Note 98 — Chapter IX · Birmingham—Matthew Boulton.

Mr. Boulton afterwards purchased the fee simple of the property, together with much of the adjoining land. The nature of his tenure caused him to take a lively interest in the question of common lands enclosure, and at a much later period (17th April, 1790) we find him writing to the Right Hon. Lord Hawkesbury as follows:—“The argument of robbing the poor [by enclosures of wastes] is fallacious. They have no legal title to the common land; and the more of it that is cultivated, the more work and the more bread there will be for them. I speak from experience; for I founded my manufactory upon one of the most barren commons in England, where there existed but a few miserable huts filled with idle beggarly people, who by the help of the common land and a little thieving made shift to live without working. The scene is now entirely changed. I have employed a thousand men, women, and children, in my aforesaid manufactory for nearly thirty years past. The Lord of the Manor hath exterminated these very poor cottages, and hundreds of clean comfortable cheerful houses are found erected in their place. Thus the inhabitants of the parish have been trebled without at all increasing the poor levies. I am more confirmed in this view when I turn my eyes to a neighbouring parish (Sutton Colefield), where there are 10,000 acres of common land uncultivated, and yet the poor rates are very high. Let this land be divided, enclosed, cultivated, and rendered saleable to active, industrious, and spirited men; and the poor will then have plenty of work, and the next generation of them will be fully reconciled to earning their bread instead of begging for it.”—Boulton MSS.