LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. i]pttf,L%. %mm¥ lo.; Shelf!. a^ UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. J'JL 15 1«ft5 Features of Society In ®15 attli in Mm €tt0lan^. HENRY MANN, AUTHOR OF " Ancient and Medieval Republics.' rs^r ;:?^>y-^ Providence : SIDNEY S. RIDER 1885. '^1 To Mr. ALEXANDER MANN, OP Swindon, Wilts, England, and formerly of Aberdeen, Scotland, These Thoughts are Inscribed, By His Son, THE AUTHOR. Copyright, 1885, by Henry Mann. PREFACE. Of British birth and training, I began to reside in New England at an age sufficiently mature for the memories of the Old World to be enduring, while my mind was yet plastic enough to receive fair and unprejudiced impressions of the New. The following pages, therefore, so far as they apply to New England, are not the crude com- ments of a sojourner, or the hasty observations of a traveler. They are the fruit of thought and of experience, on the farm, in the office, in the court, in all the varied phases of life of which an employe in journalism is a witness, and often a part. The articles in reply to Mr. Mallock's work on Property and Progress appeared origi- nally as editorial contributions in the columns of the Providence yoiirnaL iv Preface. I take the opportunity to thank the critics of the press, at home and abroad, who reviewed my former work on Ancient and Medimval Re- -publics^ and I think it due to myself to add a brief explanation. The writer of the very cour- teous and intelligent criticism in the New York Star did me the honor to suggest that I had consulted Mr. Lecky's History of European Morals, I simply reply that I never read a line of Mr. Lecky's most interesting volumes until after my own book was in type. I make the same answer to the suggestion of the World in regard to Sir Henry Sumner Maine. This con- fession is perhaps not to my credit ; but it is none the less true. Whether the ideas in Ancient and MedicBval Refuhlics were valuable or poor, they were at least original ; and I can say the same of this little book. The Author. North Providence, R. I., May 15, A. D. 1885. CONTENTS. A REPLY TO MR. MALLOCK. Communism not an American Question, An Exotic in England, Weakness of Mr. Mallock's Case, Labor and Capital, Population and Subsistence, Motives for Emigration, . The English Food Supply, Property and Poverty, The State as Landlord, PAGE I 3 4 6 8 9 II 12 11. FROM ABSTRACT REASONING TO FACTS. The Owners of the Land, i? Interesting Figures, 19 Aristocratic Incomes, ....... 21 Advantages of Land-Ownership, 22 The Throne and the People, 24 Comparison of Incomes, ....••• 25 The Question at Issue, . . . . . • .26 Popular Sentiment, ......•• 28 Primogeniture and Entail, ...... 29 Comfort and Agitation, 3^ VI Contents. ELEMENTS OF SOCIETY IN NEW ENGLAND. Office Open to All, .... Native Dislike of the Irish, The English in New England, . English Labor Agitators, . Native Prejudice against the English, The Scotch in New England, . The Germans, ..... The French-Canadians — The Negro, New England Impressions of the Negro, Discrimination against the Colored Race, Morality among the Negroes, . An Aristocracy of Workers, Gold not Alone a Key, . . . , American Exclusiveness, . . . . 34 35 37 38 40 41 42 43 44 45 47 48 49 50 THE NATIVE FARMER. Pride of Ancestry, The Farming Influence, Individuality and Self-Reliance, Gnarled and Knotty Families, . The Farmer's Dwelling, How Farmers Live, . A Darker Phase of Country Life, Out-of-the-way Homes, Causes of Degradation, 54 55 56 57 59 60 62 63 Private Graveyards, ....... 64 History in Headstones, ....... 67 Contents. vu SMALL FAMILIES. A Delicate Subject, 69 Social Sentiment, 70 Motives for Prevention, . 71 An Injury to the State, 72 No Prospect of Reform, 73 DIVORCE. The Domestic Equality of Woman, Abuse of the Divorce Laws, Benefits of Liberal Divorce, Drunkenness and Divorce, Crusade against Divorce, . Baneful Effects of Divorce, Evils and Proposed Remedies, A Flagrant Instance, Room for Improvement, . 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 84 86 RELIGION IN NEW ENGLAND. Hell an Obsolete Terror, The Clergy and Politics, How Pulpits are Filled, Moulders of Education, Church Association, . Influence of the Church, Hypocrites and Iconoclasts, 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 Vlll Contents. SPIRITUALISM. Pretended Mediums, . Advanced Spiritualists, Origin of Spiritualism, Yearning for the Unseen, . Skepticism and Spiritualism, 97 99 I GO lOI 1 02 A Reply to Mr. Mallock; Communism can hardly be called an American question. No sentiment is more deepl}^ im- planted in the native American breast than re- spect for the rights of property. The leveling philosophy of Hegel, and the Utopian dreams of Bakunin find but fev^ disciples among the de- scendants of the Pilgrims, and it is not difficult to account for this healthy state of public opin- ion. There can be no doubt here about the title of the freeholder to his estate. Here there are no abject and subordinate cultivators, with the w^rongs of centuries rankling in their hearts, and w^ith the ever-present know^ledge that the earn- ings of their labor go to support an idle landlord * Property and Progress, or a Brief Inquiry into Contemporary Social Agitation in England. By W. H. Mallock. New York: G. P. Put- nam's Sons. 2 Comniunisjii N^ot aii American Question. in baronial splendor. The man who tills the soil owns the soil, and every stone which he ex- tracts from the field, every stump which his oxen uproot, represents an addition to his personal wealth. The idea that he should share his es- tate with others seems to him too absurd for ar- gument, and the advocate of such a revolution he regards as either mildly insane or wittingly dishonest. Communism can take no hold upon a people whose possessions have been acquired and developed by centuries of rugged toil, who call no man master, and whose happy mediocrity of condition induces contentment and stability, as well as a wholesome distrust of novelty. It is in this deeply implanted New England rever- ence for established institutions that the hope for the future of America rests. Before it the pesti- lential vapor of socialism, borne across the At- lantic from the squirming and steaming masses of Europe, disappears like a plague befoi'e a puri- fying flame, and, whatever may be the outcome of the struggle, in its various forms, now going on between the upper and lower orders in the mother continent, in the United States the found- An Exotic in England. ations of society are likely to remain firm and unsapped. The subject of Mr. Mallock's work may there- fore be regarded as strictly foreign. In conti- nental Europe, communism is a reality, formid- able to the aged Emperor of Germany, notwith- standing his chancellor and his armies ; terrible in the form of Nihilism to the Czar of Russia, not safe from its machinations in the palace or on the public street, and, it may be said, holding his life and his crown by the forbearance of the conspirators who deprived his father of both. In England, communism is an exotic ; but, accord- ing to Mr. Mallock, it is taking root, and Mr. George's work, on Progress and Poverty., is becoming the social gospel of multitudes of the