Part 68

To conclude an account of Suffolk, and not to sing the praises of Bury St. Edmund's, would offend every creature of Suffolk birth; even at Ipswich, when I was praising _that place_, the very people of that town asked me if I did not think Bury St. Edmund's the nicest town in the world. Meet them wherever you will, they have all the same boast; and indeed, as a town _in itself_, it is the neatest place that ever was seen. It is airy, it has several fine open places in it, and it has the remains of the famous abbey walls and the abbey gate entire; and it is so clean and so neat that nothing can equal it in that respect. It was a favourite spot in ancient times; greatly endowed with monasteries and hospitals. Besides the famous Benedictine Abbey, there were once a college and a friary; and as to the abbey itself, it was one of the greatest in the kingdom; and was so ancient as to have been founded only about forty years after the landing of Saint Austin in Kent. The land all round about it is good; and the soil is of that nature as not to produce much dirt at any time of the year; but the country about it is _flat_, and not of that beautiful variety that we find at Ipswich.

After all, what is the reflection now called for? It is that this fine county, for which nature has done all that she can do, soil, climate, sea-ports, people; everything that can be done, and an internal government, civil and ecclesiastical, the most complete in the world, wanting nothing but to _be let alone_, to make every soul in it as happy as people can be upon earth; the peace provided for by the county rates; property protected by the law of the land; the poor provided for by the poor-rates; religion provided for by the tithes and the church-rates; easy and safe conveyance provided for by the highway-rates; extraordinary danger provided against by the militia-rates; a complete government in itself; _but having to pay a portion of sixty millions a year in taxes, over and above all this; and that, too, on account of wars carried on, not for the defence of England_, not for the upholding of _English liberty and happiness_, but for the purpose of crushing liberty and happiness in other countries; and all this because, and only because, a septennial Parliament has deprived the people of their rights.

That which we _admire_ most is not always that which would be _our choice_. One might imagine, that after all that I have said about this fine county, I should certainly prefer it as a place of residence. I should not, however: my choice has been always very much divided between the woods of Sussex and the downs of Wiltshire. I should not like to be compelled to decide; but if I were compelled, I do believe that I should fix on some vale in Wiltshire. Water meadows at the bottom, corn-land going up towards the hills, those hills being _Down land_, and a farm-house, in a clump of trees, in some little cross vale between the hills, sheltered on every side but the south. In short, if Mr. Bennet would give me a farm, the house of which lies on the right-hand side of the road going from Salisbury to Warminster, in the parish of Norton Bovant, just before you enter that village; if he would but be so good as to do that, I would freely give up all the rest of the world to the possession of whoever may get hold of it. I have hinted this to him once or twice before, but I am sorry to say that he turns a deaf ear to my hinting.

_Cambridge, 28th March, 1830._

I went from Hargham to Lynn on Tuesday, the 23rd; but owing to the disappointment at Thetford, everything was deranged. It was market-day at Lynn, but no preparations of any sort had been made, and no notification given. I therefore resolved, after staying at Lynn on Wednesday, to make a short tour, and to come back to it again. This tour was to take in _Ely_, Cambridge, St. Ives, Stamford, Peterborough, Wisbeach, and was to bring me back to Lynn, after a very busy ten days. I was particularly desirous to have a little political preaching at Ely, the place where the flogging of the English local militia under a guard of German bayonets cost me so dear.

I got there about noon on Thursday, the 25th, being market-day; but I had been apprised even before I left Lynn, that no place had been provided for my accommodation. A gentleman at Lynn gave me the name of one at Ely, who, as he thought, would be glad of an opportunity of pointing out a proper place, and of speaking about it; but just before I set off from Lynn, I received a notification from this gentleman, that he could do nothing in the matter. I knew that Ely was a small place, but I was determined to go and see the spot where the militia-men were flogged, and also determined to find some opportunity or other of relating that story as publicly as I could at Ely, and of describing the _tail_ of the story; of which I will speak presently. Arrived at Ely, I first walked round the beautiful cathedral, that honour to our Catholic forefathers, and that standing disgrace to our Protestant selves. It is impossible to look at that magnificent pile without _feeling_ that we are a fallen race of men. The cathedral would, leaving out the palace of the bishop, and the houses of the dean, canons, and prebendaries, weigh more, if it were put into a scale, than all the houses in the town, and all the houses for a mile round the neighbourhood if you exclude the remains of the ancient monasteries. You have only to open your eyes to be convinced that England must have been a far greater and more wealthy country in those days than it is in these days. The hundreds of thousands of loads of stone, of which this cathedral and the monasteries in the neighbourhood were built, must all have been brought by sea from distant parts of the kingdom. These foundations were laid more than a thousand years ago; and yet there are vagabonds who have the impudence to say that it is the Protestant religion that has made England a great country.

