9^0 MANAGEMENT OF HOUNDS. 



present day place their hands upon their hearts and say 

 with truth, that the whole and sole object of their advo- 

 cating certain measures has been for the benefit only of 

 their poorer brethren, without the slightest reference to 

 their own advancement? Why, then, are the honest 

 yeomen to be taunted only with motives which are 

 foreign to their nature, and to be likened by one raised 

 from below their own rank by some fortuitous circum- 

 stances to the clods of the valley ? The farmers of Old 

 England are not the enemies and oppressors of the poor, 

 but their friends. Their motto ever has been, " Live, 

 and let live ;" not perish, ye degraded and half-starved 

 workers at the loom, that your masters may ride in gilded 

 coaches, or live in glittering tinselled palaces. The 

 farmer and his workmen have one common and united 

 interest; together they rise for their morning work, 

 together bear the heat and labour of the day, together 

 rejoice or repine, as things go well or ill. No hard task- 

 masters are they ; nor spurn from their door the old man 

 who has become grey-headed in their service. Together 

 master and man are seen approaching the house of God 

 on the Sabbath morn, and side by side they are often 

 laid in the narrow house appointed for all living in the 

 evening of that day when all their trials and troubles of 

 this world are ended. Such was the case in olden times, 

 and such are the feelings which exist between the farmer 

 and labourer. The present race of farmers may not 

 labour with their hands so much as did their fathers, but 

 their heads have little respite. Their hearts are still in 

 the right place — the mantle of integrity has descended 

 unsullied from father to sons; and their boast yet is, 

 and I trust ever will be, in the words of the old song, 

 " that it still from a spot shall be free." 



