CHAPTER XXI. 1875-1908

1875-1908

AGRICULTURAL DISTRESS AGAIN.--FOREIGN COMPETITION.--AGRICULTURAL HOLDINGS ACTS.--NEW IMPLEMENTS.--AGRICULTURAL COMMISSIONS.--THE SITUATION IN 1908

About the year 1875 the good times came to an end. The full force of free trade was at last felt. The seasons assisted the decline, and there was now no compensation in the shape of higher prices. In the eight years between 1874 and 1882 there were only two good crops. A new and formidable competitor had entered the field; between 1860 and 1880 the produce of wheat in the United States had trebled. Vast stretches of virgin soil were opened up with the most astonishing rapidity by railroads, and European immigrants poured in. The cost of transport fell greatly, and England was flooded with foreign corn and meat. English land which had to support the landlord, the tithe-owner, the land agent, the farmer, the labourer, and a large army of paupers, had to compete with land where often one man was owner, farmer, and labourer, with no tithe and no poor rates. Yet prices held up fairly well until 1884, when there was a collapse from which they have not yet recovered. In 1877 wheat was 56s. 9d., in 1883 41s. 7d., and in 1884 35s. 8d.; by 1894 the average price for the year was 22s. 10d.

Farmers' capital was reduced from 30 to 50 per cent., and rents and the purchase value of land in a similar proportion. Poor clays only fit for wheat and beans went out of cultivation, though much has since been laid down to grass, and much has 'tumbled down'. In fact most of the increased value of the good period between 1853-75 disappeared.

The year 1879 will long be remembered as 'the Black Year'. It was the worst of a succession of wet seasons in the midland, western and southern counties of England, the average rainfall being one-fourth above the average, and 1880 was little better. The land, saturated and chilled, produced coarser herbage, the finer grasses languished or were destroyed, fodder and grain were imperfectly matured. Mould and ergot were prevalent among plants, and flukes producing liver-rot among live stock, especially sheep. In 1879 in England and Wales 3,000,000 sheep died or were sacrificed from rot, by 1881 5,000,000 had perished at an estimated loss of L10,000,000, and many, alas! were sent to market full of disease. Cattle also were infected, and hares, rabbits, and deer suffered. In some cases entire flocks of sheep disappeared. The disease was naturally worst on low-lying and ill-drained pastures, but occurred even on the drier uplands hitherto perfectly free from liver-rot, carried thither no doubt by the droppings of infected sheep, hares, and rabbits, and perhaps by the feet of men and animals. Apart from medicine, concentrated dry food given systematically, the regular use of common salt, and of course removal from low-lying and damp lands, were found the best preventives.

Besides this great calamity, this year was distinguished by one of the worst harvests of the century, outbreaks of foot and mouth disease, of pleuro-pneumonia, and a disastrous attack of foot-rot. The misfortunes of the landed interest produced a Commission in 1879 under the Duke of Richmond, which conducted a most laborious and comprehensive inquiry. Their report, issued in 1882, stated that they were unanimously convinced of the great intensity and extent of the distress that had fallen upon the agricultural community. Owner and occupier had alike been involved. Yet, though agricultural distress had prevailed over the whole country, the degree had varied in different counties, and in some cases in different parts of the same counties. Cheshire, for instance, had not suffered to anything like the same extent as other counties, nor was the depression so severe in Cumberland, Westmoreland, Northumberland, and parts of Yorkshire. The rainfall had been less in the northern counties. In the midlands, the eastern, and most of the southern counties the distress was severe, in Essex the state of agriculture was deplorable, but Kent, Devon, and Cornwall were not hardly hit.

The chief causes of the depression were said to be these:--

1. The succession of unfavourable seasons, causing crops deficient in quantity and quality, and losses of live stock.

2. Low prices, partly due to foreign imports and partly to the inferior quality of the home production.

3. Increased cost of production.

4. Increased pressure of local taxation by the imposition of new rates, viz. the education rate and the sanitary rate; and the increase of old rates, especially the highway rate, in consequence of the abolition of turnpikes. Some exceptionally bad instances of this were given. In the parish of Didmarton, Gloucestershire, the average amount of rates paid for the five years ending March 31, 1858, was L26 6s. 3d., for the five years ending March 31, 1878, L118 11s. 7d. In the Northleach Union the rates had increased thus in decennial periods from 1850:--

1850-1 L5,471 1860-1 5,534 1870-1 8,525 1878-9 10,089

On one small property in Staffordshire the increase of rates, other than poor rates, amounted to 3s. 6d. in the L on the rateable value.

5. Excessive rates charged by railway companies for the conveyance of produce, and preferential rates given to foreign agricultural produce; the railway companies alleging, in defence of this, that foreign produce was consigned in much greater bulk, by few consignors, than home grown, and could be conveyed much more economically than if picked up at different stations in small quantities.

As to the effect of restrictive covenants on the depression, the balance of evidence did not incline either way.

The Agricultural Holdings Act of 1875 was stated to have done much good in the matter of compensation to tenants for improvements, notwithstanding its merely permissive character, as it had reversed the presumption of law in relation to improvements effected by the tenant, prescribed the amount of compensation, and the mode in which it should be given.

As to the important subject of freedom of cropping and sale of produce, there were diverse opinions, some advocating it wholly, others not believing in it at all, others saying each landlord and each tenant should make their own bargains since each farm stands on its own footing, others again favouring modified restrictions. The preponderance of opinion was in favour of a modification of the law of distress.

The Commission further said that the pressure of foreign competition was greatly in excess of the anticipations of the supporters and of the apprehensions of the opponents of Corn Law Repeal; if it had not been for this, English farmers would have been partly compensated for the deficient yield by higher prices. On the other hand, the farmer had had the advantage of an increased and cheapened supply of feeding stuffs, such as maize, linseed and cotton cakes, and of artificial manures imported from abroad. At the same time the benefit to the community from cheap food was immense. It seemed just, however, that as agriculture was suffering from low prices, by which the country gained as a whole, that the proportion of taxation imposed on the land should be lessened; it was especially unjust that personal property was exempted from local rates, contrary to the Act of 43 Eliz. c. 2, and the whole burden thrown on real property. The difficulties of farmers were aggravated by the high price of labour, which had increased 25 per cent. in twenty years, largely owing to the competition of other industries, and at the same time become less efficient. As provisions were cheap, and employment abundant, the labourer had been scarcely affected by the distress. His cottage, however, especially if in the hands of a small owner, with neither the means nor the will to expend money on improvements, was often still very defective.

