Levelling

“ But the process by which this is accomplished is more of the nature of a levelling up than of a levelling down. The attachment of a villager is at first confined to his village; as his mind expands, his interests extend themselves progressively to the country, the state, and the nation. ”

“ Contrary to the custom in other countries, the contours of the English survey have all been surveyed and levelled on the ground, checked by the numerous bench marks, the standard of accuracy demanded in levelling being two-tenths of a foot. ”

“ The sect called the ‘Levellers’ is thus alluded to in the same tract:—‘Colonel Martin’s approach with his Levellers 131 in these parts hath alarmed the Country and put themselves into a posture to receive them, and for preservation of their ancient rights and liberties against their new design of levelling, who by their strange, politick, and subtill delusions have wrought into the hearts of divers people to ingage with them, especially among those who are of a desperate fortune, and mean condition, the basest and vilest of men resorting to them. ”

“ The juvenile lovers of mirth and mischief displayed their loyalty, by smeeking the houses or burning the effigies of the Levellers; and he was a good subject and a perfect gentleman, who, out of his liberality and patriotism, contributed a shilling to purchase powder to make the head of the effigy go off in a rocket, and its fingers start away in squibs. Levellers were persecuted by the young, and suspected by the old. Every town and village in the kingdom had its coterie of Levellers. ”

“ The first division of the glen, as I have said, was scattered over with rocks, trees, and woody hillocks, and cottages were to be seen here and there. The second division is bare and stony, huge mountains on all sides, with a slender pasturage in the bottom of the valley; and towards the head of it is a small lake or tarn, and near the tarn a single inhabited dwelling, and some unfenced hay-ground—a simple impressive scene! Our road frequently crossed large streams of stones, left by the mountain-torrents, losing all appearance of a road. ”

“ Before the midshipman could recover from his surprise, he felt himself run forward by the two hands which had been dropped on his shoulders, thrust through the door, the farmer whispering savagely, “Work, or I’ll break your neck;” and giving him a fierce push and a kick, which drove him along a passage, where on his left was the open doorway into the dimly lit cellar.
So great was the impetus given, that but for a desperate effort to keep his feet, and a bound or two, the lad would have gone down upon his face. ”

“ We now beg to call the attention of our readers to a most important division in the next great formation—which has been termed the TRANSITION CLASS—because the individuals composing it are in a gradual state of elevation, and have a tendency to mix with the superior strata. By referring to the scale which we gave in our first section, it will be seen that the lowest layer in this class is formed by the people who keep shops and one-horse “shays,” and go to Ramsgate for three weeks in the dog-days. They all exhibit evidences of having been thrown up from a low to a high level. ”

“ Underground the men all have their respective levels, and there alone they belong. The miner who works on the 1400-foot level may not venture down upon the 1,500, nor up to the 1300. Those who are working on one level of a mine knows no more of what is going on in the level above or below—when there is anything of special importance being done—than they do of the developments that are being made in the mine of another company. The foreman of one level does not intrude upon the domain of a brother foreman. ”

“ But if, on the approach of the vehicle, they perceived it decorated with branches, or a flag displayed from it, away turned the Levellers from the unwelcome symbols of national rejoicing, and condoled one with another in their own places of retirement. They were seldom or never found amongst rosy-faced country gentlemen, who walked in the midst of their fellow-mortals as if measuring their acres. ”

“ No, no! there is no corner—everything has gone. Oh, surely he can’t be drowned!”
There was no reply, but, headed by Willows, a strong party of the men followed him and the boys down the track of the mighty torrent—a clean-swept path of stone, for mill, house, sheds, cottages, the whole of the tiny village was not!
There was nothing to impede their way for fully half a mile, and there, in a deep curve down in the valley, in a turgid stream still running fast, lay in wild confusion, baulk and beam, rafter and mass of swept-down stone, the relics of the water’s prey. ”

