Firth, Mr., 35. - - Fitzwilliam, Lord, 101, 330. - - Fitzwilliams, 13. - - Flackwell Heath, 307. - - Flanders, 2. - - Ford, John, 261. - - Fordingbridge, 121, 259, 280, 285. - - Forster, Mr., of Norwich, 83. - - Fox, C. J., 53 _n._, 139, 140, 311, 314, 328, 329; - on M.P.’s and patrons, 13 f.; - and Sedgmoor, 68 f.; - and Horne Tooke, 72 f.; - on mixed bread, 126; - on minimum wage, 134, 141 f.; - on charity, 210; - despair of Parliamentary government, 330. - - Fox-hunting, change in, 214. - - France, position of aristocracy in, 1 ff.; - monarchy in, 2 ff.; - division of common land in, 87; - peasants compared with English labourers, 105, 111, 168, 240. - - Franchise, Parliamentary, 7 ff.; - in boroughs, 8 ff.; - county, 13. - - Francis I., 22. - - ---- Philip, 78. - - Freeholders, 28 f. - - Freemen boroughs, 11 f. - - French, Colonel, M.P., 196. - - French Convention, 168. - - ---- war, agriculture during, 171. - - Friends of the People, 13 f. - - Frome, 127. - - Fryer, Mr., 306. - - Fuel rights, 31, 100, 106; - allotments, 76; - cost of, to labourer, 107; - scarcity after enclosure, 130 ff.; - taken from hedges, 131. - - Fussell, J., 283. - - - Gage, Lord, 251. - - Gaiter, John, 303. - - Galloway, Lord, 57. - - Galsworthy, J., 35. - - Game Laws, 187 ff., 321; - convictions under, 191 f.; - supply of game to London, 196 f. - - Gardens for labourers, 157, 175. - - Gateward’s case, 32. - - Gatton, 8. - - Geese on Otmoor, 88. - - George III., 6, 80, 312. - - ---- IV., 168, 312; - on Cobbett, 223. - - German legion, 173. - - Gibbon, 24, 217, 222, 325, 326. - - Gibbons, Sir W., 86, 102. - - Gibbs, Sir Vicary, 317. - - Gilbert, 108. - - Gilbert’s Act, 146, 148, 164, 179 _n._ - - Gillray, 329. - - Gilmore, 260, 285. - - Glasse, Rev. Dr., 132 _n._ - - Gleaning, 107 ff., 117; - controversy on, 108 f. - - Gloucester, 144; - trials at, 301. - - Gloucestershire, 1830 rising, 268; - prisoners, 308 _n._ - - Godalming, 152. - - Goderich, Lord, 317 f., 324. - - Godmanchester, 17. - - Goldsmith, Oliver, 24, 201, 203, 212, 223, 331. - - Gooch, Mr., 212. - - Goodenough, Dr., 218. - - Goodfellow, Thomas, 303 f. - - Goodman, Thomas, 309, 318. - - Gordon riots, 288. - - Gosport, 289; - jurors, 283. - - Goudhurst, 256. - - Gould, Sir Henry, 109. - - Graham, Sir James, 187, 317. - - Gray, Thomas, 104, 214. - - Great Tew, 17, 30. - - Greenaway, 268. - - Greenford, 132 _n._ - - Greetham, 155. - - Gregory, 284. - - Grenville, Lord, 77. - - Grey, Lord, 14 _n._, 19, 76, 140, 233, 314, 328, 329, 330; - Prime Minister, 311 ff., 320; - Cobbett on, 313; - at Cobbett’s trial, 317 f.; - on Corn Laws, 321; - and Suffield, 322 ff. - - Guercino, 326. - - Guernsey, Lord, 218. - - Guildford, 121. - - Guildford, Lord, 220. - _See also_ North, Francis. - - Gulliver, Mary, 102. - - Gurney, J., in 1830 trials, 302 ff. - - - Hale, 108. - - Halifax, 116, 216 _n._ - - Hambledon, 155. - - Hampden, 10. - - Hampshire, 128, 184; - 1830 rising in, 258 ff.; - prisoners, 308 _n._ - - ---- and Wiltshire labourers compared, 298. - - Harbord Harbord, Sir, 80, 203 f., 321. - - Harding, John, 262. - - Hardres, 244. - - Hardy, J., 227. - - Harewoods, the, 13. - - Hasbach, Professor, 7, 26 _n._, 33. - - Haslemere, 9. - - Hastings, Warren, 206. - - Hastings, 12. - - Hatch, 293. - - Haute Huntre (enclosure), 44, 55, 59, 61 _n._, 78, 101, 199 _n._, - and Appendix A (5). - - Hawker, W., 65. - - Hay, Mr., M.P., 115. - - Hazlitt, William, 235. - - Heacham, 137, 139. - - Headley Workhouse, 243 f., 260, 280, 282, 285. - - Healey, Dr., 238. - - Heathfield, 250, 255. - - Heckingham, 147 _n._ - - Hele, Rev. Mr., 250. - - Helpstone, 332 _n._ - - Henley, 305. - - Henley, Thomas, 249 f. - - Henry IV. (of France), 7, 19. - - Henstead, 227. - - Hereford, 269. - - Hetherington, 102. - - Hickson, Mr., 226. - - Higgs, Ann, 102. - - Highlands, the, 40. - - Hill, Edmund, 102. - - ---- G. S., 249 _n._ - - ---- Isaac, 276. - - Hinchcliffe, J. _See_ Bishop of