414 CONCLUSION. 



taxation, rent and usury keep them always as 

 near as possible to the margin of starvation. In 

 this twentieth century, whole populations still 

 plough with the same plough as their mediaeval 

 ancestors, live in the same incertitude of the 

 morrow, and are as carefully denied education 

 as their ancestors ; and they have, in claiming 

 their portion of bread, to march with their 

 children and wives against their own sons' 

 bayonets, as their grandfathers did hundreds of 

 years ago. 



In industrially developed countries, a couple 

 of months' work, or even much less than that, 

 would be sufficient to produce for a family a rich 

 and varied vegetable and animal food. But the 

 researches of Engel (at Berlin) and his many 

 followers tell us that the workman's family has 

 to spend one full half of its yearly earnings 

 that is, to give six months of labour, and often 

 more to provide its food. And what food ! 

 Is not bread and dripping the staple food of 

 more than one-half of English children ? 



One month of work every year would be quite 

 sufficient to provide the worker with a healthy 

 dwelling. But it is from 25 to 40 per cent, of 

 his yearly earnings that is, from three to five 

 months of his working time every year that 

 he has to spend in order to get a dwelling, in 

 most cases unhealthy and far too small ; and 



