From London to Land's End: and Two Letters from the "Journey through England by a Gentleman"Defoe, Daniel
History
From London to Land's End: and Two Letters from the "Journey through England by a Gentleman"
Defoe, Daniel
England -- Description and travel -- Early works to 1800
This was the scheme for settling the Palatinates, by which means twenty
families of farmers, handsomely set up and supported, would lay a
foundation, as I have said, for six or seven hundred of the rest of their
people; and as the land in New Forest is undoubtedly good, and capable of
improvement by such cultivation, so other wastes in England are to be
found as fruitful as that; and twenty such villages might have been
erected, the poor strangers maintained, and the nation evidently be
bettered by it. As to the money to be advanced, which in the case of
twenty such settlements, at 1,000 pounds each, would be 80,000 pounds,
two things were answered to it:--
1. That the annual rent to be received for all those lands after twenty
years would abundantly pay the public for the first disburses on the
scheme above, that rent being then to amount to 40,000 pounds per annum.
2. More money than would have done this was expended, or rather thrown
away, upon them here, to keep them in suspense, and afterwards starve
them; sending them a-begging all over the nation, and shipping them off
to perish in other countries. Where the mistake lay is none of my
business to inquire.
I reserved this account for this place, because I passed in this journey
over the very spot where the design was laid out--namely, near Lyndhurst,
in the road from Rumsey to Lymington, whither I now directed my course.
Lymington is a little but populous seaport standing opposite to the Isle
of Wight, in the narrow part of the strait which ships sometimes pass
through in fair weather, called the Needles; and right against an ancient
town of that island called Yarmouth, and which, in distinction from the
great town of Yarmouth in Norfolk, is called South Yarmouth. This town
of Lymington is chiefly noted for making fine salt, which is indeed
excellent good; and from whence all these south parts of England are
supplied, as well by water as by land carriage; and sometimes, though not
often, they send salt to London, when, contrary winds having kept the
Northern fleets back, the price at London has been very high; but this is
very seldom and uncertain. Lymington sends two members to Parliament,
and this and her salt trade is all I can say to her; for though she is
very well situated as to the convenience of shipping I do not find they
have any foreign commerce, except it be what we call smuggling and
roguing; which, I may say, is the reigning commerce of all this part of
the English coast, from the mouth of the Thames to the Land's End of
Cornwall.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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