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CHAPTER XX. 



CONCLUSION. 



It only remains to sum up the conclusions which have been 

 formed. 



The history of agriculture in this country traces the 

 English system of land tenure to commercial or social exi- 

 gencies which did not affect Continental nations. To these 

 natural differences, rather than to artificial causes, is due 

 the contrast in respect of land- ownership which England 

 and the Continent present. What England lost in one 

 direction she gained in another ; she sacrificed the yeoman 

 to the artisan. 



Historically no substantial foundation exists for the cry 

 that the English peasant proprietary was forcibly divorced 

 from the soO, Still less does the history of any foreign 

 country support the theory that the class can be created 

 by the stroke of a pen. Nor can agricultural depression 

 be attributed to our system of land-ownership. Whatever 

 social and political advantages belong to a peasant proprie- 

 tary, Continental experience shows that it is little less ex- 

 posed to agricultural depression or foreign competition than 

 the class of tenant farmers, and that its standard of farming 

 can only be raised or maintained by a large outlay of public 

 money, which in England is borne by private individuals. 



The collapse of English agriculture must therefore be 

 traced to other causes than conditions of land tenure. It 



