After the Repeal of the Corn-laws 65 



same Tremenhere who paid homage to the achievements of the small 

 farmer in the sphere of the lesser agricultural products said also that 

 in his opinion the day of small holdings was over. They might be 

 slow to disappear, but their time was past 1 . Such was also the 

 conviction of landlords at this time, and the result was that the 

 tendency to increase the size of holdings showed itself more and more 

 decidedly in the period between 1850 and 1880. 



The landlords expected advantages in every direction from this 

 enlargement of farms. Their rents rose, cost of repairs for buildings, 

 fences, etc., diminished, estate management was simplified, and the 

 farms themselves became models of constant agricultural progress*. 

 Naturally they carried on the movement vigorously how vigorously 

 all the relevant Parliamentary Reports of the period show 3 . Wherever 

 a small farm was given up, it was added to some larger holding*. 

 This, of course, happened most markedly in the arable districts'. 

 But the formation of large farms made rapid progress even in 

 counties which had hitherto been almost the preserve of the small 

 holder, owing to the natural qualities of soil and climate which had 



1 Report on the Employment etc. loc. cit. 



2 See Journal R. A. S., 1863, p. 165, in a letter from Mr John Gurdon, a landowner : 

 " I am for progressing with the times ; I like large farms and extended fields ; they save the 

 landlord many buildings, they give full scope to machinery, and they meet the requirements 

 of the march of intellect." Also Report of 1881, qu. 32,142, 32,143, where Mr A. Doyle 

 states that in his opinion "the tendency to throw farms together" has arisen "from the 

 conviction that good farming cannot be carried on except upon farms of considerable 

 extent." ' Large farms," he says, " are regarded as one of the necessities of progressive 

 agriculture." See also ibid., qu. 55,687 (Mr J. Walter, M.P.) : " At the time when the 

 system of engrossing farms, as it was called, came in, the landlords had the idea that by 

 consolidating farms, they would be saving money on buildings." And so qu. 4788. Also 

 Small Holdings Report, 1889, qu. 3809. For the tendency to consolidate farms for the sake 

 of simplifying the work of estate management, see Report of 1881, qu. 37,610. 



3 Second Report on the Employment of Women and Children, 1868-9, p. 144: "The 

 number of small farms is rapidly diminishing.... The consolidation of farms is becoming 

 general, as it is found by the landed proprietors to be most beneficial to their interests." 

 See also the statement of the farmer Overmann as to Norfolk in the Report on Agriculture, 

 1880, qu. 51,879 ; and the Small Holdings Report, 1889, qu. 3807, 3808 : " Do you think 

 that the number of small holdings has decreased or increased ? In what period ? I said in 

 your experience ; say in the last 30 years ? Small holdings have decreased certainly in that 

 time." Also Report of 1894, Vol. n, qu. 19,149 ff. : " In your opinion between 1871 and 

 1 88 1 there was a considerable consolidation of farms going on? Yes, there was; it was 

 constantly going on." 



4 Report on Agriculture, 1894, qu. 39,166. 



5 Shaw Lefevre, op. cit. p. 22 : " Throughout the chief agricultural districts, however, 

 and especially in the arable districts, the small farms have been largely reduced in numbers 

 during the last fifty or sixty years, and in many parts have almost ceased to exist." 



L. 5 



