A person from the south or midland counties of England, journeying northward2, is struck when he enters Durham, or Northumberland, with the sight of bands of women working in the fields under the surveillance of one man. One or two such bands, of from half a dozen to a dozen women, generally young, might be passed over; but when they recur3 again and again, and you observe them wherever you go, they become a marked feature of the agricultural system of the country, and you naturally inquire how it is that such regular bands of female labourers prevail there. The answer, in the provincial4 tongue, is—“O they are the Boneditchers,” i. e. Bondagers. Bondagers! that is an odd sound, you think, in England. What, have we bondage, a rural serfdom, still existing in free and fair England? Even so. The thing is astounding5 enough, but it is a fact. As I cast my eyes for the first time on these female bands in the fields, working under their drivers, I was, before making any inquiry6 respecting them, irresistibly7 reminded of the slave-gangs of the West Indies: turnip-hoeing, somehow, associated itself strangely in my brain with sugar-cane dressing8; but when I heard these women called Bondagers, the association became tenfold strong.
On all the large estates in these counties, and in the south of Scotland, the bondage system prevails. No married labourer is permitted to dwell on these estates unless he enters into bond to comply with this system. These labourers are termed hinds9. Small houses are built for them on the farms, and on some of the[120] estates—as those of the Duke of Northumberland—all these cottages are numbered, and the number is painted on the door. A hind10, therefore, engaging to work on one of the farms belonging to the estate, has a house assigned him. He has 4l. a year in money; the keep of a cow; his fuel found him,—a prescribed quantity of coal, wood, or peat, to each cottage; he is allowed to plant a certain quantity of land with potatoes; and has thirteen boles of corn furnished him for his family consumption; one-third being oats, one-third barley11, and one-third peas. In return for these advantages, he is bound to give his labour the year round, and also to furnish a woman labourer at 1s. per day during harvest, and 8d. per day for the rest of the year. Now it appears, at once, that this is no hereditary12 serfdom—such a thing could not exist in this country; but it is the next thing to it, and no doubt has descended13 from it; being serfdom in its mitigated14 form, in which alone modern notions and feelings would tolerate it. It may even be said that it is a voluntary system; that it is merely married hinds doing that which unmarried farm-servants do everywhere else—hire themselves on certain conditions from year to year. The great question is, whether these conditions are just, and favourable16 to the social and moral improvement of the labouring class. Whether, indeed, it be quite of so voluntary a nature as, at first sight, appears; whether it be favourable to the onward17 movement of the community in knowledge, virtue18, and active and enterprising habits. These are questions which concern the public; and these I shall endeavour to answer in that candid19 and dispassionate spirit which public good requires.
In the first place, then, it is only just to say that their cottages, though they vary a good deal on different estates, are in themselves, in some cases, not bad. Indeed, some of those which we entered on the estates of the Duke of Northumberland, were much more comfortable than labourers’ cottages often are. Each has its number painted on the door, within a crescent,—the crest20 of the Northumberland family; and though this has a look rather savouring too much of a badge of servitude, yet within many of them are very comfortable. They are all built pretty much on one principle, and that very different to the labourers’ houses of the south. They are copied, in fact, from the Scotch21 cottages. They[121] are of one story, and generally of one room. On one side is the fireplace, with an oven on one hand and a boiler22 on the other; on the opposite side of the cottage is the great partition for the beds, which are two in number, with sliding doors or curtains. The ceiling is formed by poles nailed across from one side of the roof to the other, about half a yard above where it begins to slope, and covered with matting. From the matting to the wall the slope is covered with a piece of chintz in the best cottages; in others, with some showy calico print, with ordinary wall-paper, or even with paper daubed with various colours and patterns. This is the regular style of the hind’s cottage; varying in neatness and comfort, it must be confessed, however, from one another by many degrees. Many are very naked, dirty, and squalid. Where they happen to stand separate, on open heaths, and in glens of the hills, nature throws around them so much of wild freedom and picturesqueness24 as makes them very agreeable. The cottages of the shepherds are often very snug27 and curious. We went into the cottage of the herd25 of Middleton, at the foot of the Cheviots, an estate formerly28 belonging to Greenwich Hospital. This hut was of more than ordinary size, as it was required to accommodate several shepherds. The part of the house on your left as you entered was divided into two rooms. The one was a sort of entrance lobby, where stood the cheese-press and the pails, and where hung up various shepherds’ plaids, great coats, and strong shoes. In one place hung a mass of little caps with strings29 to them, ready to tie upon the sheeps’ heads when they become galled30 by the fly in summer; in another were suspended wool-shears and crooks31. The other little room was the dairy, with the oddest assemblage of wooden quaighs or little pails imaginable. Over these rooms, a step-ladder led to an open attic32 in the roof, which formed at once the sleeping apartment of the shepherds and a store-room. Here were three or four beds, some of them woollen mattresses33 on rude stump-bedsteads; others pieces of wicker-work, like the lower half of a pot-crate cut off, about half a yard high, filled with straw, and a few blankets laid upon it. There were lots of fleeces of wool stowed away; and lasts and awls stuck into the spars, shewed that the herds26 occasionally amused their leisure in winter and bad weather by cobbling their shoes. The half of[122] the house on your right hand on entering, was at all points such as I have before described, with its coved34 and matted ceiling, its chintz cornice, and its two beds with sliding doors. But the majority of the cottages of the hinds about the great farm-houses, are dismal35 abodes36. They are generally built in a low, and sometimes in a dreary37 quadrangle, without those additions of gardens, piggeries, etc., which so much enrich and embellish38 the cottages of the labourers in many parts of the kingdom. And what is the state of feeling within? is it that of contentment or acquiescence39? I am bound to say that many inquiries40 made in various places, discovered one general sentiment of discontent with the system. But in the first place, let us take a view of the general aspect of the country under this system as it appears to a stranger from the south, and here we have at hand the graphic41 descriptions of Cobbett, from his tour in Scotland and the northern counties of England, in 1832.
