The people were uneducated to an extent now unusual.

Nearly all the letters of the village were written by my uncle's gardener, a Scotchman, who, having the degree of education usual with his countrymen of the profession, and who being very good natured, had abundant occupation for his evenings, and being, moreover, a prudent man, and _safe_, became the depository of nine-tenths of the family secrets of the inhabitants.
Being thus ignorant generally, and few of them ever having been twenty miles from the place, I may consider the parish fifty years behind the rest of the world when I went there, so that it now furnishes recollection of rural people, of manners and intelligence, dating back a hundred years from the present time.

It was indeed a very primitive race; and it is curious to recall the many indications afforded in that obscure village of unmitigated ignorance.

With all this were found in full exercise also the more violent and vindictive passions of our nature.

They might have the simplicity, but not the virtues, of Arcadia....