Before I quit this part of my volume, let me say a word on the subject of forest enclosures. There are certain persons who, from notions of national benefit, are very desirous that all crown lands should be disposed of; and all forests and wastes enclosed. As a matter of national benefit I think them considerably2 mistaken. For the very highest purposes of national benefit I desire, and that most earnestly, to see them kept open. I know the logic3 regularly employed by these people;—to make two blades of corn grow where one grew before; to make all our lands in the highest degree productive of food. Now, if we were cattle, or sheep, the great end of whose existence it was to graze well and get fat, then is their reasoning most excellent. But I look upon humanity as having other wants than mere4 physical ones. I too would have all our lands produce us food: but then it should be food of various kinds; food not only for one part, the corporeal5, but for every part of our nature; and in these forests and open lands the intellectual part of the nation “have a food that these men know not of.” He who attends to our mere animal prosperity may call himself an utilitarian6, but the true utilitarian comprehends in his scheme what is good for man in his integral nature; for his spiritual and intellectual needs, as well as for his bodily. But taking them on their own ground, these forest lands are not mere unproductive wastes. They supply our dockyards with an abundance of[389] valuable timber; in them lie farms, and cottage homes, with their orchards7, gardens, and little enclosures. They maintain a large population, and they pasture a vast quantity of cattle, sheep, hogs8, and horses. Take even such a tract9 as that of Dartmoor, now stripped of its trees. There cattle and sheep run in great numbers; and there lies about in inexhaustible quantities, granite10, which supplies labour in shaping it, and conveying it away, to a large body of men, and goes forth11 to build our public works and adorn12 our metropolis13. And there too the mines employ, again, numerous people, and send up large quantities of valuable metal. And what should we gain by an enclosure? We should gain a greater supply of corn, which the farmers and landlords sometimes find they have actually too much of.[23] Having hedged about the kingdom with enactments14 to prevent the free importation of grain, they ever and anon find that they grow so much of it that they cannot really get a remunerating price for it. But even if we did want it, we have only to throw open our ports, and have as much as we want, at almost any price, and cattle too, which we could give our manufactures in exchange for. This is all that the most sanguine15 advocates of universal enclosure pretend that we should gain; and then let us see what we should lose by it. In the first place, these lands would go to swell16 the rentals17 of the rich, as all others enclosed have done. The enclosure system has been one of unexampled absurdity18 and injustice19. It has been conducted on the principle of—“Unto him that hath shall be given, and from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath.” Unto him who could shew that he had land lying in proximity20 to the waste about to be enclosed, has been given more, in the exact proportion to the quantity which he had. The more he had, the more was given him; and from him that had none, was taken away that which he had—the custom of commoning his beasts on the waste. One would naturally have supposed that in a christian21 country there would have been a desire to provide for those who had nothing. That in every parish the waste land should have been, if allotted22 at all to the inhabitants, allotted to those who had most need of it. The rule has always been exactly the reverse; and the consequence has been that our[390] poor population, stripped of their old common rights, have been thrown upon the parish; their little flock of sheep, their few cows, their geese, their pigs, all gone; and no collateral23 help left them to eke24 out their small earnings25; and in case of loss of work, or sickness, no resource but parish degradation;—the consequent evil influence upon the character of the rural population has been enormous. They have a sense of injustice, if they have not the power to resist it; and when they see a system of this kind, they say—“much will have more,” and their spirits are none the better for the feeling that accompanies the melancholy26 truth. Now, the same system would assuredly be continued, where common allotments took place; and in the sale of crown lands, a few great persons would purchase them; a few farmers would live and pay high rents, where hundreds of comfortable cottagers now live, who would then be added to the list of paupers27.
[23] They did so especially in 1834 and 1835; when wheat was only 38s. and 40s. per quarter.