working classes. Mr. Mallock attempts to re- fute the theories of Mr. George with cold, analyt- ical reasoning, and he refines to absurdity, in the crucible of accomplished criticism, the broad and brilliant assertions of the socialistic aposde. But, unfortunately for the effect of Mr. Mallock's well-rounded and euphonious periods, the fact that Mr. George's arguments may be ill-founded Weakness of Mr. Matlock's Case. and untenable does not establish a sound defence for his clients, the property -holding nobility and gentry of England. When he quotes,to prove what he calls the grotesque character of the socialistic doctrine of the inalienable right of the people to the land, the case of the island of Rum, whose three hundred inhabitants — all but twelve — were expelled in order that the island might be turned into a deer forest for an Englishman, to prove that, if the expulsion had never taken place, the inhabitants would have multiplied, in the course of 3'ears, to such an extent that the surplus would have had to emigrate, and that, therefore, the right to their native shore could not have been inalienable, he brings the more vividly to mind the atrocious manner in which British land-owners have in the past abused the right of property, which, largely in consequence of such abuse, is now questioned and assailed. " Thrice is he arm'd that hath his quarrel just," says England's greatest poet, and the weakness of Mr. Mallock's plea is not in its ingenuity or ability so much as in the iniquity of the English tenure of land, and of the methods by which a Weakness of Mr. Mallock's Case. very large proportion of the land was acquired by the ancestors of the proprietors, and in the game laws which still debar the English work- ingman from the invigorating sport of the chase in the forest which adjoins his village, and from adding to his larder a rabbit or a hare, under penalty of arrest as a criminal ; and, on the other hand, the influence of the teachings of Mr. George and of Mr. Hyndman on the lower classes of the Enghsh people, is not because the latter have not the intelligence and discernment to appreciate the fallacy of the theories pro- pounded, but because they keenly feel the injus- tice of the existing system, and are ready to ac- cept the panacea of the quack, when they cannot obtain the prescription of a regular doctor. When an advocate deliberately waives, as Mr. Mallock does, the issues of fact and of equity, and bases his argument on abstract reasoning, he may convince the head, but he cannot the heart, of the judicial tribunal of the world's opinion, and in the mighty impulses which cruide the destiny of nations, the heart is above the head. Labor a7id Capital. Mr. Mallock shows wisdom in recognizing the strength of the enemy, because, as he states, *' since action in modern poHtics so largely de- pends on the people, the mildest errors are grave, if they are only sufficiently popular. For prac- tical purposes no proposals are ridiculous unless they are ridiculous to the mass of those who act upon them ; in any question in which the people are powerful, no fallacy is refuted, if the people still believe in it," and Mr. Mallock admits the widespread and spreading popularity of Mr. George's proposal for the confiscation of landed estates. He first takes up Mr. George's proposi- tion that *' the laboring class creates its own wages as it receives them ; it being wholly false that wages are drawn from capital." This proposi- tion hardly needs the elaborate and finical refu- tation which Mr. Mallock devotes to it. It is evident that in New England, for instance, the capital of the manufacturer is invested in his fac- tory of cotton or wool, the machinery which it contains, and the material with which to begin manufacture. The skill and labor of the oper- atives convert that material into an article for Labor and Capital. 7 sale, and the money received for it comes back to pay the wages of the operatives, the other running expenses, and, if anything is left over, the profits of the manufactm-er on his invested capital. It is not, therefore, wholly false, as Mr. George asserts, that wages are drawn from capital ; for, while the laboring class by its own labor creates its own wages as it receives them, it does so with the aid of capital, in the form of the tools with which the wage-produc- ing material is manufactured. It is true that the village blacksmith, making his own horse- shoes with iron bought with his own money, and receiving into his hands the price of his labor, creates his own earnings as he receives them, and to him Mr. George's proposition would correctly apply ; but it would not apply to the great multitude of workers, employed in aggre- gated masses in the manufacturing establish- ments of New and Old England. Labor is the vitalizing principle ; without it, capital would be inert and non-productive : but without capital, also, the labor and skill of the vast majority of men and women who depend for their bread and Popiytlatioji arzd Subsistence. clothing on wages to be earned, would be equally non-productive . The next proposition, that "population does not increase faster than do the means of subsist- ence, and thus the current explanations of pov- erty are no explanations at all," is the more plausible because it is partly true. It is true that a few colonists starting in a new^ country would not be able to produce the same propor- tion of the necessaries of life for their subsist- ence that their more numerous descendants, with increased facilities and diversity of industry and of commerce, would be able to obtain and enjoy. The history of all colonial enterprises goes to prove this. It is also true, as Mr. George avers, that " while all through the vegetable and animal kingdoms the limit of subsistence is inde- pendent of the thing subsisted, with man the limit of subsistence is, within the final limits of earth, air, water, and sunshine, dependent upon man himself," but it is not true that as men mul- tiply they widen, -pari fassii^ the limits of their subsistence, and will continue to do so until every mile of the earth is peopled. Mr. Mallock ]\Iotives for Emigration. points out that it by no means follows, because the limits of subsistence are elastic, that very great pressure may not be required to stretch them ; but he fails to point out the also evident fact that with the majority of mankind, as in India and China, the tendency of the people is not to press beyond the bounds within which comfortable subsistence has ceased to be possible, but to remain and grovel upon the soil which hardly yields them a daily morsel, and where frequent famines, claiming victims by the thou- sands, and sometimes by millions, attest the inad- equacy of nature to provide for the wants of the children of earth. Where population has sprea^, it has ordinarily been attributable to other causes than a seeking for mere subsistence. The pil- grim could have lived in England, the Huguenot in France, the Spaniard and Portuguese in their native peninsula, had their remaining been only a question of food, but religious belief compelled the former, as a thirst for riches impelled the latter, to seek in strange lands that which they could not