Peterborough. - - Hindhead, 40. - - Hindon, 184, 276. - - Hirst. _See_ Redlich. - - Histon and Impington (enclosure), 51. - - Hobhouse, H., 254. - - ---- John Cam, 312 f. - - ---- Lord, 22 _n._ - - Hobson, J. A., 166. - - Hodges, Mr., M.P., 253 f. - - Hodgson, Naomi, 102. - - Holdaway, Robert, 260, 285. - - Holdsworth, W., 23 _n._ - - Holkham, 328. - - Holland, Lady, 250. - - ---- Lord, 140, 314, 320, 321, 327; - on spring guns, 195; - on penal code, 204, 330. - - Holy Island (enclosure), 48 f. - - Homage. _See_ Juries. - - Homer, 238. - - ---- Rev. H., 100. - - Hone, 315. - - Horace, 238. - - Horsham, 257 f. - - Horsley, Bishop, 218. - - Horton, 89. - - Hothfield, 118. - - Howlett, Rev. J., 115, 147 _n._, 151; - on minimum wage, 135 f. - - Hubbard, Ann, 102. - - Hudson, W. H., 199, 262 _n._, 298 _n._, 308. - - Hume, J., 315. - - Hungerford riots, 264, 303, 305. - - Hunt, Henry, 190, 262, 266, 276, 282; - and Lush, 291; - and amnesty debate, 314 f. - - ---- Rev. Dr., 189 _n._ - - Huntingdon, 177; - prisoners, 308 _n._ - - Hurst, Ann. _See_ Strudwick. - - ---- Mr., 257 f. - - Hurstbourne, 284. - - Hythe, 247. - - - Idmiston, 295. - - Ilchester, Lord, 67. - - Ilmington, 53. - - Ipswich, 15, 121. - - _Ipswich Journal_, 121 _n._, 164 _n._ - - Isherwood, H., 102. - - Isle of Wight, 169. - - Islip, 94. - - - James I., 8. - - ---- II., 5. - - Jenks, E., 20. - - Jennings, John, 261. - - Jerome, St., 219. - - Johnson, A. H., 41, 42. - - ---- Mary Ann, 246. - - ---- (overseer), 254. - - ---- Samuel, 24, 40, 80, 129, 203, 328, 331. - - Joliffe, Mr., M.P., 149. - - ---- Rev. J., 285. - - _Jones, Tom_, 194. - - Jordan, Edmund, 102. - - Judd, Mr., 293. - - Judges, discretion in sentences, 202 f.; - salaries advanced, 241; - addresses at Special Commissions, 274, 275, 300, 303. - - Juries, presentments by, 17; - of Manor Courts, 30. - - Justices of the Peace, growth of power, 16 ff.; - autocratic character, 18 ff.; - unpaid, 20; - and regulation of wages, 140, 144; - and workhouses, 148; - Brougham on, 191. - - Juvenal, 204. - - - Keene, Mr., 68. - - Kelvedon, 230. - - Kempster, Richard, 305. - - Kemys Tynte, Sir C., 65, 68. - - Kendal, 127. - - Kent, 144, 183; - 1830 rising in, 244 ff.; - prisoners, 308 _n._ - - Kent, Nathaniel, 80, 81, 110, 111, 127, 135, 154, 155, 160. - - ---- William, 102. - - Kenton, 118. - - Kew, 235. - - Kibworth-Beauchamp, 117, 164. - - King, Gregory, 26 _n._, 28. - - ---- Captain, 256. - - ---- Lord, 320. - - ---- Thomas, 102. - - Kingsley, 260. - - King’s Lynn, 11. - - ---- Sedgmoor (enclosure), 52, 64 ff., 98 _n._, Appendix A (14). - - Kington, 56. - - Kintbury mob, 264; - anecdotes of, 265. - - Kirton, 100 _n._ - - Knaresborough (enclosure), 55, 59 f., 64, 86, 98 _n._, Appendix A (6). - - Knatchbull, Sir Edward, 245 f. - - Kosciusko, 173. - - - ‘Labour Rate’ system, 230. - - Laleham (enclosure), 50, 51 _n._, 59, 86, Appendix A (7). - - Lamb, George, 315. - - Lambton. _See_ Durham, Lord. - - Lampsacus, 70. - - Lancashire, 133. - - Lane, 277. - - Lansdowne, Lord, 273, 291, 314, 322. - - Lauderdale, Lord, 202. - - Launceston, 12. - - Lawyers, French and English, compared, 215 f. - - Laxton, 43 _n._ - - Lechmere, Mr., M.P., 77, 141, 233. - - Lecky, W. E. H., 111 _n._, 129 _n._ - - Leeds, 59, 60, 116. - - Leeds, Duke of, 47 f. - - Legg, the brothers, 294. - - ---- George, 301. - - Leicestershire, 186. - - Leigh, Lord, 100. - - Leo X., 22. - - Lespinasse, Mlle. de, 4. - - Levy, Professor, 26 _n._, 41, 100 _n._, 111. - - Lewes Assizes, 274; - Gaol, 246. - - Light, 294. - - Lilley, the brothers, 193. - - Limoges, 4. - - Lincoln, 152. - - Lincoln, Bishop of, 57. - - ---- Lord, 53. - - Lincolnshire, 155, 269. - - Litchfield, 119 _n._ - - Little Marlow, 307. - - Littleport, 178. - - Liverpool, 11. - - Liverpool, Lord, 256. - - Llandaff, Bishop of. _See_ Watson. - - Loches, 3. - - Locke, 150. - - Loes and Wilford, 118, 120. - - Lofft, Capel, 108. - - London, City of, 12. - - Londonderry, Lord, 