Page:Agricultural labour.djvu/15

 District Y.—In an average agricultural county distinguished, however, by two special conditions. Pauperism had been virtually exterminated by a wise administration of Poor Law and by setting, and premium on thrift, and the interests of the labourers had been for forty years past intelligently cared for, more especially in selecting the most thrifty to hold small plots of land where they could keep a cow. There was little or no difficulty here in readjusting matters satisfactorily, the rise in wages being chiefly met by a system of classification and the principles of industrial partnerships were to some extent adopted. It would be incredible to some of those who have never offered to the labourers a means of rising by holding land, to see the way in which men will slave and save to obtain these small prizes: and the amount of self-respect, education and comfort which their acquisition wisely conceded will produce.

District Z.—In a low-waged, pauperized, typical south-western county, a resident landlord pointed out last year to his tenants the desirability of raising the condition of the labourers, and thereby sowed the seeds of what he afterwards was enabled to accomplish. One of his most intelligent tenants set about a system of piece-work last winter, by which in a district where ten shillings a week was the normal standard of wages, his labourers earned about fourteen shillings, and he found the labour by no means expensive; (one consequence of that intelligent policy was to give him a great command of labourers in the last harvest, for the men hoping to be set on again at piece-work for the winter, naturally preferred to work for him in the summer.) He also added considerably to their gardens by allotment ground with the consent of his landlord, and now many of the neighbouring farmers are following his example. The landlord, too, is making arrangements for letting some of the best men keep a cow. But further than this landlords and tenants