Economics of the Size of Farms 185 



it would certainly pay him better to divide the fields and the holdings, 

 and get the consequent higher rents. But he doubts whether those 

 rents would be high enough to compensate him for the capital expen- 

 diture he would be obliged to incur as things are. He has further 

 to consider that his expenditure on repairs would necessarily be 

 increased. Under these circumstances he not seldom comes to the 

 conclusion that the profits of the agricultural products proper to the 

 small farm, though greater than those obtainable at present from the 

 large farms, would not be high enough to make such an outlay 

 worth his while 1 . It is clear that these considerations did much to 

 prevent the extension of small holdings in the last decade of the 

 nineteenth century 2 . At a time when they were rapidly losing their 

 rents, landlords were not inclined to lay new burdens upon them- 

 selves. 



Another general advantage of the large farm system, though only 

 general so far as large landed estates are the rule, is that it entails 

 smaller costs of administration than the small farm system. This 

 has been already discussed when the attitude of the land-agent 

 towards small holdings was under consideration. Since the work of 

 administration is much greater where there are many small farms 

 than where there are a few large ones, an estate on which a division 

 of holdings is undertaken will have to be provided with more agents, 

 unless those already employed are able and willing to do the extra 

 work. 



1 Mr Fyffe said before the Committee of 1889 (qu. 6163): "I do not think that we 

 can solve the small holdings difficulty, that is, the creation of them, by merely expecting 

 that landlords will let enough small holdings. The difficulty of buildings comes in there.... 

 To provide buildings for the small holder is so expensive a matter for the landlord, that 

 practically there are very few cases in which you can have a new small holding made." 



1 Mr Huskinson said in 1894, as to Nottinghamshire {Report of 1894, qu. 765) : 

 "Wherever they (the farms) have been made large by the amalgamation of two or three, 

 there were two or more homesteads, and we have divided them where we possibly could ; 

 but, of course, in many cases the house was made for a larger description of farm, and in 

 that case it is impossible to divide it into smaller farms." Mr Jesse Collings said {Small 

 Holdings Report, 1889, qu. 765) : "One great reason against the sub-division is the want of 

 money to restore buildings and other appurtenances which have been destroyed by the policy 

 of consolidation which is now found to be a wrong one." A land-agent said (ibid. qu. 3783) : 

 "I should be willing to advise the splitting up 10,000 acres of land on two estates in that 

 neighbourhood at once into small holdings, if it were not for the awful consideration of the 

 homesteads and buildings." See also Report of 1881, qu. 62,293 and 55,794 ; Small Holdings 

 Report, 1889, qu. 4006, 5096, 6076, 6607, 6364 ; Report of 1894, qu. 6059, 6291, 13,419) 

 14.37'- 34. 2 56, 1700, 3574, 567 ; also Mr Wilson Fox's Report on Lincolnshire, 1895, p. 19. 

 Also Small Holdings Report, 1906, Index, p. 479, under "Buildings," and especially the 

 evidence given under the head " Finance Question." 