197. - - Long, Walter, J.P., 278. - - Long Crendon, 306. - - ---- Newnton, 156. - - Longparish, 284. - - Lonsdale, Lord, 9. - - Looker case, the, 295, 296, 315. - - Lord of the Manor, position under common-field system, 28 f., 32 f.; - position on enclosure, 58, 61, 73, 97. - - Louis XIII., 5, 19. - - ---- XIV., 2, 3, 19, 34. - - ---- XV., 2, 4, 219. - - ---- XVI., 3, 4, 5, 218, 311. - - Louth (enclosure), 51, 58 _n._, 59, 86, 98 _n._, 102, Appendix A (8). - - Lowell, Professor, 17. - - Lower Winchendon, 132. - - Lucan, 206. - - Lucretius, 125. - - Ludlow, 12. - - Lush, James, 277, 291, 292, 298. - - Lyminge, 245. - - Lynn, 139. - - - Macaulay, 23; - on _Deserted Village_, 331. - - Macclesfield, Lord, 96. - - Machinery, judges on benefits of, 275; - destruction of, in 1830, 259 ff., 268, 303, 306; - penalties for destruction, 273. - _See also_ Threshing Machines. - - Mackarness, John, 89. - - Mackrell, Thomas, 306. - - Macquarie Harbour, 206. - - Magnesia, 70. - - Maidenhead, 268. - - Maids Morton, 164. - - Maidstone, 246 f., 255 f.; - Assizes, 274. - - Maine, 23. - - Mair, Colonel, 259. - - Maldon, 12. - - Malicious Trespass Act, 199 f. - - Malthus, 165, 204, 207, 322, 323; - on Whitbread’s scheme, 180 ff. - - Manchester, 115. - - Manor, the, connection with common field system, 27. - - ---- Courts, 16 f.; - and common field system, 30. - - ---- Lord of the. _See_ Lord. - - March Phillipps, L., 327 _n._ - - Marengo, 188. - - Margate, 183. - - Mariner, 187. - - Market Lavington, 265. - - Marlborough, 265, 297. - - Marlborough, Duke of, 43 _n._, 89. - - Marshall, William, 36, 80, 97 _n._, 110 _n._, 158 _n._; - on methods of enclosure, 81. - - Martin, Rev. Mr., 43 _n._ - - Mason, Joseph and Robert, 284 f. - - Maulden (enclosure), 78, 100, 101 _n._ - - Maurice of Saxony, 319. - - Mayfield, 250 f. - - Mazarin, 6. - - M‘Culloch, 185, 240. - - Melbourne, Lord, 96, 302, 310 _n._; - and transportation, 205; - and 1830 rising, 259, 264, 309, 312, 314; - circular of Nov. 24, 267; - of Dec. 8, 266 _n._, 270; - and Special Commissions, 307; - at Cobbett’s trial, 317 f.; - and spring guns, 319; - on Corn Laws, 321; - and Suffield’s proposals, 322 f. - - Meredith, Sir William, 64. - - Merton, 99, 183. - - Metcalf, Ann, 102. - - Methodist movement, 220, 326. - - Micheldever, 276, 287. - - Middleton, Mr., 38, 86. - - Middlesex, 21. - - Midlands, 34, 101. - - Milan, 131. - - Millet, 332. - - Military tenures, abolition of, 22. - - Milk, and enclosure, 39, 110, 127 ff.; - attempts to provide, 129 f. - - Minimum wage, 133 ff.; - Whitbread’s proposals, 86, 139 ff.; - probable effects of, 233 f. - - Mirabeau, Marquis de, 4. - - Mollington, 119. - - Monck, J. B., 305. - - Monoux, Sir P., 101. - - Montesquieu, 4. - - Montgomery, Mrs., 294. - - Moorcott, 89. - - Moore, Adam, 139. - - ---- F., 100 _n._ - - ---- Robert (in _Shirley_), 35. - - Moreton Corbet (enclosure), 47, 60. - - Morey, Farmer C., 301. - - Morgan, 275. - - Mould of Hatch, 293. - - Mount, W., 303. - - Muir, Thomas, 299. - - Municipal government, 15. - - Myus, 70. - - - Napoleon, 140, 173, 188, 241, 328, 329. - - Nash, Thomas, 102. - - Neale, Jane, 281. - - Newbolt, Rev. Dr., 265 f. - - Newbury, 161, 267, 305. - - New England, 82. - - ---- Forest, 57. - - Newington, 218. - - Newport, 201 _n._ - - ---- Pagnell, 157. - - New Sarum, 109 _n._ - - ---- South Wales, 261 _n._, 263 _n._, 277 _n._, 308 _n._ - - Newton, Mr., 268. - - Newton Toney, 293. - - Nicholls, Sir George, 146 _n._ - - Ninfield, 250. - - Noakes, David and Thomas, 249 f. - - Noke, 89. - - Norfolk, 122, 177, 269; - prisoners, 308 _n._ - - North, Francis, 22. - - ---- Lord, 68, 71, 73. - - ---- Roger, 23. - - Northampton, 8. - - Northamptonshire, 184, 269. - - Northesk, Lord, 282. - - Norton, Sir Fletcher, 72. - - Norwich, 177. - - _Norwich Mercury_, 321. - - Nottingham, 11, 116, 118; - castle, 243. - - Nottinghamshire, 156. - - Nutbean, E. C., 281. - - Nylands, 43 _n._ - - - Oakley, William, 