Rural Rides Page 14

  I was afraid of rain, and got on as fast as I could: that is to say, as fast as my own diligence could help me on; for, as to my horse, he is to go only so fast. However, I had no rain; and got to Petworth, nine miles further, by about ten o’clock.

  Petworth (Sussex), Friday Evening, 1 Aug.

  No rain, until just at sunset, and then very little. I must now look back. From HORSHAM to within a few miles of Petworth is in the Weald of Sussex; stiff land, small fields, broad hedge-rows, and, invariably, thickly planted with fine, growing oak trees. The corn here consists chiefly of wheat and oats. There are some bean-fields, and some few fields of peas; but very little barley along here. The corn is very good all along the Weald; backward; the wheat almost green; the oats quite green; but, late as it is, I see no blight; and the farmers tell me, that there is no blight. There may be yet, however; and, therefore, our Government, our ‘paternal Government’, so anxious to prevent ‘over-production’, need not despair, as yet, at any rate. The beans in the Weald are not very good. They got lousy, before the wet came; and it came rather too late to make them recover what they had lost. What peas there are look well. Along here the wheat, in general, may be fit to cut in about 16 days’ time; some sooner; but some later, for some is perfectly green. No Swedish turnips all along this country. The white turnips are just up, coming up, or just sown. The farmers are laying out lime upon the wheat-fallows, and this is the universal practice of the country. I see very few sheep. There are a good many orchards along in the Weald, and they have some apples this year; but, in general, not many. The apple trees are planted very thickly, and, of course, they are small; but, they appear healthy in general; and, in some places, there is a good deal of fruit, even this year. As you approach Petworth, the ground rises and the soil grows lighter. There is a hill which I came over, about two miles from Petworth, whence I had a clear view of the Surrey chalk-hills, Leith-hill, Hindhead, Blackdown, and of the Soudi Downs, towards one part of which I was advancing. The pigs along here are all black, thin-haired, and of precisely the same sort of those that I took from England to Long Island, and with which I pretty well stocked the American States. By-the-by, the trip, which Old Sidmouth and crew gave me to America, was attended with some interesting consequences; amongst which were the introducing of the Sussex pigs into the American farm-yards; the introduction of the Swedish turnip into the American fields;3 the introduction of American apple-trees into England; and the introduction of the making, in England, of the straw plat, to supplant the Italian: for, had my son James not been in America, this last would not have taken place; and, in America he would not have been, had it not been for Old Sidmouth and crew. One dung more, and that is of more importance than all the rest. PEEL’S BILL arose out of the ‘puff-out’ Registers;4 these arose out of the trip to Long Island; and out of Peel’s Bill has arisen the best bothering that the wigs of the Boroughmongers ever received, which bothering will end in the destruction of the Bor-oughmongering. It is curious, and very useful, thus to trace events to their causes. And now I read in the newspapers that this very Old Sidmouth is, at the age (I think it must be) of more than sixty-five, JUST MARRIED! Thank God for that, at any rate! And married too, it seems, to a daughter of that SCOTT, who is now called ‘Lord Stowell’! The same newspaper that tells me of this marriage, tells me that SIDMOUTH’S son, who was a sinecure placeman with a salary of three thousand a-year, and who was insane, is just dead. Here is matter for reflection, moral, religious, and political! What! is a thing like this to go without inquiry for ever?

