Lord Napier on the Land Laius 



133 



claims to a participation in the land-rights the number of estates placed in circulation, 



of the proprietor on the part of the occupiers and disseminate the benefits of landed pro- 



and cultivators, leaving nothing but rights perty, without any violent shock to existing 



under contractwheresuch exist; thehighvalue interests and feehngs. The mere size of 



ofland produced by the abundance of capital estates in which primogeniture is chiefly 



derived from the profits of manufactures and operative, has no pernicious results. On the 



trade • the immense amount of capital in- contrary, the greatest estates are often the 



vested by the landlord, in Great Britam, m 

 farm buildings and permanent improvements 

 in connexion with the existing groups or 

 areas of cultivation ; the large amount of 

 capital required for the cultivation of land, 

 and the maintenance of stock, in a country 

 where scientific culture is firmly established, 

 and where that country alone can raise pro- 

 duction in any degree to a level with the re- 

 quirements of the whole people, already so 

 insufficiently supplied ; the power which the 



best ordered. It is rather the law of entail 

 which acts as a bar to social amelioration. 

 In discussing this question, we must be care- 

 ful to avoid extreme and indiscriminate 

 assertions. The condition of life ownership 

 has not always and everywhere prevented the 

 development of cultivation, the improvement 

 of farm buildings, or the re-construction of 

 the habitations of the poor. If I were to 

 conduct any gentleman whom I have the 

 honour to address through the south of 



proprietors of land, and those who share their Scotland, that part of the kingdom to which 



intereits and convictions, possess, and justly 

 possess, in the legislature and government 

 of the country. Bearing in mind these ex- 

 ceptional features in the social and political 

 condition of our country, the President next 

 proceeded to a consideration of the expe- 

 dients which have been proposed, or might 

 be suggested; for the correction of the evils 

 and dangers attached to the excessive con- 

 centration of real property, with the view of 

 ascertaining what can be adopted for present 

 action, and what should be definitively or 

 temporarily laid aside. The conclusion at 

 which he arrived was that the necessary 



1 am least a stranger, he would find it difficult 

 to discriminate, from the aspect of the fields, 

 the state of the fences, or the quality of the 

 buildings, between the land which is free 

 and the land which is bound. He might be 

 shewn estates under strict destinations, 

 where every habitation has been rebuilt 

 in a single generation by the intelligence, 

 philanthropy, and taste of a life landlord ; 

 and he might be shewn lands purchased as 

 an investment, in which improvements of 

 this nature have been restricted to a bare 

 commercial necessity. Or he might see an 

 entailed estate which is a model of order, 



to be found in the removal of lying contiguous to one which is a picture 



measures are 

 laws which act as an impediment to the divi- 

 sion and improvement of landed property, or 

 as an instrument for its consolidation ; in the 

 institution of authorities and regulation by 

 which the proprietor of land may be enabled 

 and obliged to perform his duty by the land, 

 and especially by the labouring poor settled 

 upon it ; in the encouragement of private 

 and commercial enterprise, and in facilitating 

 the acquisition of real property by the honest 

 and industrious labourer and mechanic. 



PRIMOGENITURE AND ENTAIL. 



The abolition of the right of primogeniture, 

 and the restriction of the powers of destina- 

 tion with reference to land, would increase 



of social desolation and neglect. There have 

 been on entailed estates many causes at work 

 which have tempered the mischief which 

 naturally belongs to the practice of entail. 

 The development of mineral industry has in 

 many cases enriched the life proprietor, the 

 State and the loan societies have come to 

 his assistance. Influences of a moral nature 

 have been powerful auxiliaries in the same 

 direction. The life proprietor is still moved 

 by duty, by self respect, by traditional 

 afi"ection, by emulation, to make great 

 pecuniary sacrifices in advancing the moral 

 and material condition of those by whom he 

 is surrounded. To do this sort of good is 

 even a selfish pleasure. The spectacle of 



