Page:The farm labourer in 1872.djvu/14

 four shillings a week beyond their present earnings would not tempt them to go elsewhere. The men seem very grateful to me for what I have done, though except in treating them kindly and intelligently, I am doing nothing but consulting my own interests, and they certainly work harder on my farm than anywhere else this side of the Trent."

"Well, Newstyle, I hope the other farmers will soon do the same as you, and then we shall have no more discontent and agitation. I think I can do something to forward your system by letting some of the best men about here have a few acres of land to keep a cow. There's a small place of twenty acres at the other side of the village, which will fall in this next year at latest, for they tell me the old man will never get out of bed again. If I can find four or five labourers on the estate who have saved money I'll parcel it out among them as cowland, instead of reletting it as a farm."

"I'm sure," said Newstyle, "it will be a great boon to them, and a great advantage to the estate; if you're careful in the selection, it will be the means of keeping our best men in the district, and except on my farm, we are fast losing all our best workmen; the old ones are getting past their work, and the young ones go elsewhere."

"Do you think your men are equal to Northumberland labourers?"

"They're fast becoming so; my best men are