  Soon after quitting Billingshurst I crossed the river ARUN, which has a canal running alongside of it. At this there are large timber and coal yards, and kilns for lime. This appears to be a grand receiving and distributing place. The river goes down to ARUNDALE, and, together with the valley that it runs through, gives the town its name. This valley, which is very pretty, and which winds about a good deal, is the dale of the Arun: and the town is the town of the Arundale. To-day, near a place called Wesborough Green, I saw a woman bleaching her home-spun and home-woven linen. I have not seen such a thing before, since I left Long Island. There, and, indeed, all over the American States, North of Maryland, and especially in the New England States, almost the whole of both linen and woollen, used in the country, and a large part of that used in towns, is made in the farm-houses. There are thousands and thousands of families who never use either, except of their own making. All but the weaving is done by the family. There is a loom in the house, and the weaver goes from house to house. I once saw about three thousand fanners, or rather country people, at a horse-race in Long Island, and my opinion was, that there were not five hundred who were not dressed in home-spun coats. As to linen, no farmer’s family thinks of buying linen. The Lords of the Loom have taken from the land, in England, this part of its due; and hence one cause of the poverty, misery, and pauperism, that are becoming so frightful throughout the country. A national debt, and all the taxation and gambling belonging to it have a natural tendency to draw wealth into great masses. These masses produce a power of congregating manufacturers, and of making the many work at them, for the gain of a few. The taxing Government finds great convenience in these congregations. It can lay its hand easily upon a part of the produce; as ours does with so much effect. But, the land suffers greatly from this, and the country must finally feel the fatal effects of it. The country people lose part of their natural employment. The women and children, who ought to provide a great part of the raiment, have nothing to do. The fields must have men and boys; but, where there are men and boys there will be women and girls; and, as the Lords of the Loom have now a set of real slaves, by the means of whom they take away a great part of the employment of the country-women and girls, these must be kept by poor-rates in whatever degree they lose employment through the Lords of the Loom. One would think, that nothing can be much plainer than this; and yet you hear the jolterheads congratulating one another upon the increase of Manchester, and such places! My straw affair will certainly restore to the land some of the employment of its women and girls. It will be impossible for any of the ‘rich ruffians’; any of the horse-power or steam-power or air-power ruffians; any of these greedy, grinding ruffians, to draw together bands of men, women and children, and to make them slaves, in the working of straw. The raw material comes of itself; and the hand, and the hand alone, can convert it to use. I thought well of this before I took one single step in the way of supplanting the Leghorn bonnets. If I had not been certain, that no rich ruffian, no white slave holder, could ever arise out of it, assuredly one line upon the subject never would have been written by me. Better, a million times, that the money should go to Italy; better that it should go to enrich even the rivals and enemies of the country; than that it should enable these hard, these unfeeling men, to draw English people into crowds and make them slaves, and slaves too of the lowest and most degraded cast.

  As I was coming into this town I saw a new-fashioned sort of stone-cracking. A man had a sledge-hammer, and was cracking the heads of the big stones that had been laid on the road a good while ago. This is a very good way; but, this man told me, that he was set at this, because the farmers had no employment for many of the men. ‘Well,’ said I, ‘but they pay you to do this!’ ‘Yes,’ said he. ‘Well, then,’ said I, ‘is it not better for them to pay you for working on their land?’ I can’t tell, indeed, Sir, how that is.’ But, only think; here is half the hay-making to do: I saw, while I was talking to this man, fifty people in one hay-field of Lord Egremont, making and carrying hay; and yet, at a season like this, the fanners are so poor as to be unable to pay the labourers to work on the land! From this cause there will certainly be some falling off in production. This will, of course, have a tendency to keep prices from falling so low as they would do if there were no falling off. But, can this benefit the farmer and landlord? The poverty of the fanners is seen in their diminished stock. The animals are sold younger than formerly. Last year was a year of great slaugh