He does not seem to have become aware of the existence of the system while in Durham and Northumberland. He perceived, what no man can pass through those counties without seeing, the large-farm system in full operation, and with all its consequences in its face. “From Morpeth to within four miles of Hexham the land is very indifferent; the farms of an enormous extent. I saw in one place more than a hundred corn-stacks in one yard, each having from six to seven Surrey wagon-loads of sheaves in one stack; and not another house to be seen within a mile or two of the farm-house. There appears to be no such thing as barns, but merely a place to take in a stack at a time, and thrash it out by a machine. The country seems to be almost wholly destitute43 of people: immense tracts45 of corn land, but neither cottages nor churches.” p. 56. This was the first glimpse of the thing; it had not yet broken fully46 upon him; but he had not gone much further before the vast solitude47 of the depopulative system began to press upon his brain, and to set those indignant feelings and theorizings at work in him, which belonged so peculiarly to his nature. “From Morpeth to Alnwick, the country, generally speaking, is very poor as to land, scarcely any trees at all; the farms enormously extensive: only two churches, I think, in the whole of the twenty miles, i. e. from Newcastle to Alnwick. Scarcely any thing worthy48 the name of a tree,[123] and not one single dwelling49 having the appearance of a labourer’s house. Here appears to be neither hedging nor ditching; no such thing as a sheep-fold or a hurdle50 to be seen; the cattle and sheep very few in number; the farm-servants living in the farm-houses, and very few of them; the thrashing done by machinery51 and horses; a country without people. This is a pretty country to take a minister from, to govern the south of England! a pretty country to take a Lord Chancellor52 from, to prattle53 about poor-laws, and about surplus population! My Lord Grey has, in fact, spent his life here, and Brougham has spent his life in the inns of court, or in the botheration of speculative54 books. How should either of them know any thing about the eastern, southern, or western counties? I wish I had my dignitary, Dr. Black, here; I would soon make him see that he has all these number of years been talking about the bull’s horns instead of his tail and buttocks. Besides the indescribable pleasure of having seen Newcastle, the Shieldses, Sunderland, Durham, and Hexham, I have now discovered the true ground of all the errors of the Scotch feelosophers, with regard to population, and with regard to poor-laws. The two countries are as different as any things of the same nature can possibly be; that which applies to the one does not at all apply to the other. The agricultural counties are covered all over with parish churches, and with people thinly distributed here and there. Only look at the two counties of Dorset and Durham. Dorset contains 1005 square miles; Durham contains 1061 square miles. Dorset has 271 parishes; Durham has 75 parishes. The population of Dorset is scattered55 all over the whole county; there being no town of any magnitude in it. The population of Durham, though larger than that of Dorset, is almost all gathered together at the mouths of the Tyne, the Wear, and the Tees. Northumberland has 1871 square miles; and Suffolk has 1512 square miles. Northumberland has eighty-eight parishes; and Suffolk has five hundred and ten parishes. So here is a county one-third part smaller than that of Northumberland, with six times as many villages in it! What comparison is there to be made between states of society so essentially56 different? What rule is there, with regard to population and poor-laws, which can apply to both cases? * * * Blind and thoughtless must that man be, who imagines that all but farms in the south[124] are unproductive. I much question whether, taking a strip three miles each way from the road, coming from Newcastle to Alnwick, an equal quantity of what is called waste ground in Surrey, together with the cottages that skirt it, do not exceed such strip of ground in point of produce. Yes; the cows, pigs, geese, poultry57, gardens, bees, and fuel that arise from these wastes, far exceed, even in the capacity of sustaining people, similar breadths of ground, distributed into these large farms, in the poorer parts of Northumberland. I have seen not less than ten thousand geese in one tract44 of common, in about six miles, going from Chobham towards Farnham in Surrey. I believe these geese alone, raised entirely58 by care and the common, to be worth more than the clear profit that can be drawn59 from any similar breadth of land between Morpeth and Alnwick.”
There are two important particulars connected with this statement: one regards the sustenance60 of life, and the other morals. Much has been said of the morals of the hinds of Northumberland under this system, and in the main their morals may be good; but one or two facts I can state, as it regards the morals of the common people in general in both counties. In going over this very ground, of which Cobbett has been speaking, we witnessed such a scene as we never witnessed in any other part of England. We had taken our places in an afternoon coach, going from Newcastle to Morpeth. It was market-day, and we had not proceeded far out of Newcastle when we found that the coach in which we were, had actually two-and-thirty passengers. They consisted of country-people returning from market, who were taken up principally on the road. There were nine inside, and twenty-three outside; six of whom sat piled on each other’s knees, on the driving-box! The greater part of them were drunk; and the number of tipsy fellows staggering along the road, exceeded what we ever saw in any other quarter. We happened to be too at Alnwick fair, and we never saw the farmers and drovers more freely indulge in drink and noise. Moreover, from Alnwick to Belford we had a wealthy farmer in the coach, who was raving62 drunk, shouted out of the windows, chafed63 like a wild beast in a cage, and presented a spectacle such as I have never seen in a coach elsewhere. So much for the morals of that region.
But Cobbett had not yet seen the finest lands, or got a glimpse[125] of the Bondage System. He still goes on expressing his astonishment64 at the solitude, the vast farms with their steam thrashing-machines; “so that the elements seem to be pressed into the amiable65 service of sweeping66 the people from the earth, in order that the whole amount may go into the hands of a small number of persons, that they may squander67 it at London, Paris, or Rome.” It was only after he had traversed the Lothians that the full discovery broke upon him; so that, after all, he never seems to have perceived that the Bondage System was prevalent in England, but speaks of it as exclusively a Scotch system. There is every reason to believe it a relic68 of ancient feudalism; but it is certain that but for the doctrines69 of the Edinburgh Economists70 it would have long ago vanished from our soil. When Cobbett arrived at Edinburgh, there he seemed to take breath, and clear his lungs for a good tirade71 against the system; which he does thus, in his first letter to the Chopsticks of the south. “This city is fifty-six miles from the Tweed, which separates England from Scotland. I have come through the country in a post-chaise, stopped one night upon the road, and have made every inquiry, in order that I might be able to ascertain72 the exact state of the labourers on the land. With the exception of about seven miles, the land is the finest that I ever saw in my life, though I have seen every fine vale in every county in England, and in the United States of America. I never saw any land a tenth-part so good. You will know what the land is, when I tell you that it is by no means uncommon73 for it to produce seven English quarters of wheat upon one English acre; and forty tons of turnips74 upon one English acre; and that there are, almost in every half mile, from fifty to a hundred acres of turnips in one piece, sometimes white turnips, and sometimes Swedes; all in rows, as straight as a line, and without a weed to be seen in any of these beautiful fields.
“Oh! how you will wish to be here! ‘Lord,’ you will say to yourselves, ‘what pretty villages there must be; what nice churches and churchyards. Oh! and what preciously nice alehouses! Come, Jack75, let us set off to Scotland! What nice gardens we shall have to our cottages there! What beautiful flowers our wives will have, climbing up about the windows, and on both sides of the paths leading from the wicket up to the door! And what[126] prancing76 and barking pigs we shall have running out upon the common, and what a flock of geese grazing upon the green!’
