The Raftsmen Are (Sometimes) Not Bliged to Row

Someone who conveys goods or people by raft.

"A small current begins here, and the raftsmen are not bliged to row."

Charles Carroll, Journal during his mission to Canada (1776).

A Poor Man Hanging on to His Plow

A farmer who tills the earth with a plow.

"One such poor family was observed with a sympathetic eye by a contemporary, who tells us how as he went on his way he saw a poor man hanging on to his plough. His coat was of a poor stuff called 'cary'; his hood was full of holes and his hair stuck out of it. As he trod the soil his toes stuck out of his worn and thick-soled shoes; his hose hung about his hocks and he was beslobbered with mud from following the plough. His two mittens, scantily made of rough stuff, with worn-out fingers, were stiff with muck. Bemired with mud, almost up to his ankles, he drove four heifers before him that had become so feeble that men might count every rib, so sorry looking they were. Beside him walked his wife, carrying a long goad, her short dress tucked up high, with a winnowing-sheet round her as a protection against the cold weather. She was barefoot, so that the ice cut into her feet and made them bleed. At the end of the row was a little wooden bread-bowl which held a small child covered with rags and on one side of it stood the two-year old twins. They all sang one song that was pitiful to hear: they all cried the same cry--a note full of care. The poor man sighed deeply and said, 'Children, be still!'"

Six Medieval Men & Women, "Richard Bradwater," H. S. Bennett (1955).