224 RURAL DENMARK 



holdings or found themselves with a good prospect 

 of buying them ? 



Now in Denmark all these things are different. 

 There the rural labourer has, at any rate in many 

 instances, a future before him. He hopes not to 

 remain in that condition throughout his life. He looks 

 forward to the time when, in his middle-age, he 

 and his family will work a holding of their own, either 

 with or without the assistance of the State ; when 

 they will be independent ; when " their feet will be 

 under their own table." It may seem a small 

 ambition, but I say that it is a good one, and that 

 the Government which makes it possible of accom- 

 plishment is doing a noble work, of which in due time 

 their country will reap the benefit. But the Dane 

 knows that when he attains to his small-holding he 

 has a fair prospect of being able to make it pay by the 

 aid of co-operation. As I learned in Denmark once 

 and for all, that is the root of the matter Co-operation, 

 and again Co-operation ! 



I commend these views to the consideration of 

 the writer in the Jyllandsposten and of those large 

 landowners in Denmark and elsewhere who hold that 

 small-holdings are u all nonsense." But I am not vain 

 enough to suppose even for a moment that they will 

 be convinced thereby, for who is ever convinced 

 against his will ? Yet I do believe that the course 

 of events will prove their cogency, though probably 

 this will happen after I have ceased to speak or write, 

 by which means alone I, a humble individual without 

 voice in the councils of the nation, have it in my 

 power to advance them. Perhaps, too, this proof will 

 manifest itself at last in some signal and painful fashion. 



To return. As these pages show, there is, how- 