“Stop! stop! I have not come to listen to you, but to make you listen to me. Let me tell you, then, that there is neither village, nor church, nor alehouse, nor garden, nor cottage, nor flowers, nor pig, nor goose, nor common, nor green; but the thing is thus:—1. The farms of a whole county are, generally speaking, the property of one lord. 2. They are so large, that the corn-stacks frequently amount to more than a hundred upon one farm, each stack having in it, on an average, from fifteen to twenty English quarters of corn. 3. The farmer’s house is a house big enough and fine enough for a gentleman to live in; the farm-yard is a square, with buildings on the sides of it for horses, cattle, and implements77; the stack-yard is on one side of this, the stacks all in rows, and the place as big as a little town. 4. On the side of the farm-yard next to the stack-yard, there is a place to thrash the corn in; and there is, close by this, always a thrashing-machine, sometimes worked by horses, sometimes by water, sometimes by wind, and sometimes by steam, there being no such thing as a barn or a flail78 in the whole country.
“‘Well,’ say you, ‘but out of such a quantity of corn, and of beef, and of mutton, there must some come to the share of the chopsticks, to be sure!’ Don’t be too sure yet; but hold your tongue, and hear my story. The single labourers are kept in this manner: about four of them are put into a shed, quite away from the farm-house, and out of the farm-yard; which shed, Dr. Jameson, in his Dictionary, calls a ‘boothie,’ a place, says he, where labouring servants are lodged79. A boothie means a little booth; and here these men live and sleep, having a certain allowance of oat, barley, and pea meal, upon which they live, mixing it with water, or with milk when they are allowed the use of a cow, which they have to milk themselves. They are allowed some little matter of money besides, to buy clothes with, but never dream of being allowed to set foot within the walls of the farm-house. They hire for the year, under very severe punishment in case of misbehaviour, or quitting service; and cannot have fresh service, without a character from the last master, and also from the minister of the parish!
“Pretty well that for a knife and fork chopstick of Sussex, who[127] has been used to sit round the fire with the master and mistress, and pull about and tickle80 the laughing maids! Pretty well that! But it is the life of the married labourer that will delight you. Upon a steam-engine farm, there are perhaps eight or ten of these. There is, at a considerable distance from the farm-yard, a sort of barrack erected81 for these to live in. It is a long shed, stone walls and pantile roof, and divided into a certain number of boothies, each having a door and one little window, all the doors being on one side of the shed, and there being no back-doors; no such thing, for them, appears ever to be thought of. The ground in front of the shed is wide or narrow according to circumstances, but quite smooth; merely a place to walk upon. Each distinct boothie is about seventeen feet one way, and fifteen feet the other way, as nearly as my eye could determine. There is no ceiling, and no floor but the earth. In this place, a man and his wife and family have to live. When they go into it there is nothing but the four bare walls, and the tiles over their head, and a small fireplace. To make the most of the room, they at their own cost erect82 berths83, like those in a barrack-room, which they get up into when they go to bed; and here they are, a man, and his wife, and a parcel of children, squeezed up in this miserable84 hole, with their meal and their washing tackle, and all their other things; and yet it is quite surprising how decent the women endeavour to keep the place. These women, for I found all the men out at work, appeared to be most industrious85 creatures, to be extremely obliging, and of good disposition86; and the shame is, that they are permitted to enjoy so small a portion of the fruit of all their labours, of all their cares.
“But if their dwelling-places be bad, their food is worse, being fed upon exactly that which we feed hogs87 and horses upon. The married man receives in money about four pounds for the whole year: and he has besides sixty bushels of oats, thirty bushels of barley, twelve bushels of peas, and three bushels of potatoes, with ground allowed him to plant the potatoes. The master gives him the keep of a cow the year round; but he must find the cow himself; he pays for his own fuel; he must find a woman to reap for twenty whole days in the harvest, as payment for the rent of his boothie. He has no wheat,—the meal altogether amounts to about[128] six pounds for every day in the year; the oatmeal is eaten in porridge; the barley-meal and pea-meal are mixed together, and baked into a sort of cakes, upon an iron plate put over the fire; they sometimes get a pig, and feed it upon the potatoes.
“Thus they never have one bit of wheaten bread, or of wheaten flour, nor of beef, nor mutton, though the land is covered with wheat and with cattle. The hiring is for a year, beginning on the 26th of May, and not at Michaelmas. The farmer takes the man just at the season to get the sweat out of him; and if he dies, he dies when the main work is done. The labourer is wholly at the mercy of the master, who, if he will not keep him beyond the year, can totally ruin him, by refusing him a character. The cow is a thing more in name than in reality; she may be about to calve when the 26th of May comes: the wife may be in such a situation as to make removal perilous88 to her life. This family has no home; and no home can any man be said to have, who can thus be dislodged every year of his life at the will of his master. It frequently happens, that the poor creatures are compelled to sell their cow for next to nothing; and, indeed, the necessity of character from the last employer, makes the man a real slave, worse off than the negro by many degrees; for here there is neither law to ensure him relief, nor motive89 in the master to attend to his health, or to preserve his life.
“Six days from daylight to dark these good, and laborious90, and patient, and kind people labour. On an average they have six English miles to go to church. Here are therefore twelve miles to walk on Sunday; and the consequence is, that they very seldom go. But, say you, what do they do with all the wheat, and all the beef, and all the mutton? and what becomes of all the money that they are sold for? Why, the cattle and sheep walk into England upon their legs; the wheat is put into ships to be sent to London or elsewhere; and as to the money, the farmer is allowed to have a little of it, but almost the whole of it is sent to the landlord, to be gambled, or otherwise squandered91 away at London, at Paris, or at Rome. The rent of the land is enormous; four, five, six, or seven pounds for an English acre. The farmer is not allowed to get much; almost the whole goes into the pockets of the lords; the labourers are their slaves, and the farmers their slave-drivers. The[129] farm-yards are, in fact, factories for making corn and meat, carried on principally by the means of horses and machinery. There are no people; and these men seem to think that people are not necessary to a state. I came over a tract of country a great deal bigger than the county of Suffolk, with only three towns in it, and a couple of villages, while the county of Suffolk has 29 market-towns and 491 villages. Yet our precious government seems to wish to reduce England to the state of this part of Scotland; and you are abused and reproached, and called ignorant, because you will not reside in a boothie, and live upon the food which we give to horses and hogs.” pp. 102-7.
