38 Broughton Gifford. 



sides, no employment requires a longer education or greater natural 

 powers of observation, than that of the agricultural labourer. Small 

 wits may sneer at him as uncultivated ; but the eye, the hand, and 

 the judgment, which can mark out a field into ridges, turning up 

 a furrow straight as an arrow from end to end, the intelligence 

 which can detect so well something ailing in the stock from the touch 

 of the skin, the appearance of the eye or hair, when to an ordinary 

 observer there is nothing calculated to excite attention ; these things 

 demand considerable natural powers, improved and strengthened by 

 sharp observation. I have officiated both in town and country, 

 and I consider the agricultural labourer a more agreeable conver- 

 sationist than his civic brother ; his range of observance is larger, 

 his employment is less special, his topics have more general interest. 



Parochial Economy. 



The Parish is in the Bradford Union, and the average number 

 of persons in receipt of relief is 52, of whom 43 are out-door, and 

 9 in-door paupers. So that 8'7 of the population are receiving re- 

 lief. The allowance per week per head of the entirely destitute is 

 2s. 6d. The rest are lower, according to their means. I am not 

 aware that any degradation is attached to the receipt of parish pay. 

 That is an old fashioned idea which has passed away with the 

 wearing of pauper badges. We should all get on the parish pay 

 book, if we could. The indignity and the allowance would be 

 pocketed together. Such is human nature. Happily human na- 

 ture provides the remedy also. The same self interest which 

 prompts the demand of the recipient, sharpens the investigations 

 of the paymaster. Alter either side of the proportion, and you 

 give selfishness play on the other side, and do what you can to 

 bring ruin on both sides. Before the Poor Law Amendment Act 

 our rates were nearly double their present amount. The rate-payer 

 was on the road to insolvency. Out of his hard earned profits he 

 had to maintain a weaving population who did not care to do, per- 

 haps could not do, such out-door labour as he could supply. The 

 poor were gradually becoming poorer, as is always the case with 

 those who are taught to rely on others. Why should they work ? 



