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Tlic Country Gentlemmi s Magazine 



employer and employed, as donor and reci- 

 pients of out-relief look to the rates as a 

 legitimate fund for indirectly and sometimes 

 directly eking out wages, the effect cannot 

 but be pernicious and demoralizing. For man, 

 even the most depressed and degraded, is 

 not a machine or an animal. If he have any 

 intelligencewhatever he must havemovement, 

 progress, and objects before him ; he must 

 have some practical motive and reason to be 

 respectable, thrifty, energetic, careful, and the 

 like. If he is to be of any account, of any 

 real use to an employer or a farmer, he must 

 have some other out-look and distraction than 

 the beershop — some better prospect than the 

 workhouse. The want of sympathy and intel- 

 ligence sometimes displayed, especially about 

 the southern counties, in the expression of the 

 rural labourer, caused by the careless and per- 

 nicious — it would not be too much to say the 

 atrocious administration of the Poor-law, as yet 

 uncorrected by the Central Board — calls aloud 

 for amendment and cure. There is one more 

 point, not quite belonging to the subject of 

 this paper, which is yet one of considerable 

 moment to the agricultural interest. It is the 

 answer to the question — is it possible to intro- 

 duce into farming an industrial partnership, 

 such as already obtains in manufactures ? that 

 is to say, by the farmer or employer giving, 

 in addition to the- weekly wages, other extra 

 payments depending on his owii profits. I 

 venture to assert, speaking from practical 

 knowledge, that something of the sort is pos- 

 sible and desirable, and would also be for the 

 advantage of employer as well as employed. 

 And I say so as one who dare not advance 

 one word or statement that is not founded on 

 strict practical experience. 



. THE VALUE OF ALLOTMENTS TO THE 

 LABOURER. 



In most districts, I might almost say on 

 nearly every large farm, something of that 

 obtains, in the allowances made to shepherds 

 for their care and trouble in the lambing 

 season ; this can be easily extended to stock- 

 men and some others. The difficulties in 

 the way of a general application of the prin- 

 ciple arise partly from absence of strict ac- 



counts and partly owing to the uncertain 

 effect of v/eather and seasons. It m.ust be 

 left to every farmer for himself to work out 

 how best to put such a plan into practice ; but 

 certain I am that every farmer who in these 

 days wishes to make farming profitable, 

 would do well to consider how to give to 

 every labourer on his farm some sort of an 

 interest in the profits of that farming. By 

 some such means as these described above, 

 it is in the power of farm.ers as well as land- 

 lords to mend this matter — gradually to im- 

 prove the position of their labourers, without 

 any very great cost or outlay. Let all have 

 opportunities of rising and improving their 

 condition. Let the best men feel that they 

 are not dragged down to the treatment of 

 the worst, and let all perceive that it de- 

 pends on their own exertions whether they 

 rise or not. But do not suppose from any- 

 thing herein contained, that you can go 

 down into a pauperised district, where there 

 exists a total disregard of the real welfare of 

 the people, aggravated by a fatuous adminis- 

 tration of the Poor-law, and with this or any 

 other plan in your pocket, set all right in a 

 day or in a year. You cannot. You can- 

 not put such a district on a par with one 

 where the results of a totally difterent policy 

 have left their permanent traces. But you 

 can commence the improvement at once, 

 and perhaps the results of a few 

 months will appear marvellous. Thus a 

 fanner employing say half-a-dozen la- 

 bourers might, by apportioning i or 2 acres 

 out of his farm, give each a ^ or ^'^ of an 

 acre, which would probably be more valued 

 by the men than a considerable rise of 

 wages ; and at the same time, he m.ight hold 

 out a prospect to any of his men who should 

 have saved sufficient money to give them a 

 run for a cow, or apportion another 2 acres 

 for that purpose. By such means, and by 

 some classification and payment by results, 

 or industrial partnerships, he might gradually 

 raise the quality of his labour and the status 

 of his labourer — meanwhile, attaching them 

 to the place more surely than by any cash 

 however devisable ; and if his neighbours 

 declined to follow his example, he might 