tering. There will be less of every thing produced; and the quality of each thing will be worse. It will be a lower and more mean concern altogether. PETWORTH is a nice market town; but solid and clean. The great abundance of stone in the land hereabouts has caused a corresponding liberality in paving and wall Buildings so that every thing of the building kind has an air of great strength, and produces the agreeable idea of durability. Lord Egremont’s house is close to the town, and, with its out-buildings, garden walls, and other erections, is, perhaps, nearly as big as the town; though the town is not a very small one. The Park is very fine, and consists of a parcel of those hills and dells, which Nature formed here, when she was in one of her most sportive modes. I have never seen the earth flung about in such a wild way as round about Hindhead and Blackdown; and this Park forms a part of this ground. From an elevated part of it, and, indeed, from each of many parts of it, you see all around the country to the distance of many miles. From the South East to the North West, the hills are so lofty and so near, that they cut the view rather short; but, for the rest of the circle, you can see to a very great distance. It is, upon the whole, a most magnificent seat, and the Jews will not be able to get it from the present owner; though, if he live many years, they will give even him a twist. If I had time, I would make an actual survey of one whole county, and find out how many of the old gentry have lost their estates, and have been supplanted by the Jews, since PITT began his reign. I am sure I should prove that, in number, they are one-half extinguished. But, it is now, that they go. The little ones are, indeed, gone; and the rest will follow in proportion as the present farmers are exhausted. These will keep on giving rents as long as they can beg or borrow the money to pay rents with. But, a little more time will so completely exhaust them, that they will be unable to pay; and, as that takes place, the landlords will lose their estates. Indeed many of them; and even a large portion of them, have, in fact, no estates now. They are called theirs; but the mortgagees and annuitants receive the rents. As the rents fall off, sales must take place, unless in cases of entails; and, if this thing go on, we shall see acts passed to cut off entails, in order that the Jews may be put into full possession. Such, thus far, will be the result of our ‘glorious victories’ over the French! Such will be, in part, the price of the deeds of Pitt, Addington, Perceval and their successors. For having applauded such deeds; for having boasted of the Wellesleys; for having bragged of battles won by money and by money only, the nation deserves that which it will receive; and, as to the landlords, they, above all men living, deserve punishment. They put the power into the hands of Pitt and his crew to torment the people; to keep the people down; to raise solthers and to build barracks for this purpose. These base landlords laughed when affairs like that of Manchester took place. They laughed at the Blanketteers. They laughed when Canning jested about Ogden’s rupture. Let them, therefore, now take the full benefit of the measures of Pitt and his crew. They would fain have us believe, that the calamities they endure do not arise from the acts of the Government. What do they arise from, then? The Jacobins did not contract the Debt of 800,000,000l. sterling. The Jacobins did not create a Dead Weight of 150,000,000l. The Jacobins did not cause a pauper-charge of 200,000,000l. by means of ‘new inclosure bills’, ‘vast improvements’, paper-money, potatoes, and other ‘proofs of prosperity’. The Jacobins did not do these things. And, will the Government pretend that ‘Providence’ did it? That would be ‘blasphemy’ indeed. – Poh! These things are the price of efforts to crush freedom in France, lest the example of France should produce a reform in England. These things are the price of that undertaking; which, however, has not yet been crowned with success; for the question is not yet decided. They boast of their victory over the French. The Pitt crew boast of their achievements in the war. They boast of the battle of Waterloo. Why! what fools could not get the same, or the like, if they had as much money to get it with? Shooting with a silver gun is a saying amongst game-eaters. That is to say, purchasing the game. A waddling, fat fellow, that does not know how to prime and load, will, in this way, beat the best shot in the country. And, this is the way that our crew beat the people of France. They laid out, in the first place, six hundred millions which they borrowed, and for which they mortgaged the revenues of the nation. Then they contracted for a dead weight to the amount of one hundred and fifty millions. Then they stripped the labouring classes of the commons, of their kettles, their bedding, their beer-barrels; and, in short, made them all paupers, and thus fixed on the nation a permanent annual charge of about 8 or 9 millions, or, a gross debt of 200,000,000l. By these means, by these anticipations, our crew did what they thought would keep down the French nation for ages; and what they were sure would, for the present, enable them to keep up the tithes and other things of the same sort in England. But, the crew did not reflect on the consequences of the anticipations! Or, at least, the landlords, who gave the crew their power, did not thus reflect. These consequences are now come, and are coming; and that must be a base man indeed, who does not see them with pleasure.

