The Man Farthest Down: A Record of Observation and Study in Europe

by Booker T. Washington; Robert Ezra Park

There is certainly no more beautiful country to look upon than rural England. Flowering vines cover the humble cottage of the farm labourer as well as the luxurious country seats of the landowners, and lend a charm to everything the eye rests upon. I was all the more impressed with the blooming freshness of the country because I had come out of the stifling life of the crowded city. I learned, however, that rural England has for a long time past been steadily losing its population. From 1891 to 1900 it is said that the number of farm labourers in England decreased 20 per cent., and it has been estimated that the rural population of England and Wales has diminished something like 30 or 40 per cent. during the past century, at a time when the urban population has multiplied itself many times over.

There are, of course, many reasons for this decrease in the agricultural population. One is, that at the present time not more than 15 per cent. of the land in England is farmed by the people who own it. Thirty-eight thousand landowners hold four fifths of all the agricultural land in England.

A few days after my visit to Sir Fowell Buxton at Waltham Abbey I went into northern Scotland to visit Mr. Andrew Carnegie at Skibo Castle. While I was there I had opportunity to get some sort of acquaintance with farming conditions in that part of the world.

In Scotland the opportunities for the small farmer to obtain land are even less than they are in England. Some years ago, it is said, twenty-four persons in Scotland owned estates of more than 100,000 acres. The Duke of Sutherland owns a tract stretching, I was told, clear across Scotland from coast to coast.

In no country in the world is so small a portion of the population engaged in agriculture as is true in England. For instance, 68 per cent. of the population of Hungary, 59 per cent. of the population of Italy, 48 per cent. of the population of Denmark, 37.5 per cent. of the population of the United States are engaged in agriculture. In England and in Wales in 1901 only 8 per cent. were engaged in agriculture.

Not only is it true that a larger proportion of the population of England than of other countries has removed from the country to the city, but in England, also, the distance between the man in the city and the man on the soil is greater than elsewhere. For example, in Italy the distinction between the agricultural labourer and the labourer in the city may be said hardly to exist; the man who, at one part of the year, finds work in the city, is very likely to be found at work at some other time of the year in the country.

In Germany also I noticed that a great many of the manufacturing plants were located in the country, where the factory labourer had an opportunity to cultivate a small patch of land. To the extent that he has been able to raise his own food, the factory hand in Germany has made himself independent of the manufacturers and the market.

In Hungary I was told that in harvest time the public works were deserted and many of the factories were compelled to shut down, because every one went away to the country to work in the fields.

Now, the thing that interested me in observing the vast dislocation of the rural population of England, represented by this vast labouring community of East London, was the extent to which the English labourer, in moving from the country to the city, had lost his natural independence.

In losing his hold upon the soil the English labourer has made himself peculiarly dependent upon the organization of the society about him. He can, for instance, neither build his own home nor raise his own food. In the city he must pay a much larger rent than it would be necessary for him to pay in the country. He must work more steadily in order to live, and he has to depend upon some one else to give him the opportunity to work. In this respect, although the English labourer is probably better paid and better fed than any other labourer in Europe, he is less protected from the effects of competition. He is more likely to suffer from the lack of opportunity to work.