Page:Notes on the Anti-Corn Law Struggle.djvu/242

 liberties against the encroachments of their kings, laid the foundation of the liberties of England, and thereby of the liberties of all mankind.

From the stile above mentioned there was a view of a house of considerable size, prettily situated, which an old woman informed me was the house of the clergyman, adding, "We don't have much good from he." The living is worth upwards of one thousand pounds a year; but the incumbent at that time did not appear to enjoy a large amount of popularity among his parishioners, who, on the other hand, extolled the virtues of a neighbouring squire, the labourers on whose property were much better off than those in this parish, most of them living rent free and having fuel found them by their landlord.

Here is a cottage a mere ruin. It is built of mud, supported by upright and cross pieces of timber, originally forming squares, but now distorted by time and neglect into irregular figures for which geometry has no name. Is it inhabited? Yes; and the woman in this hovel says that in the cold weather they pay two shillings a week out of their seven shillings a week for firing, and they have eight children. They have no garden, and she says their rent is one pound a year.

But a man now pointed out a cottage worse than