This is the description of one of the most accurate observers of all that related to the working man that ever lived. Such is the comparison which he draws between the condition of the hinds, and of the southern chopsticks. Such is his opinion of the superior condition of the southern peasantry, that he says he would not be the man who should propose to one of them to adopt the condition of a hind, especially if the fellow should have a bill-hook in his hand. Cobbett’s description is as accurate as it is graphic. Let any one compare it with my own in the early part of this paper, made from personal observation in the summer of 1836. Such was the painful impression left upon Cobbett’s mind, that he reverts92 to it again and again. He tells us of a visit made to a farm near Dunfermline, and of the wretched abodes and food of the men he found there; but the last extract contains the substance of the Bondage System.
Let it be understood that the system to the Bondagers, so called, is no hardship. They are principally girls from sixteen to twenty years of age. Full of health and spirits, and glad enough to range over the farm fields in a troop, with a stout93 young fellow, laughing and gossiping,—the grievance94 is none of theirs; but the poor hind’s, who has to maintain them. Just when his family becomes large, and he has need of all his earnings95 to feed, and clothe, and educate his troop of children, then he is compelled to hire and maintain a woman to eat up his children’s food; and to take away in her wages that little pittance96 of cash that is allowed him, as many a wife with tears in her eyes has said, “to clothe the puir bairns and put them to school.” But the system is not without[130] its injurious effect on the Bondager herself. It has been said that the Bondagers are of service in the hind’s cottage, but the wives over the whole space where the bondage system prevails tell you that the Bondagers are of little or no use in the house. They look upon themselves as hired to work on the farm, and they neither are very willing to work in the house, nor very capable. They get out-of-door tastes and habits; they loathe97 the confinement98 of the house; they dislike its duties. “They are fit only,” say the women, to “mind the bairns a bit about the door.” And this is one of the evils of the system. Instead of women brought up to manage a house, to care for children, to make a fireside comfortable, and to manage the domestic resources well, they come to housekeeping ignorant, unprepared, and in a great measure disqualified for it. They can hoe turnips and potatoes to a miracle, but know very little about the most approved methods of cooking them. They can rake hay better than comb children’s hair; drive a cart or a harrow with a better grace than rock a cradle, and help more nimbly in the barn than in the ingle.
The two points of most importance are those of the hind’s being compelled to have a character from the last master, and of being at his mercy, to turn him not only out of employ, but out of house and home. I think little of their having no wheaten flour. Many a hardy100 race of peasants, and even farmers, both in Scotland and England, in mountain districts, never see any thing in the shape of bread but oat-cake. In Lancashire, Yorkshire, Cumberland, and the Peak of Derbyshire, there are thousands that would not thank you for wheaten bread. The girdle-cakes, as they call them, which the wives of the hinds make, of mixed barley and pea meal, I frequently ate of and enjoyed. They are about an inch thick, and eight or ten inches in diameter, and taste perceptibly of the pea. These, and milk, are a simple, but not a despicable food; but the fact, that these poor people must bring a character from the last master before they can be employed again, is one which may seem at first sight a reasonable demand, but is in fact the binding101 link of a most subtle and consummate102 slavery. I have seen the effect of this system in the Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire collieries. There, amongst the master colliers, a combination was entered into, and for aught I know still exists, to regulate the price of coal, and[131] the quantity each master should relatively103 get. This rule, that no man should be employed except he brought a character from his last master, was adopted; and what was the consequence? That every man was the bounden slave of him in whose employment he was; and that soon the price of coals was raised to three times their actual value, and the labour of the men restricted to about three half-days, or a day and a half, per week.
Let any one imagine a body of men bound by one common interest, holding in their possession all the population of several counties, and subjecting their men to this rule. Can there be a more positive despotism? The hind is at the mercy of the caprice, the anger, or the cupidity104 of the man in whose hand he is; and if he dismiss him, as I said in the early part of this paper, where is he to go? As Cobbett justly remarks, he has No Home; and nothing but utter and irretrievable ruin is before him. Such a condition is unfit for any Englishman; such power as that of the master no man ought to hold. A condition like this must generate a slavish character. Can that noble independence of feeling belong to a hind, which is the boast of the humblest Englishman, while he holds employment, home, character, everything at the utter mercy of another? I have now laid before the reader the combined evidence of my own observation and that of a great observer of the working classes, both in town and country, in the north and the south, and I leave it to the judgment106 of any man whether such a system is good or bad: but I cannot help picturing to myself what would be the consequence of the spread of this system of large farm and bondage all over England. Let us suppose, as we must in that case, almost all our working population cooped up in large towns in shops and factories, and all the country thrown into large farms to provide them with corn—what an England would it then be! The poetry and the picturesque23 of rural life would be annihilated107; the delicious cottages and gardens, the open common, and the shouting of children would vanish; the scores of sweet old-fashioned hamlets, where an humble105 sociality and primitive108 simplicity109 yet remain, would no more be found; all those charms and amenities110 of country life, which have inspired poets and patriots111 with strains and with deeds that have crowned England with half her glory, would have perished; all that series of gradations of rank and[132] character, from the plough-boy and the milk-maid, the free labourer, the yeoman, the small farmer, the substantial farmer, up to the gentleman, would have gone too;
And a bold peasantry, its country’s pride,
would be replaced by a race of stupid and sequacious112 slaves, tilling the solitary113 lands of vast landholders, who must become selfish and hardened in their natures, from the want of all those claims upon their better sympathies which the more varied114 state of society at present presents. The question, therefore, does not merely involve the comforts of the hind, but the welfare and character of the country at large; and I think no man who desires England not merely to maintain its noble reputation, but to advance in social wisdom and benevolence115, can wish for the wider spread, or even the continuance of the Bondage System. I think all must unite with me in saying, let the very name perish from the plains of England, where it sounds like a Siberian word.[4] Let labour be free; and this Truck System of the agriculturists be abolished, not by Act of Parliament, but by public principle and sound policy. It is a system which wrongs all parties. It wrongs the hind, for it robs his children of comfort and knowledge; it wrongs the farmer, for what he saves in labour he pays in rent, while he gains only the character of a taskmaster; and it wrongs the landholder, for it puts his petty pecuniary116 interest into the balance against his honour and integrity; and causes him to be regarded as a tyrant117, in hearts where he might be honoured as a natural protector, and revered118 as a father.
[4] Since the publication of the former edition of this work, I understand the name has been changed; that, in May 1839, it was agreed to call the Bondagers Woman’s-workers; a clumsy appellation119, and which does not at all do away with anything more in the system than its name.
