VIII AND OTHER COUNTRIES 161 



He tells us that the number of proprietors, large and small, 

 has increased since 185 1. 1 But this includes owners of 

 houses in towns, which, as he shows elsewhere, have grown 

 enormously ; 2 and this fact altogether destroys the value 

 of his statistics. Moreover, he himself acknowledges that 

 the price of land is low to-day, that capital is no longer 

 looking to land as an investment, but is turning to others, 

 good or bad; that many of the peasants and other pro- 

 prietors are in serious debt 3 because of the money they 

 raised in the good years, some wherewith to increase their 

 holding, some for less good reasons, and that in the bad 

 years, 1877-1900, compulsory sales of land increased from 

 7-75 per cent, in 1880 to 27-78 per cent, in 1889, although 

 they have been going down since. He does not, however, 

 tell us how far this applies to the peasant proprietor alone. 



The close resemblance between the economical position 

 of the French landowner of to-day with that of the English 

 in the later eighteenth and the nineteenth and twentieth 

 centuries seems to teach the same lesson how difficult 

 it is for the small landowner to survive amidst modern 

 economical conditions. And if we look to the agricultural 

 labourers we hear the same tale. Their distaste for the 

 country life, the effect of the notable rise in wages in 

 the manufacturing industries which tempts them to prefer 

 the regular industrial wage to the risks of tillage, and the 

 development and cheapening of communication which 

 enables them to move more easily, and the consequent 



1 Econ. Journal, March, 1909. In 1851, 7,845,724 proprietors; 

 1882, 8,500,000 proprietors ; 1900, 8,090,000 proprietors ; he says one- 

 fourth of the land is still held by peasant proprietors. 



8 In 1872, 69 towns with population over 20,000; 1891, 104 towns 

 with population over 20,000 ; to-day, 120 at least. 



s Mortgages in 1820 amounted to 8 million francs ; 1897, 19 million 

 francs. 