“ Here the man who had studied mining in his youth with the possibility of succeeding to his father’s industrial occupation was in his element, and showed himself ready to study the country with an open and receptive mind. He was eager at once to investigate the mountainous and sterile country covered by the Alps and Tyrol, the vast forests and their timber, the transport, the burning of charcoal, and the general cheerlessness of a land of desolation often covered with huge boulders and scaurs of white stone. ”

“ Another fifty yards brought Matt to the next post, where he again stopped.
“I’m a leveller, am I, sir? P’r’aps so; but we levellers make the way smooth for those poor folks who are to tramp the road of life in days to come. I’m very sorry for the blacks, sir; and no doubt here and there you may find one who, under proper management, would turn out bright; but they can’t be much account, or else they would have made some progress among themselves, whereas they’re just where they were hundreds of years ago. It’s a good job slavery is done away with ”

“ The college man, over whom there came a feeling of desolation on settling down in a small country village with one store, comes eventually to find contentment, sitting on the counter or on a drygoods box, swapping stories with others like himself who have leveled down to a very circumscribed [Pg 155] life and living. Leveling down may be accomplished without effort or thought, but eternal vigilance is the price of leveling up. ”

“ It was enough to startle the strongest man, for there were about fifty yards of a rushing torrent to stem, as it swept icily cold along the river’s rocky bed, and already the pressure seemed greater than he could bear, while he felt that if the water rose higher he would be perfectly helpless to sustain its force. ”

“ Perhaps it was all too unusual a sensation for the young miner to bear in his arms a burden clothed in silken sheen, to feel waving round him, fluttering over his shoulder, a gauzy white veil, for as his eyes rested on the beautiful pale face which had made so brave a stand in the moment of danger, a bewildered look passed over his features, and he set down his charge hastily almost roughly, in a place of security. ”

“ I felt as if a load had been lifted off my breast as Ike came back at a heavy trot with a fresh ladder and planted it for me against the apple-tree.
“That’s about safe,” he cried. “If you feel yourself falling, hook one of your ears over a bough and hang on. Never mind the ladder: let that go.” ”

“ By taking this course you may perhaps compel a little more money to be left in the Valley. What will be done with it? Why, money, like every other stream, will seek its own level. The water courses here find their own level. Suppose there is more money left in the Valley than we actually need—where will it go to? It will find its own level. By and by the land we occupy will come into market, and then where goes the money? ”

“ They had galleries in their own mine that he knew nearly reached those of the old, and to drive from one to the other was the simplest of things.
The very next day, provided with the old map of the mine, which he had been studying half the night, he descended the shaft with one of the shifts of men, and, providing himself with a lamp, he set off alone to explore some of the old workings which had been given up in consequence of the dread that at any time the ancient mine might be tapped and their own pit flooded by the enormous gathering of water. ”

“ Ah, that’s not in my line, Mr Penwynn. But to be frank with you, sir, I want work. I am a poor younger son who decided not to take to church, law, or physic, but to try to be a mining engineer. I am a bit of a chemist, too, and have studied metallurgy as far as I could. My education has taken nearly all my little fortune, which I have, so to speak, sunk in brain-work. ”

“ The barbarous race of Fen-men has disappeared before the skill of the engineer. As the land has been drained, the half-starved fowlers and fen-roamers have subsided into the ranks of steady industry—become farmers, traders, and labourers. The plough has passed over the bed of Holland Fen, and the agriculturist reaps his increase more than a hundred fold.. ”

“ Let us, in this chapter, investigate some things which, although apart from the school and education in any technical sense, are truly educative, in the best sense.
Leveling Down.—One thing that sometimes impresses the close observer who is visiting in the country and in farm homes is that there exists in some rural localities a kind of "leveling down" process. People become accommodated to their rather quiet and unexciting surroundings. Their houses and barns, in the way of repairs and improvements, are allowed gradually to succumb to the tooth of time and the beating of the elements. ”

