Small Holdings in Cornwall. 
395 
tural holdings, might fairly hope to be able to get a holding on 
reasonable terms, and thence push their way up until pei’chance 
they might ultimately become occupiers of large holdings, or possibly 
owners of the land. Who can estimate the advantage to agriculture, 
and the social elevation of the rural districts, that would result if 
such persons as these were induced to remain ? 
In manufactures, trade, and commerce, what advantages have 
been derived from those who were once operatives or clerks, who by 
their exceptional abilities rose to be millowners, tradesmen, or 
merchants, inventing new appliances and devising more economical 
inethods, the adoption of which has revolutionised the particular 
calling into which they had made their way ! 
May we not expect that similar results will accrue to agricul- 
ture, when, by the extension of small holdings, the smartest young 
men of the labouring class will be retained on the land ? There 
may be some persons who have such a poor opinion of them, as 
to be unable to conceive that agriculture can ever benefit if they ai'e 
retained on the land and become occupiers or owners. Probably 
they forget that an elevating process has commenced and is pro- 
ceeding at an accelerated speed, and that in consequence the labourers 
as a class are no longer the stolid, unintelligent, unambitious men 
they once were. 
In the past they were neglected and their grievances un- 
heeded ; but the times have changed ; their votes now count at 
an election. 
If the improved labouring class have grievances, or desires of 
advancement, the former are promised to be redressed and the latter 
gratified, until there is apparently some danger of their receiving so 
much attention that they may think that theii’s is the only interest 
to be studied. Coexistent with this is the fact of their better, and 
still improving, educational advantages. Labourers now read the 
daily newspaper at the village reading-room, they discuss social and 
political questions, they observe the wages that are being earned 
in other fields of labour, they are well abreast of the eight-hours 
question, and the result of the combined influences which have been 
brought to bear on them is that they are not satisfied with their 
present lot and future prospects. Old age pensions would doubtless 
be a welcome substitute for the workhouse, and an increase of small 
agricultural holdings, brought within the labourers’ reach, would go 
far towards removing the disability that at present exists, and would 
stimulate many of them to greater efforts in order that they might 
improve their position. Tliis conduct on the part of some would be 
likely to act beneficially on many others, and so the general condi- 
tion and status of the agricultural labourer would be perceptibly 
improved. 
If this result is attained there follows the necessary conclusion 
that pauperism in the rural districts will be diminished. 
We doubt if such an increase of small occupiers would, on the 
whole, lessen the number of hired labourers required on the land, or 
lessen their supply. 
