356 CATSHILL 



perous - looking holdings, on which a house has 

 been built with money advanced from the County 

 Council, is made up of two adjacent lots with a 

 total acreage of 9 J acres. There is a small piece of 

 grass-land on which the horse can be turned out, 

 and two breeding sows. Another patch is devoted 

 to oats for the horse, and the rest is laid out in 

 market-garden crops of all kinds. A considerable 

 area has been planted with apple-trees, currants, 

 and gooseberries. 



The holder had been employed in a town. He 

 and his two sons were able to work this amount 

 with very occasional hired labour. Now that the 

 land was in working order they could well do with 

 some more. 



This man is paying 15 5s. 6d. for his 9j acres. 

 His house was erected at a cost of 240, of which 

 200 was advanced by the County Council. His 

 yearly repayment of capital and interest on this 

 sum amounts to 13 4s. 4d. for a period of thirty- 

 three years. That is to say, he is paying a total of 

 28 9s. lOd. for his house and land, which works 

 out at 3 an acre. 



(2) Another man holds three of the original lots 

 amounting to 14^ acres. He had been a nailer 

 earning an average of 11s. 6d. a week. When the 

 nail trade became very bad he started dealing in 

 poultry, and worked his way up. He had first got 

 on to 6 acres of the Belbroughton Parish Council 

 allotments, which had been a good start for eventu- 

 ally getting on to the County Council land. He is 