264, 303, 305. - - O’Connell, 239. - - Oddington, 89. - - Officials, salaries raised, 241. - _See also_ Parliamentary _and_ Village. - - Old Age Pensions, 169. - - Oldfield, 11. - - Old Sarum, 9. - - Orleans, Duke of, 2. - - Ormonde, Duke of, 23. - - Orpington, 244. - - Orridge, Mr., 192. - - Oswestry, 152. - - Otmoor (enclosure), 45 _n._, 60, 88 ff. - - Oundle, 269. - - Overseers, and relief, 145 f.; - salaried, 182; - hostility to, in 1830 rising, 247, 249, 250, 252, 254, 278. - - Overton, 266. - - Owslebury, 282. - - Oxford, 23, 95, 132, 147 _n._, 163, 218. - - _Oxford Journal_, Jackson’s, 88 _n._, 92 _n._, 93 _n._, 96 _n._ - - _Oxford University and City Herald_, 89 _n._, 93 _n._, 95 _n._, - 269 _n._ - - Oxfordshire, 128, 131, 268; - prisoners, 308 _n._ - - - Page, Mr., 264. - - Paine, Thomas, 169, 217, 315. - - Pakeman, the brothers, 309 f. - - Palmer, G., 254. - - ---- T. F., 299. - - Palmerston, Lord, 317, 318. - - Parham, Farmer, 294. - - Parish carts, 182, 242, 278 f. - - Park, Mr. Justice, on Special Commissions, 275, 302, 304 ff. - - Parke, Mr. Justice, and Otmoor, 94; - on Special Commissions, 275, 278, 283, 300. - - Parliament, qualifications for members, 14. - - Parliamentary Committees, on Private Enclosure Bills, 45 ff.; - how constituted, 46. - - ---- government, established, 5. - - ---- officials and enclosure, 76, 103. - - ---- Reform, 8; - Cobbett and, 236; - Grey’s Government and, 311 f. - - ---- representation, analysis of, 12, 13, 14. - _See also_ Franchise. - - Parr, Dr. 203. - - Patience, Ambrose, 292, 294. - - Patrons, control of boroughs by, 10 f., 15; - relations to M.P.’s, 13. - - Patteson, Sir John, 95, 302. - - Pearse, Mr., M.P., 265. - - Peel, Sir Robert, 191 _n._, 195, 202, 288; - and 1830 rising, 246, 247, 256, 258, 311; - and prosecution of Cobbett, 316. - - Penal Code, 203. - - ---- Settlements, 205, 206. - - Peninsular War, 139, 327. - - Pennells, Richard, 310. - - Perceval, Spencer, 143, 317. - - Perry, E., 109 _n._ - - ---- John, 294. - - Peterborough, 31 _n._, 269. - - Peterborough, Bishop of, 56. - - Peterloo, 330. - - Petersfield, 10. - - Petitions, for enclosure, 43 f.; - against enclosure, 47; - how treated, 48; - about New Forest, 57; - about Tollington, 71 f. - - Pinniger, Mr., 277. - - Pitt, William, the younger, 14, 15, 60, 103, 139, 174, 212, 241, 299; - on mixed bread, 124; - on minimum wage, 134 f., 141 f.; - his Poor Law Bill, 86, 145, 149 ff., 210; - and settlement, 152 f.; - and Sinking Fund, 173; - and French War, 328 f. - - Plymouth, 15. - - Plympton, 12. - - Poachers, in Bedford Gaol, 193; - loss to village, 238. - _See also_ Game Laws. - - Polhill, Mr., 267. - - Political economy, in fashion, 207; - judges on, 275. - - ---- Unions, 290, 316. - - Pollen, R., J.P., 275 _n._, 278, 283 _n._ - - Pompey, 2. - - Poor Law, system of relief, 145 ff.; - of employment, 148; - Pitt’s Bill of 1796, 149 ff.; - Whitbread’s Bill of 1807, 143, 179 ff.; - litigation, 178. - _See also_ Settlement _and_ Speenhamland system. - - ---- ---- Commission of 1834, 125, 160, 167 _n._, 170, 184, 225 ff. - - Pope, 326. - - Popham, 21. - - Population and Speenhamland system, 170, 174 f., 228. - - Porritt, E., 8 ff., 11, 13. - - Port Arthur, 206. - - Porter, Thomas, 295. - - ---- William, 102. - - Porteus, Bishop, charge to clergy, 220 f. - - Portland, Duke of, 108. - - Portsmouth, 289. - - Potato ground, 160. - - Potter, Richard, 200. - - ---- Macqueen, 192, 308 _n._ - - Pottern, 85. - - Potwalloper boroughs, 9. - - Powis, Mr., M.P., 76. - - Pretymans, the, 220. - - Price, William, and others, 95. - - ---- Rev. Mr., 245. - - Prices, growth of, 109. - - Priestley, Dr., 218. - - Privileges, Committee of, 10. - - _Proteus_, the, 308 _n._ - - Prothero, R. E., 42. - - Public schools, 23. - - Pulteney, Sir William, 153. - - Punishment, discretion of judges, 202; - penal code, 203; - fears of its mildness, 204. - _See also_ Transportation. - - Purley, 