i8 BRITISH RURAL LIFE AND LABOUR. 



change their situations without good cause, and when they 

 change them they generally do so with regret. On most farms 

 of any size in Northumberland and Durham a steward is 

 employed, and under him a ploughman steward, who has 

 charge of the horsemen. The steward has charge under 

 his employer of all the workpeople on the farm except the 

 shepherd. As a rule the shepherd is responsible only to 

 the employer. On the larger farms there are women 

 stewards, who take immediate charge of the women workers." 



In Durham, and partly in Northumberland, young 

 men, and sometimes older but unmarried men, and also 

 women and girls, are hired in spring and autumn by 

 the half-year, and board and lodge in the farmhouses. 

 This provides a sufficiency of labour in those counties, 

 so that there are not many " datal men " or casual 

 labourers required, although some Irish arrive before 

 harvest time, and before and after it get some employ- 

 ment given to them by certain of the farmers. A similar 

 system of hiring, lodging, and boarding exists in the 

 Lancashire rural districts of Fylde, Garstang, Lancaster, 

 Limesdale, and Ulverston, though in some of these the 

 hiring is for the year. In Cumberland, North Lancashire, 

 and Westmorland the ordinary day- working, outside 

 farm labourer, so common in most other counties, is 

 almost unknown, and the boarding and lodging plan is 

 the one generally adopted. In these counties the odd 

 or casual men are called " darrikers," at any rate that 

 is the name in parts of Cumberland. The "darrikers" 

 live in the villages near the farms, take monthly engage- 

 ments, and dig potatoes or do other piecework. But 

 in the counties just mentioned, on many farms, the 

 farmers and their own families manage almost entirely 

 to do their own work. Some of them have risen from 

 the position of labourers, and have ultimately become 

 large farmers. But the " rising from the ranks " is a 

 process performed in connection with many callings. 

 Probably the best opportunity of saving to obtain the 

 capital, whether small or large, necessary to make a 

 start as a master man arises during the period of board- 