But it is not merely the poor that would lose by it. The miner, the artist, the naturalist28, the poet, the antiquarian, the lover of the country, and the frequenter of it for health or relaxation29, all would suffer most seriously by it, and the country would suffer with them. In the wastes of Devon and Cornwall, in those of Derbyshire, Warwickshire, and Northumberland, the subterranean30 mass is worth, in many places, a hundred times the surface. Enclose and cover up with cultivation31 these wastes, and you bury by millions the wealth of the nation, and the bread of the miners. At present, they lie open to the foot and the eye of the scrutinizing32 and adventurous33. They can traverse heaths and mountains, and amid the barely covered rocks beneath them, or in the precipices34 that tower above them, they can at leisure hunt out and discover the sparkling vein35, or the dull and secret ore; and open up a fountain of labour and affluence36 that may run for ages. But enclose these wild regions; warn off the curious inquirers with boards threatening “prosecution as the law directs,” or as may now be seen on the premises37 of an old lady in Surrey—that “anybody trespassing38 will be shot at without farther notice!”—keep them out with fences, and cover up the surface with accumulating soil and manure39, and there may the riches of Providence40 remain buried for ever. With the researches of the miner, you restrict those of the geologist41 too. With the naturalist it fares the same. Every spadegraft of your cultivation[391] annihilates42 the habitats and localities of animals, insects, and plants, which can exist only in the unploughed wilderness43. You destroy some of the most curious natural productions of your country for ever, and circumscribe44 some of the most healthful, heart-purifying, and spirit-cheering pursuits of men. Your ploughs and mattocks pierce through and erase45 immediately the earthy mounds46, the circles, the stone vestiges47 of far-past ages, and with them the pleasant journeys and inspiring speculations48 of antiquarians; as well as a great portion of the historic light and evidences of the nation. If you could root out the New Forest, you might possibly get as well supplied with timber from some other quarter, but where would you find the landscape painter such a treasury49 of sylvan50 and picturesque51 beauty, such delicious nooks and hollows, and fair streams winding52 under forest boughs53? Where such groupings and endless variety of foliage54 and forest stems? Where such lights and shades and colours as nature there diffuses55 over her own regions in the everlasting56 circulation of the seasons; and all within six or seven hours’ ride of the metropolis?[24] I should like to know where you will find him substitutes for the naked, waste, but glorious expanses of the Surrey heaths, of Dartmoor, Stainmore, the high moors57 of Derbyshire, those of Northumberland, Lancashire, or of Scotland—that land which has often been called poor, but which from the influence of its wild and magnificent scenery is continually pouring out a wealth of genius that is miraculous58? Thank God; they never can pull down its mountains, and reduce them to the dead level, and quadrangular fields of cultivation; and into their fairyland recesses59 there will always be a retreat from the engrossing60, engulphing spirit of mercantile calculation.
[24] By the Southampton Railway, now brought within about three hours’ journey of London.
But I am passing from painting to poetry; and yet, one is so blended with the other that I would ask the shrewdest person living to shew me where they totally separate. Where then, I ask, will they find substitutes for the painter, for our wild and desolate61 moors? There the very air in its elastic62 freshness is full of health and inspiration to him. There he draws an indemnity63 for his constitution from the deadly effects of long and close confinement64 in[392] cities and painting rooms. There every turf is covered with a rude beauty to his eyes; there every rock and stone is piled in bold and inimitable shapes of savage65 grandeur66 by the spirit of nature for him; and the winds, and rains, and vegetative powers of centuries have been busy tinging67 them with the hues68 of his admiration69. There, amid the sound of falling waters and the roar of coming tempests, he feels all his faculties70 called into power and life within him, and brings home, season after season, scenes that cover the walls of our city homes with a wild magnificence. Enclose these tracts71; hem1 them in with walls and hedges, and he will no longer visit them. You will no longer find him sitting on some moorland stone, watching the stream which hurries with sea-like