16 
Condition of the Agricultural Labourer, with 
service ; and there has rarely been an instance in which these 
girls have not turned out well. 
If a good secular education were generally given, and sound 
religious principles and good moral habits properly impressed 
upon our rural population, and if all were duly trained to a skil- 
ful performance of their respective tasks, can we doubt that the 
position of the agricultural labourer would be improved, or that he 
would be a better member of society, better in his domestic 
relations, better to his employer, and better in himself, than he is 
at present ? — To the realization of this result, to the securing of 
these benefits, the best efforts of the landed gentry of England, 
and of all others who take an interest in the welfare and happi- 
ness of their fellow-men, should be strenuously directed; and if 
they swerve not from the task, but follow it up earnestly, perse- 
veringly, and with all singleness of purpose, they will assuredly 
reap a rich reward in witnessmg the good which they have con- 
ferred upon others, no less than in the benefits which they will 
have secured for themselves. 
3rd. — To provide comfortable Cottages. 
The habitation of the labourer, taken with all its accompani- 
ments, forms perhaps as important a consideration in connexion 
with his everyday comfort, as any other circumstance appertain- 
ing to his positi<m in life. If the labourer be enabled to return 
from his dailv toil to a cheerful home, and there see his family in 
comfort around him, it will conduce to health of body and con- 
tentment of mind. It is not a highly ornamented cottage which 
the labourer needs. Such structures may serve to display the 
builder's taste or the landlord's munificence, but they appear 
hardly in keeping with the labourer's position, and, it may be 
feared, are not unfrequently oppressive rather than a source of 
gratification, by the contrast which they present to his other 
domestic arrangements. What the labourer really requires is a 
habitation sufficiently roomy and substantial for the comfortable 
accommodation of his family, and furnished with appliances to 
answer his and their daily wants ; and this assuredly ought to 
be provided for him, or he ought to possess the means of ob- 
tainmg it. 
Every cottage should have a sufficiency of light and ventilation, 
for which a glazed window, made to open, is necessary in each 
room. The health of the inmates will depend very much upon 
this being attended to, as it will likewise upon the proper drain- 
age of the premises. The size of the cottage must of course be 
governed m some measure by the number of the family ; but there 
ought always to be the means for a decent separation of the sexes 