Farmers were already complaining of the results of the new system of education, for which they had to pay, while it deprived them of the labour of boys, and drained from the land the sources of future labour by making the young discontented with farm work. The Commission denied that rents had been unduly raised previous to 1875; and in the exceptional cases where they had been, it was due to the imprudent competition of tenant farmers encouraged by advances made by country bankers, the sudden withdrawal of which had greatly contributed to the present distress. Districts where dairying was carried on had suffered least, yet the yield of milk was much diminished, and the quality deteriorated, owing to the inferiority of grass from a continuance of wet seasons. The production and sale of milk was increasing largely, so that the attention of farmers and landlords was being drawn to this important branch of farming, milk-sellers necessarily suffering less from foreign competition than any other farmers.

Let us turn once more to the hop yards: in 1878 the acreage of hops in England reached its maximum. We have seen that in the first half of the eighteenth century hop yards covered 12,000 acres; which between 1750 and 1780 increased to 25,000, and by 1800 to 32,000. In 1878, 71,789 acres were grown. The great increase prior to that year was due to the abolition of the excise duty in 1862, which on an average was equal to an annual charge of nearly L7 an acre. This encouraged hop-growing more than the taking off of the import duty in the same year discouraged it. In 1882 there was a very small crop in England, which raised the average price to L18 10s. a cwt.; some choice samples fetching L30 a cwt.; growers who had good crops realizing much more than the freehold value of the hop yards. This, however, was most unfortunate for them, as it led to a great increase in the use of hop substitutes, such as quassia, chiretta, colombo, gentian, &c., which, with the decreasing consumption of beer and the demand for lighter beer, has done more than foreign competition to lower the price and thereby cause so large an area to be grubbed up as unprofitable, that in 1907 it was reduced to 44,938 acres. Yet the quality of the hops has in the last generation greatly improved in condition, quality, and appearance. Growers also have in the same period often incurred great expense in substituting various methods of wire-work for poles; and washing, generally with quassia chips and soft soap and water, has become wellnigh universal, so that the expense of growing the crop has increased, while the price has been falling. The crop has always been an expensive one to grow; Marshall in 1798 put it at L20 an acre, exclusive of picking, drying, and marketing; and Young estimated the total cost at the same date at L31 10s. an acre; to-day L40 an acre is by no means an outside price. It may be some encouragement to growers to remember that hops have always been subject to great fluctuations in price; between 1693 and 1700, for instance, they varied from 40s. to 240s. a cwt., so that they may yet see them at a remunerative figure. 'Upon the whole', says an eighteenth-century writer, 'though many have acquired large estates by hops, their real advantage is perhaps questionable. By engrossing the attention of the farmer they withdraw him from slower and more certain sources of wealth, and encourage him to rely too much upon chance for his rent, rather than the honest labour of the plough. To the landlord the cultivation of hops is an evil, defrauding the arable land of its proper quantity of manure and thereby impoverishing his estate.'

It was by this time the general opinion of men with a thorough experience of farming, that in many parts of Great Britain no sufficient compensation was secured to the tenant for his unexhausted improvements. In some counties and districts this compensation was given by established customs, in others customs existed which were insufficient, in many they did not exist at all. It must be confessed that often when a tenant leaves his farm there is more compensation due to the landlord than to the tenant. Human nature being what it is, the temptation to get as much out of the land just before leaving it is wellnigh irresistible to many farmers.

In these days, when the landlord is often called upon by the tenant to do what the tenant used to do himself, the question of compensation to the tenant must on many estates appear to the landlord extremely ironical. It is, in the greater number of cases, the landlord who should receive compensation, and not the tenant; and though he has power to demand it, such power is over and over again not put in force.

At the same time there are bad men in the landlord class as in any other, and from them the tenant required protection. By the Agricultural Holdings (England) Act of 1875, 38 & 39 Vict. c. 92, improvements for which compensation could be claimed by the tenant were divided into three classes. First class improvements, such as drainage of land, erection or enlargement of buildings, laying down of permanent pasture, &c., required the previous consent in writing of the landlord to entitle the tenant to compensation. Second class improvements, such as boning of land with undissolved bones, chalking, claying, liming, and marling the land, the latter now hardly ever practised, required notice in writing by the tenant to the landlord of his intention, and if notice to quit had been given or received, the consent in writing of the landlord was necessary. For third class improvements, such as the application to the land of purchased manure, and consumption on the holding by cattle, sheep, or pigs, of cake or other feeding stuff not produced on the holding, no consent or notice was required. Improvements in the first class were deemed to be exhausted in twenty years, in the second in seven, and in the third in two. It was the opinion of the Richmond Commission of 1879 that, notwithstanding the beneficial effects of this Act, no sufficient compensation for his unexhausted improvements was secured to the tenant.

The landlord and tenant also might agree in writing that the Act should not apply to their contract of tenancy, so in 1883 when the Agricultural Holdings Act of that year (46 & 47 Vict. c. 61) was passed, it was made compulsory as far as regarded compensation, and the time limit as regards the tenant's claims for improvements was abolished, the basis for compensation for all improvements recognized by the Act being laid down as 'the value of the improvement to an incoming tenant'. Improvements for which compensation could be claimed were again divided into three classes as before, but the drainage of land was placed in the second class instead of the first, and so only required notice to the landlord. This was the only improvement in the second class; the other improvements which had been in the second class in the Act of 1875 were now placed in the third, where no consent or notice was required.

The Act also effected three other important alterations in the law; first, as to 'Notices to Quit', a year's notice being necessary where half a year's notice had been sufficient, though this section might be excluded by agreement; secondly, after January 1, 1885, the landlord could only distrain for one year's rent instead of six years as formerly; and thirdly, as to fixtures. These formerly became the property of the landlord on the determination of the tenancy, but by 14 & 15 Vict. c. 25 an agricultural tenant was enabled to remove fixtures put up by him with the consent of his landlord for agricultural purposes. Now all fixtures erected after the commencement of the Act were the property of and removable by the tenant, but the landlord might elect to purchase them.