sound along its craggy bed; or gazing on those rocky banks and long lines of trees that overhang it, and mark its course along the desert. He will no longer fix the solitary72 labourer, or the passing group, in their own peculiar73 character, nor paint the lurid74 gloom of the storm as it comes with a frown and a thunder of rains and winds only known in such shelterless regions. And when you banish75 him, you banish the poet, and the lovers of poets too. It is on our moors and our mountains that the profoundest spirit of poetry dwells. There is an influence felt there, which has more than half created our Shakspeares, Miltons, Spensers, Wordsworths, Scotts, Coleridges, Shelleys, and other high spirits that have striven to elevate the English mind above the mere ordinary enjoyments76 of life. And is it true that any one ever felt the full charm of the works of Scott, who was not familiar with heaths and mountains? Did any one ever feel all the beauty of the opening of Ivanhoe who had not often lingered in our forests? Has any one a true conception of “As you like it,” of “Macbeth,” or of “The Midsummer Night’s Dream,” of “The Fairy Queen,” or of many another divine creation of the British Muse77, who is not conversant78 with the free, beautiful, and untamed nature by whose influence they are shaped? It is one of the great offices of the poet to keep alive the love of nature; and it is, again, by a corresponding love of nature that they must be comprehended and relished79. The more you reduce our whole island to a uniformity of colour and cultivation, the more effectually you extinguish this great action and reaction, which are health to the spirituality of the public mind.
[393]
We are now arrived at a crisis in which we can afford a few forests and moors to lie open; but we cannot afford to have our higher tastes and feeling deprived of their legitimate80 aliment. Shut us up in towns, or within an eternal continuity of hedges and ditches, and we shall cease to be the high-souled people we are. We shall become the drudges81 of selfish interests, or the victims of false taste. We must have some openness, some freedom, some breathing places left us. As Abernethy said, that the parks of London were its lungs; so our mountains, forests, and moorlands, are the lungs of the whole country. It is there that we rush away from counting-houses, factories, steam-engines, railroads, politics, and sectarian factions82, and breathe for a season the air of physical and mental vigour83; and feel the peace of nature; and drink in from all things around us a new life, a new feeling, full of the benevolent84 calm which is shed by its Creator over the world. Scott said he must see the heather at least once a year, or he should die. Crabbe mounted his horse in a passion of desire which could no longer be resisted, and rode fifty miles to see the sea; and more or less of this feeling lies in every bosom85 that is not totally dead to the true objects of life. The failing in health; the over-worn in spirit; the followers86 of a summer’s recreation, all seek our hills and sea-coasts, and plains, where the peace or magnificence of nature, or where some celebrated87 monument of the past is to be found. If any one would know the extent of this delight in such things, or the numbers who indulge in it, let him go, as I have elsewhere said, to any such place in this kingdom, on any day through the summer and autumn. If we had the amount of the numbers who make a summer excursion to the sea-side, or to our moorland and mountain districts, it would be amazing. The parties who swarm88 along our Derbyshire valleys, and in every nook of Scotland, Wales, Ireland, and the Western Isles89, are apparently90 without end.
Now this is a very healthful taste, and one, that with all our trading, manufacturing, and money-getting habits, we cannot too much encourage. We complain of our countrymen seeking pleasure so much abroad, and shall we diminish the objects of popular attraction at home? No, there never was an age in which our forests and moorlands were of half the value they are of to us now. As true utilitarians91, we have the strongest motives92 to keep them[394] open, as we mean to keep alive the fine arts, poetry, the love of antiquity93, and the love of nature amongst us; as we would retain and invigorate in us that higher life by which we have climbed to our present national altitude; by which our sages94 and poets have been nourished, and become the true teachers and inspirers of virtue95 and nobility to the world; by which we are made to feel our animal life even with a double zest96; and are yet, I trust, destined97 to make the name of England the greatest in the history of the world.
