The first general demand we made for an increase in wages took place in March 1873. We asked that wages should be increased from 11s. to 13s. a week, so far as Norfolk was concerned, and this demand was granted. It had never reached that figure before. This gave a great stimulus to the movement generally. The Aylsham branch of which I was a member decided not to join Arch's Union, but joined the Lincolnshire Amalgamated League, which governed on the principle of each district holding its own funds and paying a quarterly levy to the central fund, on the same principle which obtained with the Oddfellows and Foresters Friendly Societies. The next great struggle was in the spring of 1874, when a demand was made for another 2s. increase and time off for breakfast. Up to that time we were not allowed to stop for breakfast, and we had no food from tea-time the previous day until dinner-time the next day. Many farmers allowed the concession but others would not. The man I worked for at Oulton, Mr. James Rice, was one of the latter, although a member and a deacon of the Congregational Church in that village. We adopted all kinds of methods to snatch time to eat our piece of bread. Scores of times I have held the plough with one hand and eaten the bread with the other. Others, when a number were working together, would set one to watch to see if the boss came while they ate their bread. This demand was hotly contested and I became involved and struck work. Fortunately for me I had another trade at my back, namely brickmaking. There was a great call for brickmakers at this time and I obtained work at once with James Applegate at Blickling, himself a leader of the Amalgamated Labour League, so I had not to call on the funds of the Union at all and I did not go back to farm work for several years. During these two years I had made rapid progress with my education, and I was so far advanced that I could begin to read a newspaper. I had, however, not been in ignorance of happenings in the world around me, for my wife had always read to me the weekly papers. The first newspapers I read were the _Eastern Weekly Press_ and the _People's Weekly Journal_, the two local papers. I had, however, not spoken at a Labour meeting since the first meeting was held two years before, but I had been on the preachers' plan for two years and had begun to have a little confidence in myself. I at once begun to speak at local labour meetings. The strike going on at this time was successful, and the village labourer in Norfolk for the first time in his history received his 2s. 6d. per day and the right to stop for breakfast.