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THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. 



by tlio tenant or by the landlord, under the control 

 and sanction of a Chairman of Quarter Sessions or a 

 Judge of the Landed Estates Court. Compensation 

 for the sums so expended is to be secured by an an- 

 nuity of £7 2s. per cent, for twenty-five years, com- 

 mencing on tlie date of the charging order made by the 

 judge or Chairman when the improvements have been 

 completed and certified. The second part of the Act 

 has reference to leasing powers, and is very important. 

 It gives the right to grant leases, under the different 

 titles of agricultural leases for terms not exceeding 

 twenty-one years, improvement leases not exceeding 

 forty-one years, and building leases not exceeding 

 ninety-nine years (except in special cases), under the 

 conditions set forth in the 25th section of the Act. The 

 most interesting portion of the Act to tenant farmers is 

 that which deals with tenants' improvements — Part 3. 

 Although the retrospective question is not touched, it 

 is satisfactory to find that henceforth a tenant is to 

 be protected in his interest in the soil created by his 

 own labour and outlay; and that he cannot be turned 

 out of his holding without being compensated for all 

 the money he has spent and the labour he has be- 

 stowed in j udiciously improving his landlord's property." 

 The nature of the improvements, as specified in the 

 Act, are : — The thorough drainage or main drainage of 

 lands— Reclaiming bog land, or reclaiming or inclosing 

 ■waste land— The making farm roads — Irrigation — 

 Protection of land by embankment from inland waters 

 —The erection of farm-house or any building for agri- 

 cultural purposes suitable to the holding, or the 

 enlarging or the extending of any such farm-house or 

 building erected or to be erected thereon, so as to 

 render the same more suitable to the holding — The 

 renewal or re-construction of any cf the foregoing 

 works, or such alterations therein or additions thereto 



as are not requii-ed for maintaining the same, and in- 

 crease durably their value. 



The majority of these sound to us more like land- 

 lord's, or, as distinguished here, " permanent" im- 

 provements ; but the admission of others, more pro- 

 perly the tenant-*' improvements, will follow. It 

 is within only the last month cr two that Mr, Oliphant 

 Pringle, one of the editors of the Irish Farmers' Ga- 

 zette, has collected a series of very able and well- 

 considered papers he had written for that journal, *"' On 

 Meat Manufacture, and the Rearing and Breeding of 

 Stock." This extraordinary shilling's worth of informa- 

 tion has upon its title-page, as a motto, oneof the maxims 

 of Mr. Mechi — " The more meat you make the more 

 manure you produce, and the more corn you grow." 

 And, as Mr. Pring'e shows us Ireland is the country 

 above all others to grow more meat. More manure and 

 more corn will follow ; and so, as the green isle flou- 

 rishes, the landlord will lay out his money in building 

 and draining ; while the tenant, more properly, em- 

 ploys his capital in feeding more stock, buying more 

 oilcake — in a word, in making more manure and more 

 corn ; either being secured — we care not how, by cus- 

 tom, agreement, or enactment — of the due fruits of his 

 outlay and exertions. We have now had the oppor- 

 tunity of personally witnessing the advancement of agri- 

 culture in Ireland for some years past; but we know of 

 nothing more encouraging, or rather of nothing so likely 

 to establish this, as the new Bill of Landlord and Tenant. 

 Mr. Pringle's pamphlet is an appropriate commentary 

 upon the Act; or, rather perhaps the prologue to what 

 must come. When the readers of the Irish Farmers' 

 Gazette require such elaborate essays as these, the fact 

 only shows how ready they must be for improvement. 

 The author has ably done his duty by them : let them 

 now do theirs. Everything urges them onwards. 



THE FARMERS' D I FFICU LTI ES — AN D HOW TO MEET THEM. 



No man now can continue (o question the seri- 

 ous effects of the past unpropitious season, although 

 one still hears, after a few hours without rain, that 

 the fine weather has done wonders. However, the 

 corn thrashed is mostly in the worst possible condi- 

 tion, whilst it is often found to be nearly as bad in the 

 yield. A sack instead of a quarter is ah-eady said to be 

 the rule in some districts, and even this is so damp that 

 scarcely a miller will look at it. Then, again, there is 

 no getting on the land, which is becoming terribly 

 foul ; and cattle, utterly unsaleable, are starving over 

 the mouldy hay they cannot eat. The root crop is 

 even yet more generally indifferent, so that the farmer, 

 thoroughly "beat" for once, turns from this side to 

 the other without a ray of light or hope in the horizon. 

 What, under the circumstances, is he to do ? How 

 shall he get fit his wet wheat and his discoloured 

 barley? Is there any way of turning the unsavoury 

 fodder to account ? How is he to get on his land, and 

 his seed-corn in ? What is he to say to his landlord ? 



And when does he think he might be able to pay his 

 rent ? 



There is nothing like seizing the happy moment for 

 introducing a topic of interest, and the members of a 

 neighbouring club have just been talking over these 

 matters one with the other. The farmers about Croy- 

 don confess to '■ the casualties resulting from the past 

 season," and go on to offer "hints for their mitigation." 

 It will be by no means unprofitable to follow up some 

 of these suggestions, and see how far they may be sus- 

 ceptible of practical adoption. Of course one of the 

 great difficulties of the hour is the condition of the 

 sample the producer has to offer to the consumer, and 

 it is thus that the Croydon Club deal with it. Mr. 

 Barling said — " The kiln had been mentioned as a 

 remedy, but perhaps there were not three persons in 

 the room who possessed one. Their worthy chairman 

 had a kiln, which he had kindly placed at the disposal 

 of several of h'n neighbours. But very little corn was 

 thrashed kilndried, and even if they thrashed it when 



