landlord not solely bent on screwing out the
highest interest for his investment.

Riverport is now a quiet village, and
semi-nude boatmen no longer run a-muck
through the one street, or fight pitched
battles in the churchyard. They smoke the
pipe of peace and drink mild ale without
defying the passers-by to mortal combat.
The squeak of the fiddle may be heard at the
Bargee's Rest in the evening; but at an
early hour every public "retires into the
privacy of its own domestic circle," as the
parish clerk sententiously informed us.

Do these material changes give unmixed
contentedness? Are the wives satisfied that
their husbands work longer hours, get more
wages, and drink less beer; that their children
are taught to read, and write, and to
wash their faces and hands; to sing hymns
and psalms, and reverently pray in church?
Well, not quite. From Roman Horace's time
to Sisty Caxton's there have always been
praisers of time past to be found.

An old woman of vinegar aspect and suspicious
alcoholic odour, complains grumblingly
of the new man; that there is no
life in the place now; and that the Hall
isn't what it used to be. "Why, I can remember
the time when my good man could go
and get as much dried wood out of the plantation
as he could carry, and no one said a
word, and now you mayn't take a stick. To be
sure, they give away coals, and flannel, and
meat to some; but they ask so many questions,
and want to know if the children go to
school, and those that won't don't get none,
except they're sick or so. Ah, those were
the days when we went Thomassin' and got
the best of ale, and beef, and clothes, every
one alike, an' no prying into what you did.
There was my poor son; just for nothing,
Squire Wagerman took and sent him across
the water, poor lamb. They false-swore him.
He never touched the pedlar's pack, I'm sure.
And though my lady comes in her carriage,
and brings me a few bits of things, I say
these are not like the old times."

Very likely there are plenty more in the
village of the same mind.

There are farmers, too, holding land under
Mr. Wagerman who grumble a good deal at
his tyranny, but do not seem inclined to
leave. On Riverport farms I find the reverse
of the Irish landlord system adopted.
The worse a man farms the higher his rent
is raised. One old fellow grumbles grievously
because his land has been drained
against his will, with that of his neighbours,
and because he was charged four pounds per
cent. interest for the operation. He confesses
that he can feed sheep all the winter where
they all rotted before; but still he does not
hold with draining, nor like paying, nor like
leaving either. He complains, too, that he
is never left alone. His buildings were all
tumbling about his ears, or rather his cattle's
ears, and now nothing will serve the squire
but a complete new set and a water-wheel
to work a threshing machine: and he'll have
to pay for that, though father used flails,
and his father afore him. The young men
accommodate themselves better, and it is
plain to see that the force of example is
ploughing in many mental seeds, grubbing up
narrow mental boundaries.

But, next to the change in the village, the
greatest change is in the labouring men.

"When Mr. Wagerman first settled here,"
said my friend and guide, "piecework was
unknown in the parish, but he seemed determined
to make the men earn their wages or
leave the parish, and as it nearly all belonged
to him, he had a fair chance. The first fight
was when the ploughmen refused to use a
pair-horse iron plough. That was settled, by
the parish ploughmen being discharged, and
others sent for from counties where crawling
with a long team and an idle boy is unknown.
The ploughmen soon gave in. Then came
hay-making time. The new squire set a
hay-making machine to work; first the hay-makers
broke it—that wouldn't do. The
squire's blacksmith, a capital mechanic, imported
from railway works, set it to rights.
Then they struck in a body; but that did not
help them far: there was the machine, and by
collecting all his gardeners off and grooms,
and giving a hand himself, the hay was got
in in good order. The ignorant people
who struck against machinery, although the
squire employed a hundred times more men
than any previous squire of Buckleigh Park,
at first found work in summer tramping
about. In winter they were obliged to
return home. There was grubbing up hedges,
draining, and other improvement work to be
done. Mr. Wagerman offered it by the piece.
They struck again. They would not work by
the piece: no, they would go on the parish
first. A servant sent on horseback with a
message to the telegraph soon settled that
business. Four-and-twenty hours brought a
supply of labourers very happy to work piece
work. At a week's end the parish labourers
out of work applied for parish relief, but they
were not to be so indulged. The new squire
met threats of Swing fires with his insurances:
undertook the reclaiming of a piece of waste,
then recently enclosed, with spade labour.
The trenching was offered at a price sufficient
for a good man to earn three shillings a-day.
All able-bodied men were referred to the
spade-work on the common, and parish relief
refused. Some worked and did well, some
took employment with neighbouring parishes,
some left the district; all worth having came
to the squire's terms and conditions, and
earned more money than ever they had
earned in their lives.

"With a steam-engine going, instead of the
flail, with his smart-stepping horses in the
plough, with drills, clod-crushers, and
scarifiers to look after, men could not crawl
through their work, nor remain stupid, if they