GROWTH UNDER STORMY SKIES. 225 



tors. Apparently none of these men were members of a 

 union, but every man was an unpaid agitator. 



With the placidity, patience, and kindliness of the peasant, 

 the carters, though on strike, attended to and fed their 

 horses, the cowmen looked after the cattle, and on the last 

 day of the strike, when the South and West Wilts Hounds 

 met at Chitterne, they joined in an exciting chase over the 

 Down after the fox ! Who can say after this that those 

 who tie their trousers with string under the knee are filled 

 with class hatred for the booted and spurred ? 



A meeting was held at Heytesbury under the historic 

 chestnut tree. It was a dark February night. One man 

 told the audience that he " took home us. gd. and the 

 baker wanted us. 8fd. of it. (Instead of bitterness this 

 statement raised a laugh.) He asked, what had he left 

 for boots and clothing and everything else ? 



An old man whose hair was white, stood bareheaded and 

 asked, with that pathetic love of men for their horses, how 

 he could strike, as he had his cattle to feed. He was told 

 he could feed his cattle, but do no more. Then some one 

 suggested that they should start a trade union. 



No animosity was displayed. They were unorganised, 

 but the men had come to the end of their tether : they could 

 not carry on with only 12s. a week. This tolerant placidity 

 was too much for the farmers. They granted an immediate 

 advance of is. a week to all over 16 years of age, and of 6d. 

 a week to boys under that age. 



The Workers' Union soon visited the villages in this 

 county and made rapid strides in organising farm labourers. 

 Branches were formed, but the farm worker very quickly 

 learnt how impolitic it was to be the secretary of a branch 

 when his employer refused his labourer the same right to 

 combine as himself. At Broad Hinton, a local secretary 

 was dismissed. Immediately, one hundred men on the neigh- 

 bouring farms struck work, which sign of solidarity and 

 discipline took the local farmers completely by surprise. 



A large protest meeting was held, at which an improvised 

 band consisting of melodeons, concertinas, triangles and 

 tambourines discoursed anything but sweet music, for the 

 VOL. H. Q 



