Mr. Docura admitted the fact, upon which the rev. gentleman said, "I wish I had given you a written order!"
Mr. Docura: "If you had, I have orders to resist them to the utmost."
The Rev. T. Morice upon this, in the presence of Wood and another labourer, exclaimed in a violent passion, "it would serve you right if your town was burnt down; you richly deserve it!" and then ordered the man Wood to come to him at some other time.
A few days afterwards the Overseers received a summons to appear at the Rev. Thomas Sissons', at Wallington, to show cause, &c.
The Overseers naturally resented being dragged to Wallington, and wrote a letter asking for the case to come before the ordinary Sessions at Royston, as one of the Overseers was ill.
The suggested alteration was not acceded to, however, and one of the Overseers and the Assistant had to go to Wallington before the Rev. Thos. Sissons and Rev. John Lafont. The magistrates first tried to persuade the Overseer by appealing to his feelings, and then to intimidate by pointing out the consequences of his refusal to comply with their order, but he was proof against both, and said if they thought proper to make an order he was under the necessity to say that he must refuse complying with it. Upon which they gave him till Wednesday to consider, and if he did not comply by that time they would certainly give an order and enforce it.
They had orders to appear again on the Wednesday, "but for some unaccountable cause the men did not appear, to the joy, apparently, of the Magistrates and Overseers, since which time they have not tried to enforce it, but we have since had good reason to suppose that they have not either forgotten or forgiven us."
So ended the attempt to enforce a legal right to supplement wages, which was acted upon in all the surrounding parishes.
Everything seemed to conspire to make the labourer a pauper even if he would aspire to independence, until, through early and improvident marriages, the lax treatment of bastardy, &c., paupers became a glut in the market so to speak, and, finding the doles less satisfactory in consequence, discontent, riot, and incendiarism, manifested themselves in many places; hence the inuendo of the Rev. Mr. Morice, the magistrate, about the town being burnt.