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 CHAPTER V. THE AGRICULTURAL DISTRICTS.

Merchants and manufacturers were now universally convinced that they could have no sound and prosperous trade while they were limited in their returns by a selfish legislation, which excluded the articles that would otherwise find an extensive market in this country; working men also were now almost universally convinced that the corn and provision laws, which lessened the demand for their labour, and raised the price of their food, were unjust and iniqui tous; and their only difference with the League was as to the means by which the redress of their grievances was to be obtained. Seeing this—seeing that their labours had been so far successful—and seeing that the great "unsettlement" which the new Corn Law and the tariff had made, and the general belief that monopoly was tottering to its fall—they determined to carry the war into the enemy's stronghold, and to raise the demand for free trade from the tenant-farmers who had hitherto lent their aid to support landlord aggression. A double number of the Norwich Mercury, of Saturday, April 28, contained no fewer than twenty columns of a report of meetings held in the county town of Norfolk, at which Mr. Cobden, Colonel Thompson, and Mr. Moore completely and triumphantly demolished the landowners' fallacies, and convinced the farmers that what is called "protection" had been grievously injurious to their interests, and that nothing but free trade could prevent their