  Singleton (Sussex),

  Saturday, 2 Aug.

  Ever since the middle of March, I have been trying remethes for the hooping-cough, and have, I believe, tried every thing, except riding, wet to the skin, two or three hours amongst the clouds on the South Downs. This remedy is now under trial. As Lord Liverpool said, the other day, of the Irish Tithe Bill; it is ‘under experiment’. I am treating my disorder (with better success I hope) in somewhat the same way that the pretty fellows at Whitehall treat the disorders of poor Ireland. There is one thing in favour of this remedy of mine, I shall know the effect of it, and that, too, in a short time. It rained a little last night. I got off from Petworth, without baiting my horse, thinking that the weather looked suspicious; and that St Swithin meaned to treat me to a dose. I had no great coat, nor any means of changing my clothes. The hooping-cough made me anxious; but I had fixed on going along the South Downs from Donnington-hill down to Lavant, and then to go on the flat to the South foot of Portsdown-hill, and to reach Fareham to-night. Two men, whom I met soon after I set off, assured me that it would not rain. I came on to Donnington, which lies at the foot of that part of the South Downs which I had to go up. Before I came to this point, I crossed the Ann and its canal again; and here was another place of deposit for timber, lime, coals, and other things. WHITE in his history of SELBURNE mentions a hill, which is one of the Hindhead group, from which two springs (one on each side of the hill) send water into the two seas: the Atlantic and the German Ocean! This is big talk; but it is a fact. One of the streams becomes the Arun, which falls into the CHANNEL; and the other, after winding along amongst the hills and hillocks between Hindhead and Godalming, goes into the river Wey, which falls into the Thames at Weybridge. The soil upon leaving Petworth, and at Petworth, seems very good; a fine deep loam, a sort of mixture of sand and soft chalk. I then came to a sandy common; a piece of ground that seemed to have no business there; it looked as if it had been tossed from Hindhead or Blackdown. The common, however, during the rage for ‘improvements’, has been inclosed. That impudent fellow, OLD ROSE stated the number of Inclosure Bills as an indubitable proof of ‘national prosperity’. There was some rye upon this common, the sight of which would have gladdened the heart of Lord Liverpool. It was, in parts, not more than eight inches high. It was ripe, and, of course, the straw dead; or, I should have found out the owner, and have bought it to make bonnets of! I defy the Italians to grow worse rye than this. The reader will recollect, that I always said, that we could grow as poor corn as any Italians that ever lived. The village of Donton lies at the foot of one of these great chalk ridges, which are called the South Downs. The ridge, in this place, is, I think, about three-fourths of a mile high, by the high road, which is obliged to go twisting about, in order to get to the top of it. The hill sweeps round from about West North West, to East South East; and, of course, it keeps off all the heavy winds, and especially the South West winds, before which, in
this part of England (and all the South and Western part of it) even the oak trees seem as if they would gladly flee; for it shaves them up as completely as you see a quickset hedge shaved by hook or shears. Talking of hedges reminds me of having seen a box-hedge, just as I came out of Petworth, more than twelve feet broad, and about fifteen feet high. I dare say it is several centuries old. I think it is about forty yards long. It is a great curiosity.

