THE 'EVESHAM CUSTOM' 61 



cultivation, the proceeds of his first lot enabling 

 him to give up his wage-earning occupation. 



The extension of market-gardening in the neigh- 

 bourhood of Evesham is still of such recent history 

 that one finds most of the present occupiers of 

 land started in this way ; and as the method is 

 slowly extending for miles round in all directions, 

 the lots can be seen in all stages of progress. But, 

 at the same time, the system has been going on 

 long enough, especially near Evesham, for many of 

 the cultivated lots to change hands in their present 

 high state of cultivation and with trees in full 

 bearing. By the ' Evesham custom ' the incoming 

 tenant pays the outgoing one the value of his 

 improvements, the landlord having no say in the 

 matter beyond the approval of the new tenant, who 

 is generally introduced by the late one. This value 

 is very seldom fixed by paid valuers, but is arrived 

 at by bargaining together, in the same way as if the 

 men were bargaining for a pot of plums or what 

 not. As the price of the ' ingoing,' as it is locally 

 called, represents a relatively large capital sum, a 

 small man beginning is generally in a better position 

 to get a plot into cultivation by his own labour as 

 before described ; but cases are known where the 

 men will have saved a sufficient amount to pay the 

 ingoing on a plot which is ready for immediate 

 returns. One good season of fruit in this case will 

 repay this initial outlay ; on the other hand, a 

 succession of bad seasons will either cripple him 

 entirely if he has no other means to fall back on, 



