222 A Walk from 



ooat, was mildly-spoken, quiet and seemingly thought- 

 ful. He had come for his harvest allowance of 20s. 

 worth of beer. If he abstained from its use on 

 Sundays, he would have a ration of about tenpence's 

 worth daily. That would buy him a large loaf of 

 bread, two good cuts of mutton or beef, and all the 

 potatoes and other vegetables he could eat in a day. 

 But he puts it all into the Jug instead of the Basket. 

 Jug is the juggernaut that crushes his hard earnings in 

 the dust, or, without the figure, distils them into 

 drink. Jug swallows up the first fruits of his 

 industry, and leaves Basket to glean among the 

 sharpest thorns of his poverty. Jug is capricious 

 as well as capacious. It clamors for quality as well 

 as quantity ; it is greedy of foaming and beaded 

 liquors. Basket does well if it can bring to the 

 reaper the food of well-kept dogs. In visiting 

 different farms, I have noticed men and women at 

 their luncheons and dinners in the field. A hot 

 mutton chop, or a cut of roast-beef, and a hot potatoe, 

 seem to be a luxury they never think of in the 

 hardest toil of harvest. Both the meals I have 

 mentioned consist, so far as I have seen, of only two 

 articles of food, bread and bacon, or bread and cheese. 

 And this bacon is never warm, but laid upon a slice 

 of bread in a thin, cold layer, instead of butter, both 



