Suggestions for its Improvement. 
5 
No one will deny that the labourer is as necessary to the em- 
plover, as the employer is necessary to the labourer — each is in 
lact essential to the other, and the kindliest feelings should be 
mutually cultivated between them. On the part of the employer 
this will be at once easv and delightful. By promoUng the com- 
fort of his people he wUl secure their confidence, and obtain the 
services of the heart as well as of the hands. His interest will 
become their interest, and they will watch over and promote it 
with a zeal proportionate to that which he evinces in promoting 
their welfare. A little done in this way will ensure a large return, 
if it be done in a frank and kindly spirit ; but there must be 
nothing derogatory to the recipients, either in the thing done or 
in the manner of doing it. Whatever it be, it must appear to 
emanate from a desire for their benefit. If any other motive be 
apparent, no responsive feeling will be awakened. The people 
are quick in reading motives, and not always prone to inter}>ret 
them favourably ; but their confidence once obtained, they are 
easily led, especially when they find their own comforts increasing 
under the guidance. 
Having made these few intrwluctory observations, I will now 
proceed to the immediate subject of consideration, as it has been 
proposed by the Society, namely, the improvement of the con- 
dition of the agricultural labourer, so far as it may be promoted 
by private exertion without legislative enactment." This question 
may, I think, be most conveniently dealt with under the four fol- 
lowing heads of recommendation, viz. : — 1st. To enlarge the field 
of labour ; 2nd. To extend the benefits of education; 3rd. To 
provide comfortable cottages: 4th. To provide cottage gardens. 
Under one or the other of these heads, or under the whole of 
them collectively, all or nearly all which can with safety be done 
for impro\-ing the condition of the agricultural labourer, may, I 
believe, be comprised. 
1st. — To enlarge the Field of Labour. 
To increase the demand for labour, by enlarging the field of its 
application, will necessarily lead to an increase of the means of 
living for the labouring class. Of course profitable labour is here 
meant, labour that will yield a return to the employer ; for labour 
that is profitless, or altogether forced and artificial, cannot be 
relied upon for affording permanent means of subsistence to the 
labourer. It is only from the profits of labour that the fund for 
the payment of wages can be permanently obtained. 
That the field of profitable labour in this country is susceptible 
of being enlarged, is universally admitted. The agricultural pro- 
duce ol England might probably be increased one third bv the 
application of more capital and more labour to the cultivation of 
