week (7s. 7d.), exclusive of cloth- | hold all the inhabitants, even down ing, firing, candle, and lodging; to the bed-ridden and the babies. the base wretches know, that the What then, will any man believe common foot-soldier receives more that these churches were built for to go down his own single throat, such little knots of people? We than the overseers and magistrates are told about the great superstiallow to a working man, his wife, tion of our fathers, and of their and three children; the base readiness to gratify the priests by wretches know all this well; and building altars and other religious yet their railings are confined to edifices. But, we must think those the poor and the poor-rates; and priests to have been most devout it is expected, that they will, next creatures indeed, if we believe, session, urge the Parliament to that they chose to have the money pass a law to enable overseers laid out in useless churches, raand vestries and magistrates to ther than have it put into their own transport paupers beyond the pockets! At any rate, we all seas! They are base enough for know, that Protestant Priests this, or for any thing; but the have no whims of this sort; and whole system will go to the devil, that they never lay out upon long before they will get such an churches any money that they can, act passed; long before they will by any means, get hold of. see perfected this consummation of their infamous tyranny.

It is manifest enough, that the population of this valley was, at one time, many times over what it is now; for, in the first place, what were the twenty-nine churches built for? The population of the 29 parishes is now but little more than one-half of that of the single parish of Kensington; and there are several of the churches bigger than the church at Kensington. What, then, should all these churches have been built FOR? And, besides, where did the hands come from? And where did

But, suppose that we were to believe that the Priests had, in old times, this unaccountable taste; and suppose we were to believe that a knot of people, who might be crammed into a church-porch, were seized, and very frequently too, with the desire of having a big church to go to; we must, after all this, believe that this knot of people were more than giants, or, that they had surprising riches, else we cannot believe that they had the means of gratifying the strange wishes of their Priests and their own not less strange piety and devotion. Even if we the money come from? These could believe that they thought twenty-nine churches would now that they were paving their way to not only hold all the inha- heaven, by building churches bitants, men, women, and chil-which were a hundred times too dren, but all the household goods, large for the population, still we and tools, and implements, of the whole of them, farmers and all, if you leave out the wagons and carts. In three instances, FIFIELD, MILSTON, and ROACH-FEN (17, 23, and 24), the church-porches will

cannot believe, that the building could have been effected without bodily force; and, where was this force to come from, if the people were not more numerous than they now are? What, again, I

ask, were these twenty-nine stead of remaining, as formerly, churches stuck up, not a mile to be, in great part, consumed in from each other; what were twen- these twenty-nine parishes. ty-nine churches made FOR, if the population had been no greater than it is now?

The stars, in my map, mark the spots where manor houses, or gentlemen's mansions, formerly stood, But, in fact, you plainly see all and stood, too, only about sixty the traces of a great ancient po-years ago. Every parish had its pulation. The churches are almost manor house, in the first place; all large, and built in the best and then there were, down this manner. Many of them are very Valley, twenty-one others; so fine edifices; very costly in the that, in this distance of about building; and, in the cases where thirty miles, there stood FIFTY the body of the church has been MANSION HOUSES. Where altered in the repairing of it, so as are they now? I believe, there to make it smaller, the tower, are but EIGHT, that are at all which every where defies the hos-worthy of the name of mansion tility of time, shows you what the houses; and even these are but church must formerly have been. poorly kept up, and, except in two This is the case in several in-or three instances, are of no benestances; and there are two or fit to the labouring people; they three of these villages which must employ but few persons; and, in formerly have been market-towns, short, do not half supply the place and particularly PEWSEY and UP-of any eight of the old mansions. AVON (4 and 13). There are now All these mansions, all these parno less than nine of the parishes, out of the twenty-nine, that have either no parsonage-houses, or have such as are in such a state that a Parson will not, or cannot, live in them. Three of them are without any parsonage-houses at all, and the rest are become poor, mean, falling-down places. This latter is the case at UPAVON, which was formerly a very considerable place. Nothing can more clearly show than this, that all, as far as buildings and population are concerned, has been long upon the decline and decay. Dilapidation after dilapidation have, at last, almost effaced even the parsonage houses, and that too in defiance of the law, ecclesiastical as well as civil. The land remains; and the crops and the sheep come as abundantly as ever; but they are now sent almost wholly away, in