This Act was amended by the Act of 1900 (63 & 64 Vict. 50), and has been much altered by the Agricultural Holdings Act of 1906 (6 Edw. VII, c. 56), which has treated the landlord with a degree of severity, which considering the excellent relations that have for the most part existed between English landlords and tenants for generations, is utterly unwarranted. In several respects indeed he has been treated by the Act as if the land did not belong to him, while freedom of contract, until recent years one of the most cherished principles of our law, is arbitrarily interfered with. The chief alterations made by the Act of 1906 were:--

1. Improvements.--By the Act of 1883, in the valuation for improvements under the first schedule, such part of the improvement as is justly due to the inherent capabilities of the soil was not credited to the tenant This provision is repealed by the Act of 1906, in reference to which it must be said that the latent fertility of the soil, sometimes very considerable, may be developed by a small outlay on the part of the tenant for which outlay he is certainly entitled to compensation. But the greater part of the improvement may be due to the soil which belongs to the landlord, yet the Act credits the tenant with the whole of this improvement. An addition is made to the list of improvements which a tenant may make without his landlord's consent and for which he is entitled on quitting to compensation, viz. repairs to buildings, being buildings necessary for the proper working of the holding, other than repairs which the tenant is obliged to execute.

2. Damage by Game. A tenant may now claim compensation for damage to crops by deer, pheasants, partridges, grouse, and black game.

3. Freedom of Cropping and Disposal of Produce. Prior to this Act it had been the custom for generations to insert covenants in agreements providing for the proper cultivation of the farm; as, for instance, forbidding the removal from the holding of hay, straw, roots, green crops, and manure made on the farm. These and other covenants were merely in the interests of good farming, and to prevent the soil deteriorating. In recent times vexatious covenants formerly inserted had practically disappeared, and where still existing were seldom enforced. By this Act, notwithstanding any custom of the country or any contract or agreement, the tenant may follow any system of cropping, and dispose of any of his produce as he pleases, but after so doing he must make suitable and adequate provision to protect the farm from injury thereby: a proviso vague and difficult to enforce, and not sufficient to prevent an unscrupulous tenant greatly injuring his farm.

4. Compensation for unreasonable disturbance. If a landlord without good cause, and for reasons inconsistent with good estate management, terminates a tenancy by notice to quit; or refuses to grant a renewal of the tenancy if so requested at least one year before the expiration thereof; or if a tenant quits his holding in consequence of a demand by the landlord for an increased rent, such demand being due to an increased value in the holding owing to improvements done by the tenant; in either of such events the tenant is entitled to compensation.

This compensation for disturbance is in direct opposition to the recommendation of the Commission of 1894, and seems to be an unwarrantable interference with the owner's management of his own land.

Another benefit, and one long needed, was conferred on farmers by the Ground Game Act of 1880, 43 & 44 Vict., c. 47. Before the Act the tenant had by common law the exclusive right to the game, including hares and rabbits, unless it was reserved to the landlord, which was usually the case. By this Act the right to kill ground game, which often worked terrible havoc in the tenant's crops, was rendered inseparable from the occupation of the land, though the owner may reserve to himself a concurrent right. One consequence of this Act has been that the hare has disappeared from many parts of England.

The greatest improvement in implements during this period was in the direction of reaping and mowing machines, which have now attained a high degree of perfection. As early as 1780 the Society of Arts offered a gold medal for a reaping machine, but it was not till 1812 that John Common of Denwick, Northumberland, invented a machine which embodied all the essential principles of the modern reaper. Popular hostility to the machine was so great that Common made his early trials by moonlight, and he ceased from working on them. His machine was improved by the Browns of Alnwick, who sold some numbers in 1822, and shortly afterwards emigrated to Canada taking with them models of Common's reapers. McCormick, the reputed inventor of the reaping machine, knew the Browns, and obtained from them a model of Common's machine which was almost certainly the father of the famous machine exhibited by him at the Great Exhibition of 1851. Various other inventors have assisted in improving this implement, and in 1873 the first wire binder was exhibited in Europe by the American, W.A. Wood, wire soon giving place to string owing to the outcry of farmers and millers. The self-binding reaper is the most ingenious of agricultural machines, and has been of enormous benefit to farmers in saving labour. Though the hay-tedding machine was invented in 1814 it is only during the last thirty years that its use has become common, the spread of the mowing machine making it a necessity, cutting the grass so fast that only a very large number of men with the old forks could keep up with it. The tedder also rendered raking by hand too slow, and the horse-rake, patented first in 1841, has immensely improved in the last thirty years.

Another enormous labour saver is the hay and straw elevator, having endless chains furnished with carrying forks at intervals of a few feet, driven by horse gear. The steam cultivator invented by John Fowler is much used, but cannot be said to have superseded the ordinary working stock of the farm, though for deep ploughing on large farms of heavy land it is invaluable. Improvements in dairying appliances have also been great, but the English farmer has generally fought shy of factories or creameries, so that his butter still lacks the uniform quality of his foreign rivals.

In manures the most important innovation in the last generation has been the constantly growing use of basic slag, formerly left neglected at the pit mouth and now generally recognized as a wonderful producer of clover.

Most of the suggestions of the Commission of 1879 were carried into effect. Rents were largely reduced, so that between 1880 and 1884 the annual value of agricultural land in England sank L5,750,000. Grants were made by the Government in aid of local burdens, cottages were improved although the landowners' capital was constantly dwindling, Settled Land Acts assisted the transfer of limited estates, a Minister of Agriculture was appointed in 1889, and in 1891 the payment of the tithe was transferred from the tenant to the landlord, which generally meant that the whole burden was now borne by the latter.

