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than ever necessary when most of our roads are rendered dangerous by motor-cars and cycles, and exceedingly disagreeeble and unhealthy to pedestrians by the clouds of gritty dust continually raised by these vehicles.

Returning now to the question of the rights of the people at large to a share in their native land, I would further point out that the inclosure of commons is only one of many acts of robbery that have been perpetrated by or for the landlords. If we go back no further than the reign of Henry VIII. we have the whole vast properties of the abbeys and monasteries confiscated by the king, and mostly given away to personal friends or powerful nobles, without any regard whatever to the rights of the poor. Most of these institutions took the place of our colleges, schools, and workhouses. The poor were relieved by them, and they served as a refuge for the wanderer and the fugitive. No provision was made for the fulfilment of these duties by the new owners, and the poor and needy were thus plundered and oppressed. Under the same king and his successors all the accumulated wealth of the parish churches, in gold and silver vessels, in costly vestments often adorned with jewels, in paintings by great masters, and in illuminated missals which were often priceless works of art, were systematically plundered, court favourites obtaining orders to sequestrate all such "popish ornaments," in a certain number of cases keeping the produce for themselves, while in others they were sold for the king's benefit. The property thus stolen the Rev. A. Jessopp estimates to have been many times greater than the value of all the abbeys and monasteries of the kingdom!

If we consider the nature of this long series of acts of plunder of the people's land and other property, we find in it every circumstance tending to aggravate the crime. It was robbery of the poor by the rich. It was robbery of the weak and helpless by the strong. And it had this worst feature that distinguishes robbery from mere confiscation--the plunder was divided among the robbers themselves. Yet again, it was a form of robbery specially forbidden by the religion of the robbers-a religion for which they professed the deepest

reverence and of which they considered themselves the special defenders. They read in what they called The Word of God, "Woe unto them that join house to house, that lay field to field, till there be no place, that they may be placed alone in the midst of the earth!" Yet this is what they were, and are, constantly striving for, not by purchase only, but by open or secret robbery. Again, they read in their holy book, "The land shall not be sold for ever: for the land is Mine;" and at every fiftieth year all land was to return to the family that had sold it, so that no one could keep land beyond the year of jubilee, the reason being that no man or family should be permanently impoverished by the misdeeds of his ancestors. But this part of the law they never obey.

This all-embracing system of land-robbery, for which nothing is too great and nothing too small; which has absorbed meadow and forest, moor and mountain, which has appropriated most of our rivers and lakes and the fish that live in them; which often claims the very seashore and rocky coasts of our island home, fencing them off from the wayfarer who seeks the solace of their health-giving air and wild beauty, while making the peasant pay for his seaweed manure and the fisherman for his bait of shell-fish; which has desolated whole counties to replace men by sheep or cattle, and has destroyed fields and cottages to make a wilderness for deer and grouse; which has stolen the commons and filched the roadside wastes; which has driven the labouring poor into the cities, and has thus been the primary and chief cause of the lifelong misery, disease, and early death of thousands who might have lived lives of honest toil and comparative well-being had they been permitted free access to land in their native villages ;-it is the advocates and beneficiaries of this inhuman system who, when a partial restitution of their unholy gains is proposed, are the loudest in their cries of "robbery"!

But all the robbery, all the spoliation, all the legal and illegal filching, has been on their side, and they still hold the stolen property. They made laws to legalize their actions, and, some day, we, the people, will make laws which will not

only legalize but justify our process of restitution. It will justify it, because, unlike their laws, which always took from the poor to give to the rich-to the very class which made the laws ours will only take from the superfluity of the rich, not to give to the poor or to any individuals, but to so administer as to enable every man to live by honest work, to restore to the whole people their birthright in their native soil, and to relieve all alike from a heavy burden of unnecessary and unjust taxation. This will be the true statesmanship of the future, and it will be justified alike by equity, by ethics, and by religion.

In the few preceding pages I have expressed the opinions which have been gradually formed as the result of the experience and study of my whole life. My first work on the subject was entitled "Land Nationalization: its Necessity and its Aims," and was published in the year 1882; and this, together with the various essays in the second volume of my "Studies Scientific and Social," published in 1900, may be taken as expressing the views I now hold, and as pointing out some of the fundamental conditions which I believe to be essential for the well-being of society.

But at the time of which I am now writing such ideas never entered my head. I certainly thought it a pity to enclose a wild, picturesque, boggy, and barren moor, but I took it for granted that there was some right and reason in it, instead of being, as it certainly was, both unjust, unwise, and cruel. But the surveying was interesting work, as every trickling stream, every tree, every mass of rock or boggy waterhole, had to be marked on the map in its true relative position, as well as the various footpaths or rough cart-roads that crossed the common in various directions.

At that time the medicinal springs, though they had been used from the time of the Romans, were only visited by a few Welsh or West of England people, and there was little accommodation for visitors, except in the small hotel where we lodged. One of our great luxuries here was the Welsh mutton fed on the neighbouring mountains, so small that a

hind-quarter weighed only seven or eight pounds, but which, when hung a few days or a week, was most delicious eating. I agree with George Borrow in his praise of this dish. In his "Wild Wales" he says, "As for the leg of mutton it was truly wonderful; nothing so good had I ever tasted in the shape of a leg of mutton. The leg of mutton of Wales beats the leg of mutton of any other country, and I had never tasted a Welsh leg of mutton before. Certainly I shall never forget that first Welsh leg of mutton which I tasted, rich but delicate, replete with juices derived from the aromatic herbs of the noble Berwyn mountain, cooked to a turn, and weighing just four pounds.' Well done, George Borrow! You had a good taste in ale and mutton, and were not afraid to acknowledge it.

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CHAPTER XI

BRECKNOCKSHIRE

IT was in the summer or early autumn of 1841 that we left Kington for the survey of a parish a few miles beyond the town of Brecon. As there was no coach communication, and the distance was only about thirty miles, we determined to walk, and having sent our luggage by coach or waggon, we started about sunrise, and after two hours' walking stopped at a nice-looking roadside public-house for breakfast. Our meal consisted of a large basin cf bread-and-milk with half a pint of good ale in it, and sugar to taste, which had been recommended to my brother as the best thing to walk on. I certainly enjoyed it very much. We then walked on through the little town of Hay, and soon after midday had dinner at a village inn and a good rest, as the day was very hot and the roads hilly. In the afternoon I became very tired, and while we were still some miles from Brecon, I felt quite exhausted with the heat and fatigue. At length I became so faint that I had to lie down in the road to prevent myself from losing consciousness and falling down. However, with the aid of repeated rests I struggled on, and we reached Brecon when it was nearly dark.

The next morning I felt all right again, and as we started for our destination, I was delighted with the grand view of the double-headed Beacons, the highest mountain in South Wales, which, though five miles away, seem to rise up abruptly into the clouds as viewed down the street by which we entered the town. On leaving the town we crossed a bridge over the

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