AGRICULTURAL ECONOMICS 



Scotland would prove very interesting and help- 

 ful. Leases of long duration, most commonly 

 for nineteen or for twenty-one years, have been in 

 general use in Scotland for more than a century. 

 The system of "corn rents," already referred to, 

 proved an effective means of adjusting rents to 

 prices at the time when this problem was prov- 

 ing disastrous to the long term lease in England. 

 At the present time the Agricultural Holdings 

 Act of Scotland is practically the same as that in 

 force in England. While it continues to be the 

 custom among Scottish landlords and tenants to 

 have long term leases drawn, it has become the 

 common thing to include a clause which makes 

 it possible for either the landlord or the tenant to 

 bring the tenancy to a close at certain periods, as 

 for example, at the end of the fifth, tenth or fif- 

 teenth year, or at the end of the second, fourth, 

 sixth, etc., year, by giving proper notice to the 

 other party. In effect, therefore, the long term 

 lease is passing away, for the same object is now 

 attained through the Agricultural Holdings Act. 

 In another connection the writer had occasion 

 to publish the statement that, "the relation be- 

 tween landlord and tenant is very satisfactorily 

 arranged, the farmers are, as a rule, contented 

 with the present system, and the fields of England 

 prove that landownership on the part of farmers 

 is not essential to good agriculture." This state- 

 ment has occasioned surprise on the part of some 

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