Still foreign imports continued to pour in and prices to fall. Wheat land, which was subject to the fiercest competition, began to be converted to other uses, and between 1878 and 1907 had fallen in England from 3,041,214 acres to 1,537,208, most of it being converted to pasture or 'tumbling down' to grass, while a large quantity was used for oats. The price of live stock was now falling greatly before increasing imports of live animals and dead meat, while cheese, butter, wool, and fruit were also pouring in. Farming, too, was now suffering from a new enemy, gambling in farm produce, which began to show itself about 1880 and has since materially contributed to lowering prices. The enormous gold premium in the Argentine Republic, with the steady fall in silver, was another factor. As Mr. Prothero says, 'Enterprise gradually weakened, landlords lost their ability to help, and farmers their recuperative power. The capital both of landlords and tenants was so reduced that neither could afford to spend an unnecessary penny. Land deteriorated in condition, drainage was practically discontinued ... less cake and less manure were bought, labour bills were reduced, and the number of males employed in farming dwindled as the wheat area contracted.' The year 1893 was remarkable for a prolonged drought in the spring; from March 2 to May 14 hardly any rain fell, and live stock were much reduced in quality from the parching of the herbage, while in many parts the difficulty of supplying them with water was immense.

In the same year another Commission on Agriculture was appointed, whose description of the condition of agriculture was a lamentable one. The Commission in their final report stated that the seasons since 1882 had on the whole been satisfactory from an agricultural point of view, and the evidence brought forward showed that the existing depression was to be mainly attributed to the fall in prices of farm produce. This fall had been most marked in the case of grain, particularly wheat, and wool also had fallen heavily. It was not surprising therefore to find that the arable counties had suffered most; in counties where dairying, market gardening, poultry farming, and other special industries prevailed the distress was less acute, but no part of the country could be said to have escaped. In north Devon, noted for stock rearing, rents had only fallen 10 to 15 per cent. since 1881, and in many cases there had been no reduction at all. In Herefordshire and Worcestershire good grass lands, hop lands, and dairy farms had maintained their rents in many instances, and the reductions had apparently seldom exceeded 15 per cent.; on the heavy arable lands, however, the reduction was from 20 to 40 per cent.

In Cheshire, devoted mainly to dairying, there had been no general reduction of rent, though there had been remissions, and in some cases reductions, of 10 per cent.

In fact, grazing and dairy lands, which comprise so large an area of the northern and western counties, were not badly affected, though the depreciation in the value of live stock and the fall in wool had considerably diminished farm profits and rents. But of the eastern counties, those in which there are still large quantities of arable land, a different tale was told. In Essex much of the clay land was going out of cultivation; many farms, after lying derelict for a few years, were let as grass runs for stock at a nominal rent The rent of an estate near Chelmsford of 1,418 acres had fallen from L1,314 in 1879 to L415 in 1892, or from 18s. 6d. an acre to 5s. 10d. The net rental of another had fallen from L7,682 in 1881 to L2,224 in 1892, and the landlord's income from his estate of 13,009 acres in 1892-3 was 1s. an acre. The balance sheet of the estate for the same year is an eloquent example of the landowner's profits in these depressed times:

11:12 AM 7/25/2005RECEIPTS. L s. d.

Tithe received 798 5 9 Cottage rents 495 8 6 Garden " 213 5 10 Estate " 7,452 14 8 Tithes refunded by tenants 530 15 2 -------------- L9,490 9 11 ==============

PAYMENTS. L s. d.

Tithe, rates and taxes 2,964 1 9 Rent-charge and fee farm rents 179 0 4 Gates and fencing 8 7 8 Estate repairs and buildings 4,350 12 8 Draining 170 6 1 Brickyard 170 1 8 Management 936 14 7 Insurances 58 11 5 Balance profit 652 13 9 --------------- L9,490 9 11 ===============

In the great agricultural county of Lincoln rents had fallen from 30 to 75 per cent. The average amount realized on an acre of wheat had fallen from L10 6s. 3d. in 1873-7 to L2 18s. 11d. in 1892; and the fall in the price of cattle between 1882 and 1893 was a little over 30 per cent. Many of the large farmers in Lincolnshire before 1875 had lived in considerable comfort and even luxury, as became men who had invested large sums, sometimes L20,000, in their business. They had carriages, hunters, and servants, and gave their children an excellent start in life. But all this was changed; a day's hunting occasionally was the utmost they could afford, and wives and daughters took the work from the servants. The small farmers had suffered more than the large ones, and the condition of the small freeholders was said to be deplorable; a fact to be noted by those who think small holdings a panacea for distress.

Even near Boston, where the soil is favourable for market gardening, the evidence of the small holder was 'singularly unanimous' as to their unfortunate condition. The small occupiers were better off than the freeholders, because their rents had been reduced and they could leave their farms if they did not pay; but their position was very unsatisfactory. From the evidence given to the assistant commissioner it is clear that the small occupier and freeholder could only get on by working harder and living harder than the labourer. 'We all live hard and never see fresh meat,' said one. 'We can't afford butcher's meat,' said another. Another said, 'In the summer I work from 4 a.m. to 8 p.m., and often do not take more than an hour off for meals. That is penal servitude, except you have your liberty. A foreman who earns L1 a week is better off than I am. He has no anxiety, and not half the work.' These instances could be multiplied many times, so that it is not surprising that the children of these men have flocked to the towns.

In Norfolk, 'twenty or thirty years ago, no class connected with the land held their heads higher' than the farmers. Many of them owned the whole or a part of the land they farmed, and lived in good style. All this was now largely changed. 'The typical Norfolk farmer of to-day is a harassed and hardworking man,' engaged in the struggle to make both ends meet. Many were ruined.

However, there were farmers who, by skill, enterprise, and careful management, made their business pay even in these times, such as the tenant of the farm at Papplewick in Nottinghamshire who gained the first prize in the Royal Agricultural Society's farm competition in 1888.. This farm consisted of 522 acres, of which only 61 were grass, but chiefly owing to the trouble taken in growing fine root crops, a large number of live stock were annually purchased and sold off, the following balance sheet showing a profit of L3 1s. 0d. per acre:

DR. L

Rent, tithes, rates, taxes, &c. 278 Wages 387 Purchase of cake, corn, seeds, manure, &c. 688 Purchase of live stock 2,654 ----- L4,007 Profit 1,589 ------ L5,596 ======

CR. L

Corn, hay, potatoes, and like product sold 655 Live stock, poultry, dairy produce, and wool sold 4,941 ------ L5,596 ======

The reductions of rents in various counties were estimated thus:

Per cent. Per cent.

