116 PROBLEMS OF VILLAGE LIFE 



Born only to endure, 



The patient passive poor 

 Seem useful chiefly by their multitude ; 



For they are men who keep 



Their lives secret and deep ; 

 Alas, the poor are seldom understood. 



To a very large extent then the English 

 labourer has been disappointed and dis- 

 illusioned in his political hopes. Before the 

 bestowal of the franchise politicians devoted 

 practically no attention whatever to the in- 

 articulate villages, and since the vote was 

 secured the help offered by members and 

 candidates has been largely lip-service. The 

 landlord and property influences in both the 

 historic parties, and still more so amongst the 

 permanent officials of Government Boards, 

 have frequently succeeded in neutralizing 

 the efficacy of reforms ostensibly directed 

 towards opening the land to the poor and 

 providing them with decent cottages. From 

 decade to decade the villagers have been duped 

 by cries like " Every labourer his own land- 

 lord " or the " Colonization of England." 



The general interest shown in the local 

 government of the parish and county is, as a 

 rule, lamentably small. By a strange paradox 

 the advent of local government has stereo- 

 typed the hopeless dependence of the labourer 

 more fully than before. What part or lot 



