right, it implies that inequality of opportunity is right, and that "the law of social justice" as laid down by Herbert Spencer is not a just law. It implies that it is right for one set of individuals, thousands or millions in number, to be able to pass their whole lives without contributing anything to the well-being of the community of which they form a part, but on the contrary keeping hundreds, or perhaps thousands, of their fellow men and women wholly engaged in ministering to their wants, their luxuries, and their amusements. Taken as a whole, the people who thus live are no better in their nature-physical, moral, or intellectual-than other thousands who, having received no such inheritance of accumulated wealth, spend their whole lives in labour, often under exhausting, unhealthful, and life-shortening conditions, to produce the luxuries and enjoyments of others, but of which they themselves rarely or more often never partake. Even leaving out of consideration the absolute vices due to wealth on the one hand and to poverty on the other, and supposing both classes to pass fairly moral lives, who can doubt that both are injured morally, and that both are actually, though often unconsciously, the causes of ever-widening spheres of demoralization around them? If there is one set of people who are tempted by their necessities to prey upon the rich, there is a perhaps more extensive class who are in the same way driven to prey upon the poor. And it is the very system that produces and encourages these terrible inequalities that has also led to the almost incredible result, that the ever-increasing power of man over the forces of nature, especially during the last hundred years, while rendering easily possible the production of all the necessaries, comforts, enjoyments, and wholesome luxuries of life for every individual, have yet, as John Stuart Mill declared, "not diminished the toil of any worker," but even, as there is ample evidence to prove, has greatly increased the total mass of human misery and want in every civilized country in the world.

And yet our rulers and our teachers-the legislature, the press, and the pulpit alike-shut their eyes to all this terrible

demoralization in our midst, while devoting all their energies to increasing our already superfluous and injurious wealthaccumulations, and in compelling other peoples, against their will, to submit to our ignorant and often disastrous rule. As the great Russian teacher has well said, "They will do anything rather than get off the people's backs." And we, who adopt the principles of those great thinkers whom all delight to honour-Ruskin and Spencer-and urge the adoption of "equality of opportunity "—of equal education, equal nurture, an equal start in life-for all (implying the abolition of all inequality of inheritance) as the one Great Reform which will alone render all other reforms-all general social advance -possible, are either quietly ignored as idle dreamers, or openly declared to be "enemies of society."

These few remarks and ideas have been suggested to me by the life and death of Jack Mytton, and I trust that some of my readers may follow them up for the good of humanity.

CHAPTER XIII

GLAMORGANSHIRE: NEATH

IT was late in the autumn of 1841 that we finally bade adieu to Kington and the wild but not very picturesque Radnorshire mountains for the more varied and interesting country of Glamorgan. I have no distinct recollection of our journey, but I believe it was by coach through Hay and Brecon to Merthyr Tydvil, and thence by chaise to Neath. One solitary example of the rhyming letters I used to write has been preserved, giving my younger brother Herbert an account of our journey, of the country, and of our work, of which, though very poor doggerel, a sample may be given. After a few references to family matters, I proceed to description.

"From Kington to this place we came
By many a spot of ancient fame,

But now of small renown,

O'er many a mountain dark and drear,
And vales whose groves the parting year
Had tinged with mellow brown;

And as the morning sun arose

New beauties round us to disclose,

We reached fair Brecon town;

Then crossed the Usk, my native stream,

A river clear and bright,

Which showed a fair and much-lov'd scene
Unto my lingering sight."

We had to go to Glamorganshire to partially survey and make a corrected map of the parish of Cadoxton-juxtaNeath, which occupies the whole northern side of the Neath valley from opposite the town of Neath to the boundary of the county at Pont-Nedd-Fychan, a distance of nearly fifteen

miles, with a width varying from two to three miles, the boundary running for the most part along the crest of the mountains that bound the valley on the northwest. We lodged and boarded at a farmhouse called Bryn-coch (Red Hill), situated on a rising ground about two miles north of the town. The farmer, David Rees, a rather rough, stout Welshman, was also bailiff of the Duffryn estate. His wife could not speak a word of English, but his two daughters spoke it very well, with the pretty rather formal style of those who have first learnt it at school. Here we stayed more than a year, living plainly but very well, and enjoying the luxuries of home-made bread, fresh butter and eggs, unlimited milk and cream, with cheese made from a mixture of cow's and sheep's milk, having a special flavour, which I soon got very fond of. In this part of Wales it is the custom to milk the ewes chiefly for the purpose of making this cheese, which is very much esteemed. Another delicacy we first became acquainted with here was the true Welsh flummery, called here "sucan blawd" (steeped meal), in other places "Llumruwd" (sour sediment), whence our English word flummery." It is formed of the husks of the oatmeal roughly sifted out, soaked in water till it becomes sour, then strained and boiled, when it forms a pale brown sub-gelatinous mass, usually eaten with abundance of new milk. It is a very delicious and very nourishing food, and frequently forms the supper in farmhouses. Most people get very fond of it, and there is no dish known to English cookery that is at all like it; but I believe the Scotch sowens is a similar or identical preparation. This dish, with thin oatmeal cakes, home-made cheese, bacon, and sometimes hung beef, with potatoes and greens, and abundance of good milk, form the usual diet of the Welsh peasantry, and is certainly a very wholesome and nourishing combination. We, however, had also two other kinds of bread, both excellent, especially when made from new wheat. One was the ordinary huge loaves of farmhouse bread, the other what was called backstone bread-large flat cakes about a foot in diameter and an inch thick, baked over the fire on a large circular iron plate

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(formerly on a stone or slate, hence the name "bakestone or "backstone"). This is excellent, either split open and buttered when hot, or the next day cut edgeways into slices of bread-and-butter, a delicacy fit for any lady's afternoon tea.

A little rocky stream bordered by trees and bushes ran through the farm, and was one of my favourite haunts. There was one little sequestered pool about twenty feet long into which the water fell over a ledge about a foot high. This pool was seven or eight feet deep, but shallowed at the further end, and thus formed a delightful bathing-place. Ever since my early escape from drowning at Hertford, I had been rather shy of the water, and had not learned to swim; but here the distance was so short that I determined to try, and soon got to enjoy it so much that every fine warm day I used to go and plunge head first off my ledge and swim in five or six strokes to the shallow water. In this very limited sphere of action I gained some amount of confidence in the water, and afterwards should probably have been able to swim a dozen or twenty yards, so as to reach the bank of a moderate-sized river, or sustain myself till some neighbouring boat came to my assistance. But I have never needed even this moderate amount of effort to save my life, and have never had either the opportunity or inclination to become a practised swimmer. This was partly due to a physical deficiency which I was unable to overcome. My legs are unusually long for my height, and the bones are unusually large. The result is that they persistently sink in the water, bringing me into a nearly vertical position, and their weight renders it almost impossible to keep my mouth above water. This is the case even in salt water, and being also rather deficient in strength of muscle, I became disinclined to practise what I felt to be beyond my powers.

The parish being so extensive we had to stay at many different points for convenience of the survey, and one of these was about five miles up the Dulais valley, where we stayed at a small beershop in the hamlet of Crynant. I was often here alone for weeks together, and saw a good deal of