WAGES ADVANCED. 269 



those now generally paid, but without cider : carters, from 

 twelve to fourteen shillings per week ; shepherds, from 

 twelve to thirteen ; general labourers, from eleven to twelve 

 all exclusive of house rent, which generally costs from 

 fifteenpence to two shillings a week, according to the size 

 and condition of both cottage and garden. Cider has not 

 been given during the last year or two to any extent, partly 

 owing to the scarcity of apples, and (I believe) partly from 

 a desire to break down the system. In lieu of cider the 

 farmer usually gives one shilling per week. The quantity 

 of cider when given is usually from three to four pints per 

 day, and is often, in this immediate district, a fair article, 

 with some amount of strength or intoxicating power." 



We have had occasion, in a previous chapter, to call 

 attention to the exceptionally low rate of wages pre- 

 vailing in the extreme west of the county of Somerset, 

 a sort of isolated, out-of-the-world district away from 

 any important town and not subject to the competition 

 of other kinds of labour. We refer to the district of 

 which Wootton Courtney is the centre ; and that, it 

 may be remembered, where the worthy vicar kept a 

 number of cows and gave all their milk to the farm 

 labourers. 



Although in a position to be uninfluenced by the 

 general tide of improvement, there had nevertheless 

 been some beneficial advance in the condition of its 

 peasant inhabitants ; for in 1880 the then vicar wrote : 



" With regard to the wages, privileges, and condition of 

 the labourer, this parish may be taken as an instance. The 

 wages of an able-bodied man are generally from nine to ten 

 shillings a week a carter or shepherd receiving from one to 

 two shillings more. In the majority of cases the houses are 

 let with the farms, or at least a certain number with each 

 farm, and the men who occupy these houses have them rent 

 free with a garden, which additions may be reckoned as 

 worth eighteenpence or two shillings more this being 

 about the average rent paid by those who do not have their 

 houses free." 



A comparison with the former conditions as to wages 

 will show that the amounts recorded in this chapter are 

 appreciably in advance of them ; and indicate the 

 sure and steady, if slow, hand of improvement. 



