562 PARLIAMENTARY COLBERTISM 
rates for ten years to come equal to the pressure which they 
have experienced during the last ten years, that so useful and 
respectable a set of men must necessarily be exterminated 
entirely ip many districts of the kingdom, and many re- 
spectable fathers and mothers of families would themselves 
become objects of that charity which they had been ruined 
to support; their farms would, on the first vacancy, be 
purchased by neighbouring gentlemen or by opulent farmers; 
and eventually, by the entire suppression of small occu- 
pations, every hope would be taken away from the labouring 
poor of ever bettering their condition by renting and culti- 
vating a few acres for their own comfort and advantage.” 
The progress of agricultural improvements left its mark by 
drawing hard and fast lines of cleavage between the classes 
in rural society!; the smaller farmer who had succumbed in 
the struggle was all the more to be pitied, because the 
labouring class in which he had been merged was entering on 
a terrible period of privation and degradation? 
236. The development of manufacturing had done much 
The to stimulate agricultural production, but it also had serious 
pressure of results in imposing fresh burdens on the proprietors of the 
Palin forth 50113. In many places the wage-earning population had no 
discussions 1 oang of support to fall back upon, in times of bad trade; 
the pressure of the poor rates was occasionally a very heavy 
burden, and prudent men were desirous of avoiding the risk 
of being exposed to it. Changed circumstances gave rise to 
new social problems, and there were some alterations in the 
administration of the Elizabethan system of poor relief; it 
was also supplemented by Private Bill legislation®, Still 
A.D. 1689 
—1776. 
1 Compare H. Levy, op. cit. p. 48 on the bitterness this change engendered. 
t See below pp. 713—715. 
1 «This clothworking I have named a commodity of this country, and so is it 
generally taken to be and I suppose you conceive it is 80; and so it is a great use 
to the kingdom. But I may tell you secretly in council not so much for this 
country (some few excepted), to whom it is more burdensome than profitable; for 
having engrossed 80 great a trade it hath made the towns and country so populous 
that notwithstanding all their best endeavours in husbandry, yet yields hardly 
sufficient of bread, beer and victual to feed itself....And in every rumour of war or 
contagious sickness (hindering the sale of those commodities), makes a multitude 
of the poorer sort chargeable to their neighbours, who are bound to maintain 
them.” Westcote, 4 view of Devonshire in MDOXXX. On the inability of 
Devonshire to feed its large manufacturing population in 1620. see Giles. Parl. 
Hist. 1. 1196. 
4 Clifford. Private Bill Legislation. 1. 266°. There were more than 150 local