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But these remarks relate chiefly to the material aspect of the great Condition of England Question . Did space permit , we should have much more to say on the moral results of this enormous accumulation of wealth in the hands of the rich , and the increasing impoverishment of the poor . This is b y far the most important part of the question , and it is one to which we are sure the heart and the
intellect of Dr . Smiles would equally prompt his attention . He must have seen how much the discontent and sufferings of the poor have been aggravated by finding their privileges and pastimes curtailed or abolished one after another ; while the progress of wealth and luxury has been , all the while , continually adding fresh means of relaxation and enjoyment to the rich . Nor is this the worst evil
connected with the tendency of capital to gather into mischievous heaps . The small tradesman , who embarks his capital and skill in any branch of business where-the leviathan capitalist is his competitor , must do so , in almost every instance , with the hopeless feeling that his chances of failure are every year becoming greater . He cannot help seeing that the large capitalist , if his wealth is not already great enough to enable him to swallow up the small capitalist ' s business by the ordinary strife of competition , can easily borrow more money . The rate of interest is only two per cent . ; and when it comes to a struggle of that kind it is easy to see how the struggle will end .
Still we do not say that the progress of the nation is backward . What we contend for is , that the whole question should be stated . When we look at the increase of £ 75 , 000 , 000 in the gross annual income of the upper and middle classes , let us not forget that this has been accompanied by a vast multiplication of the wretched , a gieat increase of discontent . Such a state of things , we contend , is unhealthy , is dangerous . It teaches the industry of the nation the habit of looking at the prosperity of the nation .
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WONDERS . The sea-serpent once more ! He has shown himself again in one of his accustomed haunts , the coast of Ireland . Is it a fable , or is it not ? Professors are obstinately sceptical , while the most respectable people are full y prepared to make affidavit on the subject . This conflict of affidavit and professional dictum has been going on for some generations . Scepticism alternately rules the public , and we seem to be precisely where we were when the mind was swayed alternately by faith or
disbelief in the stories of the Kraken . Two incidents , indeed , in the new experience will tend to set the public against even the enlightened dictum of Professor Owen . Not only does the story of the last appearance bear many marks of verisimilitude , but the witnesses belong to a fresh class , the highlyrespectable yacht-keeping class . And one would suppose that a man who could afford to keep a yacht must have an opinion on icthyological subjects worth attending to . Secondly , a veritable
piece of the monster has been found , at least where he was seen to rub himself against barrels , there , sticking to those barrels , was a piece of skin , and that skin the people of the yacht secured . It is on shore . It quite upsets Professor Owen ' s idea that the monster is a seal , for it is not the skin of a marine beast , but the scaly integument of a fish or serpent . The monster was moulting it would seem . The public feeling , therefore , would incline for the present to the existence of sea-serpents .
Perhaps the most remarkable incident of this long-continued controversy is the imperative necessity under which the pensive public seems to feel itself to come to some conclusion . It seems to be thought that the matter is too interesting to be left in suspense . Even learned Professors share in the necessity . The data are very imperfect , but they are so suggestive that the mind is eager to piece them out with assumptions ; and so , instead of stopping at the provisional conclusion that something has been seen in various places of a very impressive and not thoroughly comprehended aspect , the mind strives to snatch from tne future the final
conclusion that there is a sea-serpent frequenting the deep seas , and occasionally showing himself near Ireland or Norway ; or else the opposite conclusion , not only that there is no sea-serpent , but that such a creature is impossible to the Creator . Not long ago the sudden appearance of frogs rained from the atmosphere was esteemed a fable . The phenomenon is still chronicled as something wonderful , and we see it reported this week , even in the railway region of Greenwich and Woolwich . The fable of a former generation is becoming the com-
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A SHORT CROP BUT PLENTY OF FOOD . From a report of the state of the crops throughout the kingdom , which appears in the Gardener ' s Chronicle , we learn that a large portion of the wheat crop has been seriously injured ^ and that " a return much under the average will be the general experience in our principal wheat-growing districts . " Before the repeal of the corn-laws such an announcement would have filled the nation with alarm ; now , however , it makes little or no sensation . It will be seen from the following account of the American crop , as given by the New York Herald , that , should our own supplies fall short , there will be no difficulty in getting ten or twelve millions of quarters of grain from the United States : —•
" According to the accounts which are daily reaching us from the grain-growing districts of the United States , there can be no doubt that the yield for the year 1850 will be the most abundant that the country was ever blessed with , and that breadstuff ' s will be as cheap , if not cheaper , than they ever were . The west , the great granary of the country , is one vast storehouse of corn , wheat , and oats , while in the southern and eastern states the product will be far above that of past years . We have no means of ascertaining the yield of last year , but for 1848 , according to the report of the Commissioner of Patents at Washington , the quantity of whf at harvested was 126 , 364 , 600 bushels , and of Indian corn 583 , 150 , 000 bushels . It is acknowledged on all hands that a much
larger breadth of these cereals have been sown this year than ever , and this , together with the enormous yield , satisfies us that the wheat product this year will not fall much short of two hundred millions of bushels , and that of corn seven hundred millions of bushels . Estimating the population of the United States at twenty millions , this would give ten bushels of wheat , or two barrels of flour , to every individual—man , woman , and child—to say nothing of the corn , which is much more than is required for their consumption . Of course , however , there will be a large quantity exported , but not as much as in former years . Heretofore we have depended upon Great Britain for a market for a large portion of our surplus crops , but , according to recent accounts from them , the demand will not be near so great as it has been in past years ; although the harvest promised to be later than U 3 ual , there were no fears entertained of a short crop . In addition to that , the yield on the Continent promised to be abundant , and tnere was very little danger of damage to the potato in Ireland ocourring from the rot . The surplus , over and above what we will require for home consumption , and what will be probably exported , will , therefore , be unusually large this year , and must bring the price down to a very low figure—as low , perhaps , as we have ever seen it in the market . "
The Herald is mistaken in supposing that the demand from this country will not be so great as in former years . Although last year ' s harvest was very abundant , we have imported and consumed some eight to ten millions of quarters altogether during the last twelve months . If so much has been needed with an abundant harvest , what an enormous increase must we require with a deficient one !