This account of the Bondage System in the first edition, excited, as was to be expected, a strong feeling in the public mind, both in the north and the south. In the south great surprise, for it was a system totally unknown to nine-tenths of readers; in the north great indignation on the part of the supporters of the[133] system. I have received many conflicting statements from the Bondage district,—some thanking me for having made public so accurate a description of an objectionable system; others vindicating120 the system, and applauding it. I need not here notice those communications which accorded with my own personal observations and inquiries; but as my object is simply truth, I am more desirous to give a counter-statement, so that all readers may draw their own inferences. The most able, and in itself most interesting, defence of the system, I received from the lady of John Grey, Esq. of Dilstone House, Northumberland. Mr. Grey is well known as an active magistrate121, an eminent122 agriculturist and promoter of the interests of the agricultural class; and Mrs. Grey is evidently a lady of a vigorous intellect and a noble nature. She is a native of Northumberland, proud of her county, and thoroughly123 persuaded of the excellence124 of its agricultural system. I regret that my space will not permit me to give more than a very summary notice of her vindication125, nor more than a mere15 reference to the documents by Mr. Grey, Mr. Gilly of Norham, the author of the “Life of Felix Neff,” and Mr. Blackden of Ford61 Castle, which, however, may be found in Mr. Frederick Hill’s works on National Education, under the head of “Northern District.”
Mrs. Grey denies that Cobbett, though a graphic writer, is an accurate one. She denies that a character is required with a hind from his last master, but merely a certificate called “The Lines,” stating that he is free from his former service. She asserts that all hinds have gardens; and that Bondagers make good domestic servants, and wives. She reports that Mr. Grey only remembers two instances of his hinds receiving parochial relief, and adds that she never saw two instances of their own hinds being intoxicated126.
But her description of the cottages of hinds and their way of life, is perfectly127 Arcadian. “In a glance at cottage life in Northumberland, such as 20 years of intimate observation has shewn it to me, let me introduce you into one of the ‘miserable holes’ where, according to Cobbett, this ‘slave population’ are ‘squeezed up.’ Observe, if you please, its furniture. There are a couple of neatly128 painted or fir-wood press-beds; a dresser and shelves, on which are ranged a goodly display of well-hoarded delf, or of modern blue-and-white Staffordshire ware42. There is[134] also a press or cupboard, in which are kept the nicer articles of food, and below which are drawers for the clothes of the family. A clock, in a handsome oaken case, ticks, not behind the door, but in some conspicuous129 situation; and, in many families, is added a mahogany half-chest of drawers for the female finery. I admit that the houses are generally too small, and the want of a back-door and a commodious130 second apartment, are great evils; but this is the landlord’s blame; and my object is only to shew that the hind, though esteemed131 by you ‘many degrees worse than a negro,’ has yet the means of making these insufficient132 abodes look most respectable and comfortable. The press-beds form a partition, behind which is a small space containing in one part a bed for the Bondager, and in another, a little dairy and pantry containing stores of meat, flour, etc. This space ought to be larger, and to form a second respectable apartment, but, such as it is, it is well filled with the necessaries of life, which is no small matter to the inhabitant. We might censure133, too, the matted ceiling, were not the eye immediately attracted from it by the plentiful134 store of bacon which hangs below it, together with hanging shelves containing a supply of cheeses, pot-herbs, etc., and in other parts bunches of yarn135 ready for making into stockings or blankets. Then, as to clothing, the men on Sundays are both respectably and handsomely dressed, and the women,—yes, these very ‘slaves’, the Bondagers, may be seen with their light print or Merino gowns, their winter’s plaid, and their summer’s Thibet, or spun136 silk shawls; their Tuscan or Dunstable bonnets137; and their open-work cotton stockings, or smart boots. A tawdry figure is a rare sight; the generality are comfortably and neatly attired138, and their dress good in quality.
“When the ‘slave-gangs’ are at work in the fields under their ‘driver’ in winter, they are certainly a motley and uncouth139 group; many of them having on their fathers’ great coats, and others long woollen dresses, reaching to their ankles, above their other clothes, to defend them from the cold. But in summer, the jaunty140 air of their short white, or light cotton jackets, an article of dress which has somewhat the appearance of the waist of a lady’s riding-habit, with its open collar displaying a gay handkerchief beneath, with their pink or blue gingham petticoats, give them quite a picturesque appearance.
[135]
“I should like to shew you too, what a pleasant sight it is when you pay a visit of enquiry on the occasion of a birth. You will find the mother laid among her well-bleached sheets, and comfortable home-made blankets, surmounted141 by a gaily-patched quilt; and though you may be no admirer—as gentlemen seldom are—of new-born babies, yet, when the little thing is brought out of its snug cradle for your inspection142, you cannot but cast an approving glance on its nicely-plaited cap, and the warm flannels143 and neatly made frock (often ornamented144 with braiding), which bespeak145 it the child of competence146 and comfort. The Bondager too is there, rather dressed for the occasion (though ‘said by the wives to be of little or no use to them’), it being customary for her to stay at home to look after the house and nurse the mother, till she is well enough to resume her duties. Should it be a first-born, you are invited to inspect the baby’s wardrobe, and there is little appearance of wretchedness in the sufficient stock of neat little garments ‘laid up in lavender’ for the little stranger. It is expected, too, that you should drink the child’s health, and a bottle of wine or spirits is produced from the cupboard, along with a noble cheese, and a loaf to match it, which it would be thought very ‘mean’ not to have to offer on such occasions.” Mrs. Grey luxuriates in descriptions of the “white loaf which the women always have, and the dainty white cake for tea, kneaded with butter or cream, when a friend comes to visit them; of the fat things with which their cows and their pigs overflow147 their dairy and larder148; of their general good fare; and of the many days when the Bondager is not at field-work, but stays to spin, knit, wash and iron for the household,— always milking the cow, and frequently churning and making cheese.” She adds that the hinds’ wives make great profit of their butter, about 5l. a year; and that they have “great spinning matches, and spin all the woollen articles that they use.”
Mr. Grey in “Two Letters on the State of the Agricultural Interests, and the Condition of the Labouring Poor,” published by Ridgway, London, 1831, draws a similar picture, describing the hind’s cottage as “a scene of comfort and contentment.”
Now these hinds must be very unreasonable149 fellows. Spite of all their bounteous150 and Arcadian lot; spite of their cottages being “scenes of comfort and contentment,” they certainly were, as[136] described in the preceding pages, found by us, in 1836, in a most discontented state. And since then they have turned out in great numbers, calling upon their employers to abolish the system. In public meetings held at Wooller, and elsewhere, they described their situation as wretched, and their average weekly gains at about 5s. 63?4d. Mr. L. Hindmarsh, in a paper on the Bondage System, read at Newcastle, in August, 1838, bears testimony151 to the great dissatisfaction of the hinds. Mr. Grey, in his pamphlet alluded152 to above, states, on the other hand, that the “conditions” of the hind, as they are called, were in 1831, the year of its publication, as follows; and that however the market-price may vary the quantities are invariably the same, and always of the very best quality; varying with the price of grain from ￡30 to ￡40 a year.
