128 AWAKENING OF ENGLAND. 



and help to increase the population of a bold 

 and thriving peasantry. There is no lord of the 

 manor on this estate who interdicts the build- 

 ing of new cottages, no large farmer with 

 power to prevent land being used by the 

 labourer for his own benefit. Thirty years 

 ago hardly a cottage was to be seen across the 

 stretch of moorland heath. To - day, blue 

 smoke rises into the clarified atmosphere from 

 many a cottage chimney. 



It is probable that success — that is, success 

 which is not measured by the ordinary standard 

 of wealth, but by the creation of a healthy and 

 thriving peasantry earning then* livelihood free 

 of taskmasters — is due to other causes than 

 that of the absence of rack - renting and the 

 presence of cheap building materials. In the 

 first place, these small holders, like many others 

 in or round the confines of the New Forest, 

 have extensive grazing rights. This enables 

 the cottagers to shut up their entire piece of 

 grass land for hay, letting their cows graze on 

 the common, where they can pick up a living 

 in the summer on the rough grass, the gorse and 

 the tender heather shooting up after fire has 

 burnt the coarser stems. 



Here handicraft too is closely allied to 



