1881.] on the Land Systems of England and of Ireland. 571 



lawyers, matured by tlicir successors in the evil days after tlio 

 Restoration, largely nioditied by such temporary causes as the liigh 

 prices current during the Great War, and afterwards strengthened by 

 a constant flow of population towards great towns, partly consequent 

 on the operation of the Lmd system itself. 



I will not conceal my belief that, before another generation has 

 elajised, the law of Primogeniture will have been abolished, that tho 

 power of entail will have been largely restricted, that by these means 

 and by simpler methods of land transfer land will come to be divided 

 among a larger number of owners, that, by degrees, more landlords 

 will farm their own land, and more farmers will own the land which 

 they cultivate, that leases will more and more be substituted for 

 yearly tenancy, and that labourers, no longer divorced from the soil, 

 but enabled to rise by industry into the class of farmers, will regain 

 the self-respect and providence which are the special virtues of a true 

 peasantry. 



I will venture to read you a passage in which I endeavoured, a 

 few years ago, to group together some of the effects likely to result 

 from such a movement, and especially from the extension of the 

 territorial aristocracy.* 



" We may rest assured that no sudden or startling change would 

 be wrought by so moderate a reform of the land system in the charac- 

 teristic features of English country life. There would still be a squire 

 occupying the great house in most of our villages, and this squire 

 would generally be the eldest son of the last squire, though he would 

 sometimes be a younger son of superior merit or capacity, and some- 

 times a wealthy and enterprising purchaser from the manufacturing 

 districts. Only here and there would a noble park be deserted or 

 neglected for want of means to keep it up and want of resolution to 

 part with it ; but it is not impossible that deer might often be replaced 

 by equally picturesque herds of cattle; that landscape gardening 

 and ornamental building might be carried on with less contempt for 

 expense ; that hunting and shooting might be reduced within the 

 limits which satisfied our sporting forefathers; that some country 

 gentlemen would be compelled to contract their speculations on the 

 turf, and that others would have less to spare for yachting or for 

 amusement at Continental watering-places. Indeed, it would not be 

 surprising if greater simplicity of manners, and less exclusive notions 

 of their own dignity, should come to prevail even among the higher 

 landed gentry, leading to a revival of that free and kindly social 

 intercourse which made rural neighbourhoods what they were in the 

 olden times. The peculiar agricultural system of England might 

 remain, with its threefold division of labour, between the landlord 

 charged with the public duties attaching to property, the farmer con- 

 tributing most of the capital and all the skill, and the labourer 

 relieved by the assurance of continuous wages from all risks except 



* See Brodrick's ' English Land and English Landlords,' 1881, pages 3G2-4. 



