“Begging your pardon, my dear, that is a more foolish remark than I should have expected from you. When we reason upon subjects of this kind, it is not our business to take the part of one class against another, but to discover what is for the general good; which is, in the long-run, the same as the good of individuals. We are not now taking the part of the large farmers against the small (though Mr. Malton is riding beside us), nor of the small against the large (though we are full of pity for poor Norton); but the question is, how the most regular and plentiful supply of food can be brought to market? If it be clear that this is done by cultivation on an extensive scale, we ought not to wish for the continuance of small landed properties, but rather that their owners may apply their labour and capital where they will meet with a better return. We are all sorry for the little farmers, and nobody more so than Mr. Malton; but the more clearly we see that they suffer through a mistake, the more anxious we must be that the mistake should be rectified.”
“I am sure,” said Mr. Malton, “it gives me great concern to see a man like Norton growing poorer and poorer every year; but I know that it is partly his own fault, because he must see that his mode of tillage can never answer. If I had his lot now in my own hands, I would serve him, not by doing anything to his two fields, but by employing him on good wages. In the one case the help I should give would be all at an end in a year or two; in the other, he would soon be in possession of the comforts of life, and might lay by a provision for his old age; while, at the same time, he would be serving me and society at large by giving up his land to be made more productive.”
“I am aware,” said I, “that an industrious labourer is a benefactor to society.”
“And what more honourable title need a man desire?” exclaimed my father. “Is it not better to deserve this title, and to possess the comforts of life, than to starve on the empty name of a landed proprietor?”
“But is it not a hard thing,” I persisted, “for a man who is born to a few acres to give them up? I do not pretend to justify Norton’s ambition. He might have been content as he was; but it must cost a man a severe struggle to part with his fifty or hundred acres when his fathers tilled them before him.”
“I have no doubt of it, my dear. Such a man should consider what his plan of life is to be. If he has only himself to care for, and a little capital in his pocket, let him remain upon his land, keep it up, and improve it by the saving of his returns if he can. If he has not capital to do this, his duty to the public requires that he should not let his property degenerate. If he has a family to provide for, it becomes his duty to do his best for them—even at the expense of his pride, if need be.”
“His pride should be,” said Mr. Malton, “to maintain his children in decency and comfort; this is a pride worth having.”
“After all,” said my father, “it is not so much that a man loses his rank in these days by becoming a labourer, as that the employment of a labourer has become more honourable than formerly.”
“There is one question more,” said I, “that I want to ask; and it is, why there should be a scarcity in a bad season, even if all our farms were small? If, in other countries, there is more corn grown than is wanted, why should not we supply ourselves from them? Would not it be a mutual advantage?”
My father smiled as he replied,