￡. s. d.
36 bushels of oats ?6 12 ?0
24 ditto barley ?5 12 ?0
12 ditto peas ?3 ?0 ?0
3 ditto wheat ?1 ?5 ?0
3 ditto rye ?0 15 ?0
36 ditto potatoes, at 1s. 6d. ?2 14 ?0
24 pounds of wool ?1 ?0 ?0
A cow’s keep for the year ?9 ?0 ?0
Cottage and garden ?3 ?0 ?0
Coals, carrying from the pit ?2 ?0 ?0
Cash ?3 10 ?0
￡ 38 ?8 ?0
This is also exclusive of what the other branches of the family earn; the females receiving 10d. or 1s. a day generally, and 2s. or 2s. 6d. in harvest.
Besides the general discontent and turn-out just noticed, which Mrs. Grey attributes to the waywardness of human nature, we must introduce these facts. The morals of these districts have been highly extolled153, and both Mr. and Mrs. Grey strongly reiterate154 the eulogium. Mrs. Grey does not recollect155 two instances of intoxication156 amongst the hinds in her life; we saw many one day, as already stated. In the Fourth Annual Report of the Poor Law Commissioners157, even while advocating “the hinding system,” we find these singular paragraphs: “Whatever general merits may or[137] may not otherwise have distinguished158 Northumberland and Durham from more pauperized districts, these counties must not lay claim to superiority in reference to bastardy159, for in no part of England was bastardy more prevalent than in portions of this district, and in none was the practice of relief to the mother more pertinaciously160 upheld. The Newcastle parishes of All Saints’ and St. Andrews, together with the parishes of Sunderland and Berwick, are the only places we can call to mind where a weekly allowance for every legitimate161 child was not a matter of course.
“The difficulties of inducing children in competent circumstances to contribute to the support of their aged162 parents (whose maintenance the parish had hitherto taken off their hands), were quite as great, if not relatively greater, considering the wages of labour, in the north as in the south.”
So much for morals; now for the Arcadian cottages. The Newcastle Courant of November 23d, 1838, stated that “Thomas Dodds, Esq., surgeon, read a very valuable paper on ‘Improvement in Cottage Architecture, and the domestic comfort of the peasantry of North Northumberland.’ Mr. Dodds’ long personal observation, arising from his medical practice,” it is stated, “peculiarly qualified99 him for the discussion of this important and interesting subject,” and Mr. Dodds very summarily and pithily163 characterized these abodes as “a disgrace to Northumberland.” He contrasted them with “the splendid edifices164, commemorative columns, and magnificent streets, which the people of Northumberland are raising.” He said, “The miserable tenements165 of numbers of this class are less carefully constructed than the stables of their horses, formed, as they are, in a majority of cases, of only one apartment, open to the roof, with earthen floor, and four-paned windows that dim the light of day, a part of which is often occupied by the cow; and where the decencies of life cannot be observed, there being no separate apartments for the females of the family, one of whom is often a stranger in the capacity of a servant to work ‘the bondage.’” He represented them equally detrimental166 to health as to comfort and morals; and gave many instances from personal observation, especially a case at that moment of a family of eight persons, near Alnwick, all lying ill of typhus fever in their one room with the corpse167 of one of them laid out in the midst of them. He added a[138] ludicrous anecdote168 of a cow which, in the night, leaped, in some sudden fear, from its fastening behind the bed of a hind at Hawkhill, right through the bed, and alighted on the hearth169, bringing the bed at one crash upon the people in it, and severely170 injuring the man’s wife. Mr. Dodds called the attention of his hearers to some cottages of the Duke of Northumberland erected at Brislee, as models for cottage architecture, and strongly urged that “the hinds should be no longer compelled to seek in sleep and oblivion the only solace171 of his cheerless dwelling,” but have “an ingle blinking bonnily,” where he might “spend his hours of relaxation172 in innocent amusements, or in reading books suited to his way of life.”
“A vote of thanks to Mr. Dodds for this address was moved by John Lambert, Esq., and carried by acclamation.”
What then are we to infer from these very conflicting statements? Why, that where the people are discontented, and the appeal to their wealthy neighbours on their behalf is received with acclamation,—the evil must be the actual condition, and the “cottage scenes of comfort and contentment,” the exceptions. Mrs. Grey admits that she “has endeavoured to present the sunny side of the picture as the reverse of my gloomy one.” I can well believe that she lives on the sunny side of humanity; and that her enlightened husband, and the most liberal portion of the agriculturists, so treat their hinds as to form the exception. It is only another proof of the wisdom of Pope’s words that “whate’er is best administered is best.” That, under a pure despotism, people may be perfectly happy if they happen to have a kind tyrant. That the hinds under the bondage system may be, moral, flourishing, and happy, when they have kind and sympathizing employers but that does not prove that the system itself has a tendency to such happy results, nor consequently remove our objections to it. Any condition of the people is good where Christian173 benevolence and enlightened regard are exercised towards them, and any system, even the bondage system, is better than that deadly neglect of the peasantry by the landowners, which too much prevails in many parts of the south.
