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rent of land) should be found rolling in wealth and luxury, while, hard by, the poor laborer, with his wife and almost invariably large family, is suffering from want of the actual necessaries of life.

Recently, under the leadership of Joseph Arch, a Warwickshire hedge-cutter and Primitive Methodist preacher, the laborers have roused themselves from the apathy of centuries, and have formed Unions, modeled after the Trades' Unions, the result of which has already shown itself in a marked amelioration of their lot. Arch has proven himself possessed of the sterling qualities of courage, modesty, and foresight, which go so far to form the character of a true leader of the people. In pursuance of his purpose to right the wrongs of his fellow-laborers, he left England and undertook a tour of observation through Canada and the United States. He expresses his determination, unless the grievances of his fellow-workers receive immediate attention, to organize a vast emigration scheme, which shall bring the landlords and farmers of England to a truer appreciation of the value of a man. He intends to devote five or six years to looking about, carefully avoiding haste, in order that he may not arrive at any conclusion likely to be disastrous to those whom he wishes to serve.

ENGLISH FARMERS AGITATING.

The farmers themselves, too, are arriving at the conclusion that they are an abused and really oppressed class. Now that voting by ballot has become the law of England, (though it has not yet been tried on a large scale), they hope to get at the true sentiments of their class, free from the intimidation and undue influence which their lords and masters have not scrupled to use hitherto. The "'Squire

ENGLISH FARMERS AGITATING.

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archy," as the landlord class is called, are well aware that the scepter of power is passing from them. Therefore, being wise in their generation, they seek to conciliate the farmers by temporizing, and condescending patronage. The meetings of the Chambers of Agriculture are at

[graphic]

One of the Grievances of English Farmers.

tended by dukes, marquises, viscounts, earls, and so on, including the "knights of low degree" and esquires of still "less dignity." These blue-blood gentry are

fully alive to the fact that, unless they can keep the farmers and the people in good humor, their power will depart from them, and, perhaps, their property as well. Therefore,

they are eager to impart "what they know about farming" to their humble but restive dependents.

As it is, the grumblings are loud and deep. The justice of allowing thousands of fertile acres to lie waste, to no other end than that their noble owner may delight himself by the slaughter of partridges, pheasants, and hares, is questioned, and justly questioned, in view of the vast amount of farm produce that England is compelled to import to feed her teeming millions.

The people also begin to inquire whether it be a sufficient ground for their own and their children's suffering for bread that William the Norman passed bad laws and gave land, which did not belong to him, to his sans culotte followers eight hundred years ago. Pinched, as they are, by the scarcity and dearness of meat, they do not see the equity of allowing a land-owner to rob the country by raising a couple of rabbits, worth a shilling apiece, for the pleasure of shooting them, while on what those rabbits eat and spoil could be grown a sheep, furnishing a dozen times as much. food. These, and similar questions, are being thoroughly agitated and debated. Parliament shows its knowledge that these grievances are real ones, and its desire that they should be shelved, by appointing commissioners to investigate them.

A GOOD TIME COMING.

It is evident, to all far-seeing minds, that the law of primogeniture in England is doomed, and that with it, or perhaps before it, will go down the connection of the Church with the State, which is intimately associated with those laws.

These relics of Norman barbarism, the primogeniture

A GOOD TIME COMING.

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laws, whereby "families" are built up at the expense of the nation, have already received a shattering blow by the late abolition of the purchase of commissions in the army. Commissions are now given only after the passage of examinations severe enough to eliminate from the candidates the hosts of younger sons and poor relations of whom army officers have hitherto been composed. Here is one avenue closed against the juniors. By and by will come the severance of Church and State, and the loss of the right to give away or sell the cure of souls. Then the landed gentry will have to provide for their entire families, instead of getting all their sons, save the eldest, supported at the public expense, as is the custom now. When this is forced upon them, they will no longer bar the correction of the ancient, unjust laws of entail and inheritance; and then, in natural sequence, will follow the breaking up of the large aggregations of land in single hands. Thus it is plain that the grievances of the English farmers, which consist in the actual existence of injurious laws, and not, as is the case with American farmers, in the evasion and open breaking of laws by high-handed aud too-powerful corporations, are in a fair way of being abolished. There, as here, it will have to be done by organization and concerted action. In both cases, the enemies of the farmers are well organized, wealthy, and unscrupulous; in both cases, it is a battle of the weak against the strong; and in both cases, the odds are greatly in the favor of the weak, if they will be true to themselves. They have the numerical majority, and it is only by fomenting divisions among them that their exactors can longer hope to continue their usurped power.

CHAPTER V.

AMERICAN FARMERS' CLUBS.

AT THE TIME OF THE REVOLUTION.

While eminent citizens of England were seeking, by every legitimate means, to foster the interests of agriculture, a corresponding class in the then infant States of America were not idle. Manufactures at that day were comparatively unknown, or only in their infancy. Then the foremost men of the nation were farmers, and derived their revenue directly from the soil. Of those engaged in the various professions of life, many still clung to the pursuit of their youth, and gave their farms their personal supervision. A large proportion of the heroes of the Revolution left the plow for the battle-field, and when the war was over returned again to their peaceful art.

Those, indeed, were days that may never again return. Then there was no swindling, no stock jobbing, no Credit Mobilier, no open buying and selling of votes, no fine art of lobbying, no overshadowing monopolies. The offer of a bribe was scorned, and the tempter held up to public indignation. If the first American bribe-taker, the traitor Arnold, could have been secured, he would have swung on a gibbet higher than Haman.

Alas! how changed. In this day of fraud and corruption, we see the bribe-taker and the swindling and drunken

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