Cassell's History of England, Vol. 3 (of 8) / From the Great Rebellion to the Fall of Marlborough.

by Anonymous

But we shall soon find that this conclusion is, on the whole, too sweeping. Even that age had its philanthropists, and we may name the crowds who flocked to witness the agonies of a hanging man to point in some degree the wide distance between the mobs of this age and that. But, as concerns the condition of the people, the important difference is that the humanity which now pervades the community was scarcely to be recognised then. The poor were treated with little tenderness. Though four-fifths of the working people were engaged in agriculture, agriculture was then extended over a very small portion of the country. There was a surplus of hands, and these, therefore, were poorly paid, whilst their clothing and provisions were comparatively high. Not more than half the area of the island was then, it is supposed, in cultivation, and the tillage was rude and slovenly. The rate of wages for agricultural labourers, wood-cutters, shepherds, and the like, differed in different parts of England, but in the best it did not average more than four shillings a week with food, or six shillings without. In 1661, the magistrates of Essex fixed the rate of wages from March to September at eightpence a day with food, and one shilling and twopence without; and for the other months, sixpence with food, and a shilling without. Women had, of course, less. In most counties a similar scale was fixed by the magistrates; and an Act of Elizabeth empowered them to punish whoever gave more or less, and the labourer who received more or less. Wheat at that time was seventy shillings a quarter—a price enormously in excess of current prices. All kinds of clothing that they could make themselves were much higher than with us, because manufacturing was not so extensive.

The wages of artisans were but little better, except in London, where first-rate bricklayers and carpenters could earn two shillings or two-and-sixpence a day. In many counties, indeed, they were restricted to the same rate as that of the labourers. In 1685 this was the case in Warwickshire, where the daily wages of masons, bricklayers, carpenters, shinglers, and other handicraftsmen, were fixed with those of ploughmen, miners, ditchers, etc., at only sixpence a day. A shilling a day is quoted as extravagant wages. The consequence was that children were compelled to work as early as six years of age. This was very much the case at Norwich; and writers of the time refer with pride to the fact that before nine years of age children earned more than was necessary for their own support by twelve thousand pounds a year! The consequence of the miserable pay and the dearness of food and clothing was an amount of pauperism scarcely less than in the reign of Henry VIII. or Elizabeth. The poor rates amounted at that period to from seven to nine hundred thousand pounds a year.

The condition of the poor was rendered infinitely worse two years after the restoration of Charles II. than it had been, by an Act which was passed to prevent them from settling in any other place than the one where they had previously resided. This was the origin of the law of settlement, which continued down to 1834 to harass the poor, and to waste the parochial funds in litigation. In fact, Sir Frederick Eden, in his work on "The State of the Poor," asserts that it caused more litigation, and was more profitable to the lawyers, than any other Act ever passed.

The preamble of the Act of 1662 recounts the prevalence of pauperism, and at the same time professes that this enactment "is for the good of the poor"! "The necessity," it says, "number, and continued increase of the poor, not only within the circles of London and Westminster, with the liberties of each of them, but also through the whole kingdom of England and dominion of Wales, is very great and exceeding burdensome, being occasioned by reason of some defects in the law concerning the settlement of the poor, and for want of due provision of the regulations of relief and employment in such parishes or places where they are legally settled, which doth enforce many to turn incorrigible rogues, and others to perish for want, together with the neglect of the faithful execution of such laws and statutes as have formerly been made for the apprehension of rogues and vagabonds, and for the good of the poor."

It was therefore provided that any two justices of the peace should, on complaint made by the churchwardens and overseers of the poor, within forty days after the arrival of any new comer in the parish, proceed to remove him by force to the parish where he had last a legal settlement, either as native, householder, sojourner, apprentice or servant, unless he either rented a house of ten pounds a year, or could give such security against becoming chargeable as the judges should deem sufficient. This was made more stringent by a subsequent Act, 1 James II. c. 17, which, to prevent any one from getting a settlement by the neglect or oversight of the parish authorities, dated the day of his entrance into the parish only from the time that he gave a written notice of his new abode and the number of his family.

These enactments, in fact, converted the free labourers of England into serfs. They were bound to the soil, and could not move from the spot unless by the will of the overseers and justices. It was not necessary that a man should become chargeable to the parish in order to effect his removal; it was enough that the authorities could assume that he might become so; and it was not till 1795—in fact, till the reign of George III.—that this oppressive law was ameliorated, allowing working people to change their abode as they saw a better chance of employment elsewhere, so long as they did not come upon the parish.