enjoy at home. Indeed, the history of civilization nowhere contains a record of the ex- lo Motives for Emigration. pulsion or emigration of any large body of peo- ple on account of inability to obtain enough to eat in the countr}" of their origin, while among the barbarous tribes in the period of the Roman republic and empire, before capital and private proprietorship of land were known to the ances- tors of English-speaking races, such emigrations were frequent, and sometimes resulted in the destruction of the emigrants by the inhabitants of the more fortunate countries invaded by the savage communists, and sometimes in victory for the invaders, whereupon the communists from the forests soon developed into landed proprie- tors, as jealous of their rights and privileges as the people whom they had conquered. Mr. Mallock, in endeavoring to show the fal- lacious character of Mr. George's implied asser- tion that want cannot be caused by the pressure of population, appears to err as much on one side as Mr. George on the other. He says : ** Of all other countries, England and America are, perhaps, the two which are now most closel}^ connected ; but the connection was not established without infinite pain and effort, and The Ejiglish Food Supply. 1 1 it costs constant effort every day to maintain it. All we need here speak of is the question of the American food supply. This reaches England only through the most complex and delicate machinery, which was slow in construction, which is easy to derange, which it is possible to ruin, and which it is difficult to add to. Eng- land only gets from America because it gives to America, and what it gets depends, not on what America grows, but on what Americans desire of the things that England makes. Thus, so far as Englishmen subsist on the produce of American corn-fields, it is not the extent of the corn-fields that forms the limit of this existence, but the wants and the tastes of the Americans, as related to England's powers of supplj^ing them. Now, such wants and tastes are of all things the most liable to vary. There may be a point beyond which they cannot shrink, as there is certainly a point beyond which they cannot expand ; but though they may never entirely disappear, yet any day they might dwindle, and did they dwindle, what w^ould happen is obvious. The limits of subsistence for England would be 1 2 Property and Poverty. suddenly narrowed, and the population of Eng- land would at once be pressing against them." All of which may be agreed to, with the quali- fication that, but for the reservation of large tracts of land from cultivation and from cattle- raising in northern as well as southern Britain, and but for the laws which prevent the soil from being cut up, as in France, into numerous small proprietorships, the population of the British Isles would be, if not independent as to food supply, at least very near to independence, and would not be in peril of " pressing against the limits of subsistence " upon every mutation of taste or tariff in America. And this brings us to the most important of Mr. George's propositions, and Mr. Mallock's form of refuting it — that private property in land causes poverty, and that therefore the land should be confiscated for the public benefit by taxation that would leave to the nominal proprie- tor only a sufficient amount to compensate him as an agent of the state, in the collection of rents for the state. As I have indicated in my introductory remarks, it is difficult for an Property and Poverty. 13 American to appreciate the force with which this proposition presents itself to the minds of the Enghsh working classes, for the reason that the conditions here and there are so ditierent. Here ownership is almost uniformly coupled with occu- pation, and, in the rural districts, with cultiva- tion ; there it is not. The owner receives and enjoys, and expends but little in proportion in the locality from whence he drawls his income. Ab- sentee landlordism is not confined to Ireland, and not infrequently an English squire has owed his defeat for Parliament to his neglect of the local tradesmen. The sweeping evictions in Scotland, immortalized in the pathetic strains of " Locha- ber no more," have left a brand upon the popu- lar memory that ages will not efface, while the existence of almost impassable barriers between title and wealth on the one side, and respectable labor on the other, causes an irritation which is growing more inflammatory with years. Not that the English workingman is disloyal to his country or his sovereign, but he can see no rea- son why the space between the throne and the people should be fllled with an aristocracy? 14 The State as Landlord, with coronets and titles, and vested privileges, and extensive landed possessions, instead of, as in America, the higher positions in life being oc- cupied by men who have earned their promotion by their toil, by their energy and by their excep- tional ability. It is not strange, therefore, that Mr. George's assaults upon property, which seem to us here so absurd as to be unworthy of refutation, are regarded as dangerous by one of the most accomplished of critics, and that the valuable pages of the ^tarterly Review are de- voted to his reply. Mr. Mallock demonstrates very clearly that Mr. George's scheme to make the landlords middlemen for the state, by taxing them up to, or nearly up to, the rentable value of their estates, would not benefit the general public, for the state would simply take the place of the landlord, and, it may be added, would probably be more severe in the collection of rents, for it is admitted in a quotation by Mr. George himself from Miss C. G. O'Brien's article on "The Irish Land Qiiestion'' in the nine- teenth Century^ that " an aristocracy, such as that of Ireland, has its virtues as well as its The State as Landlord. 15 vices, and is influenced by sentiments which do not enter into mere business transactions — sen- timents which must often modify and soften the calculations of cold self-interest." The same may be said of the English aristocracy, and while there may be instances of harshness and oppression, the tenant of the English land- owner is doubtless more pleasantly situated than he would be as tenant of the soulless and inexor- able state. Besides, it is impossible to see how the poor would be helped by such a change of tenure ; for, as Mr. George proposes that the property should be let to the highest bidder, the man without a shilling, or a. hundred shillings, would be as much shut out from competition as he is to-day. II. From Abstract Reasoning to Facts, When Mr. Mallock leaves the domain of ab- stract and speculative reasoning in his confuta- tion of Mr. George to try issues of fact with Mr. Hyndman, he appears at once at a serious disad- vantage, for it is manifest that he is either igno- rant of the subject with which he is dealing, or presumes ignorance in his readers, and delib- erately endeavors to deceive them. Mr. Mallock quotes from the New Domesday Book to prove that the agricultural soil of Great Britain is not practically owned by 30,000 persons, as Mr. Hyndman asserts, and to show that " the classes of smaller land-owners are not far off from a