THE RISE OF FAMILIES 103 



break-down of local organization, had led to the placing 

 of the Elizabethan Poor Law on the Statute Book of 

 England. 



In the conditions of life that we have described 

 above, certain characteristics, such as stability and 

 sobriety of conduct, power of organization, knowledge 

 of local conditions, combined with the possession of a 

 moderate amount of capital, were sure to come to the 

 front, and precisely such characteristics were supplied 

 by the yeomen and farmers of the bleak and unsettled 

 country of East Lancashire and West Yorkshire. Of 

 good stock, many of them bearing honourable names, 

 and some descended from families of distinction, they 

 had established their homesteads and booths along 

 the streams and up the mountain - sides. Managing 

 their parish affairs as churchwardens and overseers, 

 serving as " high constables " of the bare forests which 

 were their summer pasturing ground, they had ample 

 scope for developing their powers of organization, and 

 the virtues of self-confidence and independent foresight. 

 With these aptitudes, they became the natural leaders 

 of the new trade movement. The water power was at 

 hand running through their farm buildings ; the sheep 

 were grazing in the forest to provide the necessary 

 material ; the population was increasing on all hands 

 to both supply labour and justify production ; it was, 

 in fact, the precise moment when we should expect 

 to see a fresh sorting-out of the accumulated stock of 

 ability, and the recognition of a new type of aristocracy. 

 Let us trace from wills and other records the actual 

 rise of one or two typical families. 



Two brothers, Richard and John, living in hamlets 



