FIRST YEARS OF SUCCESS. 117 



since, to obtain a bare living out of the four 

 acres, a man must live on or very near to it, 

 and spend his whole time in attending to it. 

 But the extent of allotment-ground which such 

 a society as this would provide for the work- 

 man must not be so large as to require any 

 more attention than he could pay to it in the 

 evening, or the Saturday afternoon, or at most 

 in a day or so of absence from his work. He 

 would have, of course, to go to his allotment 

 by rail, and rail costs money. But how many 

 thousands of workmen at this very hour go to 

 their work day by day by rail, and return 

 home at night; and the sum of money they 

 thus expend must collectively be something 

 enormous in the course of a year ! To work 

 his allotment he would have no necessity to 

 visit it every day, or hardly every week. Such 

 an allotment-ground must be under the direc- 

 tion of a proper staff of officers, for the distri- 

 bution of lots, the collection of rent, the pre- 

 vention of theft, and generally to maintain the 

 necessary order. Looked at in this light, the 

 extension of the allotment system to large 

 towns does not hold out any very great diffi- 