mil- lion." We will give his own words and figures : ''The landed aristocracy, all told," he says, " number about five thousand. Just below them come 4,800 owners with estates that average The Owners of the Land. 17 700 acres; then come 32,000, with estates that average 300 acres; then come 32,000, with es- tates that average 200 acres; then 25,000, with estates that average seventy acres ; and then 72,000 with estates that average forty acres, the total number of the smaller rural proprietors being thus not less than 133,000. Finally, there come the urban and suburban proprietors — the latter with their four acres, the former with their fourth of an acre — and the number of these is 820,000." Now, in this list of proprietors no distinction is drawn between copy-holders and free-holders, or between these and lease-holders, and any one acquainted with the conditions on which English urban and suburban property is usually held, cannot doubt that the large major- ity of possessors are not free-holders, or owners in the real sense, but lease-holders, the fee re- maining in the landlord. Again, it has been demonstrated that the New Domesday Book is untrustworthy in other important statements. An extent of 2,781,063 acres, a very large pro- portion belonging, it is reasonably certain, to great land-owners, is not included in its tables. i8 The Owners of the Lajid. while the whole metropolis, with its enormous rentals and vast estates, is also excluded. Again, church lands are entered as the property of individuals in occupancy, and the names of large land-owners are multiplied according to the counties in which they happen to own property, the 525 members of the peerage standing, ac- cording to Mr. Arthur Arnold, for upwards of 1,500 owners. Making due allowance for these errors, the Hon. George C. Brodrick, in his work on English Land and English Land- lords^ estimates that "not more than 4,000 persons, and probably considerably less than 4,000 persons, owning estates of 1,000 acres and upwards, possess in the aggregate an extent of nearly 19,000,000 acres, or about four-sevenths of the whole area included in the Domesday Book returns. If we now subtract the owners of between 1,000 and 2,000 acres, who ostensibly number 2,719, and must really number as much as 1,750, we find that a landed aristocracy consisting of about 2,250 persons own together nearly half the enclosed land in England and Wales." Interesting Figures. 19 On turning to the county tables compiled by Mr. Brodrick, we find in still more striking form the evidence of oligarchical control of the greater part of the agricultural soil of England. Begin- ning alphabetically, we learn that in Bedford, three peers own 53,789 acres, and fourteen great land-owners own 60,127 acres, while 1825 small proprietors own but 38,906 acres, and 5,302 cottagers (most of them probably lease-holders) possess 824 acres. It will be seen that the three peers own about 14,000 acres more than the 7,127 small proprietors and cottagers. In Derby, six peers own nearly double the amount of land really or nominally owned by 6,017 small pro- prietors and 12,874 cottagers ; and in Dorset, ten peers own more than three times the amount of land owned by 2,794 small proprietors and 7,694 cottagers. In the whole of England and Wales, 400 peers and peeresses own 5,728,979 acres, 1,288 great land-owners, 8,497,699 acres, and 217,049 small proprietors own 3,931,806 acres, and 703,289 cottagers, 151,148 acres. These are dry figures, but they are from an author who compiled them with equal industry, care, and in- 20 Interesting Figures. telligence, both from government statistics and from information collected by direct inquiry among the land-owners themselves ; an author who cannot be called a " smatterer," as Mr. Mallock terms Hyndman and Marx, but who has gone to the very root of the subject, and who, so far from being inclined to communism, speaks and evidently feels a conservative interest in the maintenance of British institutions, as far as may be consistent with the welfare and continued prosperity of the people of Great Britain ; and, in view of these figures, and of facts and cir- cumwStances which must be apparent to every Englishman with his eyes wide open to his sur- roundings, it may not be offensive to say that Mr. Mallock sinks to the level of " a smatterer," when he quotes the Domesday Book as authority that the major part of the soil of England is not controlled by a few thousand aristocratic families, to whom the toil and enterprise of nearly thirty millions of people, directly or indirectly, pays a vast and accumulating tribute. So far we have been dealing with Mr. Hynd- man's loose and essentially truthful averment in Aristocratic Incomes. 21 regard to the number of land-owners, and Mr. Mallock's seemingly well-grounded but really illusive refutation of it. Now, let us take up Mr. Mallock's next assertion, that the aristocracy re- ceive not so much as one-third of the gross rental of England, which he states to be about £99,000,000. In order to arrive at this conclu- sion he conveniently cuts off from the aristocratic classes all whose estates average less than one thousand acres, although the prefix of " rever- end" to the names of many of these shows that a large proportion of the class are clergymen, most of them presumably of the Established Church, and undoubtedly connected by blood, position, and education with the aristocracy, while many others are the wealthy owners of val- uable tracts, covered with buildings, in towns and cities. These latter may not be reckoned among large land-owners, in the extent of their territo- ries, but if of gentle descent, they may fairly claim to belong to the aristocracy. Mr. Mallock's arbitrary bound would also exclude not a few who are prominent in the highest circles of society, while scores of the country squires, the typical 22 Advantages of La7id- Ownership. landed gentry of England, would hardly more than be within the limit, for the average in many of the English counties is but little over one thousand acres to a squire ; in Anglesea, for in- stance, six squires having 10,200 acres, in Mid- dlesex five squires having 8,500 acres, and in York, W. R., one hundred and one squires hav- ing 171,700 acres. It should be added that there are very impor- tant and desirable advantages connected with the ownership of land, besides the pecuniary. The squire of the village is a prince in his domain, and the coronet of the land-owning peer is far from being an emblem of obsolete sovereignty. Feudal services, it is true, have for centuries been abolished ; but the whole administration of a country parish, reformed and liberalized as it may seem to be, is within the control of the usually pleasant, good-natured and fairly well- educated gentleman who owns the soil, who sits as a magistrate to try local offenders, as the lord of the manor did of old, and whose tenantry cast their votes at his beck, as they formerly drew the sword at that of his ancestor. Even in the towns Advantages of Land- Ownership. 