, as magistrate and _ex-officio_
guardian, and so on, he cannot divest himself of a personal--a
family--influence, which at once gives him a leading position, and causes
everything to be expected of him. He must arbitrate here, persuade there,
compel yonder, conciliate everybody, and subscribe all round.

This was, perhaps, easy enough years ago, but it is now a very different
matter. No little diplomatic skill is needful to balance parties, and
preserve at least an outward peace in the parish. He has to note the
variations of public opinion, and avoid giving offence. In his official
capacity as magistrate the same difficulty arises. One of the most
delicate tasks that the magistracy have had set them of recent years has
been arbitrating between tenant and man--between, in effect, capital and
labour. That is not, of course, the legal, but it is the true, definition.
It is a most invidious position, and it speaks highly for the scrupulous
justice with which the law has been administered that a watchful and
jealous--a bitterly inimical party--ever ready, above all things, to
attempt a sensation--have not been able to detect a magistrate giving a
partial decision.

In cases which involve a question of wages or non-fulfilment of contract
it has often happened that a purely personal element has been introduced.
The labourer asserts that he has been unfairly treated, that implied
promises have been broken, perquisites withheld, and abuse lavished upon
him. On the opposite side, the master alleges that he has been made a
convenience--the man staying with him in winter, when his services were of
little use, and leaving in summer; that his neglect has caused injury to
accrue to cattle; that he has used bad language. Here is a conflict of
class against class--feeling against feeling. The point in dispute has, of
course, to be decided by evidence, but whichever way evidence leads the
magistrates to pronounce their verdict, it is distasteful. If the labourer
is victorious, he and his friends 'crow' over the farmers; and the farmer
himself grumbles that the landlords are afraid of the men, and will never
pronounce against them. If the reverse, the labourers cry out upon the
partiality of the magistrates, who favour each other's tenants. In both
cases the decision has been given according to law. But the knowledge that
this kind of feeling exists--that he is in reality arbitrating between
capital and labour--renders the resident land