I do not mean to say that no waste lands should be henceforth enclosed. There are plenty, every one knows, that have no particular grace or interest about them. Let them, in the name of all that is reasonable, be hedged and ditched as soon as you please; but as for the village green, the common lying near a town, the forest, and the moorland that has a poetical98 charm about it, felt and acknowledged by the public—may the axe99 and the spade that are lifted up against them be shivered to atoms, and a curse, worse than the curse of Kehama, chase all commissioners100, land-surveyors, petitioning lawyers, and every species of fencer and divider out of their boundaries for ever and ever.
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1
hem
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| n.贴边，镶边；vt.缝贴边；(in)包围，限制 | |
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considerably
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| adv.极大地；相当大地；在很大程度上 | |
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logic
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| n.逻辑(学)；逻辑性 | |
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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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corporeal
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| adj.肉体的，身体的；物质的 | |
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utilitarian
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| adj.实用的，功利的 | |
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orchards
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| （通常指围起来的）果园( orchard的名词复数 ) | |
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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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tract
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| n.传单，小册子，大片(土地或森林) | |
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granite
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| adj.花岗岩，花岗石 | |
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forth
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| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
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adorn
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| vt.使美化，装饰 | |
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metropolis
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| n.首府；大城市 | |
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enactments
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| n.演出( enactment的名词复数 )；展现；规定；通过 | |
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sanguine
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| adj.充满希望的，乐观的，血红色的 | |
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swell
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| vi.膨胀，肿胀；增长，增强 | |
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rentals
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| n.租费，租金额( rental的名词复数 ) | |
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absurdity
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| n.荒谬，愚蠢；谬论 | |
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injustice
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| n.非正义，不公正，不公平，侵犯（别人的）权利 | |
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proximity
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| n.接近，邻近 | |
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Christian
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| adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒 | |
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allotted
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| 分配，拨给，摊派( allot的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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collateral
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| adj.平行的；旁系的；n.担保品 | |
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eke
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| v.勉强度日，节约使用 | |
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earnings
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| n.工资收人；利润，利益，所得 | |
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melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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paupers
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| n.穷人( pauper的名词复数 )；贫民；贫穷 | |
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naturalist
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| n.博物学家(尤指直接观察动植物者) | |
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relaxation
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| n.松弛，放松；休息；消遣；娱乐 | |
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subterranean
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| adj.地下的，地表下的 | |
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cultivation
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| n.耕作，培养，栽培（法），养成 | |
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scrutinizing
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| v.仔细检查，详审( scrutinize的现在分词 ) | |
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adventurous
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| adj.爱冒险的；惊心动魄的，惊险的，刺激的 | |
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precipices
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| n.悬崖，峭壁( precipice的名词复数 ) | |
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vein
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| n.血管，静脉；叶脉，纹理；情绪；vt.使成脉络 | |
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affluence
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| n.充裕，富足 | |
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premises
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| n.建筑物，房屋 | |
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trespassing
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| [法]非法入侵 | |
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manure
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| n.粪，肥，肥粒；vt.施肥 | |
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providence
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| n.深谋远虑，天道，天意；远见；节约；上帝 | |
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geologist
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| n.地质学家 | |
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annihilates
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| n.（彻底）消灭( annihilate的名词复数 )；使无效；废止；彻底击溃v.（彻底）消灭( annihilate的第三人称单数 )；使无效；废止；彻底击溃 | |
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43
wilderness
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| n.杳无人烟的一片陆地、水等，荒漠 | |
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circumscribe
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| v.在...周围划线，限制，约束 | |
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45
erase
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| v.擦掉；消除某事物的痕迹 | |
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46
mounds
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| 土堆，土丘( mound的名词复数 )； 一大堆 | |
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vestiges
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| 残余部分( vestige的名词复数 )； 遗迹； 痕迹； 毫不 | |
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48
speculations
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| n.投机买卖( speculation的名词复数 )；思考；投机活动；推断 | |