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sonages, aye, and their goods and furniture, together with the clocks, the brass-kettles, the brewing-véssels, the good bedding and good clothes and good furniture, and the stock, in pigs, or in money, of the inferior classes, in this series of once populous and gay villages and hamlets; all these have been, by the accursed system of taxing` and funding and paper-money, by the well-known exactions of the state, and by the not less real, though less generally understood, extortions of the monopolies arising out of paper-money; all these have been, by these accursed means, conveyed away, out of this Valley, to the haunts of the taxeaters and the monopolizers. There are many of the mansion houses, the ruins of which you yet behold. At MILTON (3 in my map) there are two mansion houses, the walls

and the roofs of which yet remain, dilapidated, and, in some cases, but which are falling gradually to wholly demolished, nine out of pieces, and the garden walls are twenty-nine even of the parsonage crumbling down. At ENFORD (15 houses. I told SNIP, at the time in my map) BENNETT, the Mem-(1821), that paper-money could ber for the county, had a large create no valuable thing. I begged mansion house, the stables of which SNIP to bear this in mind. I beare yet standing. In several sought all my readers, and particuplaces, I saw, still remaining, in-larly Mr. MATHIAS ATWOOD (one dubitable traces of an ancient ma- of the Members for Lowther-town), nor house, namely, a dove-cote, not to believe, that paper-money or pigeon-house. The poor pigeons ever did, or ever could, CREATE have kept possession of their heri- any thing of any value. I besought tage, from generation to genera-him to look well into the matter, tion, and so have the rooks, in and assured him, that he would their several rookeries, while the find, that, though paper-money paper-system has swept away, or, could CREATE nothing of value, rather, swallowed up, the owners it was able to TRANSFER every of the dove-cotes and of the lofty thing of value; able to strip a trees, about forty families of which little gentry; able to dilapidate owners have been ousted in this even parsonage houses; able to one Valley, and have become rob gentlemen oftheir estates, and dead-weight creatures, tax-gather- labourers of their Sunday-coats ers, barrack-fellows, thief-takers, and their barrels of beer; able to or, perhaps, paupers or thieves. snatch the dinner from the board

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Senator SNIP congratulated, of the reaper or the mower, and some years ago, that preciously to convey it to the barrack-table honourable "Collective Wisdom," of the Hessian or Hanoverian of which he is a most worthy grenadier; able to take away the Member; SNIP congratulated it wool, that ought to give warmth on the success of the late war in to the bodies of those who rear creating capital! SNIP is, you the sheep, and put it on the backs must know, a great feelosofer and of those who carry arms to keep a not less great feenanceer. SNIP the poor, half-famished shepherds cited, as a proof of the great and in order! glorious effects of paper-money, I have never been able clearly the new and fine houses in London, to comprehend what the beastly the new streets and squares, the Scotch feelosofers mean by their new roads, new canals and bridges."national wealth;" but, as far SNIP was not, I dare say, aware, as I can understand them, this is that this same paper-money had their meaning: that national destroyed forty mansion houses in wealth means, that which is left this Vale of Avon, and had taken of the products of the country away all the goods, all the substance, of the little gentry and of the labouring class. SNIP was not, I dare say, aware, that this same paper-money had, in this one Vale of only thirty miles long,

over and above what is consumed, or used, by those whose labour causes the products to be. This being the notion, it fellows, of course, that the fewer poor devils you can screw the products out of,

the over-produce go to them, as a very great part of it does,. nothing, not even the parings of one's nails, can come back to the valley in exchange. And, can this operation, then, add to the "6 national wealth"? It adds to the "wealth" of those who carry on the affairs of state; it fills their pockets, those of their relatives and dependants; it fattens all tax-eaters; but, it can give no wealth to the "nation," which means, the whole of the people. National Wealth means, the Commonwealth, or Commonweal; and these mean, the general good, or happiness, of the people, and the safety and honour of the state; and, these are not to be secured by robbing those who labour, in order to support a large part of the community in idleness. DEVIZES is the market-town to which the corn goes from the greater part of this Valley. If, when a wagon-load of wheat goes off in the morning, the wagon came back at night loaded with cloth, salt, or something or other, equal in value to the wheat, except what might be necessary to leave with the shopkeeper as his profit; then, indeed, the people might see the wagon go off without tears in their eyes. But, now, they see it go to carry away, and to bring next to nothing in return.

