THE NINETEENTH CENTURY 141 



The position of the labouring class was, in the early 

 years of the century, deplorable. Save in special 



districts, where old industries such as 

 labourers weaving and spinning had survived, or 

 and William new industries such as straw-plaiting or 

 Cobbett. i-ii i i_ i 



lace- making had sprung up, the men had 



to depend entirely on their low wages, supplemented, 

 if they chose to become paupers, by allowances from 

 the rates. Wages, though they varied then as now 

 throughout the country, and were to some extent 

 regulated by the Speenhamland regulations, seem to 

 have averaged from 95. to los. a week. Food was 

 excessively dear. The whole labouring class must 

 have lived on the verge of starvation. The more enter- 

 prising men poached and stole ; they also joined with 

 their fellows in rick-burnings, in the breaking-up of 

 machinery, in the raiding of corn-stores, and in the 

 other disorders that, taking place from time to time 

 during the early years of the century, culminated 

 in the risings of 1830. These disorders, though they 

 may have paved the way both to political reforms 

 and to the modification of the extraordinarily severe 

 penal code, brought no immediate benefits to the 

 people. The leaders, undoubtedly often the best of 

 the men, were soon caught in the meshes of the law, 

 to be transported or imprisoned until their spirit was 

 broken. The less enterprising members of this class 

 accepted their life of misery and learnt to depend on 

 the allowances of the poor law and the doles they 

 received from clergy and gentry. Amongst these 

 poor people the population increased rapidly, all con- 

 siderations of thrift being at an end, since the larger 

 the families the more the labourers could secure from 

 the rates. But even then some failed to secure enough 



