64 



EUROPEAN AGRICULTURE. 



who, iii looking out upon the beautiful and productive earth, 

 where God has placed him, is compelled to feel that there is not 

 a foot of soil which, under any circumstances, he can claim for 

 himself; that there is not a tree nor a shelving rock by the road 

 side, where he can shelter himself and gather under his wing the 

 little ones whom God may have cast upon his care, but he is 

 liable to be driven away at the will of another at the caprice 

 of avarice, selfishness, pride, or unbridled power ; that the use 

 of his own hands and limbs is not his own ; that he cannot, 

 but at the will of another, find a spot of ground where he can 

 apply them j and that even the gushings from the rock in the 

 wilderness and the manna which descends from heaven are 

 intercepted in their progress to him, and doled out too often in 

 reluctant and scanty measure. 



This will not be pronounced an exaggerated or colored portrait of 

 the condition of the agricultural laboring population of England. 

 I suppose that, with the exception of some few rights of common, 

 where some miserable mud-hut has been erected, and the pos 

 sessor has a kind of allowed claim during his life, few instances 

 can be found of a laborer s owning, in fee simple, a cottage, or 

 so much as a rood of land. I recollect, in passing through a part 

 of Derbyshire, in a region which farms the contiguity of several 

 large estates, the coachman, by whose side [ was seated, said to 

 me, that this was the Duke of Devonshire s village, and this the 

 Duke of Rutland s, and this the Duke of Norfolk s, and so on ; 

 and I could not help asking myself, with some sinking of heart, 

 Where is the people s own village ? 



In a part of Lincolnshire, an excellent landlord and friend, dis 

 tinguished for his integrity and philanthropy, was kind enough 

 to take me to visit several of his cottages, that I might see, as he 

 said, some of the best examples of this kind of life. It was on a 

 Sunday evening. The houses were humble, but they were neat 

 and comfortable. The inhabitants of one house which we 

 entered were advanced in life, and alone ; for, although they had 

 children, their children had been under the necessity, as soon as 

 capable of service, of leaving home in search of a livelihood. 

 The appearance of these people was altogether respectable, but 

 there were two incidents, which, though very small in themselves, 

 at least furnished matter for grave reflection. The landlord had 

 given notice, a few days previously, to some of his cottagers to 



