WCP7100

[1] [p. 214]

I had a letter not long ago from a clergyman who had lived many years in the south, and he told me he had noticed the result continually, and he thought it was one which must be seen much more in the future than in the past, because as all young people got some sort of education in the school, although not a thorough education, they were so far educated that they could read the newspaper and see what was being done in other parts of the country and in other countries; and they, looking with a hopeless feeling at their position, emigrate therefore to the large towns, in the hope of bettering their condition, or they emigrate to foreign countries, and the result is that only the poorest labour is left behind, whilst it also becomes costlier and becomes more and more an increasing burden upon the farmer."

I have called attention, by italics, to a few passages in this weighty paragraph, because they show that up to this very day there is no tendency whatever to better the condition of the rural labourers; while they fully support my contention that the overcrowding of towns, with its inevitable accompaniments of misery, vice, and disease, is the direct product of "our landed system."