. , To every land reformer, particularly the men and women in the 

 Socialist movement, these words will appeal strongly. Think of it, 

 about one million men, with their wives and families divorced from 

 the land, about equal to the number of our unemployed at the present 

 moment. On. every hand we are faced with great stretches of 

 barren wastes, instead of which, had the nation's welfare been the 

 first consideration, we might have had smiling fields of grain and 

 woodland, and millions of the population living a pure and healthy 

 life. Thousands who have drifted into our towns from the rural 

 areas are to-day living under miserable and degrading conditions, 

 and would gladly return to the land if reasonable opportunity pre- 

 sented itself. The opportunity must be given, and that before long; 

 but the time of its advent rests with the working-class voters of the 

 country. The composition of the House of Commons will have to 

 be changed by the sending of more representatives from the ranks 

 of the people, and fewer of the wealthy land-owhing class. By the 

 aid of the parliamentary machine the latter have robbed the people 

 of their birth-right, and the same machine will have again to be 

 used to restore the land again to the people. That we cannot hope 

 for much from the land-owning class is evidenced from their con- 

 stant cry to be still further relieved from taxation. In 1896, the 

 Right Honorable Mir Chaplin said : "In our opinion the condition of 

 agriculture throughout the country is such that the relief from the 

 burdens placed upon it will not brook more delay . '. . . . . 

 the unfair proportion, as we think, in which the land is taxed, 

 especially yvhen compared with its ability to bear such taxation." 

 That the land-owning class have used this cry to their own advant- 

 age, and to the detriment of the working class, is easily demonstrated. 

 At the beginning of the last century land paid 3/- in the £, but in 

 1896 it was down as low as 9d. in the £. In 1817 the total amount 

 of rates borne by land amounted to £6,730,000, and house and 

 other property paid £3,370,000, but in 1868 land only contributed 

 £5,500,000, as against £ 1 1 ,000,000 by other property. And when we 

 get up to 1891 we find the difference still greater in favour of land, 

 the totals being house and other property £23,560,000, as against 

 a paltry £4,260,000 from land. To grasp more clearly how the idle 

 lauded. aristocracy have shifted the incidence of taxation off their 

 own shoulders on to the shoulders of the people in towns, I may 

 say that house and other property in 1891 bore 84'69 per cent, of the 

 whole, whereas in 1817 it was laud 66*66 per cent., and house and 

 other property 33'33 per cent. In face of these figures it is 

 audacious that these people should still cry out for more, especially 

 when it is borne in mind that they were granted relief in regard to 

 the foor Rate a few years ago to the extent of £2,000,000 per 

 ttttUum. When we claim a larger share of the Parliamentary repre- 

 sentation, we ate often femiaded by our Opponents that we are 

 fighting for class legislatloti, whicH in tlieif opinioti is wrong. Is 

 tiiie above iiot elads l<ilgislatioti with a veugea&cei to be co&deinae4 