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1
bondage
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| n.奴役，束缚 | |
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northward
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| adv.向北；n.北方的地区 | |
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recur
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| vi.复发，重现，再发生 | |
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provincial
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| adj.省的，地方的；n．外省人，乡下人 | |
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astounding
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| adj.使人震惊的vt.使震惊，使大吃一惊astound的现在分词) | |
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6
inquiry
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| n.打听，询问，调查，查问 | |
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irresistibly
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| adv.无法抵抗地，不能自持地；极为诱惑人地 | |
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dressing
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| n.(食物)调料；包扎伤口的用品，敷料 | |
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hinds
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| n.（常指动物腿）后面的( hind的名词复数 )；在后的；（通常与can或could连用）唠叨不停；滔滔不绝 | |
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10
hind
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| adj.后面的，后部的 | |
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barley
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| n.大麦，大麦粒 | |
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hereditary
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| adj.遗传的，遗传性的，可继承的，世袭的 | |
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13
descended
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| a.为...后裔的，出身于...的 | |
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14
mitigated
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| v.减轻，缓和( mitigate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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15
mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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16
favourable
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| adj.赞成的，称赞的，有利的，良好的，顺利的 | |
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17
onward
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| adj.向前的，前进的；adv.向前，前进，在先 | |
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18
virtue
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| n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力 | |
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19
candid
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| adj.公正的，正直的；坦率的 | |
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20
crest
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| n.顶点；饰章；羽冠；vt.达到顶点；vi.形成浪尖 | |
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21
scotch
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| n.伤口，刻痕；苏格兰威士忌酒；v.粉碎，消灭，阻止；adj.苏格兰(人)的 | |
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22
boiler
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| n.锅炉；煮器(壶，锅等) | |
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23
picturesque
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| adj.美丽如画的，（语言）生动的，绘声绘色的 | |
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picturesqueness
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25
herd
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| n.兽群，牧群；vt.使集中，把…赶在一起 | |
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26
herds
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| 兽群( herd的名词复数 )； 牧群； 人群； 群众 | |
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27
snug
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| adj.温暖舒适的，合身的，安全的；v.使整洁干净，舒适地依靠，紧贴；n.（英）酒吧里的私房 | |
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28
formerly
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| adv.从前，以前 | |
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29
strings
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| n.弦 | |
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30
galled
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| v.使…擦痛( gall的过去式和过去分词 )；擦伤；烦扰；侮辱 | |
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31
crooks
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| n.骗子( crook的名词复数 )；罪犯；弯曲部分；（牧羊人或主教用的）弯拐杖v.弯成钩形( crook的第三人称单数 ) | |
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attic
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| n.顶楼，屋顶室 | |
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mattresses
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| 褥垫，床垫( mattress的名词复数 ) | |
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34
coved
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| v.小海湾( cove的过去分词 )；家伙 | |
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35
dismal
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| adj.阴沉的，凄凉的，令人忧郁的，差劲的 | |
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36
abodes
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| 住所( abode的名词复数 )； 公寓； （在某地的）暂住； 逗留 | |
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dreary
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| adj.令人沮丧的，沉闷的，单调乏味的 | |
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38
embellish
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| v.装饰，布置；给…添加细节，润饰 | |
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39
acquiescence
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| n.默许；顺从 | |
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40
inquiries
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| n.调查( inquiry的名词复数 )；疑问；探究；打听 | |
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graphic
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| adj.生动的，形象的，绘画的，文字的，图表的 | |
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42
ware
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| n.(常用复数)商品，货物 | |
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43
destitute
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| adj.缺乏的；穷困的 | |
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44
tract
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| n.传单，小册子，大片(土地或森林) | |
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45
tracts
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| 大片土地( tract的名词复数 )； 地带； （体内的）道； （尤指宣扬宗教、伦理或政治的）短文 | |
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46
fully
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| adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地 | |
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47
solitude
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| n. 孤独; 独居,荒僻之地,幽静的地方 | |
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48
worthy
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| adj.(of)值得的，配得上的；有价值的 | |
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49
dwelling
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| n.住宅，住所，寓所 | |
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50
hurdle
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| n.跳栏，栏架；障碍，困难；vi.进行跨栏赛 | |
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51
machinery
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| n.(总称)机械，机器；机构 | |
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52
chancellor
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| n.(英)大臣；法官；(德、奥)总理；大学校长 | |
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53
prattle
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| n.闲谈；v.（小孩般）天真无邪地说话；发出连续而无意义的声音 | |
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54
speculative
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| adj.思索性的，暝想性的，推理的 | |
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55
scattered
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| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
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56
essentially
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| adv.本质上，实质上，基本上 | |
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57
poultry
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| n.家禽，禽肉 | |
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58
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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59
drawn
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| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
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sustenance
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| n.食物，粮食；生活资料；生计 | |
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Ford
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| n.浅滩，水浅可涉处；v.涉水，涉过 | |
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62
raving
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| adj.说胡话的；疯狂的，怒吼的；非常漂亮的；令人醉心[痴心]的v.胡言乱语(rave的现在分词)n.胡话；疯话adv.胡言乱语地；疯狂地 | |
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63
chafed
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| v.擦热（尤指皮肤）( chafe的过去式 )；擦痛；发怒；惹怒 | |
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64
astonishment
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| n.惊奇，惊异 | |
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amiable
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| adj.和蔼可亲的，友善的，亲切的 | |
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66
sweeping
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| adj.范围广大的，一扫无遗的 | |
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67
squander
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| v.浪费，挥霍 | |
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relic
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| n.神圣的遗物，遗迹，纪念物 | |
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69
doctrines
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| n.教条( doctrine的名词复数 )；教义；学说；（政府政策的）正式声明 | |
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70
economists
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| n.经济学家，经济专家( economist的名词复数 ) | |
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71
tirade
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| n.冗长的攻击性演说 | |
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72
ascertain
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| vt.发现，确定，查明，弄清 | |
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73
uncommon
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| adj.罕见的，非凡的，不平常的 | |
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74
turnips
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| 芜青( turnip的名词复数 )； 芜菁块根； 芜菁甘蓝块根； 怀表 | |
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75
jack
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| n.插座，千斤顶，男人；v.抬起，提醒，扛举；n.（Jake）杰克 | |
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76
prancing
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| v.（马）腾跃( prance的现在分词 ) | |
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77
implements
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| n.工具( implement的名词复数 )；家具；手段；[法律]履行（契约等）v.实现( implement的第三人称单数 )；执行；贯彻；使生效 | |
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78
flail
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| v.用连枷打；击打；n.连枷（脱粒用的工具） | |
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79
lodged
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| v.存放( lodge的过去式和过去分词 )；暂住；埋入；（权利、权威等）归属 | |
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80
tickle
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| v.搔痒，胳肢；使高兴；发痒；n.搔痒，发痒 | |
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81
ERECTED
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| adj. 直立的，竖立的，笔直的 vt. 使 ... 直立，建立 | |
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82
erect
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| n./v.树立，建立，使竖立；adj.直立的，垂直的 | |
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83
berths
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| n.（船、列车等的）卧铺( berth的名词复数 )；（船舶的）停泊位或锚位；差事；船台vt.v.停泊( berth的第三人称单数 )；占铺位 | |
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84
miserable
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| adj.悲惨的，痛苦的；可怜的，糟糕的 | |
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85
industrious
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| adj.勤劳的，刻苦的，奋发的 | |
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86
disposition
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| n.性情，性格；意向，倾向；排列，部署 | |
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87
hogs
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| n.（尤指喂肥供食用的）猪( hog的名词复数 )；（供食用的）阉公猪；彻底地做某事；自私的或贪婪的人 | |
