"The number of pigs in the parish is now very great, and, in consequence, most of the families use some animal food.

"The rents which I charge for these cottage lands may be averaged at nearly 2d. a rod, tithe free. I pay the parish rates if the allotment does not exceed an acre. In three instances, I have let as much as 4 acres each to laborers who had saved money. These men work no longer on farms, but they maintain their families comfortably, and their lands are kept in a very good condition.

"In twenty years, I have found occasion only once to deprive a man of his allotment on account of crime; and in one other instance, on account of neglect in the cultivation."

Such is the noble testimony of Sir Henry Bunbury to the value of allotments. It is saddening to think that Sir Henry's practical letter, the common sense of which will commend it to every inquirer, has not stimulated the Suffolk landowners generally to give the allotment system a fair trial. Their neglect is typified by the evidence of Mr. Gissing, of Stradbroke. This village, prior to the introduction of the New Poor Law, was one of the most pauperised in the county. But Mr. Gissing says, "I have now nearly 50 applications for allotments, if I could find a purchaser of land who would divide it."

This statement of the several kinds of sources from which the agricultural laboring families obtain their means of support in this county, is at once a key to the great diversity that exists in their circumstances.

The money wages of the husband is the chief and permanent portion of the income; but his wages not only vary in different districts, but depend on his strength and ability to perform different kinds of labor, and is further affected by the diminished employment in the winter months, when many laboring men are frequently without work a day or two each week.

DIET OF AGRICULTURAL LABORERS.

355

Food and Habitation. — The command which the laboring classes possess over the necessaries and conveniences of life is a question intimately connected with their physical condition, although hitherto so much neglected and apparently despised. From the above statements of the amount of wages received, much may be inferred as to the kind of food which comes to the share of the agricultural laborer. We may rest assured that the aliment on which they are nourished must be of the plainest description, and that in some cases even the necessaries of life can scarcely be obtained in sufficient quantities; and this inference is amply borne out by the facts which we have collected, and also by the Report of Mr. Denison, on the "Employment of Women in Agriculture" in Suffolk. But a small quantity of flesh-meat comes to the farm-laborer's table, one or two lbs. of pork on Sundays being the usual weekly amount. When the man has an allotment, the family have abundance of vegetables. Very few are able to keep a pig, and those that do generally mortgage the animal long before it is killed.

Evidence as to Laborers' Diet.-J. H. Heigham, Esq., Hunston: "Their diet consists chiefly of bread, cheese, vegetables, tea, and milk." John Moseley, Esq., Glemham: "Meat once a-week, bread, cheese, butter, and tea." R. N. Shawe, Esq., Kesgrave: "Bread, cheese, tea, pork, and beer; principally bread." J. Last, Esq., Hadleigh: "Bread and potatoes, sometimes cheese; rarely meat. Mr. Appleton, Thorington: "Bread and cheese, or bread and butter, and tea, form their principal diet; they have occasionally animal food. They have all gardens, and plenty of vegetables at command: but they are not good managers in those matters." Mr. Clarke, Bungay: "Bread and butter and tea, sometimes bread and milk, occasionally cheese, but very seldom meat or beer. The children have bread and butter, or molasses.' Mr. J. K. Moore, Badley :

Chiefly bread; not much meat. Wickhambrook : "Pudding, potatoes, bread; very little meat." Mildenhall: "Chiefly flour pudding, potatoes, bread, butter, cheese, a small portion of bacon (more or less often, as a man has a large family), tea."

Blything Union.-Report of Committee." Breakfast: Tea, milk, bread, butter, lard, cheese, dumplings of flour, and occasionally bacon or pork. Dinner same as breakfast, with vegetables, and occasionally beer. Supper same as breakfast."

This evidence is conclusive respecting their general diet. But we cannot forbear soliciting attention to the following detail, furnished by the late Mr. Scott, Relieving Officer of Lavenham :-"A farm-laborer's diet depends, in a great measure, upon the number of the family, and the amount of wages brought home to the common stock; whether they are frugal in their habits, and in the outlay of their money, etc. I can give you some information, however, on the subject, having made myself acquainted, on different occasions, with the manner their wages are disposed of. The following is an account from a woman, whose family always appear clean and neat, and whose children are brought up to industrial habits:

RENT OF COTTAGES.

357

"But there are numbers of families who, although in the possession of the amount of wages shown above, do not dispose of it with such frugality, but appear in the greatest state of destitution. Many others, with the same number of children, do not get the wages this man's family have. The family I have given as an example is more to show you that, with industry and frugality, their diet consists principally of bread and potatoes. There are, however, some who, when their families are grown up, by putting their earnings together, occasionally get a piece of meat at their supper time and their Sunday dinner."

Such is the picture of the laborers' mode of living in the Cosford Union, notorious as being the most criminal district in the county.

From returns received from various districts of the county, we find that the Rent of Cottages vary from £2 to £4 and even £5 per annum. On the Duke of

Grafton's Estate the rents are very moderate, 1s. a-week down to 20s. a-year being the rule in the villages which are the property of His Grace. In many cases, tradesmen, speculators, and builders have erected tenements on small patches or waste pieces of ground; and, from the demand for house-room, they generally obtain a much higher rent than that which is taken by the principal proprietor of the soil. The village of Crowfield is an instance of this kind. There are 68 cottages, many

of them built on such small pieces of waste as to have no garden, and others with very small pieces. "At Capel St. Mary," the Rector says, "cottage rents, £4 to £5, are much too high." Those at low rents are generally very inferior tenements. In Cosford Union there are some at 1s. and 1s. 6d. a-week; but they might properly be called hovels, most of them being clay, and thatched, without ceilings, and hard floors.

The old cottages are mostly clay-walled and thatched; they are warmest in winter and coolest in summer; but

are frequently built in lone and inconvenient situations. The new-built cottages are small, one brick thick generally, and pantiled. Others are built with large clay lumps, and a few boarded ones are seen in many villages. In the western part some are built with brick and flint, and in the north-west corner they are sometimes constructed with clunch-a hard kind of chalk. Cottages in the western district are thatched with reed. Taking the county as a whole, the clay and plaster walls and straw-thatched cottages predominate. At Elmsett there are 29 cottages, forming 70 tenements; 15 are of clay, 11 plaster, and 3 brick; 18 thatched, 9 tiled, and 2 slated. At Eye, 138 were thatched; at Yoxford, only about 16 or 18 thatched; at Holbrook, most of them brick and tiled; and at Thwaite, the majority of them are clay-daubed and thatched. They have generally brick floors, and in many villages not more than half the cottages have two sleeping rooms. This want of sufficient cottage accommodation seemed almost universal, and it is thus extremely difficult, if not impossible, to divide a family, so that grown-up brothers and sisters, fathers and daughters, do not sleep in the same room.

The cottages are frequently undrained, and consequently wet and damp. The oozing of pig-sties and other filth sometimes stagnate close to the dwelling. The "necessary" accommodation is frequently wretched in the extreme, in some instances being only a few faggots set up, with two crotch sticks and a rail. In the Bosmere Union we met with a case of eight adjoining cottages with no privy, and only a few faggots as a shy.

The Guardians of the Samford Union, in December 1853, declared, "That the number of persons permitted to live in the same tenement, with only one sleeping apartment for the members of the family, of all ages and without distinction of sex, and the mode in which the houses of the poor are constructed, without regard to ventilation, drainage, or those conveniences which health,