MISCELLANIES. 



607 



toes annually. When this man 

 was turned adrift upon the world 

 by the enclosure of the common, 

 if he had been without hope, or 

 if the rood of land for which ho 

 asked had been denied, he and 

 his six children, and his pregnant 

 wife, might have gone to the 

 workhouse, and become a burden 

 to the public, instead of setting it 

 an example, and teaching a most 

 important lesson to their supe- 

 riors. We will transcribe Sii' 

 Thomas Bernard's words, and 

 print them, as he has done, in a 

 manner which may tend to excite 

 the attention they deserve. ' Five 

 unsightly^ unprofitable acres of 

 waste ground would aftbrd habi- 

 tation and comfort to twenty such 

 families as Britton Abbot's.' The 

 quarter of an acre which Avas 

 granted him was not worth a 

 shilling a year before it came into 

 his hands. 



Joseph Austin, a bricklayer in 

 tlie neighbourhood of Cambridge, 

 had often looked with a longing- 

 eye upon a bit of ground by the 

 road side, part of what is called 

 the Lord's Waste, by a term 

 which reflects little credit upon 

 manorial rights, or j)arochi;il ma- 

 nagement. Whenever he looked 

 at this spot he used to think what 

 a nice place it would be for a 

 house : and being a house-builder 

 by trade, and something of a 

 castle-builder by nature, he used, 

 as soon as he fell asleej) at night, 

 to dream that he was at work 

 there with his bricks and his 

 trowel. At length he ajjplied to 

 the manor court, and got a verbal 

 leave to build there. Two of his 

 neighbours, moved by envy as ho 

 says, threatened that if lie began 



his house they would pull it 

 down ; upon this he applied a se- 

 cond time to the court, and ob- 

 tained a legal permission with 

 the assent of all the copyholders, 

 paying for the entry of his name 

 on the court rolls, and sixpence 

 a year quit rent. And here wc 

 must do our country the justice 

 to observe, that if a man of known 

 industry and good character, like 

 Joseph Austin or Britton Abbot, 

 applies for an indulgence of this 

 kind, there is very little proba- 

 bility that the application will 

 be refused. Austin was at this 

 time about forty-two years of age ; 

 he had a wife and four children, 

 and his whole stock of worldly 

 riches amounted to fourteen shil- 

 lings : but men who deserve 

 friends are seldom without them; 

 and a master, with whom he 

 usually worked at harvest, sold 

 him an old cottage for nine gui- 

 neas, which he was to vork out. 

 He had for .some time in his lei- 

 sure hours been preparing bats, a 

 soit of bricks made of clay and 

 straw, well beaten together, eigh- 

 teen inches long, twelve wide, 

 and fou}- dee]), not burnt, but 

 dried in the sun ; with these and 

 the materials of the old cottage 

 he went to work. The bats make 

 a better wall than lath and plaster 

 with a coating of clay, less wood 

 is required, and the house is 

 stronger and warmer 3 but they 

 must be protected from rain as 

 much as possible, and especially 

 toward the bottom. As he had 

 to live and support his family by 

 his daily labour, this building 

 could only be carried on when his 

 regular day's work was done ; he 

 has often continued it by moon- 

 light, and heard the clock strike 



twelve 