71. - - Pym, Mr., 101. - - ---- Mr., J.P., 192. - - Pyt House affray, 261 f., 292 f. - - - Quainton (enclosure), 51, Appendix A (13). - - Quarrier, Dr., 283. - - Quarter Sessions, change in procedure, 17 f. - - Quesnai, 4. - - Quidhampton, 261. - - - Radicals, the, 169, 236, 312. - - Radnor, Lord, 9, 291, 313. - - Rastall, Rev. Mr., 43 _n._ - - Raunds (enclosure), 39, 51. - - Ray, river, 93 f. - - Reading, 231, 267; - Special Commission at, 302 ff. - - _Reading Mercury_, 121 _n._ f., 161 _n._ ff. - - Redlich and Hirst, 7, 20. - - Redlinch, 67. - - Reed, Mr., 249. - - Reform Bill, riots, 243; - agitation for, 324. - _See also_ Parliamentary Reform. - - ---- Government, and 1830 rising, 311 ff.; - prosecution of Carlile and Cobbett, 315 ff.; - incapacity for social legislation, 324. - - Reni, Guido, 326. - - Revolution of 1688, 5, 26. - - Reynolds, Sir J., 24, 326, 332. - - Ricardo, 207. - - Richardson, Samuel, 18, 19, 33, 45. - - Richelieu, 1 ff., 5 f. - - Richmond, 9, 214. - - Richmond, Duke of, 24, 191, 309. - - Rick-burning. _See_ Arson. - - Ride, J. and F., and R., 102. - - Ringmer, 251. - - Riots, enclosure, 78 (_see also_ Otmoor); - food riots of 1795, 120 ff.; - of 1816, 175, 177 ff.; - law about riot, 272 f.; - in 1830, Chaps. xi. and xii. _passim_. - - Rising in 1830, 240 ff.; - origin in Kent, 244; - spread to Sussex, 247; - to Berks, Hants, and Wilts, 258; - alarm of authorities, 266 ff.; - spread West and North, 268; - wholesale arrests, 267, 270; - trials, 272 ff. - - Robertsbridge, 249, 253 f. - - Robespierre, 217. - - Robinson, Mr., M.P., 68. - - ---- William, 102. - - Rochefoucault, Duc de la, 217. - - Rockingham, Lord, 13. - - Rockley, 297. - - Rode, 107. - - Rogers, Sarah, 121. - - ---- T. L., 102. - - Rome, comparison between English and Roman social history, 330 f. - - Romilly, S., 202 ff.; - on Game Laws, 189, 198. - - Romsey, 289. - - Roundsman system, 148, 159, 164 f. - - Rous, Sir John, 141. - - Rousseau, 4, 226, 232. - - Rowland, John, 295. - - Rowlandson, 329. - - Ruggles, Thomas, 108, 112 _n._, 115, 133, 147 _n._ - - Run-rig system, 28 _n._ - - Russell, Lord John, 140, 183, 308 _n._ - - ---- Lord William, 48. - - ---- 273 _n._ - - Rutland, 155, 159. - - Rutland, Duke of, 43 _n._ - - Rye, 12. - - - Sagnac, P., 87 _n._ - - St. Davids, Bishop of, 42, 55 f. - - St. Denis, 2. - - St. Germain, 219. - - St. John, H., and Sedgmoor, 65 ff. - - St. Lawrence Wootten, 281. - - St. Mary Bourne, 263. - - St. Neots, 102 _n._ - - Salehurst, 253. - - Salisbury, Special Commission at, 275, 290 ff.; - gaol rules at, 276, 291 f.; - scene in court, 298 f. - - Salisbury, Bishop of, 85. - - ---- Lord, 85 _n._, 323. - - Sanctuary, Mr., 257. - - Sandwich, Lord, 58. - - Sandy (enclosure), 101. - - Sarney, John, 307. - - Savile, Sir George, 54 f., 57. - - Scarborough, Lord, 155. - - Schools of Industry, 149 f. - - Sclater, W. L., 281. - - Scot and lot boroughs, 8. - - Scotland, 129, 195 _n._ - - Scotsmen, Cobbett on, 213. - - Scott, Sir William, 214, 221. - - Seaford, 121. - - Sedgefield, 129. - - Sedgford, 137. - - Sedgmoor. _See_ King’s Sedgmoor. - - Selborne Workhouse, 243, 260. - - Select Committees. _See_ List of Authorities. - - ---- Vestry. _See_ Vestry Reform. - - Selwyn, George, 103, 223; - and Sedgmoor, 65 ff., 103. - - Settlement, Laws of, 112 ff., 141, 178 f., 261; - effect of, 114 ff.; - reforms made and proposed, 152 f.; - Whitbread’s proposals in 1807, 179; - litigation, 215. - - Settlements, family, 21 f. - - Sevenoaks, 244. - - Sheffield, 115 f. - - Sheffield, Lord, 37, 123 _n._, 124, 153, 310. - - Shelley, Sir Timothy, 257. - - ---- P. B., 257, 326. - - Shepherd, Aaron, 295. - - Sheppard, Joseph, 301. - - Sheraton, 327. - - Sheridan, 14, 24, 139, 161 _n._, 223, 314, 326, 328, 329; - on enclosure Bills, 57; - and minimum wage, 140, 233; - and Pitt’s Poor Law Bill, 149; - and Game Laws, 198. - - Shooting, change in character, 187. - - Shopkeepers and allotments, 159. - - Shore, Mrs., 