2H AGRICULTURAL SURVEY

Many pariſhes, which within twenty years paſt paid no more than 5ol. per annum to the poor, now pay 2001. and unleſs ſome plan of prevention be adopted, the evil is not likely ro abate. This increaſe of the poor’s rate has been general, and may be attributed partly to an increaſed popu- lation, and partly to a growing diſfſoluteneſs in the manners of the poor, which ever accompanies national improvement. Aâtive exertions in this way cannot fail to produce a ſcar- city of labour; and to this, as naturally follows, an advance of wages; but the misfortune is, that ſuch ân advance 1s not accompanied with a growing diſpoſition in the work- man to maintain, in a more comfortable way, his wife and family, or to lay by againſt a time of need. No; if he can earn eight or nine ſhillings in four days of the week, the re- maining 200 days are devoted to pleaſure, or luxury, and the wife and children are in a worſe ſituation than when more moderate wages compelled him to conſtant work.

I have known many inſtances, where the wages of a collier and his family, not exceeding five perſons, have been twenty-five ſhillings per week, and their improvidence has been ſuch, that one week's illneſs has brought them to the pariſh for aſſiſtance.

I can alſo look back to the time, when a commendable degree of pride operated on the minds of the lower claſs, and withheld them from applications to the pariſh for relief, unleſs in great diſtreís.

"This pride, I am ſorry to ſay, is totally loſt, and the boon is now adminiſtered by the pariſh-offcer, with caution and reluctance; and received by the poor, with diſſatisfaction and ¿ngratitude. From what I have faid, let it not be inferred, that I wiſh to depreſs the poor, or to debar them of that coméort, which their uſefulneſs in ſociety intitles them to enjoy, No fight can be more plealing to me, than to ſee

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