THE AFTERMATH OF THISTLES. 73 



take my labour to the best market ; but when a cottage is let 

 with the farm, the man is compelled to labour on that farm from 

 January to December ; he is not allowed to remove anywhere 

 else, however good the wages may be in the neighbourhood. I 

 know a case which occurred in 1872, seven miles from my house, 

 in which when the East and West Junction Railways passed 

 through the district the railway companies were offering 

 35. 6d. and 35. lod. per day ; and the young men who were at 

 work on the land for us. per week left it, and they were told 

 that unless they came back for I2S. per week they should leave 

 their cottages." 



" In the case which you mention," said his questioner, " a 

 cottager is not obliged to go and take that particular cottage 

 under the farmer." 



" No," answered Arch, " but then you must remember that 

 taking our rural population these last twenty years a very large 

 number of cottages have gone to decay. I know villages where 

 seven and eight and ten cottages in my remembrance have gone 

 to decay. The inhabitants of those cottages have been driven 

 to the towns. Those who remained behind, of course, were glad 

 to take them for the sake of shelter. If a man is forced into these 

 things, it is almost superfluous to ask him why he does them. 

 In my own village within the last seven weeks there have been 

 six cottages pulled down. Where are those people to go ? 

 There are two or three cottages built on a farm, and a man is 

 told : ' You can go and live in one of those if you like.' The 

 necessity of the case drives him to go and live in one of those 

 cottages." 



MR. George Edwards remembers a farm labourer at Nar- 

 burgh, in Norfolk, being dismissed and evicted from his 

 cottage for taking an active part in the Union. The man's 

 goods and chattels were thrown out on to the roadside, and 

 there they remained for over a week, for either no cottage 

 was available in that neighbourhood or no one dared to 

 house the furniture. 1 



But this was not all the persecution he had to endure. 

 With a Gilbertian travesty of justice the man was prosecuted 

 and fined for obstructing the King's highway ! 



Some years later a Sussex ploughman at whose cottage 



1 Mr. George Edwards states that landlords in collusion with farmers 

 during the 'seventies " tied " many cottages which were " free " in order 

 to sap the independence of the men ; but Mr. Ankers Simmons, than 

 whom there is no land agent of greater experience in England, assures 

 me that cottages were let with farms as frequently before Arch's time as 

 afterwards. It is probable he custom of letting cottages with farms 

 was increased during the depression. 