23 which are centres of skillful industry, and where hundreds or thousands of intelligent mechanics are able to partially counterbalance the influence of the rural proprietors, the land-owners manage to maintain, in a paramount degree, their inher- ited superiority ; for, in the majority of such bor- oughs the issue, as to political representation, be- comes one between the squire who calls himself a Conservative, and is called a Tory, and the equally aristocratic squire, in an opposite parish, who calls himself a Liberal, and is nothing but a Whig. The Liberal leaders hold forth the Whig squire as the champion of popular rights, and as there is no choice except between him and the avowed Tory, the workingmen give the for- mer their support. And yet the English working classes feel an instinctive antipathy toward the whole landed gentry, while this feeling is recip- rocated by the gentry, and finds expression not in open utterance, but indirectly ; for instance, in the greater severity with which petty oflTenders of the artisan class are treated by the esquire mag- istracy, as compared with the patriarchal leniency extended toward the agricultural tenant or laborer. 24 The Throne and the People. This antipathy is doubtless at the bottom of the occasional agitation in some of the lesser towns, where there is a numerous population of me- chanics, in favor of a paid local magistracy, in place of the bench of squires. To return to Mr. Mallock's work : That gen- tleman, after his endeavor to convince us that England is not owned by the class who exercise the right of landlords over most that is worth owning, goes on to defend the institution of mon- archy against the charge of extravagant cost. The British throne does not need the champion- ship of Mr. Mallock. Among the mass of the people of Great Britain who earn their living with their sinews and their brains, there is as deep loyalty toward the monarchy as among the aris- tocracy of title and privilege, and a loyalty all the purer and more valuable because it is unsel- fish. The throne existed before the aristocracy ; in centuries past, as in the present century, in the passage of the reform bill, it has made com- mon cause with the people against the aristoc- racy, and it can and will survive the abolition of the special privileges which, in ages gone by. Comparison of Incomes. 25 have been grossly abused, and which have be- come so odious to the sentiments of the miUions, and so grotesque a mockery of the common rights of mankind that, in some particulars, they dare not be maintained otherwise than in name. Mr. Mallock estimates the cost of the crown to be about seven millions of dollars annually, cer- tainly not a large amount for the support of what he truly denotes " the most splendid and revered monarchy of which the world can boast," and, he might have added, only about one-fortieth the amount which the land-owning aristocracy col- lects from the toilers and producers of England, without giving back anything in return, or per- forming any function save that of luxurious existence. It seems unnecessary to follow Mr. Mallock in his evidence that there are men in mercantile life in England who have incomes as large as those of the leading land-owners, there being sixty-six incomes derived from land of over £50,000, and seventy-seven from business, and of incomes between £10,000 and £50,000, from land 800, and from business 910. So far from 26 The Question at Issue. these figures showing, as Mr. Mallock thinks they do, the comparative inferiority of the great land-owners as factors in the realm, to the un- prejudiced observer the only surprise is that the proportion in favor of trade and commerce is so comparatively small in a country so limited in area as England, whose cities are the workshops of the world, and whose vessels furrow every sea. It appears that with all the commercial and manufacturing enterprise of the English people, the great land-owners still rival, or nearly rival, in point of income, the leading merchants and manufacturers, who, for every pound they re- ceive, give a bounding impulse to that business which is the life-blood of the nation, and which furnishes employment for the multitude, whose labor and skill are the basis of England's pros- perity and glory. Mr. Mallock, while pointing out the errors of socialistic agitators, says that he does not con- tend that the existing land system is perfect, and does not deny or admit that, as time goes on, many changes may be needed. This, however, is the only real question at issue, and without it The Question at Issue. 27 there would be no occasion for the controversy which has given Mr. Mallock the pretext for writing his book. George, Hyndman, Marx, and other advocates of nationalization or division of land, may, and doubtless do, err in some of their statements of pretended facts, as well as in their reasoning. But the existing land system cannot stand or fall upon their errors, and if Mr. Mallock desired that his writings should influ- ence public opinion, he should have attempted to prove not only that George and the others were wrong, but also that the system they assailed was right. To the radical allegation, general in its terms, but sustained by ample his- torical evidence, that the rapacity of landlords has appropriated the common lands which the people once possessed, it is no defence to say that " if the land were distributed amongst even one-half of our existing population, not only would no common land be restored, but every acre would have to be taken of such common land as is left," or that ''were one-half of the population allotted land in plats of not more than ten acres to a family, all the land in England 28 Popular Sentiment. would be occupied, and half the population would be utterly landless still." This does not disprove the facts that previous to the eleventh century vast tracts of land, afterward appropri- ated and disposed of by the sovereign as his own, did belong to the people, that the common lands which remained were gradually enclosed by the nobles and gentry, more especially in the time of the Tudors, although in 1549 ^^ people in the eastern counties rose in insurrection against the wrong, and that this enclosing was not always, or perhaps generally, with a view of increasing the landlord's rental, but in order that parks might be stocked with useless wild ani- mals. It is safe to say, however, that there is no de- sire on the part of the working classes of Eng- land to compel the landlords to give up their lands, no matter how unjustly the title to the soil was originally acquired, and if there is an appar- ent sympathy with the impracticable doctrines of socialism, it is because Parliament is slow to effect a reform in a legitimate way, in accord with the tendency of enlightened civilization, by Primogeniture and Entail, 29 the abolition of primogeniture, and of entail, as practically secured in ordinary settlements of landed property, or in the wills of landed pro- prietors, and through which great estates are handed down from generation to generation in- tact. In the United States, where the right of the testator to dispose of his property is retained, but the equal rights of children recognized in case of intestacy, the results have been satisfac- tory alike to individuals and to the community, and any suggestion of return to primogeniture would not