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49
treasury
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| n.宝库；国库，金库；文库 | |
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50
sylvan
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| adj.森林的 | |
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51
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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52
winding
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| n.绕，缠，绕组，线圈 | |
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53
boughs
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| 大树枝( bough的名词复数 ) | |
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54
foliage
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| n.叶子，树叶，簇叶 | |
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55
diffuses
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| （使光）模糊，漫射，漫散( diffuse的第三人称单数 )； （使）扩散； （使）弥漫； （使）传播 | |
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56
everlasting
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| adj.永恒的，持久的，无止境的 | |
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57
moors
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| v.停泊，系泊（船只）( moor的第三人称单数 ) | |
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58
miraculous
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| adj.像奇迹一样的，不可思议的 | |
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59
recesses
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| n.壁凹( recess的名词复数 )；（工作或业务活动的）中止或暂停期间；学校的课间休息；某物内部的凹形空间v.把某物放在墙壁的凹处( recess的第三人称单数 )；将（墙）做成凹形，在（墙）上做壁龛；休息，休会，休庭 | |
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60
engrossing
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| adj.使人全神贯注的，引人入胜的v.使全神贯注( engross的现在分词 ) | |
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desolate
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| adj.荒凉的，荒芜的；孤独的，凄凉的；v.使荒芜，使孤寂 | |
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elastic
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| n.橡皮圈，松紧带；adj.有弹性的；灵活的 | |
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63
indemnity
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| n.赔偿，赔款，补偿金 | |
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64
confinement
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| n.幽禁，拘留，监禁；分娩；限制，局限 | |
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savage
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| adj.野蛮的；凶恶的，残暴的；n.未开化的人 | |
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grandeur
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| n.伟大，崇高，宏伟，庄严，豪华 | |
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67
tinging
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| v.（使）发丁丁声( ting的现在分词 ) | |
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68
hues
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| 色彩( hue的名词复数 )； 色调； 信仰； 观点 | |
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69
admiration
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| n.钦佩，赞美，羡慕 | |
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70
faculties
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| n.能力( faculty的名词复数 )；全体教职员；技巧；院 | |
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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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72
solitary
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| adj.孤独的，独立的，荒凉的；n.隐士 | |
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peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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lurid
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| adj.可怕的；血红的；苍白的 | |
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banish
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| vt.放逐，驱逐；消除，排除 | |
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enjoyments
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| 愉快( enjoyment的名词复数 )； 令人愉快的事物； 享有； 享受 | |
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muse
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| n.缪斯（希腊神话中的女神），创作灵感 | |
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conversant
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| adj.亲近的，有交情的，熟悉的 | |
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relished
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| v.欣赏( relish的过去式和过去分词 )；从…获得乐趣；渴望 | |
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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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drudges
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| n.做苦工的人，劳碌的人( drudge的名词复数 ) | |
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factions
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| 组织中的小派别，派系( faction的名词复数 ) | |
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vigour
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| （=vigor）n.智力，体力，精力 | |
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benevolent
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| adj.仁慈的，乐善好施的 | |
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bosom
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| n.胸，胸部；胸怀；内心；adj.亲密的 | |
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followers
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| 追随者( follower的名词复数 )； 用户； 契据的附面； 从动件 | |
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celebrated
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| adj.有名的，声誉卓著的 | |
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swarm
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| n.(昆虫)等一大群；vi.成群飞舞；蜂拥而入 | |
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isles
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| 岛( isle的名词复数 ) | |
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apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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utilitarians
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| 功利主义者，实用主义者( utilitarian的名词复数 ) | |
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motives
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| n.动机，目的( motive的名词复数 ) | |
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antiquity
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| n.古老；高龄；古物，古迹 | |
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sages
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| n.圣人( sage的名词复数 )；智者；哲人；鼠尾草（可用作调料） | |
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virtue
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| n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力 | |
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zest
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| n.乐趣；滋味，风味；兴趣 | |
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destined
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| adj.命中注定的；(for)以…为目的地的 | |
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poetical
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| adj.似诗人的；诗一般的；韵文的；富有诗意的 | |
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axe
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| n.斧子；v.用斧头砍，削减 | |
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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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