VII DECLINE OF SMALL LANDOWNER 143 



rom which my returns are drawn does not begin till 1792, 

 md runs on to 1814. 



I have not obtained any contemporary confirmation of my 

 statistics from Wilts., 1 but W. Rae, 2 in an article in the 

 Contemporary Review some years ago, pointed out that if 

 we can trust contemporary authorities there is very good 

 reason to believe that the small owner still survived in very 

 msiderable numbers in the Midland counties and in parts of 

 Yorkshire, as is attested by Marshall, a very competent and 

 careful authority. Marshall, also speaking of the Midlands 

 1790, mentions 'a species of frenzy, terramania, forty 

 years' purchase being often given by small owners', whereas 

 elsewhere, where the farmers were tenants, the price was 

 not nearly so high, and he says much the same of the vale of 

 'ickering in Yorkshire. 3 To these counties mentioned by 

 [arshall, which lie for the most part removed from. the great 

 industrial centres and were therefore not likely to feel the 

 influence of the development of manufacture so early or so 

 cutely, we should add Essex, of which A. Young says in 1802 

 Boys said of Kent, ' Never was there a greater proportion 

 small and moderate-sized farms, the property of mere 

 irmers, than at present. Such has been the prosperous 

 ite of agriculture for twenty or thirty years past, that 

 sarce an estate is sold, if divided into lots of 40 or 50 to 



1 Marshall says of N. Wilts, that the yeomen are inconsiderable, 

 ind that the tenancies are mostly at will or on twenty-one years' 

 lease : Rural Economy. 



2 Cf. Rae, Why have Yeomen perished, Contemporary, Oct. 1883. 



3 The counties mentioned by Marshall are Cumberland, West- 

 loreland, Yorks. (parts of), Staffordshire, Shropshire, Gloucester, 

 Northampton, Notts., Oxford, Berks., Devon, Kent, Surrey, Lincoln. 



ee Marshall : N. Dep., 172, 182, 218, 231, 269, 355 ; Mid. Dep., 33, 

 158, 339, /51 ; E. Dep., 102 ; S. Dep., 79, 895, 417, 483, 553 ; W. Dep., 

 For Berks, and Shropshire cf. also Mayor, Berks., 113 ; Plymly, 

 iropshire (1803), 91 ; for Lincoln, Slater, p. 52 ; for Cumberland, 

 liley and Culley, Report, 1787. 