receive a hearing. The practical effect has been to prevent the perpetuation of large estates, without invading or infringing upon the rights of property, and, as law sanctifies custom, it would now be regarded as unjust for a parent to ignore, without cause, the claim of a child to a fair share of the parental property, and wills are seldom made in violation of what most people believe to be a natural duty ; while in England, on the other hand, primogeniture, sanctioned by law, is recognized also by custom. The aboli- tion of primogeniture in England would not be accompanied by hardship, for it would be simply 30 Comfort and Agitation. a declaration by the law-making body that that which every man now has the right to do — namely, to devise his real property in equal shares — shall be done, if he should not choose to make a will to the contrary. Dealing with family settlements and the law of entail would be another and a difficult matter, involving the rights of children unborn and various rights and interests of persons living, dependent upon ex- pectant estates. But the abolition of primogen- iture would be a long step toward the leveling of the landed aristocracy, and would have a more effective influence in silencing the clamor of so- cialism, which may yet become menacing, than any quantity of subtle and technical argument. Other reforms would be adopted in due time, with the deliberation and caution characteristic of the English race. The improved and improving condition of the middle and working classes, and the increase of the number who have an interest in the soil, af- fords no security against agitation. While there have been instances of revolt under the pressure of desperate circumstances, as of the gladiators and Comfoi't a?zd Agitation. 31 of the Jacquerie, yet great movements in behalf of popular rights have usually reached their most formidable proportions when the people have learned in the leisure of comfort to feel their power and to measure their deserts. Wat Tyler's insurrection was an uprising of men who were free, and who meant to maintain the liber- ties whose sweetness they had learned and of which the nobility would fain have deprived them. The people of England were in the en- joyment of greater liberty when Parliament made war upon Charles I. than when their fathers had quietly submitted to the iron grasp of the Tudors, and it was a nation determined to assert the rights it possessed that drove the second James into exile. England had endured years of greater want than those which witnessed the fiercest agitation for the unrestricted importation of food, and the fires which gave lurid warning that the will of the electors must be obeyed by the lords in the passage of the reform bill, were not kindled by starving men. If the working classes are as well-to-do as Mr. Mallock's some- what indefinite figures are intended to show, it is Comfort a?id Agitation. not in consequence of, but in spite of the land system and its drones, and the greater the ac- cumulations of their industry the more impatient they will become of acknowledging as superiors and as rulers, men and families who affect to de- spise the toilers beneath them, and who, by virtue of descent from some male favorite or fe- male harlot of a king, enjoy unnatural exemp- tion from the more weighty anxieties and bur- dens which Divine Providence has allotted to be borne by mankind. Elements of Society in New England. In the Old World meaning of the term there are no classes of society in New England ; there is no condition of life, however low, from which a man may not aspire and rise to the highest honors and the most enviable distinction, provided that he has the requisite natural endowments, favorable opportunities, and the ability and foresight to grasp them. It is mere buncombe to assert, as some do, that there is anything like a ruling or privileged class ; while it cannot be pretended that in New England — as in New York — citizens of character and wealth stand aloof from political strife. Here the office of governor is considered the crown of a successful business career, and the gov- ernor is the chief of society, as well as of the administration. His official trust, instead of being profitable, entails a generous expendi- ture from his private purse, for he is expected to maintain the reputation of the state for hospital- 34 Office Open to All. ity, while every plausible charity appeals to his open hand. His reward is in being the first citizen during his one year or more of executive service, and to be called Governor as long as he may live. Of course, whatever a man's origin, none but the rich could uphold the dignity of the office, and therefore no poor man is ever seri- ously put forward as a candidate. The members of the General Assembly are also men of good social position and usually of independent estate in their respective localities, except where the foreign-born vote is in a majority. The difference between the New England system and the Eng- lish is that the members of Parliament — even of the House of Commons — belong, almost without exception, either to the nobility or the gentry, and were born to wealth and aristocratic station ; here the people's representatives, while generally men of property, have, almost without exception, toiled their way up to independence and influence from straitened and humble be- ginnings. But while there are no definite class lines in New England, there are certain broad bound- Native Dislike of the L'ish. 35 aries, tacitly recognized by all, and apparent to a superficial observer. The native Americans, descended from the original settlers, and re- moved by fortune above the struggle for bread, evidently believe themselves to be a superior race, and affect to regard with ill-concealed aversion the immigrants from abroad, and more especially the Irish.* Nor is this strange when one considers how wholly different the Irish im- migrants are, in religion, prejudices, habits, and ideas of morality and respectability from the native population. For instance, the native New Englander is not, as a rule, unfriendly to old England ; the Irishman detests England ; the * It is an interesting fact that the early Puritans held even a stronger aver- sion toward the Insh than New Englanders of the present day. As early as 165^ a committee of the General Court of Massachusetts, charged with the consideration of many '* evills growing amongst vs," recommended as follows : "10. This court considering j/^ crw^/ and malignant spirrit yt have ffrom tymetotyme byn manifest in ye Irish Nation, against ye English Nation, doe hereby declare thyr phibition of any Irish men, -women or chil- dren being brought Into this lurisdiction on the penalty of ffifty pounds starling to each Inhabitant yt shall buy of any marchant ship mr or other agent any such /son or /sons soe Transported by ym wch fine shall bee by the Countrys Marshall on Conviction of sum Magistrate or Court leavied and bee to the vse of ye Informer one third and two thirds to ye country. This act to be In force six months after publication of this order." 