The great landlords, according to Mr. Lloyd George, compared unfavourably,
where mining royalties were con- cerned, even with capitalists, for the capitalist at any rate risked the whole of his money. But when the beneficent Government asked them for something to keep poor and broken miners from the workhouse, " they scowl at us. We say Only a ha'penny, just a copper.' They say, 4 You thieves.' And they turn their dogs on us, and you can hear them bark every morning." Warming to his work, Mr. Lloyd George threatened these miscreants with the day of reckoning. The ownership of land was not an enjoyment, it was a steward- ship ; but if the great landlords ceased to discharge their functions—the security and defence of the country, looking after the broken in their villages and neighbourhoods—the time would come to reconsider the conditions under which land was held in this country.
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