38 



Whatever we kept from it seemed almost as theft ; 



It watched us every minute and it ruled us right and left. 



The rust and blight were with us sometimes and sometimes not ; 



The dark-browed, scowling mortgage was for ever on the spot. 



The weevil and the cutworm, they went as well as came ; 



The mortgage stayed for ever, eating hearty all the same. 



It nailed up every window, stood guard at every door; 



And happiness and sunshine made their home with us no more. 



Worm or beetle, drought or tempest, on a farmer's land may fall ; 



But for first-class ruination, trust a mortgage 'gainst them all." 



Allowing for some poetic exaggeration, these verses express 

 the paralysing effect npon farming of fixed charges upon land. 

 A mortgage produces the same effect iu England as Mr. 

 Carleton found that it worked in America. It must be 

 remembered that tithes are not more an obstacle to agriculture 

 than any other form of mortgage ; yet, though tithe rent- 

 charges differ in no material respect from the land-tax, and 

 though neither are properly a charge upon tenant farmers, the 

 latter have conceived a widespread, deep-rooted, and ineradic- 

 able objection to tithe rent-charge. Looking to the tendencies 

 of modern legislation, will any shifting of the incidence of the 

 charge diminish its unpopularity ? Will it be possible to convince 

 tenant farmers that the charge does not raise rents, or labourers 

 that it does not lower wages? I venture to think that, in some 

 form or other, the redemption of the tithe rent-charge is, sooner 

 later, inevitable. On the details of any proposal there must 

 necessarily be great differences of opinion. Titheowners and 

 tithepayers are not likely to agree offhand upon the number of 

 years' purchase, or the compiilsory nature of the clauses. 



By far the best and most equitable scheme for the redemption of 

 the tithe rent-charge is that put forward by Mr. Ryde, past presi- 

 dent of the Surveyors' Institution. It will be found in the Trans- 

 actions of the Society, Vol. XIX., part iii., pp. 57 to 95. He assumes 

 that the average " price of corn for any seven years in the future will 

 not approximate more closely to the average price of the years 

 1828 to 1835, npon which the rent-charge was originally based, 

 than 90 per cent." He proposes to redeem the whole rent- 

 charge at this figure. In other words, the sum with which he 

 deals is at par value 4,000,000Z. ; but it is reduced by 10 per 

 cent, to represent the present fall in the averages, and 15 per 

 cent, for the cost of collection and rates and taxes to 3,000,000?. 

 Three-fifths of this sum is owned by parochial incumbents, the 

 remaining two-fifths being in the hands of impropriators. The 

 whole of this si;m of 3,000,000?. is to be compulsorily redeemed 

 by the landowners " at twenty years' purchase, or 00,000,000?. ; 

 but it is proposed to borrow the sum of 75,000,000?. (being the 

 amount of twenty-five years' purchase)." The balance of 

 15,000,000?. is to go to augment the pm-chase money of 

 parochial tithes to twenty-eight and a half years' purchase. 