36 Native Dislike of the Irish. natives are nearly all of the Protestant com- munion ; the Irish of the Roman Catholic ; the Protestant churches exclude from membership persons conducting the liquor traffic, which the Catholic Church appears to look upon as no hin- drance to Christian fellowship ; the Irish oppose the public schools, which Americans cherish as the block-house of their liberties ; the Irish com- monly belong to the Democratic party, while the majority of natives adhere to the Republican. Besides, comparatively few of the Irish are skilled workingmen, and skill and capital are prone to look down on sinews and a spade. The depth of the antipathy on the part of native Americans toward the Irish might seem incred- ible to one not in frequent and confidential asso- ciation with natives ; it is deep and harsh, though, for motives of discretion, it is seldom ex- pressed in public. Nevertheless, an Irish- American willing to identify himself with Amer- icans, their traditions and their interests, and to discard the peculiarities which nettle the patriot- ism and provoke the antagonism of the native population, would not find the accident of birth a serious obstacle in the ascending path. The English in Neiv England. 37 Kindred origin and identity of religion are manifestly the chief points in favor of the Eng- lish immigrant in New England, while another and perhaps material circumstance is that Eng- lish residents very seldom interfere in politics ; many of them, indeed, adhere to their native al- legiance, and do not become citizens. Immense manufacturing interests and large estates are controlled by British subjects who spend much of their time abroad. These, of course, when in New England, move in society befitting their wealth and their reputation. The mass of Eng- lish immigrants are mill operatives, and more skillful in the higher grades of factory labor than any other nationality. They exhibit here the virtues and the faults which predominate in any English factory town, modified to a greater or less extent by their surroundings, and especially by the stringent ordinances in relation to the sale of intoxicating liquors. In the New England view the obnoxious and exotic feature of the English workingman's character is the disposi- tion to combine in labor unions and strikes. In Massachusetts, where the suffrage is liberal, and 38 English Lab 07' Agitators. many of the mill operatives are voters, the leg- islature has been induced to enact laws, similar to those in force in England, limiting the hours of factory labor, and making various provisions for the protection of persons engaged in that in- dustry ; but in Rhode Island, where the fran- chise is restricted, hours of labor are unlimited, and there is no labor bureau to excite discontent between employer and employe by the compila- tion of troublesome facts, and the suggestion of hampering reforms. Not only the manufac- turers, but nearly all the property-owning class, have been inclined to look upon the labor agita- tor as a public nuisance, to be suppressed in any legitimate manner, and a really able and liberal minded governor, of excellent social position, and extensively engaged in the manufacturing business, who dared to recommend, in an an- nual message, factory legislation after the pattern adopted by the British Parliament, has never since commanded political confidence or sup- port. His recommendations were reported to a committee which quietly ignored them, the newspapers noticed the matter in brief and sar- English Labor Agitators. 39 castic language, and such was the end of it for a time. That gentleman was ten years ahead of public sentiment. The voice of humanity has nearly convinced the judgment of the lawmakers, and a ten-hour provision for women and children cannot long be delayed. Apart from the prone- ness to labor agitation, the English operatives in our factories are a most valuable element of the community, and New England can never repay the debt that she owes to their energy and to their skill. Englishmen who arrived within the pres- ent century, poor and friendless, became the founders of prominent manufacturing houses, and their children are counted among the leading families. If English manufacturers have found a powerful rival in the United States, they owe the fact as much to their own countrymen as to Americans. Nor has the day for such English- men gone by. Although New Englanders are fully conscious of and appreciate all that Englishmen have done for New England's industrial advancement, yet it would be idle to pretend that the quills of nativ- ism do not stand up, to some extent, against 4© Native Prejudice Against the English. citizens of English, as well as of Irish origin. That the prejudice against residents of foreign birth includes settlers from England, I have been assured by English residents of old and respect- able situation, and my individual observation has led to the same opinion. The native antipathy is more marked in the country towns than in the cities and other centres. Among the elders it is strong, and is, I think, a rankling remnant of the passion aroused by the Revolution and the war of 1812. The writer remembers having heard of a grim farmer who, when a worthy young Englishman visited his daughter with matrimonial intentions, enlivened the courtship by chasing his would-be son-in-law, to whom birth was the only objection, across lots with an axe. The young man, not being a Lochinvar, did not care to risk his life for his love, much to the detriment of the daughter, who subsequently eloped with a miserable tramp fortunate enough to have first seen the light of the sun on this side of the Atlantic. The dislike of English- men is, however, dying out with the old folks. The rising generation, especiajly the girls, are The Scotch in New England. 4^ quite willing to receive on equal terms the new- comer from Great Britain whose education and habits are up to the American standard. In fundamentals of character the Scotchman — perhaps I ought to say the Lowland Scotch- man—is closely akin to the Yankee. His na- tive land, like New England, yields but a grudg- ing return to rustic toil, and accumulated wealth there, as here, is the reward of the shrewdest foresight and indefatigable enterprise — the fore- sight which saw that a fordable stream might be converted into a great commercial highway, the tireless energy and public spirit to accomplish the gigantic work. The knotty individuality of the Scotchman is respected by the native Amer- ican, who is fully conscious of his own, while the heroic history and the touching melodies of the race of Bruce and of Burns are a part of a pohte New England education. The successful Scotchman, therefore, readily obtains social rec- ognition and welcome. As forother nationalities, the Germans are not yet sufficiently numerous to exercise an appre- ciable influence, although a number of promi- 42 The Germafis. nent and respected men in the professions and in business are of German origin. The social cus- toms of the Germans form an obstacle in the way of harmony with the native population. The Germans regard Sunday as a day for recre- ation and enjoyment, whereas the New England idea is that of a day of abstinence, not only from labor but also from amusement, and the laws which protect the observance of the Sabbath, though modified in rigor, are by no means dead letters. A century ago it was the stocks ; to-day it is fine and imprisonment. In Ohio, Iowa, and other Western States settled from New England, the Germans have already come into conflict with the natives on the Sabbath and the sump- tuary issues, and even in liberal New York the Puritanical leaven is strong enough to maintain, and recently to have added to, the severity with which violations of reverence for the consecrated day of rest and of worship may be punished. In this section, as I have said, Germans are com- paratively few, and Puritanism still dominates the community, without serious question or oppo- sition. The Frejich- Canadians. — The Negro. 