ate for
trivial acts of mischief, and if the worst punishment inflicted upon
them is a shilling fine and costs, which their parents pay, that is
enough to make "a summons" a very dreadful thing to a little boy. Out of
eighteen shillings a week, his father cannot afford "a shilling and
costs" for a piece of mischief, as the little boy is but too likely to
be shown.

Children's memories are short, however, and it takes more than an
occasional punishment of two or three to inspire in them all a
timorousness so instinctive in character as that of these village boys.
At the back of it there must be a more constant and pervasive influence.
And, to come to the point at last, I think that the boys are swayed,
unwittingly, by an attitude in the grown-up people with whom they
live--an attitude of habitual wariness, not to say fear, in regard to
everything connected with property and employers. This is what makes the
timidity of the village urchins interesting. We may discern in it the
expression of a feeling prevalent throughout the cottages--an unreasoned
but convinced distrust of propertied folk, and a sense of being
unprotected and helpless against their privileges and power. Here,
accordingly, is one direction in which class distinction has seriously
affected the villagers. It would be an exaggeration to say that they
feel like outlaws; but they are vaguely aware of constraint imposed upon
them by laws and prejudices which are none too friendly to people of
their kind. One divines it in their treatment of the village policeman.
There is probably no lonelier man in the parish than the constable. Of
course he meets with civility, but his company is avoided. One hears
him mentioned in those same accents of grudging caution which the
villagers use in speaking of unfriendly property-owners, as though he
belonged to that alien caste. The cottagers feel that they themselves
are the people whom he is stationed in the valley to watch.

They feel it; nor can it be denied that there is some excuse for the
feeling. It is true that they far outnumber the employers, so that,
other things being equal, from their more numerous ranks there would
naturally come a larger number of offenders against the law. But other
things are not equal. The proportion is not kept. Anyone who studies the
police-court reports in the local papers will see that, apart from cases
of technical offence, like riding a bicycle on the footpath, or keeping
a dog witho