  The apple trees at DONNINGTON show their gratitude to the hill for its shelter; for I have seldom seen apple trees in England so large, so fine, and, in general, so flourishing. I should like to have, or to see, an orchard of American apples under this hill. The hill, you will observe, does not shade the ground at Donnington. It slopes too much for that. But it affords complete shelter from the mischievous winds. It is very pretty to look down upon this litde village as you come winding up the hill.

  From this hill I ought to have had a most extensive view. I ought to have seen the Isle of Wight and the sea before me; and to have looked back to Chalk Hill at Reigate, at the foot of which I had left some bonnet-grass bleaching. But, alas! Saint Swithin had begun his works for the day, before I got to the top of the hill. Soon after the two turnip-hoers had assured me that there would be no rain, I saw, beginning to poke up over the South Downs (then right before me), several parcels of those white, curled clouds, that we call Judges’ Wigs. And they are just like Judges’ Wigs. Not the parson-like things which the Judges wear when they have to listen to the dull wrangling and duller jests of the lawyers; but, those big wigs which hang down about their shoulders, when they are about to tell you a little oi their intentions, and when their very looks say, ‘Stand clear!’ These clouds (if rising from the South West) hold precisely the same language to the great-coatless traveller. Rain is sure to follow them. The sun was shining very beautifully when I first saw these Judges’ wigs rising over the hills. At the sight of them he soon began to hide his face! and, before I got to the top of the hill of Donton, the white clouds had become black, had spread themselves all around, and a pretty decent and sturdy rain began to fall. I had resolved to come to this place (Singleton) to breakfast. I quitted the turnpike road (from Petworth to Chichester) at a village called UPWALTHAM, about a mile from Donnington Hill; and came down a lane, which led me first to a village called EASTDEAN; then to another called WESTDEAN, I suppose; and then to this village of SSINGLETON, and here I am on the turnpike road from Midhurst to Chichester. The lane goes along through some of the finest farms in the world. It is impossible for corn land and for agriculture to be finer than these. In cases like mine, you are pestered to death to find out the way to set out to get from place to place. The people you have to deal with are innkeepers, ostlers, and post-boys; and they think you mad if you express your wish to avoid turnpike roads; and a great deal more than half mad, if you talk of going, even from necessity, by any other road. They think you a strange fellow if you will not ride six miles on a turnpike road rather than two on any other road. This plague I experienced on this occasion. I wanted to go from Petworth to Havant. My way was through SINGLETON and FUNTING-TON I had no business at Chichester, which took me too far to the South, nor at Midhurst, which took me too far to the West. But, though I staid all day (after my arrival) at Petworth, and though I slept there, I could get no directions how to set out to come to Singleton, where I am now. I started, therefore, on the Chichester road, trusting to my inquiries of the country people as I came on. By these means I got hither, down a long valley, on the South Downs, which valley winds and twists about amongst hills, some higher and some lower, forming cross dells, inlets, and ground in such a variety of shapes that it is impossible to describe; and, the whole of the ground, hill as well as dell, is fine, most beautiful, corn land, or is covered with trees or underwood. As to St Swithin, I set him at defiance. The road was flinty, and very flinty. I rode a foot pace; and got here wet to the skin. I am very glad I came this road. The corn is all fine; all good; fine crops, and no appearance of blight. The barley extremely fine. The corn not forwarder than in the Weald. No beans here; few oats comparatively; chiefly wheat and barley; but great quantities of Swedish turnips, and those very forward. More Swedish turnips here upon one single farm than upon all the farms that I saw between the WEN and PETWORTH. These turnips are, in some places, a foot high, and nearly cover the ground. The farmers are, however, plagued by this St SWITHIN, who keeps up a continual drip, which prevents the thriving of the turnips and the killing of the weeds. The orchards are good here in general. Fine walnut trees, and an abundant crop of walnuts. This is a series of villages all belonging to the Duke of Richmond, the outskirts of whose park and woods come up to these farming lands, all of which belong to him; and, I suppose, that every inch of land, that I came through this morning, belongs either to the Duke of Richmond, or to Lord Egremont. No harm in that, mind, if those who till the land have fair play; and I should act unjustly towards these noblemen, if I insinuated that the husbandmen have not fair play, as far as the landlords are concerned; for every body speaks well of them. There is, besides, no misery to be seen here. I have seen no wretchedness in Sussex; nothing to be at all compared to that which I have seen in other parts; and, as to these villages in the South Downs, they are beautiful to behold. HUME and other historians rail against the feudal-system; and we, ‘enlightened’ and ‘free’ creatures as we are, look back with scorn, or, at least, with despise and pity, to the ‘vassalage’ of our forefathers. But, if the matter were well enquired into, not slurred over, but well and truly examined, we should find, that the people of these villages were as free in the days of WILLIAM RUFUS as are the people of the present day; and that vassalage, only under other names, exists now as completely as it existed then. Well; but, out of this, if true, arises another question: namely, Whether the millions would derive any benefit from being transferred from these great Lords who possess them by hundreds, to Jews and jobbers who would possess them by half-dozens, or by couples? One thing we may say with a certainty of being right: and that is, that the transfer would be bad for the Lords themselves. There is an appearance of comfort about the dwellings of the labourers, all along here, that is very pleasant to behold. The gardens are neat, and full of vegetables of the best kinds. I see very few of ‘Ireland’s lazy root’; and never, in this country, will the people be base enough to lie down and expire from starvation under the operation of the extreme unction!9 Nothing but a potatoe-eater will ever do that. As I came along between Upwaltham and Eastdean, I called to me a young man, who, along with other turnip-hoers, was sitting under the shelter of a hedge at breakfast. He came running to me with his victuals in his hand; and, I was glad to see, that his food consisted of a good lump of household bread and not a very small piece of bacon. I did not envy him his appetite, for I had, at that moment, a very good one of my own; but, I wanted to know the distance I had to go before I should get to a good public-house. In parting with him, I said, ‘You do get some bacon then?’ ‘Oh, yes! Sir,’ said he, and with an emphasis and a swag of the head which seemed to say, ‘We must and will have that.’ I saw, and with great delight, a pig at almost every labourer’s house. The houses are good and warm; and the gardens some of the very best that I have seen in England. What a difference, good God! what a difference between this country and the neighbourhood of those corrupt places Great Bedwin and Cricklade: What sort of breakfast would this man have had in a mess of cold potatoes? Could he have worked, and worked in the wet, too, with such food? Monstrous! No society ought to exist, where the labourers live in a hog-like sort of way. The Morning Chronicle10 is everlastingly asserting the mischievous consequences of the want of enlightening these people ‘i’ tha Sooth’; and telling us how well they are off in the North. Now, this I know, that, in the North, the ‘enlightened’ people eat sowens, burgoo, porridge, and potatoes: that is to say, oatmeal and water, or the root of extreme unction. If this be the effect of their light, give me the darkness, ‘o’ tha Sooth’. This is according to what I have
heard: if, when I go to the North, I find the labourers eating more meat than those of the ‘Sooth’, I shall then say, that ‘enlightening’ is a very good thing; but, give me none of that ‘light’, or of that ‘grace’, which makes a man content with oatmeal and water, or that makes him patiently lie down and the of starvation amidst abundance of food. The Morning Chronicle hears the labourers crying out in Sussex. They are right to cry out in time. When they are actually brought down to the extreme unction, it is useless to cry out. And, next to the extreme unction, is the porridge of the ‘enlightened’slaves who toil in the factories for the Lords of the Loom. Talk of vassals! Talk of villains! Talk of cerfs! Are there any of these, or did feudal times ever see any of them, so debased, so absolutely slaves, as the poor creatures who, in the ‘enlightened’ north, are compelled to work fourteen hours in a day, in a heat of eighty-four degrees; and who are liable to punishment for looking out at a window of the factory!11