125 _n._ - - Shottesbrook, 268. - - Shrewsbury, 147 _n._, 152. - - Sidlesham, 107. - - Sidmouth, Lord, 218, 299, 314. - - Sidney, Sir Philip, 312. - - Silcock, 286. - - Simms, the brothers, 263, 277. - - Simond, M., 242. - - Simpson (enclosure), 50, 51, 58 _n._, 59, Appendix A (9). - - Simpson, Rev. Mr., 257. - - Sinclair, Sir John, 74; - on common-field system, 36; - and enclosure, 59 ff., 83 ff., 157. - - Sinecures, 173. - - Sinking Fund, 173. - - Sittingbourne, 246 f. - - Skipton, 116. - - Slade, Mrs. Charlotte, 263, 305. - - Slater, Dr., 7, 28 _n._, 30 _n._, 32 _n._, 41, 42 _n._, 85. - - Slaugham, 229. - - Slinn, John, 194. - - Smart, Professor, 173 _n._ - - Smith, Abel, 156. - - ---- Adam, 29, 36, 40, 110, 143, 152, 181, 207, 312; - on settlement, 114 f.; - on clergy, 216 f. - - ---- General, 142. - - ---- Sydney, 190 _n._, 198, 201. - - Smollett, 18, 63, 214, 216. - - Snettisham, 137. - - Society for Bettering the Condition of the Poor, 85. - - ---- for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, 318. - - ---- for the Reformation of Manners, 222. - - Soldiers and food riots, 121 f. - - Somerset, 98 _n._ - - Soup for the poor, 125 and _n._ - - Southampton, 267. - - Southey, 14 _n._ - - South Sea Bubble, 175. - - Special Commissions, in 1816, 172; - in 1830, 272 ff.; - at Winchester, 278 ff.; - Salisbury, 290 ff.; - Dorchester, 300 ff.; - Reading, 302 ff.; - Abingdon, 305 ff.; - Aylesbury, 306 f.; - conduct of prosecutions, 291. - - Speenhamland, 19, 161 ff. - - ---- system, 19, 83, 302, 331; - introduction of, 161 ff.; - scale, 163; - effects of, Chaps. viii. and x. _passim_; - introduction into Warwickshire, 170; - reduction in scale, 184 ff. - - Spenser, 5. - - Spring guns, 195 f.; - Melbourne’s suggested reintroduction, 319. - - Squatters, 28; - described, 31; - ignored in enclosure consents, 52; - results of enclosure on, 97, 102 f. - - Standing Orders, about enclosures, 43 f., 60, 62; - origin of, 73 f. - - Stanhope, Lord, 320. - - Stanwell (enclosure), 33, 55, 58 _n._, 59, 86, 102, Appendix A (10). - - Star Chamber and enclosures, 34. - - States-General, 5. - - Stavordale, Lord, and Sedgmoor, 67 ff. - - Steel, George, 281. - - Sterne, 24. - - Stevens, James, 295. - - ---- Jane, 279. - - Steyning, 9. - - Stirling, Mrs., 196 _n._ - - Stixswold, 32. - - Stockbury, 247. - - Stockton, 130. - - Stoke, 154 _n._ - - ---- Cheriton, 285. - - Stokes, 277. - - Stone, Thomas, 81, 85. - - Stotfold, 269. - - Strafford, Lord, 48, 60. - - Strudwick, Dame, 208 ff. - - Stubbes, 34. - - Studley, 89. - - Sturges Bourne, 278, 322. - - Suffield, Lord, 238; - and spring guns, 195 f., 319; - scheme in 1830, 320 ff.; - interviews with ministers, 322 ff. - _See also_ Harbord Harbord. - - Suffolk, 122, 135, 177, 269; - prisoners, 308 _n._ - - Sumner, Bishop, 159, 264. - - Surplus profits, 167 ff. - - Surrey, 258. - - Sussex, 1830 rising in, 247; - prisoners, 308 _n._ - - Sutterton (enclosure), 100 _n._ - - Sutton, Sir Richard, 30. - - ---- William, 281. - - Swabey, Maurice, 306. - - Swaffham, 99. - - Swift, 235. - - Swing, Captain, 245. - - - Taltarum’s Case, 21. - - Taunton, Mr. Justice, 274, 310 f. - - Taxation, 171 ff. - - Tea-drinking, 128 f. - - Tenant farmers, 28 f. - - Tennyson, Mr., M.P., 196. - - Tenterden, Chief Justice, 317. - - Thanet, Lord, 321. - - Thelwall, 136, 169, 241. - - Themistocles, 70. - - Thompson, Mr., 156. - - ---- Captain, 284. - - Threshing machines, destruction of, Chap. xi. _passim_; - reason of hostility to, 245; - penalty for destruction, 273, 275. - - Thurlow, Lord, on enclosure procedure, 53, 56 f., 61. - - Ticehurst, 250. - - Tilsworth, 43 _n._ - - _Times_, the, 177 _n._, 178 _n._, 193 _n._, and Chapters xi. and - xii. _passim_, including articles quoted, 269, 274, 302, - and Special Correspondent, 269, 274, 302. - - Tisbury, 261 f. - - Tithes, 217 f., 222; - origin, 167 f.; - demand for abatement in 1830, Chap. xi. _passim_. - - Tithe-owners, and