Northumberland 20 to 25 Hereford 20 to 30 Cumberland 20 to 40 Somerset 20 to 40 York 10 to 50 Oxford 25 to 50 Lancaster 5 to 30 Suffolk up to 70 Stafford 10 to 25 Essex 25 to 100 Leicester 40 Kent 15 to 100 Nottingham 14 to 50 Hants 25 to 100 Warwick 25 to 60 Wilts 10 to 75 Huntington 40 to 50 Devon 10 to 25 Derby 14 to 25 Cornwall 10 to 100

This large reduction in the rent rolls of landowners has materially affected their position and weakened their power. Many, indeed, have been driven from their estates, while others can only live on them by letting the mansion house and the shooting, and occupying some small house on the lands they are reluctant to leave. The agricultural depression, which set in about 1875, may in short be said to have effected a minor social revolution, and to have completed the ruin of the old landed aristocracy as a class. The depreciation of their rents may be judged from the following figures:

Gross annual value of lands, including tithes, under Schedule A in England. Decrease.

1879-80 1893-4 Amount. Per cent. L L L

48,533,340 36,999,846 11,533,494 23.7

These figures, however, are far from indicating the full extent of the decline in the rental value of purely agricultural land, as they include ornamental grounds, gardens, and other properties, and do not take into account temporary remissions of rent. Sir James Caird, as early as 1886, estimated the average reduction on agricultural rents at 30 per cent.

The loss in the capital value of land has inevitably been great from this reduction in rents, and has been aggravated by the fact that the confidence of the public in agricultural land as an investment has been much shaken. In 1875 thirty years' purchase on the gross annual value of land was the capital value, in 1894 only eighteen years' purchase; and whereas the capital value of land in the United Kingdom was in 1875 L2,007,330,000, in 1894 it was L1,001,829,212, a decrease of 49.6 per cent. Moreover, landlords have incurred increased expenditure on repairs, drainage, and buildings, and taxation has grown enormously. On the occupiers of land the effect of the depression was no less serious, their profits having fallen on an average 40 per cent. Occupying owners had suffered as much as any other class, both yeomen who farmed considerable farms and small freeholders. Many of the former had bought land in the good times when land was dear and left a large portion of the purchase money on mortgage, with the result that the interest on the mortgage was now more than the rent of the land.

They were thus worse off than the tenant farmer, for they paid a higher rent in the shape of interest; moreover, they could not leave their land, for it could only be sold at a ruinous loss. The 'statesmen' of Cumberland were weighed down by the same burdens and their disappearance furthered; for instance, in the parish of Abbey Quarter, between 1780 and 1812 their number decreased from 51 to 38. By 1837 it was 30; by 1864, 21; and in 1894 only 9 remained.

The small freeholders were also largely burdened with mortgages, and even in the Isle of Axholme were said to have suffered more than any other class; largely because of their passion for acquiring land at high prices, leaving most of the purchase money on mortgage, and starting with insufficient capital.

As regards the agricultural labourer, the chief effect of the depression had been a reduction of the number employed and a consequent decrease in the regularity of employment.

Their material condition had everywhere improved, though there were still striking differences in the wages paid in different parts; and the improvement, though partly due to increased earnings, was mainly attributable to the cheapening of the necessaries of life. The great majority of ordinary labourers were hired by the week, except those boarded in the farm-house, who were generally hired by the year. Men, also, who looked after the live stock were hired by the year. Weekly wages ranged from 10s. in Wilts, and Dorset to 18s. in Lancashire, and averaged 13s. 6d. for the whole country.

The fall in the prices of agricultural produce is best represented in tabular form:

TRIENNIAL AVERAGE OF BRITISH WHEAT, BARLEY, AND OATS PER QUARTER.

Wheat. Barley. Oats. s. d. s. d. s. d.

1876-8 49 9 38 4 25 6 1893-5 24 1 24 0 16 9

Thus wheat had fallen 53 per cent., barley 37, and oats 34.

TRIENNIAL AVERAGE PRICES OF BRITISH CATTLE, PER STONE OF 8 LB.

Inferior quality. Second quality. First quality.

s. d. s. d. s. d.

1876-8 4 5 5 6 6 0 1893-5 2 8 4 0 4 7

Or a fall of 24 per cent. in the best quality, and 40 per cent. in inferior grades.

The decline in the prices of all classes of sheep amounted on the average to from so to 30 per cent., and in the price of wool of from 40 to 50 per cent.; that is, from an average of 1s. 6d. a lb. in 1874-6, to a little over 9d. in 1893-5.

Milk, butter, and cheese were stated to have fallen from 25 to 33 per cent. between 1874 and 1891, and there had been a further fall since. In districts, however, near large towns there had been much less reduction in the price of milk.

This general fall in prices seems to have been directly connected with the increase of foreign competition. Wheat has been most affected by this development, and at the date of the Commission the home production had sunk to 25 per cent. of the total quantity needed for consumption. Other home-grown cereals had not been similarly displaced, but the large consumption of maize had affected the price of feeding barley and oats. As regards meat, while foreign beef and mutton had seriously affected the price of inferior British grades, the influence on superior qualities had been much less marked. Foreign competition had been, on the whole, perhaps more severe in pork than in other classes of meat, but had been confined mainly to bacon and hams.

The successful competition of the foreigner in our butter and cheese markets was attributed mainly to the fact that the dairy industry is better organized abroad than in Great Britain.

The Commission found that another cause of the depression was the increased cost of production, not so much from the increase of wages, as from the smaller amount of work done for a given sum. Where wages in the previous twenty years had remained stationary, the cost of work had increased because the labourer did not work so hard or so well as his forefathers.

The following table is a striking proof of the increased ratio of the cost of labour to gross profits:

Ratio of Average cost of Acreage Period Average annual Average labour of of gross cost of cost per to gross County. farm. acct. profit. labour. acre. profits.

L s. d. L s. d. s. d. Per cent.

