WCP590

[1]

[in ARW’s hand] Ansd 8 Jan 1913

"Whitworth"

Padstow

N. Cornwall

Dear Dr. Wallace,

May I add my word of hearty congratulation to the hundreds you will have received this week? although it is long since I saw you or wrote, you will not have forgotten me altogether, I know. I sincerely hope that you may have health & strength for many years yet, & be able both to enjoy life and to continue your work of spurring on the younger generation to all sorts of Reform.

I will only say a word about myself but that word I should like to say. Soon after I last saw you I had a lot of trouble—which seemed as if it would never end—with relatives & so on which absorbed all my energies. But At last I rather broke down in health;

[2] 2 ^{resigned my living,} went abroad for a year & then settled down to a simple life here, on this splendid N. Cornwall coast; having bought a small piece of land & built myself a sort of "Bungalow House." Here, with my wife, I cultivate my garden, live an a vegetarian diet & seem to be renewing my youth. Finding my health quite restored, better indeed than it has been for many years, I have buckled on my armour & had a tilt at the landlords of Padstow. I daresay you saw some articles in "The Daily News & L [Leader]", early in Sep. last on the condition of Padstow in the matter of House accommodation. I started that by getting Mr. Harold Spender over to inspect, & ^to write the first article. I am following the [3] 3 thing up & hope to get something done but the people are so darn afraid of being evicted if they say or do anything to offend the local "Powers that Be” that I have to move with caution. I hardly dare enter a poor man’s house in Padstow now, for his sake!

What do you think of this case? The District nurse attended a woman in her confinement last month. The family consisted of husband, wife and five children, ages 7 downwards—They had one bedroom between them. The night of the confinement three children slept together in a small bed in the same room with the woman; the 2 elder boys slept on chairs by the kitchen fire & the father, who was suffering from pleurisy, slept on the kitchen table! Next day the [4] 4 nurse found the man, much worse, in the small bed in the wife’s room & the children—well, I don’t know what became of them. The place is frightfully overcrowded, while all around fields, not a quarter cultivated, stretch for miles & miles; good land too, which would support & afford room & work for hundreds of families. Here & there a farm house; more rarely still a cottage—that is all — yes! we need more unrest & turmoil; lots more; more agitation & discontent.

I too rejoiced in the Railway strike — & even more in the recent "Knot" Strike. I thought that, fine “our comrade is wronged; leaders or no leaders, Union or no Union, — Down Tools till he’s righted"

[5] 5 I felt proud of those men. So long as we have thousands of men who will spontaneously & at once, face the risk of starvation in defence of a comrade who they think has been wronged there is not much to fear. I wish the poor down-trodden, dispirited labourers in the agricultural districts had a little of that spirit.

But now I must not take up more of your time. Pray forgive my long silence. I have felt I had not much to say that would be of any interest to you, until lately, & that you had plenty to do without having to read letters of no interest. However, now, I feel you will be interested in hearing of what is going on down here & of what we (my wife keener then I!) are trying to do: so I hope you will not find this letter the “last straw” among the piles you will receive: And with (once more) heartiest congratulations & best wishes.

I remain yours sincerely | Arnold D. Taylor.¹ [signature]

We² are in a radical conspiracy which is not well represented by its member: Agar Robartes,³ son of Lord Clifden; a whiggish young man. It is possible we may try a labour man next time.

[6]

[in ARW’s hand] Rev^d. Arnold Taylor Padstow