enclosure, 56, 61 f., 97, 168. - - Tollington, 71. - - Tonbridge, 255. - - Tonga Islands, 187. - - Tooke, J. Horne, 72. - - ---- William, 71 f. - - Toomer, James, 277. - - Transportation, dreaded by labourers, 198 f.; - described, 205 f.; - effect on village life, 239. - - Treason and Sedition Acts, 139, 329. - - Trecothick, James, 48. - - Trevelyan, Sir George, 71. - - Trout, J., 102. - - Tunbridge Wells, 255 f. - - Turgot, 4 f. - - Turner, Mr., M.P., 198. - - ---- Mr. (Pyt House affray), 262. - - - Ullathorne, Dr., 206 _n._ - - Universities, the, 23. - - Upper Clatford, 285. - - - Vachel, Rev. Mr., 178. - - Van Diemen’s Land, 205, 283 _n._, 308 _n._, 310 _n._, 324. - - Vansittart, 134. - - ---- Rev. Dr., 268. - - Vaughan, Baron, on Special Commissions, 273 f., 278 ff., 300 f. - - Vavasour, Sir Henry, 157. - - Venice, 173. - - Versailles, 2, 4, 327, 328. - - Vestry Reform, Whitbread’s proposals, 179 ff.; - Acts of 1818 and 1819, 182 f. - - Village officials, 103. - - Vine Hall, 249. - - Vinogradoff, Professor, 17, 27. - - Virgil, 122, 206, 238. - - Voltaire, 4, 24. - - - Wages, and prices, 111; - regulation of, 133 ff.; - assessment in 1725, 133; - in 1732, 144 f.; - proposals to assess at Speenhamland, 162; - wages in 1824, 183; - demand for living wage in 1830, Chaps. xi. and xii. _passim_; - wages in Berks, Hants, and Wilts, 259. - - Wakefield (enclosure), 47 f., 55, 59 f., Appendix A (11). - - Walden, 268. - - Waller, William, 65. - - Walpole, 6, 214. - - ---- Sir Spencer, 238. - - Walsingham, Lord, 220. - - Waltham (enclosure), 43 _n._ - - Wanstead, 132 _n._ - - Warbleton, 250. - - Warburton, Mr., M.P., 187 - - Ward, Mr., 304. - - Warde Fowler, Mr., 331. - - Warren, John. _See_ St. Davids, Bishop of. - - Warwick, 10. - - Warwickshire, 169, 194. - - Wasing, 303. - - Waterloo, 332. - - Watson, Bishop, 217. - - Webb, Mr. and Mrs., 7, 16, 19, 30 _n._, 191 _n._, 234 _n._ - - Webster, Sir Godfrey, 250, 254. - - Wellingborough, 269. - - Wellington, Duke of, 140, 214, 221, 240, 252, 320; - as Prime Minister, 253, 311, 316; - and 1830 rising, 258, 278, 302, 309. - - Wensleydale, Lord. _See_ Mr. Justice Parke. - - Westcote (enclosure), 43 _n._ - - Western, C. C., 176. - - ---- Squire, 50, 187, 222, 328. - - ---- Sophia, 211. - - West Grimstead, 294. - - Westminster, 8. - - Wetherall, 127. - - Wharncliffe, Lord, 190. - - Wheble, Mr., 305. - - Wherwell, 284. - - Whitaker, Sergeant, 203. - - Whitbread, Samuel, and minimum wage proposals, 86, 134, 139 ff., - 149, 210, 233; - scheme of 1807, 20, 179 ff. - - ---- Mr., J.P., 269. - - Whitchurch, 289. - - Whitecross Green, 89. - - Whiteparish, 293. - - White’s, 69, 332. - - Wickham, Mr., 266 _n._ - - Wigtoft (enclosure), 100 _n._ - - Wilbarston (enclosure), 78. - - Wilberforce, William, 124 _n._; - and minimum wage, 143; - and Protestant Church in Copenhagen, 178 _n._; - and the reform of manners, 222; - and Prince of Wales on Cobbett, 223; - on blessings of England, 332. - - Wilde, Mr. Serjeant, 278, 282. - - Wilford, 118, 120. - - Wilkes, 72. - - Wilkinson, Dr., 79. - - Wilkinson, Mr. John, 116 _n._ - - Willet, Mr., the banker, 177. - - ---- ---- the butcher, 177. - - William III., 5. - - ---- IV., 312. - - Williams, Mr., 221. - - ---- Mr., J. P., 265. - - ---- George, 305. - - ---- William, 226. - - Wilton, 261, 292. - - Wiltshire, 122; - 1830 rising in, 258 ff.; - labourers compared with Hampshire, 298; - prisoners, 308 _n._ - - Winchester, 15, 121, 219; - and 1830 rising, 265; - Special Commission at, 274, 276, 278 ff.; - scenes outside gaol, 289. - - Winchester, Bishop of. _See_ Sumner. - - ---- Lord, 284. - - ---- Mayor of, 265. - - Winchilsea, Lord, 101, 130, 242; - his allotments, 155, 157 ff., 160. - - Windermere, 217. - - Windham, W., 57, 224. - - Windsor, 80. - - Winfrith Newburgh, (enclosure), 51, 59, Appendix A (12). - - Winkworth, William, 285. - - Winslow, 164. - - Winter, Captain, 310. - - Winterbourne, 305. - - Withers, Peter, 