SECURITY FOR OUTLAY 233 



portionally as much money as the large farmer, he certainly puts in 

 more money's worth in the shape of devoted labour. 



Apart from this, being his cherished home, his holding also 

 represents to him his useful " moneybox." In an admirable 

 speech delivered nearly forty years ago — I think it was in 1883 — 

 the late Lord Goschen pointedly called attention to what he had 

 observed in Germany, what a stimulating effect the freehold 

 holding exercises upon the owner's bent for thrift, how the small- 

 holder, owning his land, spares neither labour nor such outlay as he 

 can afford, to improve his holding. That holding is his savings bank. 

 The late Henri Baudrillart, a well-known authority on this matter 

 in France, instances even a more marked effect observable in his 

 own country ; where, we know, the small proprietaire spares no 

 pains in adding to the value or the comfort of his little property. 

 We see in France the old system of metayage, notwithstanding cer- 

 tain benefits which it ensures, steadily dropping into disuse, because 

 metayers — cultivators at part profits — insist on being allowed to be- 

 come owners — now even in the long backward district of the Landes. 

 Baudrillart says that in France the smallholder loves his hold.ng 

 " like a sweetheart," and accordingly lavishes loving care and 

 labour, and what money he can, upon his holding, even beyond what 

 he has a right to look to seeing returned in the shape of a direct 

 benefit or else " saving." The country flourishes under such hus- 

 bandry. Where do you find a more thrifty, orderly, contented rural 

 population than in France ? And where, in parts so cultivated, 

 does cultivation yield more, and more valuable, produce ? 



The reason why these small folk are, in spite of their own scanty 

 allowance of funds at the outset, in a position to acquire their own 

 homes and holdings as permanent possessions is, that if they have 

 not the money themselves for all purposes required, they can, on 

 such an excellent pledge as the land and cottage constitute, easily 

 borrow it, and borrow it on comparatively easy terms. And that 

 is the position of affairs that in the United States— and also in 

 Canada— statesmen are now showing themselves eager to bring 

 about, by means of convenient methods of popular, democratised 

 credit. Those two countries are now all astir with attempts to pro- 

 vide such cheap credit as will suit the case of farmers, small and 

 large, but more particularly small. Their agricultural papers arc 

 full of notices of new schemes, or of the progress of schemes already 

 adopted, which appear, among matters affecting rural economy, 

 the subject of chief public interest. 



The method of such credit, which at present and since some 



