PEASANT PROPRIETARY 219 



made and mended, and in some cases small luxuries, 

 and house and family adornments, are indulged in, and 

 as a consequence the tradesman, shopkeeper, and 

 manufacturer are directly benefited. 



This is no fancy picture. Catshill is a place where the 

 decayed industry of nail-making was once carried on. 

 The men sought employment in the manner described, 

 and they were for a long time in a state of extreme 

 poverty for want of it. The present writer has for 

 years past known the locality and the decaying condi- 

 tion of the trade in it. He now knows personally 

 many of those who belong to the colony. They are 

 a fine lot of men, such as we want more of They 

 work hard, some of them very hard, but they are inde- 

 pendent, well housed, have plenty of food, with good 

 digestions, and their minds are healthily occupied in 

 planning further improvements on their little freeholds. 

 Recently they have taken to flower-growing. At his 

 last visit the writer saw heaps of chrysanthemums tied 

 in bunches by the women and children ready for a very 

 early start in the morning for the market towns. 



Further, the labour question is here being solved. 

 Instead of the distress and charges on the poor-rate, 

 which previously existed, there is not, at the present 

 time, the writer is informed, an able-bodied pauper in 

 the whole parish, while the rateable value of the land 

 is considerably increased. Formerly this Woodrow 

 Farm was occupied, with small success, by a single 

 tenant, and very few labourers employed. Now there 

 is on it a colony of families. One of these small 

 holders, who has bought additional land outside the 

 estate (but altogether under thirty acres), received 

 in a single year ;^6oo for produce raised on his 

 holdings. In the same year he paid jC 240 for labour, 



