220 PROBLEMS OF VILLAGE LIFE 



industrial life has availed to stir the energies 

 of our poor village folk. At a time like the 

 present when on every side the sounds of 

 healthy discontent are surging around us with 

 immense benefit to the national well-being of 

 our workers, the voice of the agricultural 

 labourer is almost silent ; nevertheless the 

 ancient fires, rekindled in the Swing Riots and 

 the brief but wonderful success of Joseph 

 Arch, are not wholly extinguished. 



The difficulties of effective combination in 

 rural districts are no doubt serious ; and they 

 have been to some extent accentuated by the 

 compulsory contributions of the excellent 

 Insurance Act, for no Union can be main- 

 tained under a weekly contribution of 2d. 

 Nevertheless, a new organization is slowly 

 rising from the ashes of Joseph Arch's Union, 

 and will make itself felt in the coming years. 

 And why not ? Everywhere else to-day we 

 find a spirit of unrest amongst the workers of 

 England, on the whole restrained and digni- 

 fied, yet definite and determined. The strikes 

 of seamen, railwaymen, miners, dockers, 

 tailors, and so on, are all outward and visible 

 signs of that new spirit which must, and 

 ought to follow the better education and 

 wider enfranchisement of a nation's workers. 

 Lawyers, doctors, and parsons have long ago 



