1831.] Power and Prospects of the Country. 163 



wretches understand French?), of Captain Swing (a vender of house- 

 spoons or some such ware) scouring the by-lanes in his gig, and scatter- 

 ing sedition by the ounce per mile ; but has it ever struck their 

 enlightened minds that men do not usually set fire to corn-stacks and 

 farm-yards at the bidding of every scrawl they pick up on the high- 

 way ? that a spark does not usually cause explosion, except it fall 

 upon gunpowder ? If these things have never struck them, why " let 

 them burn their books/' as the old saw teaches, " and send their wits 

 a wool-gathering !" 



It is really disgusting to observe the mass of drivel which has been 

 spoken and written on the subject of these disturbances. At present we 

 shall go no further than to notice the state of society which they have 

 brought to light in all its deformity ! Throughout the whole agricultural 

 population of this country a few years ago the happiest, the most 

 flourishing, the most peaceable class of the community we now see 

 nothing but penury, degrading ignorance, and crime. The farmer is 

 at open feud, or concealed, but not less dangerous enmity, with his 

 landlord, with the clergyman, and with the tythe owner. He is sinking 

 in the scale of comfort and wealth ; and to enable him to gather a hard- 

 earned living for himself and his family, he is become the oppressor of 

 the poor ! Instead of supporting a number of contented labourers, he 

 becomes the master of so many miserable slaves, who are born to toil 

 through life without comfort and without hope, degraded in mind by 

 the certain knowledge that they must end their days in the parish poor- 

 house ; in such a condition of society men are ready to embrace any 

 measure, however dangerous and however destructive, which holds out 

 the most distant hope of amendment ? The change from the wretched 

 hovel to the county jail is to them a relief! Transportation is esteemed 

 almost a blessing ! 



But this change is not confined to our agricultural population. It 

 has spread through every branch of the community, and is operating in 

 a separation of the whole frame of society into two distinct and all- 

 absorbing classes, the rich and the poor I 



We have no hesitation in expressing our firm conviction that, in the 

 present crisis, any measure of Reform, unaccompanied with other 

 important sanative measures, is dangerous to the welfare of the country ; 

 but can ministers refuse to perform the declared object of their accession 

 to office ? They are pledged to the country and to their sovereign. 

 Their character is at stake. They dare not refuse a concession which 

 the people are ready to enforce ! What then will be their policy what 

 ought to be their policy ? They are pledged to reduction of expenditure 

 and of taxation ; yet how little real good will their utmost efforts effect ! 

 The reduction of one half the expenditure of the country would be but 

 a feather from the burthen which is now pressing upon its resources ; 

 and yet this is impossible ! Their only policy, the only just policy 

 which can be pursued, must be founded upon a searching examination 

 of the workings of those mischievous theories which have been so un- 

 wisely introduced into our civil system, which have changed the whole 

 form of society, and plunged this once flourishing and happy country 

 into an abyss of crime and wretchedness, unparalleled in our own his- 

 tory, and almost in the history of the world ! 



We shall proceed to trace a few of the leading causes which have been 

 instrumental in producing, or, at the least, aggravating these disastrous 



y 2 



