LETTER TO THE EDITOR.
THE ALLOTMENTS EXTENSION ACT.
rTo THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."' SIR,-I do not know whether you were surprised to hear from " A Country Vicar " " that the agricultural labourer is becoming quite indifferent to the occupation of allotment lands ;" but as an independent observer and a careful reader of the Blne-book of last Session, to which your article referred, I own that I am as much surprised, as Sir Charles Dilke appears to be, to hear it, and altogether refuse to believe that it is the case. Your corre- spondent's experience must be singularly unfortunate. As a rule, in almost any part of the country to which one may travel, certainly in the neighbourhood of London or any other large town, allotments are taken up with avidity and worked with industry and energy. The evidence given in the Blue- book shows a widespread desire on the part of the labourers for allotments, at least under the Act. In Yorkshire and Devonshire, in Bedfordshire and Suffolk, in Bucks and Salop alike, the agricultural labourer appears to have been trying to get allotments under the Act, and to have had con- siderable difficulty in getting them, in many cases owing to the action or inaction of Trustees, parsons, and others, who were, like your correspondent himself, in possession of the Charity- lands of which they were Trustees, in defiance of the law. One Norfolk man was so eager for an allotment that he informed Mr. Jesse Collings that " he was about to emigrate two years ago, but that at the passing of the Act he saw a way by which he might supplement his little earnings by having an acre of land, and so remain at home; be had been trying ever since to get that ; he had failed, and was now off to America." His words were,—" The rural districts in this country are no place for a poor man ; you cannot help us, do what you will, it is beyond your power." Again, an overseer of the poor wrote to Mr. Collings, speaking of the " great longing of the people in his parish for land ; the outsiders [there being only enough for the people of the parish] look on with longing eyes, as they are not able to partake of it."
It is true, indeed, that allotments under the new Act are not only probably more desired, but they are much more desirable than allotments under the old Act or under private landowners. For under the old Act, " men who worked on their land on Good-Friday or Christmas-Day, and who frequented public- houses," were " deemed guilty of offences sufficient to debar them from having • the land." Again, they may reasonably prefer, as the men of Long Sutton told a solicitor—(who, by the way, admitted that, being solicitor to the Trustees, he had hired the Charity-lands himself,—i.e., committed a breach of trust)— to have "their own land which they considered they had a right to, and which they could not be dispossessed of." The reason of this preference is obvious. In that very village a private owner had let land in allotments, but when "the men had put their work into it," it was taken away from them and sold. This was elicited, after some fencing, from the solicitor. The men themselves said that it had happened over and over again. But if it happened once in a thousand cases, it is quite enough to make men distrust the system of private allotments. Is your correspondent sure that something similar has not happened in his own district ?
The truth of the whole matter appears to be that there is a real desire on the part of agricultural labourers for allotments, especially when they can claim them as a right ; and that the Trustees have in too many cases begun to make excuses, not -really because they fear diminished ineome to the Charity, but because, willing as they are to be benevolent by way of grace to the people, they hate the people to have rights. That your correspondent may not be infected by a similar spirit, I recom- mend him to remain, as I am, your obedient servant,
A CONSTANT READER.
Previous page