the richer the nation is. This is, | lady and master and miss pentoo, the notion of BURDETT, as sioners and sinecure people; if expressed in his silly and most nasty, musty aristocratic speech of last session. What, then, is to be done with this over-produce? Who is to have it? Is it to go to pensioners placemen, tax-gatherers, dead-weight people, soldiers, gendarmerie, police-people, and, in short, to whole millions-who do no work at all? Is this a cause of" national wealth"? Is a nation made rich by taking the food and clothing from those who create them, and giving them to those who do nothing of any use? Aye, but, this over-produce may be given to manufacturers, and to those who supply the food-raisers with what they want besides food. Oh! but this is merely an exchange of one valuable thing for another valuable thing; it is an exchange of labour in Wiltshire for labour in Lancashire; and, upon the whole, here is no overproduction. If the produce be exported, it is the same thing: it is an exchange of one sort of labour for another. But, our course is, that there is not an exchange; that those who labour, no matter in what way, have a large part of the fruit of their labour taken away, and receive nothing in exchange. If the over-produce of this Valley of Avon were given, by the farmers, to the weavers in Lancashire, to the iron and steel chaps of Warwickshire, and to What a twist a head must other makers or sellers of useful have before it can come to the things, there would comé an conclusion, that the nation gains abundance of all these useful in wealth by the government things into this valley from Lan-being able to cause the work to cashire and other parts; but if, as is the case, the over-produce goes to the fund holders, the deadweight, the soldiers, the lord and

be done by those who have hardly any share in the fruit of the labour! What a twist such a head must have! The Scotch feeloso

fers, who seem all to have been, put forth to teach labouring peoby nature, formed for negro- ple how to avoid having children. drivers, have an insuperable ob- Now, look at this Valley of Avon, jection to all those establishments Here the people raise nearly and customs, which occasion ho- twenty times as much food and lidays. They call them a great clothing as they consume. They hinderance, a great bar to indus- raise five times as much, even actry, a great drawback from "na-cording to my scale of living. tional wealth." I wish each of They have been doing this for these unfeeling fellows had a many, many years. They have spade put into his hand for ten been doing it for several generadays, only ten days, and that he tions. Where, then, is their NAwere compelled to dig only just TURAL TENDENCY to inas much as one of the common crease beyond the means of suslabourers at Fulham. The me- tenance for them? Beyond, intaphysical gentleman would, Ideed, the means of that sustenance believe, soon discover the use of which a system like this will leave holidays! But, why should men, them. Say that, Sawneys, and F why should any men, work hard? agree with you.. Far beyond the Why, I ask, should they work in- means that the taxing and monocessantly, if working part of the polizing system will leave in their days of the week be sufficient hands: that is very true; for it Why should the people at MIL- leaves them nothing but the scale of TON, for instance, work inces-the poor-book: they must cease to santly, when they now raise breed at all, or they must exceed, food and clothing and fuel and this mark; but, the earth, give every necessary to maintain well them their fair share of its profive times their number? Why ducts, will always give sustenance should they not have some holi- in sufficiency to those who apply days And, pray, say, thou con- to it by skilful and diligent labour. ceited Scotch feelosofer, how the "national wealth" can be increased, by making these people work incessantly, that they may raise food and clothing, to go to feed and clothe people who do not work at all.

The villages down this Valley of Avon, and, indeed, it was the sane in almost every part of this county, and in the North and West of Hampshire also, used to have great employment for the women and children in the cardThe state of this Valley seems ing and spinning of wool for the to illustrate the infamous and really making of broad-cloth. This was diabolical assertion of MALTHUS, a very general employment for which is, that the human kind the women and girls; but, it is have a NATURAL TEND- now wholly gone; and this has ENCY to increase beyond the made a vast change in the conmeans of sustenance for them.dition of the people, and in the Hence all the schemes of this state of property and of manners and the other Scotch writers for and of morals. In 1816, I wrote what they call checking popula- and published a LETTER TO THE tion. Hence all the beastly, the LUDDITES, the object of which nasty, the abominable writings, was to combat their hostility to the