Suffolk 590 1839-43 1,577 13 3 773 11 0 26 2 49.03 1863-67 1,545 0 9 836 9 0 28 4 54.07 1871-75 1,725 0 1 1,026 14 8 35 2 59.48 1890-94 728 10 5 973 1 5 33 0 133.50

On a farm in Wilts., between 1858 and 1893, the ratio of the cost of labour to gross profits had increased from 47.0 per cent. to 88.3 per cent.; on one in Hampshire, between 1873 and 1890, from 44.4 per cent. to 184.3 per cent.; and many similar instances are given, illustrating very forcibly the economic revolution which has led to the transfer of a larger share of the produce of the land to the labourer.

On the other hand, this Commission found, like the last, that the farmer had derived considerable benefit from the decrease in cost of cake and artificial manure, while the low price of corn had led to its being largely used in place of linseed and cotton cakes.

Before leaving the subject of this famous Commission it is well to state the answer of Sir John Lawes, than whom there was no higher authority, to the oft-repeated assertion that high farming would counteract low prices. 'The result of all our experiments,' he said, 'is that the reverse is the case. As you increase your crops so each bushel after a certain amount costs you more and more ... the last bushel always costs you more than all the others.' As prices went lower 'we must contract our farming to what I should call the average of the seasons'; and in the corn districts, the higher the farmer had farmed his land by adding manure the worse had been the financial results.

In 1896 the injustice of the incidence of rates on agricultural land was partly remedied, the occupier being relieved of half the rates on the land apart from the buildings, which Act was continued in 1901. But the system is still inequitable, for a farmer who pays a rent of L240 a year even now probably pays more rates than the occupier of a house rated at L120 a year. Yet the farmer's income would very likely not be more than L200 a year, whereas the occupier of the house rated at L120 might have an income of L2,000 a year.

In 1901 and 1902 Mr. Rider Haggard, following in the footsteps of Young, Marshall, and Caird, made an agricultural tour through England. He considered that, after foreign competition, the great danger to English farming was the lack of labour, for young men and women were everywhere leaving the country for the towns, attracted by the nominally high wages, often delusive, and by the glamour of the pavement. Yet the labourer has come better out of the depression of the last generation than either landowner or farmer: he is better housed, better fed, better clothed, better paid, but filled with discontent. Since Mr. Haggard wrote, however, there seems to be a reaction, small indeed but still marked, against the townward movement, and in most places the supply of labour is sufficient. The quality, however, is almost universally described as inferior; the labourer takes no pride in his work, and good hedgers, thatchers, milkers, and men who understand live stock are hard to obtain; and the reason for this is in large measure due to the modern system of education which keeps a boy from farm work until he is too old to take to it. His wages to-day in most parts are good; near manufacturing towns the ordinary farm hand is paid from 18s. to 20s. a week with extras in harvest, and in purely agricultural districts from 13s. to 15s. a week, often with a cottage rent free at the lower figure. His cottage has improved vastly, especially on large estates, though often leaving much to be desired, and the rent usually paid is L4 or L5 a year, rising to L7 and L8 near large towns. The wise custom of giving him a garden has spread, and is nearly always found to be much more helpful than an allotment. The superior or more skilled workmen, such as the wagoner, stockman, or shepherd, earns in agricultural counties like Herefordshire from 14s. to 18s. a week, and in manufacturing counties like Lancashire from 20s. to 22s. a week, with extras such as 3d. a lamb in lambing time. At the lower wages he often has a cottage and garden rent free.

The improved methods of cutting and harvesting crops have so enabled the farmer to economize labour that the once familiar figure of the Irish labourer with his knee-breeches and tall hat, who came over for the harvest, has almost disappeared. Women, who formerly shared with the men most of the farm work, now are little seen in most parts of England at work in the fields, and are better occupied in attending to their homes.

The divorce of the labourer from the land by enclosure had early exercised men's minds, and many efforts were made to remedy this. About 1836 especially, several landowners in various parts of England introduced allotments, and the movement spread rapidly, so that in 1893 the Royal Commission on Labour stated that in most places the supply was equal to or in excess of the demand. However, previous Allotments and Small Holdings Acts not being considered so successful as was desired, in 1907 an effort was made to give more effect to the cry of 'back to the land' by a Small Holdings and Allotments Act which enables County Councils to purchase land by agreement or take it on lease, and, if unable to acquire it by agreement, to do so compulsorily, in order to provide small holdings for persons desiring to lease them. The County Council may also arrange with any Borough Council or Urban District Council to act as its agent in providing and managing small holdings. The duty of supplying allotments rests in the first instance with the Rural Parish Councils, though if they do not take proper steps to provide allotments, the County Council may itself provide them.

It is a praiseworthy effort, though marked by arbitrary methods and that contempt for the rights of property, provided it belongs to some one else, that is a characteristic of to-day. That it will succeed where the small holder has some other trade, and in exceptionally favoured situations, is very probable; most of the small holders who were successful before the Act had something to fall back upon: they were dealers, hawkers, butchers, small tradesmen, &c. There is no doubt, too, that an allotment helps both the town artisan and the country labourer to tide over slack times. Whether it will succeed in planting a rural population on English soil is another matter. It is a consummation devoutly to be wished, for a country without a sound reserve of healthy country-people is bound to deteriorate. The small holder, pure and simple, without any by-industry, has hitherto only been able to keep his head above water by a life which without exaggeration may be called one of incessant toil and frequent privation, such a life as the great mass of our 'febrile factory element' could not endure. And if there is one tendency more marked than another in the history of English agriculture, it is the disappearance of the small holding. In the Middle Ages it is probable that the average size of a man's farm was 30 acres, with its attendant waste and wood; since then amalgamation has been almost constant.

It is true that the occupier of a few acres often brings to bear on it an amount of industry which is greater in proportion than that bestowed on a large farm; but the large farmer has, as Young pointed out long ago, very great advantages. He is nearly always a man of superior intelligence and training. He has more capital, and can buy and sell in the best markets; he can purchase better stock, and save labour and the cost of production by using the best machinery. By buying in large quantities he gets manures, cakes, seeds, &c., better and cheaper than the small holder.

