192 ENGLISH AGRICULTURAL LABOURER. 



night only when the populace became restive, and taken 

 off again immediately the plaudits of the crowd rose to fever 

 height. 



The Government pantomime had the longest run in the 

 great Budget performance of 1909, when Harlequin dis- 

 played such antics in smacking landlords with his pliable 

 wand that he created quite a commotion in the stalls. 

 Thoroughly alarmed they rushed back to their country 

 houses and stirred up the countryside. 



There was no doubt about it, the landlords really were 

 scared. 



But it was observed that whilst the Conservative land- 

 owners were alarmed, the more intelligent landowning Liber- 

 als went their way untroubled. They evidently knew what 

 would happen at the fall of the curtain. 



The resounding thwacks of the Harlequin barely bruised 

 a single member of the possessing class. Agricultural land 

 was exempt from taxation, and land other than agricultural 

 had merely to bear the miserable tax of a half-penny in the 

 pound, which after all was really not worth the picking up. 

 The possessing class sent up a sigh of relief as the price of 

 agricultural land steadily rose 15 per cent, in value. When 

 the Budget Play was over and those who had toiled in the 

 fields went home to lind their larders empty, hungry teeth 

 began to glisten in rural constituencies. It indicated that 

 the Earth Hunger was not satisfied, that those who worked 

 for masters .-till had to rear families on inadequate wages 

 and live in wretched cottages. Then it was that the Govern- 

 ment sent their popular comedian into the provinces to 

 " sever the shackles of feudalism " with striking phrases. 



It apeared that for the successful presentation of the 

 coiiudy. to equip it thoroughly with trap-doors and exits, 

 the services of a great number of scene-shifters had to be 

 engaged. This new play they called the Land Enquiry. 



The- Government had suddenly developed a passion for 

 rural scenic effects. Most of those who listened to the fiery 

 speeches delivered by leading politicians during the Budget 

 and the House of Lords Campaign imagined that these 

 statesmen were fully equipped with knowledge of rural 



