4 i6 A FARMER'S YEAR 



who live upon the land ? Are they or are they not to receive a 

 decent wage ? At present their pay is inadequate, and therefore 

 they are leaving the land, neither, as I believe, to their own 

 ultimate benefit, nor to the good of our country. Is this to go 

 on or is it not to go on? And if not, how is it to be prevented 

 Avithout the aid of measures which will restore the soil to its pro- 

 sperity ? That is the problem to which wiser men than I am 

 must find an answer, and within the next generation. 



What I have never been able to understand is why those 

 who, owing, let us suppose, to some mental twist, are unable 

 to accept as wise or advisable all the strict and far-reaching con- 

 sequences of the Cobden doctrines should be spoken of almost 

 as if they were evil-doers? Why indeed others, possibly more 

 enlightened, should wag the head and point the finger at them 

 even as though they were persons who, conceiving, rightly or 

 wrongly, that they had a message to deliver and a duty to 

 perform, have dared to write a novel with a purpose ? Scarcely 

 without exception, these doctrines in their entirety are to-day 

 repudiated, or at any rate not acted upon, by the other civilised 

 peoples of the world, those of our own colonies included, most of 

 which communities are not without intelligence, and may indeed 

 be supposed to be competent, like ourselves, to form an opinion 

 as to what is or is not prudent and to their advantage. 

 Also they are questioned by a great many thinking men in 

 this country, as is evidenced by the articles which now often 

 appear in some of the leading papers. And yet, if an indivi- 

 dual ventures openly to express the belief that a tax upon im- 

 ported barley and foreign-ground flour is just, or that it would 

 be desirable to give a bounty to home-grown corn, behold what 

 happens to him. Perhaps, however, the local paper does not 

 really think that I am so very wicked, or wish to throw strange 

 lights upon my views ; indeed, I venture to believe, if all the truth 

 were known, that we part good friends. 



Hood tells me that the weather at Harleston yesterday was- 

 fearful, but, wet or fine, the show and sale had to be held. All 