Besides the small holders who have outside industries to fall back upon, those who are aided by some exceptionally favourable element in the soil or climate, or proximity to good markets, should do well. Yet in the Isle of Axholme, the paradise of small holders, we have seen that the Commission of 1894 reported that distress was severe. This, however, seems to have been largely due to the exaggerated land-hunger in the good times, which induced the tenants to buy lands at too high a price; and under normal conditions, such as they are now returning to, the tenants seem to thrive. In this district the preference for ownership as opposed to tenancy is, in spite of recent experiences, unqualified, though it is admitted that the best way is to begin by renting and save enough to buy. The soil is peculiarly favourable to the production of celery and early potatoes; and large tracts of land are divided into unfenced strips locally known as 'selions' of from a quarter of an acre to 3 acres each, cultivated by men who live in the villages, each having one or more strips, some as much as 20 acres, and it is considered that 10 acres is the smallest area on which a man can support a family without any other industry to help him.

Yet in the fen districts and on the marsh lands between Boston and the east coast of Lincolnshire, where the land is naturally very productive, many people are making livings out of 5 or 6 acres, mainly by celery and early potatoes. Other districts adapted naturally to small holdings are those of Rock and Far Forest, the famous Vale of Evesham, the Sandy and Biggleswade district of Bedfordshire; Upwey, Dorset; Calstock and St. Dominick, Cornwall; Wisbech, Cambridgeshire; and Tiptree, Essex. Apart, however, from by-industries, and exceptional climate, soil, and situation, the small holding for the purpose of raising corn and meat, as distinguished from that which is devoted to dairying, fruit-growing, and market gardening, does not seem to-day to have much chance of success. If farms were still self-sufficing, and simply provided food and clothing for the farmer, the small producer even of corn and meat might do as well as the larger farmer on a lower scale, but such conditions have gone; all holdings now are chiefly manufactories of food, and the smaller manufactory has little chance in competition with the greater.

The example of foreign countries is usually held up to Englishmen in this connexion, and the argument naturally used is that 'if small holdings answer in France and Belgium, why can they not do so in England?' On this point the testimony of Sir John Lawes is worth quoting. 'In most, if not in all continental countries' he says, 'the success of small holdings depends very materially on whether or not the soil and the climate are suitable for what may be called industrial crops: such as tobacco, hops, sugar beet, colza, flax, hemp, grapes, and other fruit and vegetables; where these conditions do not exist the condition of the cultivators is such as would not be tolerated in this country.' That is the reason probably why small holdings, apart from exceptional conditions, do not answer in England; the Englishman of to-day is not anxious to face the hard and grinding conditions under which the continental small holder lives.

Since Mr. Haggard's tour the black clouds which have so long lowered over agriculture have shown signs of lifting. Rents have been adjusted to a figure at which the farmer has some chance of competing with the foreigner, though the price of grain keeps wretchedly low; stock has improved, and there is undoubtedly to-day (1908) a brisker demand for farms, and in some localities rents have even advanced slightly. The yeoman--that is, the man who owns and farms his own land, perhaps the most sound and independent class in the community--has, unfortunately for England, largely disappeared. Even of those who remain, some prefer to let their property and rent holdings from others! It has been noticed that the labourer's lot has improved in this generation of adversity; and well it might, for his previous condition was miserable in the extreme. The farmers have suffered severely, many losing all their capital and becoming farm labourers. The landlords have suffered most; they have not been able to throw up their land like the farmer, and until quite recently have watched it becoming poorer and poorer. The depression, in short, has driven from their estates many who had owned them for generations. Those who have survived have usually been men with incomes from other sources than land, and they have generally deserved well of their country by keeping their estates in good condition in spite of falling rents and increasing taxation.

No class of men, indeed, have been more virulently and consistently abused than the landlords of England, and none with less justice. There have been many who have forgotten that property has its duties as well as its rights; they have erred like other men, but as a rule they play their part well. Even the worst are to some extent obliged by their very position to be public spirited, for the mere possession of an estate involves the employment of a number of people in healthy outdoor occupations which Englishmen to-day so especially need to counteract the degenerating influences of town life. Many of the great estates are carried on at a positive loss to their owners, and it may be doubted whether agricultural property pays the possessor a return of 2 per cent. per annum; which is as much as to say that the landlord furnishes the tenant with capital in the form of land at that rate for the purpose of his business. What other class is content with such a scanty return? They are often charged with not managing their estates on business principles, and no charge is worse founded. It would be a sad day for the tenants on many an estate if they were managed on commercial lines. One of the first results would be that many properties would be given up as a dead loss. They could only be made to pay by raising the rents or cutting down the ever-recurring expenditure on repairs and buildings which are necessary for the welfare of the tenants. The Duke of Bedford, in his Story of a Great Estate, has said that the rent has completely disappeared from three of his estates. On the Thorney and Woburn estates over L750,000 was spent on new works and permanent improvements alone between 1816 and 1895, and the result, owing to agricultural depression and increased burdens on the land, was a net loss of L7,000 a year; and every one with any knowledge of the management of land knows that this is no isolated case, though it may be on an exceptionally large scale. Where would many tenants be if commercial principles ruled on rent audit days? The larger English landlords of to-day are as a rule not dependent on their rent rolls. To their great advantage, and to the advantage of their tenants, they generally own other property, so that they need not regard the land as a commercial investment. They can therefore support the necessary outlay on a large estate, the capital expenditure on improvements of all kinds, and thus relieve the tenant of any expense of this kind. The farms are let at moderate, not rack rents, such as the tenants can easily pay. Also the landlord can make large reductions of rent in years of exceptional distress. Rents are generally collected three months after they are due, a considerable concession; and even then arrears are numerous, for any reasonable excuse for being behind with the rent is generously listened to. It is owing to forbearance in this and other matters that the relations between landlord and tenant are generally excellent. Where are the best farm buildings, where the best cottages, where does the owner carry on a home farm often for the assistance of the tenant by letting him have the use of entire horses, well-bred bulls, and rams, if not on the larger estates? The restrictions in leases, so much decried of late years, were nearly always in the interest of good farming, and their abolition will lead to the deterioration of many a holding.

Bacon said, 'Where men of great wealth do stoop to husbandry, it multiplieth riches exceedingly' and wiser words were never uttered. Yet these are the men who are singled out for attack by agitators, who are only listened to because the greater number of modern Englishmen are ignorant of the land and everything connected with it. At a time when rents have dwindled, in some cases almost to vanishing point, taxation has increased, and confiscatory schemes and meddlesome restrictions have frightened away capital from the land. Many of the landlords of England would clearly gain by casting off the burden of their heavily weighted property, but they nearly all stick nobly to their duty, and hope for that restoration of confidence in the sanctity of property and of respect for freedom of contract which would do so much towards the rehabilitation of what is still the greatest and most important industry in the country.

