n
price, the parish paying the paupers. The making of the Newmarket Road
Cutting, near Royston, was an instance of this.

Parochial affairs presented this extraordinary condition of things that
for the industrious, thrifty man who was desirous of laying up
something for a rainy day, there was no hope! Take the following,
which I copy verbatim from the Commissioners' report--

"We have already quoted from Mr. Cowell's report a letter from Mr.
Nash, of Royston, in which he states that he had been forced by the
Overseer of Reed to dismiss two excellent labourers for the purpose of
introducing two paupers into their place. Mr. Nash adds that of the
men dismissed, one,

"Was John Walford, a parishioner of Barley, a steady, industrious,
trustworthy, single man, who, by long and rigid economy, had saved
about L100. On being dismissed, Walford applied in vain to the farmers
at Barley for employment! _It was known that he had saved money, and
could not come on the parish, although any of them would willingly have
taken him had it been otherwise_! After living a few months without
being able to get any work he bought a cart and two horses, and has
ever since obtained a precarious subsistence by carrying corn to London
for use of the Cambridge merchants; but just now the current of corn is
northward and he has nothing to do; and at any time he would gladly
have exchanged his employment for that of a day labourer, if he could
have obtained work. No reflection is intended on the Overseers of
Barley; they only do what all others are expected to do; though the
young men point at Walford and call him a fool for not spending his
money at a public-house as they do; adding that then he would get work"!

A somewhat similar instance is supplied to the Commissioners by Mr.
Wedd who is spoken of in the report as "an eminent solicitor of
Royston."

Here is another case:--"A man without children in this neighbourhood
emerged from poverty and bequeathed many pecuniary legacies, some L100
apiece, and others larger and smaller, to a number of agricultural
labourers who were his distant relatives. As soon as the legacies are
paid the legatees would not be able to obtain any employment in
husbandry until the legacies are spent! The employment in this parish
is all wanted for those who from deep poverty can claim it of the
Overseers, and these legatees will have no {166} title to claim
employment till they have reduced themselves again