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SOCIAL REFORM . EPISTOLJE OBSCURORUM VIRORUM . No . VI . — -The Land : its Slavery . To David Masson . September 5 , 1850 . My dear Masson , — Starting from the point indicated in mv last letter , and turning to the actual state of the People in this country , the one great fact stares us in the face—the People of England is kept off the land of England .
Do not say that it is revolutionary" and " antisocial" to give voice to such a fact : we must be in a very bad state indeed if a simple assertion on a matter of fact cannot be made , without its tending to overturn Government and society . If the assertion is false , it will merely crush itself against the rock of facts : and , if a true assertion cannot be
made , the fault lies amongst those who live so that they shrink from truth . In sticking by the truth alone is perennial safety ; and the first step towards knowing the truth is to be frank and open . The land of England is not for the People of England , but is reserved to a very small section of that People—the " landowners . " By the most preposterous "fiction of law" the owning of land
is said to be a " trust "; but " may not a man do what he likes with his own " ? The land of England belongs , not to its People , but to a section of its gentry and a few nondescripts ; and , if the People were to attempt to go upon it , the law would chastise the " trespass . " I am only stating facts . Now , what , excluded from free access to the face' of the planet on which it is born , is the condition of that People ? Do not say I am getting " abstract " : I am dealing simply with the great essentials of life among our fellow-creatures here within the four seas . What is the state of the
working classes ? You have seen the reports ^ m the Morning Chronicle—that admirable inquisition which originated with Henry Mayhew , and has done more to unsettle the thickset old prejudices on the subject than any one , labour . You will find , everywhere , with no exceptions , the working classes living in a constant strain of exertion ; with very few exceptions indeed , they are obliged to waste their whole days in labour , for necessaries
all too scanty ; even in the exceptional cases of enormously high wages the condition of the working classes , as compared with that of the middle class , which enjoys political power and commercial ^ consideration , is one of privation . I need not stop here , where I am only indicating broad truths and recalling facts already before you , to ^ describe the struggles of the artisan , the despairs of the hand-loom weaver , the faint , musty rag of life which remains to the needlewoman , the rude
existence of the labourer , the bondage of the domestic servant . Nor do I leave that subject here , as finally disposed of ; I will hereafter recur to the bondages of industry . Call it what you will , I only ask you to look at the actual state of the working classes , —look on the picture , and never mind the words , —and compare that state with what civilization has done for more fortunate classes . You will not answer that it is "the lot" of those less fortunate classes , for that begs the very question I am mooting—a question hitherto assumed in the affirmative . Is it their lot ?
Their hardships are aggravated by their being compelled to live in towns—away from the unaltered face of earth , away from the unpoisoned winds—forced to live in streets not constructed for their comfort , low , close , ill-built streetscrowded , badly ventilated , and worse drained . And even on the land , what is the fate of the People ? "hired" to cultivate their own mother earth , repaid like the hunting dog with scraps and offal of what their labour earns , struggling to keep above that slough of despond " the parish , " and
often struggling in vain : the actual tiller of the soil is half-starved , dejected , ignorant , stupid—a reproach and a slight . Is this misery of the People compensated b y the comfort of its less unfortunate section , the middle class ? I doubt it ; but this is a point I must deal with when I come to the subject of trade . I find the fact to be , however , that with the middle class life is a struggle against " sinking in the scale of society "—society being wisely built , it seems , on a steep , over a swamp , and perpetually in danger of subversion and destruction , unless every man of us
lends half his days to propping it up with makeshift devices ! A struggle solaced with homely luxury , but having little leisure for enjoyment , either of the natural pleasures or the arts of civilization . Scarcely a man is mature in this class ere he has seen through " the illusions of life "—which means that he has unlearned his instincts , and is resigned to settle down in unbroken dulness ; relieved perchance with half despairing , half-malignant conclusions touching this " vale of tears , " and the ultimate fate of those gayer beings who are not thus consigned to present gloom .
For there are those who are not doomed to that November existence . And who are they ? They are , chiefly , the small class not debarred from the land , and another small class whose labour belongs in some way to Art—a vagabond class , of whom I shall have to speak more by-and-bye . These classes are not wholly alienated from Nature or Art , and with all their troubles they are not doomed to abject hardship or homely dulness .
Is it that we live in a sterile and gloomy land ? Walk forth and look upon it—green in every part ; blessed with temperate airs ; clothed , even whera the plough goes not , with a natural agriculture . It is pleasant and fruitful . But it belongs not to the English , and they must not trespass upon it nor take its fruits , under pain of imprisonment and transportation . Even the starving must not turn to the earth on which they are born : no , the child
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monplaceofthis , and philosophers have made some progress in " accounting" forthephaenomenon . Who shall pronounce it impossible that the sea-serpent may not be a commonplace to our children ; may perhaps be tamed , or even domesticated—possibly taught to draw our great passenger-ships across the ocean ? It is to be hoped in such day that we shall have a Professor Owen to act as coachman , sitting like a civil Neptune on the prow , and waving his whip of seaweed over the prancing serpent .
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Sept . 7 , 1850 . ] ® t ) t UtabtX . 563
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Sept. 7, 1850, page 563, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1852/page/11/
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