FOOTNOTES:

And an ever increasing burden of taxation.

See Appendix III.

R.A.S.E. Journal, 1881, pp. 142, 199.

Parliamentary Reports of Commissioners, 1882, xiv. pp. 9 sq.

Parliamentary Reports of Commissioners, 1882, xiv. 14.

The rise between 1857 and 1878 has been estimated at 20 per cent., and between 1867 and 1877 at 11-1/2 per cent. Hasbach, op. cit., p. 291.

R.A.S.E. Journal, 1890, p. 324.

See infra, p. 330.

Rural Economy of Southern Counties, i. 285-6.

Victoria County History: Hereford, Agriculture.

In one respect the Act of 1883 restricted the rights of tenants to compensation, for while the Act of 1875 had expressly reserved the rights of the parties under 'custom of the country', the Act of 1883 provided that a tenant 'shall not claim compensation by custom or otherwise than in manner authorized by this Act for any improvement for which he is entitled to compensation under this Act' (Sec. 57).

Parliamentary Reports, Commissioners (1897), xv. 96.

R.A.S.E. Journal (1892), p. 63.

R.A.S.E. Journal (1901), p. 33. Cf. infra, p. 310.

R.A.S.E. Journal (1893), p. 286; (1894), p. 677. Sometimes to artificially raising them.

Ibid. (1901), p. 34.

Parliamentary Reports, Commissioners (1897), xv.

Broadly speaking, the arable section, or eastern group, included the counties of Bedford, Berks., Bucks, Cambridge, Essex, Hants, Hertford, Huntingdon, Kent, Leicester, Lincoln, Middlesex, Norfolk, Northampton, Notts, Oxford, Rutland, Suffolk, Surrey, Sussex, Warwick, and the East Riding of York; the grass section, or western group, included the remaining counties.

Parliamentary Reports, Commissioners (1894), xvi. (1), App. B. ii.

Ibid. App. B. iii.

Ibid. (1895), xvi. 169.

Ibid. p. 164.

Parliamentary Reports, Commissioners (1895), xvi. 187-8.

R.A.S.E. Journal (2nd ser.), xxiv. 538

Ibid. (1894), p. 681.

Parliamentary Reports, Commissioners (1897), xv. 22. Cf. p. 319 n.

Ibid. pp. 30-1.

Parliamentary Reports, Commissioners (1897), xv. 31.

Ibid. p. 37:

NUMBER OF AGRICULTURAL LABOURERS IN ENGLAND AND WALES.

1871. 1881. 1891. 1901.

996,642 890,174 798,912 595,702

The figures for 1901 are from Summary Tables, Parliamentary Blue Book (C, d. 1, 523), p. 202, Table xxxvi.

According to the Report of the Royal Commission on Labour, 1893-4, the labourer was 'better fed, better dressed, his education and language improved, his amusements less gross, his cottage generally improved, though generally on small estates there were many bad ones still'.--Parliamentary Reports, 1893, xxxv. Index 5 et seq.

Parliamentary Reports, Commissioners (1897), xv. 53, 85. Sir Robert Giffen suggested that the decline in the price of wheat pay be partly attributed to the great increase in the supply and consumption of meat.

Parliamentary Reports, Commissioners (1897), xv. App. iii. Table viii. From an examination of the accounts of seventy-seven farms, the average expenditure on labour was found to be 31.4 per cent. of the total outlay.

Parliamentary Reports, Commissioners (1897), xv. 106. But see above, p. 271.

59 & 60 Vict., c. 16; I Edw. VII, c. 13.

Rural England, ii. 539. Yet the census returns of 1871, 1881, and 1891 gave no support to the idea that young men were leaving agriculture for the towns. See Parl. Reports (1893), xxxviii. (2) 33.

The author speaks from information derived from answers to questions addressed to landowners, farmers, and agents in many parts of England, to whom he is greatly indebted.

It is, however, a fallacy to assume, as is nearly always done, that the ordinary farm labourer, at all events of the old type, is unskilled. A good man, who can plough well, thatch, hedge, ditch, and do the innumerable tasks required on a farm efficiently, is a much more skilled worker than many who are so called in the towns.

Parl. Reports (1893), xxxv. Index.

7 Edw. VII, c. 54, amending the Allotments Acts of 1887 and 1890 and the Small Holdings Act of 1892. The Allotments Act of 1887 defined an 'allotment' as any parcel of land of not more than 2 acres held by a tenant under a landlord; but for the purposes of the Acts of 1892 and 1907 a 'small holding' means an agricultural holding which exceeds one acre and either does not exceed 50 acres or, if exceeding 50 acres, is of an annual value not exceeding L50. At the same time the Act defines an allotment as a holding of any size up to 5 acres, so that up to that size a parcel of land may be treated as a small holding or an allotment.

Jebb, Small Holdings, p. 25.

Jebb, op. cit., p. 28.

Allotments and Small Holdings (1892), p. 19 et seq.

The gross income derived from the ownership of lands in Great Britain, as returned under Schedule A of the Income Tax, decreased from L51,811,234 in 1876-7 to L36,609,884 in 1905-6. In 1850 Caird estimated the rental of English land, exclusive of Middlesex, at L37,412,000. Cf. above, p. 310.

According to the Commission of 1894, the amount expended on improvements and repairs alone on some great estates was: On Lord Derby's, in Lancashire, of 43,217 acres, L200,000 in twelve years, or L16,500, or 7s. 8d. an acre, each year. On Lord Sefton's, of 18,000 acres, L286,000 in twenty-two years, or about L13,000, or 14s. an acre, each year. On the Earl of Ancaster's estates in Lincolnshire, of 53,993 acres, L689,000 was spent in twelve years, or 11s. 7d. an acre each year; and many similar instances are given.--Parliamentary Reports, Commissioners (1897), xv. 287-9.

Shaw Lefevre, Agrarian Tenures, p. 19.