Transcribed from the [1915] National Labour Press Ltd. edition by David Price, email ccx074@pglaf.org [Picture: Public domain book cover] PRICE ONE PENNY. The Burston School Strike * * * * * By “CASEY” (_of THE LABOUR LEADER_). [Picture: Decorative graphic] This little booklet is dedicated to the BRAVE WOMEN OF BURSTON, who have since April, 1914, nobly struggled against the tyranny of the Countryside. PREFACE. “_To understand the things that are at our door is the best preparation for understanding those that lie beyond_.”—HYPATIA. In this sentence the Reverend Charles Kingsley carries forward the message left by Aristotle. When preparing to write this little booklet I was greatly impressed with the above words. No more fitting motto could I find for it, since it deals with the tyranny of our own country side. It is a challenge to autocracy, a protest against injustice and a warning signal to the teaching profession. It shows how a simple, moral, God-fearing little community may be roused into action against parochial busybodies and local glebe lords. The squire and the rector have been the Lord High Tololorums of the countryside for centuries. To dispute their divine authority, or to question their insolence, oft means social ostracism, or a tour abroad without a Cook’s guide. Emigration returns will prove this. The people of Burston, in Norfolk, are deeply religious and law-abiding. The reverend rector has, however, gone too far. Their struggle against him for fifteen months, their brave devotion and loyalty to their teachers, is almost without parallel in the history of Nonconformity. They have seceded from the Church, their children have voluntarily left the Council School, and the parents, though fined again and again, have successfully defied that poor man’s Dragon of Wantley—the Law. The struggle is not yet concluded, and Heaven knows where and how it will end. The reverend rector finding teachers, parents, and children still true to each other, has issued notices to quit at Michaelmas, next September. Not succeeding from the religious point of view, he is now about to try his luck as landowner. By means of these glebe notices he seeks to remove the bravest and best so that he may once more hold the destinies of the villagers in the hollow of his hand.