297. - - Witley, 208. - - Wonston, 284. - - Woolridge, Henry, 306. - - Worcester, 152. - - Worcestershire, 169. - - Workhouses, 147; - destroyed in 1830, 260. - - Wraisbury, 50 _n._ - - Wycombe, 306. - - Wynne, Squire, 293. - - - Xenophon, 197. - - - Yardley Goben, 164. - - Yorkshire, 13, 155, 269. - - Young, Arthur, 31, 33 _n._, 74, 80, 102 _n._, 160; - on France and England, 3, 105, 111, 224; - on common-field system, 37; - on enclosure and its methods, 44, 58, 60, 62, 79, 81; - protest against methods, 82 ff., 154; - scheme for allotments, 84, 173, 321; - and Otmoor, 89, 93; - on wheaten bread, 126; - and minimum wage, 135, 143; - and Speenhamland system, 165; - and bailiffs, 213; - and curates, 221. - - ---- Sir William, 141, 143, 148. - - - Printed by T. and A. CONSTABLE, Printers to His Majesty - at the Edinburgh University Press - - - - -Transcriber's Note - - -The following apparent errors have been corrected: - -p. 3 "Gobereau" changed to "Hobereau" - -p. 22 "eighteeenth-century" changed to "eighteenth-century" - -p. 31 (note) "consent (p. 339)" changed to "consent’ (p. 339)" - -p. 51 "of 721 neuter.’" changed to "of 721 neuter." - -p. 58 "of canvassing,’" changed to "of canvassing.’" - -p. 62 "his award was made," changed to "his award was made." - -p. 69 "irregularity the Bill" changed to "irregularity: the Bill" - -p. 76 "no less that" changed to "no less than" - -p. 78 "ask for permisson" changed to "ask for permission" - -p. 79 "inariably" changed to "invariably" - -p. 105 "ses vaissaux" changed to "ses vassaux" - -p. 107 "As Sidlesham in Surrey" changed to "At Sidlesham in Surrey" - -p. 113 "till be became" changed to "till he became" - -p. 119 "a parishoner" changed to "a parishioner" - -p. 121 "As Ipswich" changed to "At Ipswich" - -p. 121 "severe sentence." changed to "severe sentence.’" - -p. 146 (note) "p. 91." changed to "p. 91.)" - -p. 148 (note) "vol. i. p. 397" changed to "vol. i. p. 397." - -p. 160 "saying ‘The more" changed to "saying "The more" - -p. 160 "for us.’" changed to "for us."’" - -p. 217 "demander a leur" changed to "demander à leur" - -p. 228 "p. 66" changed to "p. 66." - -p. 274 (note) "Vaughan (1769-1839" changed to "Vaughan (1769-1839)." - -p. 278 "Sergeant Wild" changed to "Sergeant Wilde" - -p. 304 "years’ transportation," changed to "years’ transportation." - -p. 342 "(Lord of the Manor)" changed to "(Lord of the Manor)," - -p. 343 "Clarks, Darey’s" changed to "Clarks, Dareys" - -p. 357 "asking for leave." changed to "asking for leave" - -p. 365 "‘A Clause was offered" changed to "A Clause was offered" - -p. 380 "Cocks, Esq" changed to "Cocks, Esq." - -p. 395 "p, 191." changed to "p. 191." - -p. 397 "oatmeal" changed to "oatmeal," - -p. 398 "scarce’) Clothes," changed to "scarce’), Clothes," - -p. 402 "_History of the English Agricultural Labourer_" changed to -"_History of the English Agricultural Labourer_." - -p. 405 "Aldeborough" changed to "Aldborough" - -p. 405 "43 _n_" changed to "43 _n._" - -p. 405 "50 59" changed to "50, 59" - -p. 405 "1795, 121" changed to "1795, 121;" - -p. 405 "J.P, 297" changed to "J.P., 297." - -p. 409 "Charles, 141," changed to "Charles, 141;" - -p. 409 "148 _n_" changed to "148 _n._" - -p. 411 "Isle of Wight, 169" changed to "Isle of Wight, 169." - -p. 411 "Holdsworth, W., 23 _n._" was printed out of order - -p. 414 "Prothero, R. E" changed to "Prothero, R. E." - -p. 414 "against enclosure 47" changed to "against enclosure, 47" - -p. 417 "Mr. Serjeant" changed to "Mr. Sergeant" - - -Inconsistent or archaic spelling and punctuation have otherwise been -kept as printed. - -*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE VILLAGE LABOURER -1760-1832 *** - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the -United States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part -of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm -concept and trademark. 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