Agricultural Wages lOl 



on the part of the landowners and the 

 farmers to depress the agricultural labourers 

 for their own gain. The freedom of labour 

 had brought with it the separation of 

 labour from the land. The wages of 

 labour began to be determined more and 

 more by demand and supply, and not by 

 customary relations of land and labour. 

 The legislation begun by Elizabeth was 

 intended to meet the evils of destitution 

 and of unemployment. The poor in very 

 deed — too feeble to work — were treated with 

 charity ; the sturdy rogues and vagabonds, 

 and even the unemployed who were capable 

 of work, were treated with what we should 

 consider ferocity. 



But the whole effect of the system was 

 to take away a great part of the economic 

 freedom that had been acquired before the 

 end of the mediaeval period. The effects 

 of the Poor - Law were aggravated in the 



