PRATT, W., Norwich, common-brewer and Printed by William Cobbett. Johnson's-court; and coal-merchant.

POLITICAL REGISTER.

VOLUME LXXII.

FROM APRIL 2, TO JUNE 25, 1831.

INCLUSIVE.

LONDON:

PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY THE AUTHOR, 11, BOLT COURT, fleet street.

1831.

TABLE OF CONTENTS.

VOLUME 72.

No. 1.-To the Labourers of England; on | No. 8.-Alterations in the Reform Bill.-State Parliamentary Reform; Instructions for raising Cobbett's Corn; about Truck System and Preston Cock.- Minority on second reading of Reform Bill.-Bloody No.

VOL. 72.-No. 1.] LONDON, SATURDAY, APRIL 2ND, 1831.

MY FRIENDS,

Kensington, 1st April, 1831.

[Price Is. 2d.

cannot pass over the present occasion
without declaring in this public manner
that my partiality in this case arises
from the circumstance of JOSEPH and
ROBERT MASON, of Bullington, having
been transported for life, after having
`been condemned to death. To relate the
whole of the story of these two excellent
labourers, will, when I come to dis-
charge, as I shall one of these days, that
sacred duty due to defenceless virtue
and to truth, the whole of their story,
together with that of poor Cooke, of
Mitcheldever, whose funeral will be re-
membered in that parish for ages yet to
come; the whole of this story, together
with all the interesting circumstances
belonging to it, will demand a book;
which book, if it shall please God to
preserve my life and give me health, I
will write and publish.

For the present, suffice it to observe that of the two MASONS, JOSEPH, aged thirty-two years, having a wife and one child, and ROBERT, aged twenty-four, unmarried, both natives of Bullington, where they had lived all their lives. They have a mother who has been many years a widow, whom they always maintained, and kept from the parish by their labour. They rented a cottage and three acres and

I ADDRESS myself to the labourers of the whole kingdom; but I am particularly desirous that this paper should be read by those of you who live in the beautiful valleys of the south of Wiltshire, and in the little hard parishes, as I call them, in the north of Hampshire, beginning at the lower den of Surrey, and sweeping along over the little dips in the high lands, till you come to Stockbridge southward, and to Weyhill and Coohill northward. I wish to see a half of land at ten pounds a year. you all well off; but those of you who inhabit these parts of the country have been, as far as my observation has gone, the most hardly treated; and, therefore, I am the more desirous to render you service. Again, of the numerous parishes in these countries, I select as objects of my still more particular regard, the inhabitants of the little bunch of . hard_parishes in Hampshire, consisting of East Stratton, West Stratton, Mitcheldever, Weston, Wonston, Sutton Scotney, Bullington, Barton Stacey, Hunton, and Stoke-Charity. The reasons why I have this very particular regard for the working people of these parishes, I shall have an opportunity of more fully stating another time; but I

They kept a cow, raised potatoes, turnip seed, and used to have a little bit of wheat. This they cultivated themselves. They worked for the neighbouring farmers; earned their money by very hard labour; were perfectly sober and honest men, and an example in these respects to the whole country round about; but it was proved that they read COBBETT'S REGISTER, and COBBETT'S HISTORY OF THE PROTESTANT REFORMATION; and they were condemned to death, Joseph for being present, as one of a mob who received two sovereigns from THOMAS DOWDEN of Mitcheldever; and Robert for being present in the mob who received five shillings from the parson at Barton

B