478 



AGRICULTURAL AND MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 



Agricultural Wages in 1897 ^nd i8g8. 



The Labour Gazette for February contains a report by the 

 Agricultural Correspondent of the Labour Department of the 

 Board of Trade on the wages of agricultural labourers in 

 1897 and 1898. The report is based on information received 

 from a large number of chairmen of District Councils in 

 England, and also from a number of other correspondents, as 

 to the rates of weekly cash wages in 249 Poor Law Unions 

 paid to ordinary agricultural labourers (men not exclusively 

 engaged with the charge of animals, such as shepherds, 

 cattlemen, carters, and v^ragoners), exclusive of piece work 

 Ccirnings and of all extra allowances in cash or kind, in 

 December, 1898, compared with December, 1897. 



The general effect of the returns is to show that there has 

 been an upward movement in agricultural wages. 



It has been assumed, for the purposes of calculation, as on 

 former occasions, that where the predominant rates of wages 

 of ordinary labourers have changed in a district, a similar 

 change has taken place in the wages of all classes of agri- 

 cultural labourers. Although, strictly speaking, this assump- 

 tion is not absolutely correct in all counties, it may be said 

 that the wages of men in charge of horses, cattle, and sheep, 

 roughly follow the movement in the wages of the ordinar}^ 

 labourers, though the changes are not necessarily of the same 

 amount, nor do they always take place at the same time. 



The following- table shows the changes of wages of agricul- 

 tural labourers in certain Poor Law Unions in the Midland, 

 Eastern, Home, and Southern and South-Western Counties 

 between the end of 1897 and the end of 1S98 