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88
perilous
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| adj.危险的，冒险的 | |
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89
motive
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| n.动机，目的；adv.发动的，运动的 | |
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90
laborious
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| adj.吃力的，努力的，不流畅 | |
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91
squandered
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| v.（指钱，财产等）浪费，乱花( squander的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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92
reverts
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| 恢复( revert的第三人称单数 )； 重提； 回到…上； 归还 | |
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94
grievance
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| n.怨愤，气恼，委屈 | |
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95
earnings
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| n.工资收人；利润，利益，所得 | |
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96
pittance
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| n.微薄的薪水，少量 | |
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97
loathe
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| v.厌恶，嫌恶 | |
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98
confinement
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| n.幽禁，拘留，监禁；分娩；限制，局限 | |
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99
qualified
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| adj.合格的，有资格的，胜任的，有限制的 | |
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100
hardy
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| adj.勇敢的，果断的，吃苦的；耐寒的 | |
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101
binding
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| 有约束力的，有效的，应遵守的 | |
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102
consummate
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| adj.完美的；v.成婚；使完美 [反]baffle | |
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103
relatively
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| adv.比较...地，相对地 | |
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104
cupidity
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| n.贪心，贪财 | |
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105
humble
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| adj.谦卑的，恭顺的；地位低下的；v.降低，贬低 | |
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106
judgment
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| n.审判；判断力，识别力，看法，意见 | |
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107
annihilated
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| v.（彻底）消灭( annihilate的过去式和过去分词 )；使无效；废止；彻底击溃 | |
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108
primitive
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| adj.原始的；简单的；n.原(始)人，原始事物 | |
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109
simplicity
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| n.简单，简易；朴素；直率，单纯 | |
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110
amenities
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| n.令人愉快的事物；礼仪；礼节；便利设施；礼仪( amenity的名词复数 )；便利设施；（环境等的）舒适；（性情等的）愉快 | |
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111
patriots
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| 爱国者，爱国主义者( patriot的名词复数 ) | |
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112
sequacious
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| adj.前后一致的；盲从的；顺从的 | |
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113
solitary
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| adj.孤独的，独立的，荒凉的；n.隐士 | |
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114
varied
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| adj.多样的，多变化的 | |
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115
benevolence
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| n.慈悲，捐助 | |
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116
pecuniary
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| adj.金钱的；金钱上的 | |
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117
tyrant
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| n.暴君，专制的君主，残暴的人 | |
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118
revered
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| v.崇敬，尊崇，敬畏( revere的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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119
appellation
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| n.名称，称呼 | |
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120
vindicating
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| v.澄清（某人/某事物）受到的责难或嫌疑( vindicate的现在分词 )；表明或证明（所争辩的事物）属实、正当、有效等；维护 | |
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121
magistrate
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| n.地方行政官，地方法官，治安官 | |
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122
eminent
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| adj.显赫的，杰出的，有名的，优良的 | |
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123
thoroughly
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| adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地 | |
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124
excellence
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| n.优秀，杰出，(pl.)优点，美德 | |
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125
vindication
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| n.洗冤，证实 | |
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126
intoxicated
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| 喝醉的，极其兴奋的 | |
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127
perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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128
neatly
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| adv.整洁地，干净地，灵巧地，熟练地 | |
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129
conspicuous
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| adj.明眼的，惹人注目的；炫耀的，摆阔气的 | |
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130
commodious
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| adj.宽敞的；使用方便的 | |
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131
esteemed
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| adj.受人尊敬的v.尊敬( esteem的过去式和过去分词 )；敬重；认为；以为 | |
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132
insufficient
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| adj.(for，of)不足的，不够的 | |
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133
censure
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| v./n.责备；非难；责难 | |
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134
plentiful
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| adj.富裕的，丰富的 | |
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135
yarn
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| n.纱，纱线，纺线；奇闻漫谈，旅行轶事 | |
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136
spun
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| v.纺，杜撰，急转身 | |
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137
bonnets
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| n.童帽( bonnet的名词复数 )；（烟囱等的）覆盖物；（苏格兰男子的）无边呢帽；（女子戴的）任何一种帽子 | |
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138
attired
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| adj.穿着整齐的v.使穿上衣服，使穿上盛装( attire的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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139
uncouth
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| adj.无教养的，粗鲁的 | |
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140
jaunty
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| adj．愉快的，满足的；adv.心满意足地，洋洋得意地；n.心满意足；洋洋得意 | |
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141
surmounted
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| 战胜( surmount的过去式和过去分词 )； 克服（困难）； 居于…之上； 在…顶上 | |
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142
inspection
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| n.检查，审查，检阅 | |
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143
flannels
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| 法兰绒男裤； 法兰绒( flannel的名词复数 ) | |
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144
ornamented
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| adj.花式字体的v.装饰，点缀，美化( ornament的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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145
bespeak
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| v.预定；预先请求 | |
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146
competence
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| n.能力，胜任，称职 | |
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147
overflow
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| v.(使)外溢，(使)溢出；溢出，流出，漫出 | |
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148
larder
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| n.食物贮藏室，食品橱 | |
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149
unreasonable
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| adj.不讲道理的，不合情理的，过度的 | |
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150
bounteous
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| adj.丰富的 | |
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151
testimony
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| n.证词；见证，证明 | |
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152
alluded
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| 提及，暗指( allude的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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153
extolled
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| v.赞颂，赞扬，赞美( extol的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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154
reiterate
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| v.重申，反复地说 | |
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155
recollect
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| v.回忆，想起，记起，忆起，记得 | |
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156
intoxication
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| n.wild excitement;drunkenness；poisoning | |
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157
commissioners
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| n.专员( commissioner的名词复数 )；长官；委员；政府部门的长官 | |
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158
distinguished
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
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159
bastardy
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| 私生子，庶出； 非婚生 | |
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160
pertinaciously
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| adv.坚持地；固执地；坚决地；执拗地 | |
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161
legitimate
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| adj.合法的，合理的，合乎逻辑的；v.使合法 | |
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162
aged
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| adj.年老的，陈年的 | |
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163
pithily
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| adv.有力地，简洁地 | |
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164
edifices
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| n.大建筑物( edifice的名词复数 ) | |
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165
tenements
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| n.房屋，住户，租房子( tenement的名词复数 ) | |
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166
detrimental
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| adj.损害的，造成伤害的 | |
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167
corpse
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| n.尸体，死尸 | |
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168
anecdote
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| n.轶事，趣闻，短故事 | |
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169
hearth
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| n.壁炉炉床，壁炉地面 | |
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170
severely
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| adv.严格地；严厉地；非常恶劣地 | |
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171
solace
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| n.安慰；v.使快乐；vt.安慰(物)，缓和 | |
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172
relaxation
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| n.松弛，放松；休息；消遣；娱乐 | |
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173
Christian
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| adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒 | |
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