204 ENGLISH AGRICULTURAL LABOURER. 



dited with the produce of allotments or cottage gardens, but 

 many men who have to feed their masters' horses and 

 cattle were forbidden to keep either poultry or pigs. In the 

 case of one woman who was allowed to keep a pig, when 

 asked why she did not do so she answered : 



" What's the use of hungering ourselves to feed a pig ? " 



She could not afford to purchase the necessary weekly 

 bag of meal even though that might become a profitable 

 investment. 



These budgets showed how the English agricultural 

 labourer, instead of being the most independent, had become 

 the most dependent of all European peasants. 



It is borne in upon us with tragic insistence that it is the 

 woman who had to bear the brunt of this unending 

 battle of trying to make both ends meet. With daily 

 self-sacrifice she saw that her man and her children were 

 fed before herself, and that if there were any meat on the 

 table it went to the breadwinner to store up physical energy 

 to meet the demands of his master. The village belle 

 became a worn-out married woman at thirty. When ques- 

 tioned as to how they managed on wages of 135. a week, a 

 woman answered : 



" I sleep all right till about twelve, and then I wake and 

 begin worrying about what I owe, and how to get things. 

 Last night I lay and cried for about a couple of hours." 



Another woman, who had to eke out 145. a week, observed : 



' We've got hell here, we have. We shall get something 

 good. But I believe hell's their place what don't look after 

 the poor. 



A Yorkshire woman whose husband earned i8s. a week 

 said : 



" When I have seen other children in warm clothing, and 

 mine jealous, then I haven't known what to say. I know 

 our Master wasn't rich. We've got a roof to cover us and 

 He hadn't where to lay His head, so I daresay it's all for the 

 best. But they say English people ought to be strong and 

 brave, and I don't know how they expect them living as 

 they do to be strong, and brave, and cheerful ! " 



" I couldn't tell you how we live/' said a woman whose 