Ely is what one may call a miserable little town: very prettily situated, but poor and mean. Everything seems to be on the decline, as, indeed, is the case everywhere, where the clergy are the masters. They say that this bishop has an income of L18,000 a year. He and the dean and chapter are the owners of all the land and tithes, for a great distance round about, in this beautiful and most productive part of the country; and yet this famous building, the cathedral, is in a state of disgraceful irrepair and disfigurement. The great and magnificent windows to the east have been shortened at the bottom, and the space plastered up with brick and mortar, in a very slovenly manner, for the purpose of saving the expense of keeping the glass in repair. Great numbers of the windows in the upper part of the building have been

## partly closed up in the same manner, and others quite closed up. One

door-way, which apparently had stood in need of repair, has been rebuilt in modern style, because it was cheaper; and the churchyard contained a flock of sheep acting as vergers for those who live upon the immense income, not a penny of which ought to be expended upon themselves while any part of this beautiful building is in a state of irrepair. This cathedral was erected "to the honour of God and the Holy Church." My daughters went to the service in the afternoon, in the choir of which they saw God honoured by the presence of _two old men_, forming the whole of the congregation. I dare say, that in Catholic times, five thousand people at a time have been assembled in this church. The cathedral and town stand upon a little hill, about three miles in circumference, raised up, as it were, for the purpose, amidst the rich fen land by which the hill is surrounded, and I dare say that the town formerly consisted of houses built over a great part of this hill, and of, probably, from fifty to a hundred thousand people. The people do not now exceed above four thousand, including the bedridden and the babies.

Having no place provided for lecturing, and knowing no single soul in the place, I was thrown upon my own resources. The first thing I did was to walk up through the market, which contained much more than an audience sufficient for me; but, leaving the market people to carry on their affairs, I picked up a sort of labouring man, asked him if he recollected when the local militia-men were flogged under the guard of the Germans; and, receiving an answer in the affirmative, I asked him to go and show me the spot, which he did; he showed me a little common along which the men had been marched, and into a piece of pasture-land, where he put his foot upon the identical spot where the flogging had been executed. On that spot, I told him what I had suffered for expressing my indignation at that flogging. I told him that a large sum of English money was now every year sent abroad to furnish half pay and allowances to the officers of those German troops, and to maintain the widows and children of such of them as were dead; and I added, "You have to work to help to pay that money; part of the taxes which you pay on your malt, hops, beer, leather, soap, candles, tobacco, tea, sugar, and everything else, goes abroad every year to pay these people: it has thus been going abroad ever since the peace; and it will thus go abroad for the rest of your life, if this system of managing the nation's affairs continue;" and I told him that about one million seven hundred thousand pounds had been sent abroad on this account, _since the peace_.

When I opened, I found that this man was willing to open too; and he uttered sentiments that would have convinced me, if I had not before been convinced of the fact, that there are very few, even amongst the labourers, who do not clearly understand the cause of their ruin. I discovered that there were two Ely men flogged upon that occasion, and that one of them was still alive and residing near the town. I sent for this man, who came to me in the evening when he had done his work, and who told me that he had lived seven years with the same master when he was flogged, and was bailiff or head man to his master. He has now a wife and several children; is a very nice-looking, and appears to be a hard-working, man, and to bear an excellent character.

But how was I to harangue? For I was determined not to quit Ely without something of that sort. I told this labouring man who showed me the flogging spot, my name, which seemed to surprise him very much, for he had heard of me before. After I had returned to my inn, I walked back again through the market amongst the farmers; then went to an inn that looked out upon the market-place, went into an up-stairs room, threw up the sash, and sat down at the window, and looked out upon the market. Little groups soon collected to survey me, while I sat in a very unconcerned attitude. The farmers had dined, or I should have found out the most numerous assemblage, and have dined with them. The next best thing was, to go and sit down in the room where they usually dropped in to drink after dinner; and, as they nearly all smoke, to take a pipe with them. This, therefore, I did; and, after a time, we began to talk.