43 The French-Canadians are numerous in the factory towns, but they are birds of passage, and seldom acquire a permanent settlement. Having earned a sufficient sum of money, they go back to their Canadian homes, to return when neces- sity again appeals for replenishment of the purse. They have been called, somewhat un- justly, the Chinese of the East, because of their migratory habits, and because they receive lower wages than the more intelligent and skillful Enghsh operatives. But the imputation is un- just, for the French-Canadians possess useful and estimable qualities which would render them a desirable acquisition to the permanent popula- tion. The negro in New England is a waiter and a hobby. He never has been, and is not to-day, regarded as the social or political equal of the white. There are educated and wealthy negroes in New England, yet no social club would enter- tain for a moment the idea of admitting one of them to membership ; while until a very recent date, there never has been a negro member of any New England legislature. The old and 44 New Englatid Impressio7is of the Negro. aristocratic families have their colored coach- men and servants, just as their ancestors had their colored slaves, and while they w^ould not deny to the man of color the right to vote, they would smile at the suggestion that he ought to be admitted to their drawing-rooms, or be elected to the General Assembly. The feeling toward the negro is not a prejudice ; it is a settled belief that he is an inferior and servile being — a belief quite compati- ble apparently with the most uncompromis- ing advocacy of the rights of mankind ; for the loudest pleaders for the protection of the colored man against tissue ballots and shot-guns in the South are the first to sneer and affect surprise at any request on the part of the blacks for substantial recognition in the North. The New Englander thoroughly believes in a white man's government — for himself; and there is ground for suspicion that the strenuous support by the political representatives of New England of negro domination and anarchy in the South- ern States has been inspired rather by a selfish desire to see that section of the Union crippled LXiscrimination Agai7ist the Colored Race. '45 by misrule, and thereby prevented from becom- ing a rival of New England in industry and in national influence, than by any sentimental pur- pose to vindicate the equality of a race, the New England measure of whose capacity for public affairs is indicated by appointments to such offices as lamp-lighter and country constable. The degree of liberality toward the colored man varies in different commonwealths. Rhode Island, where slavery lingered longest, is the least liberal. But a few years have elapsed since the law prohibiting the intermarriage of whites and colored persons was repealed, though it had long been obsolete on account of the im- possibility of proving an alleged offender to be white, the only effect of the enactment having been to throw doubts upon the legitimacy of the offspring of mixed unions. The statute was erased, and by a close vote, but the repeal did not change public opinion, and some weeks later, when a white youth of respectable family married a black woman, he was haled before a magistrate, and sentenced to the Reform School during his minority, while his dusky bride stood 4^ Discrhninatio7i Against the Colored Race. by weeping, less sympathy being extended to her than if she had been a cow, mooing for a calf taken from her stall to the shambles. Again, notwithstanding the Civil Rights Act of the late Senator Sumner, a colored lawyer was recently excluded from a place of public amusement, while it is well known that certain prominent hotels are full when a negro applies for accom- modation. It is also well known, though per- haps hardly pertinent to the subject, that colored men are practically excluded from the Masonic order, which in New England is very flourish- ing, and embraces within its ranks a very large share of the respectability, wealth, and culture of the community. It is true that colored men have Masonic lodges of their own, but no official recognition is extended to them, in Rhode Island at least. An unprejudiced observer cannot avoid the impression that the New England estimate of the colored population is justified by experience and evidence. The tone of morality is lower, as a rule, among the blacks than among the whites, there is apparent the disposition to laissez faire Morality Aifiong the Negroes. 47 characteristic of races of tropical origin, and the occasional attempt to imitate the manners and polish of gentlemen seldom rises above a ludic- rous mimicry. The pastor of the leading col- ored church in Providence v^as deposed for tell- ing his flock unpleasant truth about the neglect of soap and water, and urging them to aim for something higher in this world than to clean boots and drive coaches, but his removal has not made his admonitions any the less sound or wise. The larger number of colored residents cluster together in streets which bear an unsavory rep- utation. Lewdness is a prevailing vice, and is fostered by promiscuous gatherings for dancing, which last far into the morning, while petty gambling, in the purchase of cheap lottery tick- ets, is almost universal. Gross superstitions, undoubtedly remnants of the barbarous fetichism of Africa, have a strong hold upon many of the blacks, and their idea of Christianity is passion- ate and sensual. They interpret the Bible liter- ally, and to them the golden gates and jasper walls of the New Jerusalem are not a figure, but a reality of the future paradise which rises be- 48 An Aristocracy of Workers. fore their ecstasied vision. The persons of mixed blood are usually more intelligent than the blacks, but the latter, being in the majority, keep their liirhter brethren in the backojround, and most of the important positions, clerical and lay, in relig- ious and other societies, are occupied by men of unmistakable African origin. Such are some of the materials of which New England's population is composed — materials various in origin and diverse in their ideas, their creeds, and their aims, but nevertheless full of vital force and energy, and with a less percent- age of human weeds and refuse than in any other country on the globe. Nearly everybody is at work, from the manufacturer worth millions, to the tramp who earns his breakfast in the charity w^ood-yard. It is disreputable for any one in vi