e We note as one of the facts of this
strike that while the farmers and some of the squires combine to put down the labourers, the higher order of landlords seem to sympathize with the men. Lord Leigh, for instance, gives 15s. and half an acre ; his brother, though deprecatory of unions, counsels moderation ; and "Squire Lucy, of Charlecote," representative, we presume, of Shakespeare's enemy, Justice Shallow, pledged himself not to expel unionists from his cottages, a statement received by a labourers' meeting svith three rounds of cheering. It does not seem much of a con- cession, but the tone of the meetings is distinctly friendly to "the gentry." Let "them have their luxuries and us our rights," is the motto of the "ringleader," Arch. The bitterest feeling is expressed against the clergy, who are denounced as un-Christian for offering charity instead of wages; and the farmers, who are told that "they think God in the wrong for being good to the poor," and advised that "the earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof," and therefore belongs to the labourers as much as to them. We have seen no threats in any of the reports that have reached us, the speeches usually consisting of descriptions, quite pathetic in
their realism, of the insufficient fool the labourers get. A reporter who has been trying to live with them on their diet says he feels "as hollow as a drum."