The room was too small to contain a twentieth part of the people that would have come in if they could. It was hot to suffocation; but, nevertheless, I related to them the account of the flogging, and of my persecution on that account; and I related to them the account above stated with regard to the English money now sent to the Germans, at which they appeared to be utterly astonished. I had not time sufficient for a lecture, but I explained to them briefly the real cause of the distress which prevailed; I warned the farmers particularly against the consequences of hoping that this distress would remove itself. I portrayed to them the effects of the taxes; and showed them that we owe this enormous burden to the want of being fairly represented in the Parliament. Above all things, I did that which I never fail to do, showed them the absurdity of grumbling at the six millions a year given in relief to the poor, while they were silent, and seemed to think nothing of the sixty millions of taxes collected by the Government at London, and I asked them how any man of property could have the impudence to call upon the labouring man to serve in the militia, and to deny that that labouring man had, in case of need, a clear right to a share of the produce of the land. I explained to them how the poor were originally relieved; told them that the revenues of the livings, which had their foundation in _charity_, were divided amongst the poor. The demands for repair of the churches, and the clergy themselves; I explained to them how church-rates and poor-rates came to be introduced; how the burden of maintaining the poor came to be thrown upon the people at large; how the nation had sunk by degrees ever since the event called the Reformation; and, pointing towards the cathedral, I said, "Can you believe, gentlemen, that when that magnificent pile was reared, and when all the fine monasteries, hospitals, schools, and other resorts of piety and charity, existed in this town and neighbourhood; can you believe, that Ely was the miserable little place that it now is; and that that England which had never heard of the name of _pauper_, contained the crowds of miserable creatures that it now contains, some starving at stone-cracking by the way-side, and others drawing loaded wagons on that way?"

A young man in the room (I having come to a pause) said: "But, Sir, were there no poor in Catholic times?" "Yes," said I, "to be sure there were. The Scripture says, that the poor shall never cease out of the land; and there are five hundred texts of Scripture enjoining on all men to be good and kind to the poor. It is necessary to the existence of civil society, that there should be poor. Men have two motives to industry and care in all the walks of life: one, to acquire wealth; but the other and stronger, to avoid poverty. If there were no poverty, there would be no industry, no enterprise. But this poverty is not to be made a punishment unjustly severe. Idleness, extravagance, are offences against morality; but they are not offences of that heinous nature to justify the infliction of starvation by way of punishment. It is, therefore, the duty of every man that is able; it is particularly the duty of every government, and it was a duty faithfully executed by the Catholic Church, to take care that no human being should perish for want in a land of plenty; and to take care, too, that no one should be deficient of a sufficiency of food and raiment, not only to sustain life, but also to sustain health." The young man said: "I thank you, Sir; I am answered."

I strongly advised the farmers to be well with their work-people; for that, unless their flocks were as safe in their fields as their bodies were in their beds, their lives must be lives of misery; that if their sacks and barns were not places of as safe deposit for their corn as their drawers were for their money, the life of the farmer was the most wretched upon earth, in place of being the most pleasant, as it ought to be.

_Boston, Friday, 9th April, 1830._

Quitting Cambridge and Dr. Chafy and Serjeant Frere, on Monday, the 29th of March, I arrived at St. Ives, in Huntingdonshire, about one o'clock in the day. In the evening I harangued to about 200 persons, principally farmers, in a wheelwright's shop, that being the only _safe_ place in the town, of sufficient dimensions and sufficiently strong. It was market-day; and this is a great cattle-market. As I was not to be at Stamford in Lincolnshire till the 31st, I went from St. Ives to my friend Mr. Wells's, near Huntingdon, and remained there till the 31st in the morning, employing the evening of the 30th in going to Chatteris, in the Isle of Ely, and there addressing a good large company of farmers.

On the 31st, I went to Stamford, and, in the evening, spoke to about 200 farmers and others, in a large room in a very fine and excellent inn, called Standwell's Hotel, which is, with few exceptions, the nicest inn that I have ever been in. On the 1st of April, I harangued here again, and had amongst my auditors some most agreeable, intelligent, and public-spirited yeomen, from the little county of Rutland, who made, respecting the _seat in Parliament_, the proposition, the details of the purport of which I communicated to my readers in the last Register.

