I think, however, that there is more chance here than among the little farmers in the settled districts.

Here, at all events, I shan't have the rum-bottle eternally standing between me and my man.

What a glorious, independent, happy set of men are those said small freeholders, Major! What a happy exchange an English peasant makes when he leaves an old, well-ordered society, the ordinances of religion, the various give-and-take relations between rank and rank, which make up the sum of English life, for independence, godlessness, and rum! He gains, say you! Yes, he gains meat for his dinner every day, and voila tout! Contrast an English workhouse schoolboy--I take the lowest class for example, a class which should not exist--with a small farmer's son in one of the settled districts.

Which will make the most useful citizen?
Give me the workhouse lad!" "Oh, but you are over-stating the case, you know, Dean," said the Major.

"You must have a class of small farmers! Wherever the land is fit for cultivation it must be sold to agriculturists; or, otherwise, in case of a war, we shall be dependent on Europe and America for the bread we eat.