The Country Gcnthinaiis ]\Iagaziiic 



TENURE OF LAND. 



BY MR JOHN DUNN OF MAESTEG 



LITERALLY rendered, "tenure" means "the 

 manner or condition under wliich tenements are 

 holden ;" and a " tenement " means "anything held 

 by a tenant." Whether, therefore, we approach the 

 subject from the landlord or tenant's side of the ques- 

 tion, it is plain that to either it must have an import- 

 ance and significance greatly superior to any question of 

 detail in carrying on any operation in practical 

 farming. 



On a theme so inviting, and having so wide a bear- 

 ing on the agriculture ot our common country, it were 

 easy for an accomplished essayist to dwell in glowing 

 language, and to portray in vivid colours a picture of 

 what the Inroad page of Britain might be, were its agri- 

 culture conducted under the circumstances believed by 

 llie writer to be most favourable for its development. 

 I, however, have claim to no such ability, and there- 

 fore it is that those (if any such there be), who have 

 come here this evening in the expectation of enjoying 

 an intellectual treat, will have to go away disappointed. 

 My object will have been sufficiently accomplished, 

 if I succeed in placing before you the subject selected 

 in a plain and practical manner ; and give food for 

 thought, and matter for discussion. Nor is it a new or 

 novel subject which is to be brought under notice. 

 All land is held on some kind of condition, and has 

 been ever so, though manifold are the variations, and 

 apparently arbitrary distinctions, under which the 

 tenant farmer holds and cultivates. 



Doubtless, in the days of chivalry, the cultivator 

 of the soil was looked on by his landlord as a pro- 

 perty ; and hence it may be that the historian may be 

 able to trace, even down to our own days, links of 

 that chain of feudal dependence which then existed in 

 pristine vigour. But the relation of landlord and 

 tenant has changed since then, and with, it is hoped, 

 advantage to both. 



RELATIONS BETWEEN LANDLORD AND TENANT. 



The landlord no longer looks on his tenant as a 

 "bom thrall," nor does the tenant deem it part oj" his 

 duty to exchange at tlie bidding of another (albeit 

 his superior in social position), his ploughshare for a 

 sword. The relation is founded on a different founda- 

 tion from that which it then had — viz., on the founda- 

 tion which gives tq it a commercial aspect, and which 

 is cemented together by mutual interest. 



It has been my fortune to hear and read no small 

 amount of sentimental twaddle on what is, after all the 

 talk about generous confidence, mutual esteem, and 

 respect, but a commercial question in the fullest sense. 

 It is in this light, then, that I intend to exhibit the 



subject. Not that I am indifferent to, or insensible of, 

 the advantages which accrue in conducting the ordi- 

 nary affairs of life in the sunshine of mutual respect 

 and esteem, for I well know that, blended together as 

 are the interests of a landlord and his tenant, it is of 

 very great advantage that they co-operate heartily and 

 cordially. What I mean to inculcate is, that the mutual 

 respect and esteem should spring from the proper per- 

 formance of the duties required of each in his business 

 relation to the other. 



LEASES AND CROPPING CONDITIONS. 



It must, I think, be apparent to the merest tyro 

 in agricultural economy, that the conditions under 

 which land is held by a tenant should be such as to 

 give him the greatest possible freedom of action com- 

 patible with security to the landlord, that the land 

 shall not be deteriorated during the tenancy ; and to 

 do this the tenant requires a security in his tenure 

 which practically places him in the position of owner 

 during the period of his occupancy. The great ciy is, 

 and has been, that too little capital is employed in cul- 

 tivating the soil. But capital is never attracted to a 

 comparatively insecure investment, and hence we 

 arrive at the important question of the tenure of land 

 in its relation to capital. The history of British agri- 

 culture of the present and latter half of the last centur\-, 

 is but the record of the application of capital guided 

 by experience. But it was at the close of the last, 

 and commencement of the present centuiy, that agri- 

 culture in the northern section of the kingdom made 

 the most rapid strides in the path of progress. Then 

 it was that, protected by long lea5es, and stimulated 

 by high prices, capital began to be freely invested in 

 cultivation, and in reclaiming from a state of nature 

 much land, which, hitherto, had been comparatively 

 barren. And in after years, when prices greatly re- 

 ceded, there remained a spirit of improvement whicli 

 here and there manifested itself, and served as a beacon 

 to lighten on to success, those who were following in 

 the beaten path of a past generation, but vv'hich had 

 ceased to lead to a profitable result. 



The remembrance of how the land had been scourged 

 by successive exhausting crops naturally induced land- 

 lords to look closer into the conditions as regards crop- 

 ping under which they let their lands ; and hence we 

 may find some show of reason for some of those 

 restrictive clauses which forbade growth, in a time 

 when knowledge could not guide to restoration by 

 other means. Necessary, however, as restrictive 

 clauses might be in times when knowledge could point 

 to no other means of restoring exhausted land than 



