THE HARVEST-HOME. 191 



been so little careful to avoid trespassing on forbidden 

 ground, that they have known what it is to be denied 

 the privilege of gleaning for the future. The poor are 

 not aware that, according to the law of the land, they 

 have no right whatever to this benefit ; and that they 

 owe it entirely to the bounty and good feeling of the 

 proprietor. Few, indeed, are the examples of a farmer 

 wantonly depriving his poor neighbours of the privilege 

 of gleaning in his fields : the express injunctions of 

 Scripture would weigh with him, if the common feel- 

 ings of humanity did not prevent so harsh an act 

 But in most cases, at the present day, the farmer finds 

 it needful to have the fields cleared of sheaves before the 

 poor are admitted, and thus to remove the temptation 

 to theft and dishonesty. The poet's recommendation 

 to "fling from the full sheaf the liberal handful," is 

 indeed seldom acted upon ; for the gleaners have shown 

 so frequent a disposition to take the liberal handful 

 unbidden, that it has shut out from them the compas- 

 sion of the kind-hearted farmer, and has introduced 

 a stricter discipline with respect to the gleanings of 

 fields. 



Last of all comes the harvest-home, that vestige of 

 good old times, which every kindly disposed person 

 would wish to see preserved as a custom of our land 

 never to be slighted or forgotten. It is not so much 

 the value of the entertainment itself, as the kind and 

 friendly feelings promoted by it, that must be regarded. 

 No gratuity bestowed as a substitute for this meal can 

 make up for the loss of all those grateful and affec- 

 tionate feelings called into play by the exercise of old 

 English hospitality on the part of the farmer and his 

 family. The writer has often been present at these 

 rural feasts, and is convinced that, if well conducted, 

 they form one of the most powerful means of fostering 

 contentment and good feeling between masters and 

 their dependants. It is a pleasant thing to witness the 

 preparations for this, the most important of anmial 



