ioo THE IRISH AGRARIAN PROBLEM. 



considerable one for the non-purchasing tenant 

 to come best out of the transaction. 



Let us assume that of two tenants whose 

 judicial rent has still ten years to run, one pur- 

 chases his holding. He gets thereupon a reduc- 

 tion of 28 per cent. If his rent was 100 he will 

 have saved in ten years (not reckoning compound 

 interest) a sum of /28o. If after this tern 

 period of fifteen baa years should succeed, then 

 the tenant who did not buy would have to get a 

 reduction not only of 28 per cent, but another of 

 18 per cent, in order to be on even terms with 

 the other. The purchaser will have paid 

 72 a year for twenty-five years, or 1800 alto- 

 gether, a good quarter of which belongs to sink- 

 ing fund. The non-purchaser has paid 100 

 a year for ten years, or 1000 in all. If for the 

 next fifteen years he is to pay no more than a 

 total sum of 800, then his rent must be reduced 

 to 52 a year. 



Moreover under the system of decadal reduc- 

 tions there was the option of altering the instal- 

 ments every ten years so as to correspond with 

 possibly falling prices. When the purchaser 

 paid 2jper cent, interest and ij per cent, to the 

 sinking fund he would have paid off his debt in 

 42^ years. If he paid 72 in the first year 

 would in the case of the decadal reductions be 

 paying at the end of 20 years a sum of 52 175. 6d. 

 a year, so that he would then be as well off as 

 the tenant under rent if the latter got a reduc- 

 tion of 47 per cent. Of course, as already re- 



