250 BRITISH RURAL LIFE AND LABOUR. 



: the contented grunt or murmur of a fattening pig is 

 pleasanter to the agricultural labourer's ear than the 

 delicious notes of the sweetest nightingale." 



This is the pre-eminently roseate and ideal picture, 

 only realisable under the very best conditions which very 

 rarely prevailed at the period to which this section of our 

 volume relates. These best conditions, of which more 

 will be said in a later chapter, are the absolute possession 

 of allotment ground as a freehold easily and fairly ob- 

 tained. Very different, however, were the circumstances 

 to which reference will now be made. 



All the advantages enumerated by Mr. Kinglake might 

 arise from ground obtainable at anything like a fair 

 rent ; but in a very large number of instances the 

 rent exacted from the poor struggling servant was 

 nothing less than extortionate ; and the amount of 

 ground obtainable generally the eighth of an acre 

 in some few instances a little more has not been 

 sufficient to provide anything like vegetables enough for 

 the family consumption during a year. The most careful 

 cultivation could not produce so much as that. If 

 granted on fair terms and charged only at about the rate 

 which the farmer himself paid the landlord, it would 

 undoubtedly prove to be an appreciable advantage, in 

 the way of supplementing the food of the peasant. 



It is important to distinguish the allotment per se 

 from the cottage garden. The latter when existent 

 as a free adjunct of the house was, and is, often utilised 

 for the growing of vegetables as well as of flowers, that 

 by their prettiness and quaint, old-fashioned, character 

 have so often attracted wayfarers. Very frequently, and 

 often with the smallest-sized cottages, there were no 

 gardens : and so it happened that where the need was 

 the greatest the want was most keenly felt. In a large 

 number of instances, too, the ground apportioned for 

 allotments in a particular district was not sufficient 

 to provide all that were required. 