On the 2nd of April, I met my audience in the playhouse at Peterborough; and though it had snowed all day, and was very wet and sloppy, I had a good large audience; and I did not let this opportunity pass without telling my hearers of the part that their _good_ neighbour, Lord Fitzwilliam, had acted with regard to the _French war_, with regard to _Burke and his pension_; with regard to the _dungeoning law_, which drove me across the Atlantic in 1817, and with regard to the putting into the present Parliament, aye, and for that very town, that very Lawyer Scarlett, whose state prosecutions are now become so famous. "Never," said I, "did I say that behind a man's back that I would not say to his face. I wish I had his face before me: but I am here as near to it as I can get: I am before the face of his friends: here, therefore, I will say what I think of him." When I had described his conduct, and given my opinion on it, many applauded, and not one expressed disapprobation.

On the 3rd, I speechified at Wisbeach, in the playhouse, to about 220 people, I think it was; and that same night, went to sleep at a friend's (a total stranger to me, however) at St. Edmund's, in the heart of the Fens. I stayed there on the 4th (Sunday), the morning of which brought a hard frost: ice an inch thick, and the total destruction of the apricot blossoms.

After passing Sunday and the greater part of Monday (the 5th) at St. Edmund's, where my daughters and myself received the greatest kindness and attention, we went, on Monday afternoon, to Crowland, where we were most kindly lodged and entertained at the houses of two gentlemen, to whom also we were personally perfect strangers; and in the evening, I addressed a very large assemblage of most respectable farmers and others, in this once famous town. There was another hard frost on the Monday morning; just, as it were, to _finish_ the apricot bloom.

On the 6th I went to Lynn, and on that evening and on the evening of the 7th, I spoke to about 300 people in the playhouse. And here there was more _interruption_ than I have ever met with at any other place. This town, though containing as good and kind friends as I have met with in any other, and though the people are generally as good, contains also, apparently, a large proportion of _dead-weight_, the offspring, most likely, of the _rottenness of the borough_. Two or three, or even _one_ man, may, if not tossed out at once, disturb and interrupt everything in a case where constant attention to _fact_ and _argument_ is requisite, to insure utility to the meeting. There were but _three_ here; and though they were finally silenced, it was not without great loss of time, great noise and hubbub. Two, I was told, were _dead-weight_ men, and one a sort of _higgling merchant_.

On the 8th I went to Holbeach, in this noble county of Lincoln; and, gracious God! what a _contrast_ with the scene at Lynn! I knew not a soul in the place. Mr. Fields, a bookseller and printer, had invited me by letter, and had, in the nicest and most unostentatious manner, made all the preparations. Holbeach lies in the midst of some of the richest land in the world; a small market-town, but a parish more than twenty miles across, larger, I believe, than the county of Rutland, produced an audience (in a very nice room, with seats prepared) of 178, apparently all wealthy farmers, and men in that rank of life; and an audience so _deeply_ attentive to the dry matters on which I had to address it, I have very seldom met with. I was delighted with Holbeach; a neat little town; a most beautiful church with a spire, like that of "the man of Ross, pointing to the skies;" gardens very pretty; fruit-trees in abundance, with blossom-buds ready to burst; and land, dark in colour, and as fine in substance as flour, as fine as if sifted through one of the sieves with which we get the dust out of the clover seed; and when cut deep down into with a spade, precisely, as to substance, like a piece of hard butter; yet nowhere is the _distress_ greater than here. I walked on from Holbeach, six miles, towards Boston; and seeing the fatness of the land, and the fine grass and the never-ending sheep lying about like _fat hogs_, stretched in the sun, and seeing the abject state of the labouring people, I could not help exclaiming, "God has given us the best country in the world; our brave and wise and virtuous fathers, who built all these magnificent churches, gave us the best government in the world, and we, their cowardly and foolish and profligate sons, have made this once-paradise what we now behold!"

I arrived at Boston (where I am now writing) to-day, (Friday, 9th April) about ten o'clock. I must arrive at Louth before I can say _precisely_ what my future route will be. There is an immense fair at Lincoln next week; and a friend has been _here_ to point out the proper days to be there; as, however, this Register will not come from the press until after I shall have had an opportunity of writing something at Louth, time enough to be inserted in it. I will here go back, and speak of the country that I have travelled over, since I left Cambridge on the 29th of March.