“ The Level.—Every piece of work should be square and level, except when it is of a curved form, and then it should be reduced to the principles of the circle or ellipse. The level is used in putting up posts, palings, or work of any kind in an upright position. ”

“ Here as elsewhere there is a continuous process of specialization going on. The needs of a gradually widening experience are perpetually calling upon us to subdivide classes which are found to be too heterogeneous. Sometimes the only complaint that has to be made is that the class to which we are obliged to refer is found to be somewhat too broad to suit our purpose, and that it might be subdivided with convenience. ”

“ A Rogue in Grain.
“Oh, no; ain’t nothing like such tools as I’ve been used to,” he says. “At my last shop everything was first class, and the place beautifully fitted-up—gas on, new benches, fine joiners’ chest o’ tools, full of beading and moulding planes, and stocks, and bits, and everything first class.”
“Well,” says the guv’nor, “I don’t want to be unreasonable: anything really necessary for the job you shall have; but of course I can’t help my workshop not being equal to your last; but I ’spose it won’t make much difference if you get your wages reg’lar?” ”

“ Now, it is sometimes said that according to Fleta ‘the carucate’ would have 160 acres in ‘a two course manor’ and 180 in ‘a three course manor.’ A reference to Walter of Henley will show him endeavouring to convince the men of his time that such amounts as these really can be ploughed, if they work hard. ‘Some men will tell you that a plough can not till eight score or nine score acres by the year, but I will show you that it can.’ His calculation is worth repeating. ”

“ The rank and position my son will enjoy in this county, his fortune and estate, are such as to make any alliance, save with your family, a question of no possible pretension. I am well aware, sir, of the great disparity between a new house and one ennobled by centuries of descent. I have thought long and deeply on the interval that separates the rank of the mere country gentleman from the position of him who claims even higher station than nobility itself; but we live in changeful times: the Peerage has its daily accessions of rank as humble as my own ”

“ He cast an angry glance up at the mining works high on the cliff-side, whose chimney shaft ran along the sloping ground till it reared itself in air on the very top of the hill, where in constant repetition the iron-shod piles rose and fell, crushing the broken ore to powder. “A man might have thought he’d be free here from a woman’s tongue.” ”

“ In the progress of waste and ruin the falling of the upper parts gradually produces a more open chasm, destined perhaps in the progress of time to form a glen such as those narrow and prolonged ones which constitute a frequent feature throughout this district. ”

“ The more complex and less exact sciences may be regarded as the children of the more simple and exact ones, but between parent and offspring there is no difference of rank. In contrast with this, the other classification, which I have called synoptical, is a true hierarchy, such as was taught to exist among the angels. It will be easier to comprehend if we liken it to the system of ranking that prevails in an army. The two kinds of classification are entirely different in principle, and the last named occurs independently in each of the great serial groups. ”

“ He stopped soon after, for we had reached the end of the gallery, giving way while a workman wheeled by us a barrowful of ore, similar to a heap which two others were hewing and picking out of the wall.
“Well, my lads, what’s it like?” said my father.
“Cleaner and richer and better, I should say, master,” said one of the men. “It’s a wonder, but I’m thinking you’ll have to put more power on there to pump. Farther we goes, the worse the water gets.” ”

“ Gentleman farmer cultivates a hundred acres of land that he pays a hundred and fifty pounds a year for say: market-gardener cultivates twenty acres that he pays two or three hundred for; and they call the one a gentleman, the other a gardener. But it don’t matter, Master Dennison, a bit. Does it?”
“No, sir,” I said, “I don’t think so.”
“Old business, gardening,” he went on, with a dry look at me—“very old. Let me see. There was a man named Adam took to it first, wasn’t there? Cultivated a garden, didn’t he?” ”

“ After some minutes of silence, the man was vanquished by the Professor. Human instincts succumbed to scientific pride and exultation. Professor Hardwigg, carried away by his enthusiasm, forgot all the circumstances of our journey, the extraordinary position in which we were placed, the immense cavern which stretched far away over our heads. ”