368 LEASING. 



three active children lease in concert, it becomes a 

 beneficial employ. I have heard of a family in the 

 parish thus engaged, who have in one season ob- 

 tained eight bushels of clear wheat ; but this was 

 excess. I know a single woman, also, who has 

 gleaned in the same period four bushels and a half; 

 but this, again, was under very favourable and 

 partial circumstances. In general a good leaser is 

 satisfied if she can obtain, single handed, a clear 

 three bushels in the season, which gives her about 

 a bushel in the week ; and, if taken at seven shil- 

 lings, is very reasonable, and far from being any 

 great accession of profit less perhaps than is gene- 

 rally supposed to be the emolument of the gleaner ; 

 and this may have been acquired by the active 

 labour of eight or nine hours. Yet such is the 

 ardour for this occupation, the enjoyment of this 

 full association with their neighbours, the prattle, 

 the gossip, the glee, the excitement it occasions, 

 that I am sure the allowance of fourteen pence a 

 day, certain and constant, would hardly be ac- 

 cepted by my leasing neighbours in place of it. 

 Indeed I would not offer it, believing that this 

 gleaning season is looked forward to with anxiety 

 and satisfaction ; and is a season, too, in which the 

 children of the family can contribute to its support 

 without pain or undue exertion ; and viewing with 

 much approbation and pleasure this long-established 

 custom as a relaxation from domestic confinement, 

 when every cottage is locked up and abandoned by 

 its inmates, to pursue this innocent, healthful, laud- 