The unsatisfactory state of pauperism to which the law of settlement brought the kingdom set numbers of heads at work to plan schemes of employing the destitute poor; and Sir Josiah Child proposed that persons should be appointed for this purpose, to be called "the fathers of the poor." This seems to be the origin of the modern guardians of the poor. It was too early in the history of endeavour to educate and employ the poor, for these recommendations to receive much general attention; but there were some individuals who set themselves zealously to work to convert the swarming paupers into profitable workers and respectable members of society. The most eminent of these were two shopkeepers of London, Andrew Yarranton and Thomas Firmin. Yarranton was a linendraper; and, being employed by "twelve gentlemen of England" to bring over men from Saxony and Bohemia who understood the art of tinning sheet-iron, he there made close observation of the manufacture of linen, and conceived the idea of introducing the linen manufacture, and employing the unemployed poor upon it and the manufacture of iron. He went to Ipswich, to see whether the linen manufacture could not be established there; but he found the poor already so well employed in the stuff and say and Colchester trade, that he did not think it a suitable place. He calculated the paupers at that time at a hundred thousand, and reckoned that by employing this number at fourpence a day each would occasion a profitable outlay amongst them of upwards of six hundred thousand pounds, by which means almost the whole of the poor-rates would be saved. In 1677 he published a book containing his views called "England's Improvement by Sea and Land," showing how to set at work all the poor of England, with the growth of our own lands; to prevent unnecessary suits at law, with the benefits of a voluntary register; where to procure vast quantities of timber for the building of ships, with the advantage of making the great rivers of England navigable. He gave rules for the prevention of fires in London and other cities, and informed the several companies of handicraftsmen how they might always have cheap bread and drink. In short, Mr. Yarranton was a regularly speculative man, but one who had a good share of calculating common sense in the midst of his manufacturing and philanthropic schemes. Apparently he travelled the kingdom well, and made careful observations as to the best localities for carrying on his proposed trades; and he seems to have come to the conclusion that the midland counties would be the best for the linen manufacture, and that most people might be employed on it. The midland counties he regarded as admirably adapted for the growth of flax, from the fertility of the land, and for the trade, because of the easy conveyance of goods by water on the rivers Trent, Soar, Avon, and Thames, from the counties of Nottingham, Leicester, Warwick, Northampton, and Oxford. He found many parts of England already so well supplied with manufactures, that he did not think the poor required more work there; and his descriptions of the manufactures going on in different parts of the island give a lively view of the manufacturing industry of the time. "In the West of England," he says, "clothing of all sorts, as in Gloucestershire, Worcestershire, Shropshire, Staffordshire, and a small portion of Warwickshire; in Derby, Nottingham, and Yorkshire, the iron and woollen manufactures; in Suffolk, Norfolk, and Essex, the woollen manufacture; in Kent, Sussex, and Surrey, some cloth, iron, and materials for shipping. Then the counties to raise provisions and to vend them at London, to feed that great mouth, are Cambridge, Huntingdon, Buckingham, Hertford, Middlesex, and Berks."

A publication like this of Andrew Yarranton was calculated to produce the most beneficial change in the condition of the people. It pointed out the true resources and wealth of the nation, and showed a way to get rid of pauperism, and at the same time to raise and enrich the whole realm. It made landowners aware of the extent to which their estates would be augmented in value by the introduction of popular industries; and one of its most immediate effects seems to have been its influence on Yarranton's fellow London shopkeeper, Mr. Thomas Firmin.

In "The Life of Mr. Thomas Firmin, late citizen of London, written by one of his most intimate acquaintance," 1698, we learn that he was a shopkeeper of Leadenhall Street. We learn, moreover, that he was born at Ipswich in 1632, and began the world as a tradesman with a hundred pounds. His character for probity and ability was already such that he flourished, married a citizen's daughter with five hundred pounds, and in process of time occupied superior premises in Lombard Street. Here, though a confirmed Unitarian, and entertaining the celebrated Unitarian leader, Mr. Biddle, and procuring him an allowance of one hundred crowns from Cromwell whilst he was kept prisoner in Scilly, yet he was on intimate terms with Dr. Tillotson, and many other eminent Churchmen. Though not bearing on our main subject, the following extract is worth diffusing amongst the religious of to-day:—"During the imprisonment of Mr. Biddle at Scilly, Mr. Firmin was settled in Lombard Street, where first Mr. Jacomb, then Dr. Outram, was minister. With these two, being excellent preachers and learned men, he maintained a respectful and kind friendship. Now also he grew into intimacy with Dr. Whichcot, Dr. Worthington, Dr. Wilkins, afterwards Bishop of Chester; Mr. Tillotson (for he was not yet doctor), Archbishop of Canterbury; but in their dignity, and to their very last, Mr. Firmin had the same place and degree in their friendship and esteem that at any time formerly he had. While Dr. Tillotson preached the Tuesday's lecture at St. Lawrence, so much frequented by all the divines of the town, and by a great many persons of quality and distinction, when the doctor was obliged to be at Canterbury, where he was dean, or was out of town, either for diversion or health, he generally left it to Mr. Firmin to provide preachers for his lecture; and Mr. Firmin never failed to supply his place with some very eminent preacher, so that there never was a complaint on the account of Dr. Tillotson's absence; and this Mr. Firmin could easily do, for now there was hardly a divine of note, whether in London or in the country, that frequented London, but Mr. Firmin was become acquainted with him; which thing helped him much to serve the interests of many hopeful young preachers and scholars, candidates for lectures, schools, cures, or rectories, for whom he would solicit with as much affection and diligence as other men do for their sons or other near relations. See here a trader, who knew no Latin or Greek, no logic or philosophy, compassed about by an incredible number of learned friends who differed so widely in opinion from him."

The secret of it was Firmin's freedom from bigotry, and his perfectly benevolent character. When the Plague broke out in 1665, which carried off nearly a hundred thousand people, and left vast numbers destitute from the flight of the employers, Firmin seized on the plan of manufacturing linen, so earnestly recommended by Yarranton, and this upon a method first set on foot by Thomas Gouge, the clergyman of St. Sepulchre's. This was to buy up both flax and hemp rudely dressed, and give it out to the poor to spin at their own homes. He built a house in Aldersgate, which he called his great work-house, or spinning-house, and there he gave out the flax and hemp, and took in the yarn. The object of Firmin was not to make money by the speculation, but to allow the poor people all the profit; and, indeed, he allowed them more, for he sank a considerable sum of money in it. But he was fast growing rich, and he was too wise to allow himself to become the slave of riches; and though from six hundred pounds his capital had grown to twenty thousand pounds, he determined not to leave more than five thousand pounds behind him. His object was to employ the people instead of giving them money as a charity; and he observed that he found it greatly to the relief of the poor; for that they could earn threepence or fourpence a day, working only such times as they could spare from any other occupations, "who, being at work in their own homes, and where they could with convenience attend it, many of them became so much pleased with it, that so much money given them for doing nothing would not have done them half so much good as that which they got by their own labour in this employment."