"Farmer Oldacre a hard man to the poor!" said old John Truman, who came in at the moment from the sick man's room--"Farmer Oldacre a hard man to the poor! I'm sure you're an ungrateful woman for saying so; as I should be an ungrateful man, if I allowed you to say it without taking you to task.--I've worked for him now these seventeen years, and a better or a kinder master cannot be. Did'nt I see you, Hannah, day after day, when your little boy was ill, going to his house, sometimes for a little milk, sometimes for a little made wine, and did he ever refuse you? did he ever refuse _any_ poor person, who was really in want, any thing that he was able to give?" "I can't say but that he's ready enough to help a poor body with any thing he has himself; but then if one asks him for a little more parish relief, he's so terrible particular, and asks so many questions, that it's quite unpleasant, and perhaps we can get nothing after all." "In short," said John, "you mean to say that he is liberal and kind in giving from his own pocket, but careful and cautious how he makes free with the pockets of other people. And then again--who employs so many men as Farmer Oldacre? I'm sure I have often known him in the winter try to find out jobs for the sake of keeping the men at work; and after all I believe, that he feels the change of times as much as any man, and that he and his family allow themselves little beyond bare necessaries. And even with respect to parish relief, I believe that the _old_ men and women, who are really past work, are better off when Farmer Oldacre has the books, than at any other time." "But then," answered Hannah, "Farmer Barton is so _good-natured_ when we go to him. He says that a shilling or two cannot signify to the farmers, and is not worth thinking about." "I believe it would be better for all parties," replied Truman, "if the able-bodied poor thought less of running to the parish, and more of depending, under God's blessing, on themselves. When I was young, a man would have been ashamed of begging for parish relief. Indeed, the law was, that those who were relieved were to be marked by a badge. I know that I contrived to bring up a family of seven children without being beholden to any body. For a few years it was certainly hard work, but God helped us on." "But wages," said Nanny Fowler, "were better in those days." "Compared with what they would buy, perhaps they were, but their being low now is, I take it, partly owing to the poor rates." "Why how can you make that out?" cried the whole party. "In the first place, can you tell me, why wheat is so cheap just at present? It was, you know, ten shillings the bushel, and indeed sometimes a great deal more--it is now less than five." "Why it's cheap to be sure, because there is such plenty of it."