him to get there, and if he loiters, he is to be whipped again. If he is thought "dangerous," he is to be banished, and if he returns, to be hanged. Poor diseased persons going to Bath or Buxton are exempt from whipping if they have wherewithal to provide themselves, and don't beg, and observe the time set them. Seafaring men who have been shipwrecked may even ask relief to get home. Such were the tender mercies of the rich. All these Acts of Elizabeth show that there was a great mass of "sturdy" misery, besides much "impotence." Also that the rich required much exhortation—sometimes pointed by threat of a fine—before they showed the "willing charitable disposition" demanded by the law. For these Poor Laws, laws though they were, were really only half compulsory. The frequency of licences to beg shows a far more "willing" charitable disposition to give other people the opportunity of relieving distress, than to relieve it oneself.
In spite of the frequent hangings attributed to Elizabeth, the vagabonds can hardly be said to have been kept under; for Strype quotes an "eminent" J. P. of Somersetshire, who says (writing in 1596), that in every county three or four hundred vagabonds lived by theft and rapine—sometimes going about in gangs of sixty. The extraordinary thing is, that this J. P. talks about "the foolish lenity" of the people and the "remissness of magistrates," whereby four-fifths of these felonies escaped punishment. If it were so it could only be because the people pitied the wretched creatures, knowing by what misery they were driven to these dreadful expedients.
The 31 Elizabeth c. 7 shows how the poor were prevented from settling on the land. It forbade the erection of cottages, unless the persons who built them had 4 acres of ground to lay to each, "being his or her freehold." The fine was £10, and 40s. for every month the new cottage was continued. The exceptions were cottages within a mile of the sea, inhabited by a sailor or one engaged in the furnishing of ships; cottages in forests, chases, or parks for deer-keepers; and a shepherd's cottage, or one for "an impotent poor person."
In the latter part of the reign of Elizabeth a class of small landowners began once more to grow up, but they were not the old tenants—they were small tradesmen, who
