Is coming forth; why's this delay?
O let not Dutch, Danes, Devils stop those
Votes[662]."
The work of the Corporation of the Poor continued, but it never seems to have been great or to have grappled seriously even with the London poor. In the rest of the country there was probably the same disorganisation, and less attempt to remedy matters. At Great Yarmouth the burgesses apparently thought that the spoils of Norwich Cathedral might be used for the purpose: they petitioned Parliament to "be pleased to grant vs such a part of the lead and other vseful materialls of that vast and altogether vseles Cathedrall in Norwich towardes building of a works house to employ our almost sterued poore and repairing our peeres etc.[663]"
3. Reasons why disorganisation especially affected the provision of work for the unemployed.
There were many reasons why this disorganisation should especially affect the plans for the employment of the able-bodied poor.
Even if efforts for this purpose had been much needed after the outbreak of the Civil War it is probable that they would have been less enforced than other parts of the system of poor relief. We see from the justices' reports that schemes of this kind were not usually undertaken, except under pressure from the justices. The privation of the helpless old and young appealed far more to the sympathy of overseers and ratepayers than the needs of the able-bodied poor. Besides it was far easier to grant pensions than to superintend work and supply materials.
But a far stronger reason existed for the discontinuance of the parochial stocks for employing the poor. The necessities of the war made enormous demands upon the able-bodied males of the population. The Parliamentary army was recruited from the men above the age of sixteen and below the age of sixty. An attempt has been made to make a rough estimate of the proportion of Hertfordshire men drawn away by the war. If in 1642 the population of Hertfordshire was about one-sixth of that of the present time it would amount to about 36,000 men, women and children, and this would mean about 9,000 men of an age fit for active service. But in the summer of 1644 apparently between four and five thousand Hertfordshire men were serving in the Parliamentary army and others with the Royalists, so that a large portion of the work of the country would necessarily have to be done by women, old men and boys[664].
This calculation is very rough, but it probably approximates to the truth. We hear from the complaints of the time that much inconvenience was felt. In 1644 the Grand Jury of Hertford Quarter Sessions beg that "in regard their harvest is at hand and their labourers few to gather it, some part of their soldiers ... may be for a while recalled to assist herein." The Committee of the Eastern counties about the same time write that they have promised that some of the Hertfordshire men shall return "considering the necessity of their attendance upon their harvest[665]."
The drain on the supply of labourers might not have been so great in all districts and at all times, but it must have been considerable; the problem to be solved would therefore be to find workmen and not to find work. The difficulty of getting men is indicated by the fact that the Parliamentary army offered two and sixpence a day to a waggoner instead of the shilling or one and threepence usual before the war[666]. All who were not altogether incapable could get employment, and there would therefore be no need for the parochial stocks of materials.