AGRICULTURE. 147 



are very few farms here held on lease by tenant farmers ; 

 most of the landed proprietors occupy their own land, and 

 farm it themselves, with the aid of a working bailiff, whose 

 wages will probably be 15 or 20 a year and his keep. 

 This expense would, of course, be saved to a practical farmer 

 who looked after his business himself. 



Most of the day labourers here are what they call " tor- 

 pare," i. e., they are servants at will on the estate, and hold a 

 small piece of land and a cottage at a fixed rent, but for which 

 they do not pay in money, but by work. By their contract 

 they are obliged to work for their landlord on his farm when- 

 ever they are required, at a fixed sum by day. One day's 

 work with a horse or bullock, is valued in the summer at 

 one rqr., in the winter at about lOd. ; a man's work is reck- 

 oned at about the same. A day's work of a torpare 

 female servant is reckoned at about 4d. in the summer, 3d. 

 in the winter. These torpare are, in fact, all small farmers 

 on the estate, but without one shilling of capital, (bound to 

 pay the rent of their own farms by doing work for their 

 landlords when. they ought to be doing it at home); they 

 grow their own produce, and usually own a horse, a cow or 

 two, and a pig. 



I cannot say I altogether like this system. There is far 

 too much dependence about it, and the poor torpare are 

 obliged to be too much under the tally system. Their hold- 

 ing is often a very poor one, and invariably let too dear, and 

 the holder is scarcely ever out of debt. He is obliged to 

 work for his landlord whenever he is called upon ; to buy all 

 his food and seed corn of him, at a far dearer rate than if he 

 went to market with ready money ; and just at the very time 

 when their labour is of most value on their own little estates, 

 they are, perhaps, most wanted on the head farm. The 

 consequence is that, as far as I could see, their own land is 

 generally in a wretched state ; and, depend upon it, a day 

 labourer, who is paid regularly so much a day, and hires his 

 own cottage, is far better off, and certainly far more inde- 

 pendent, than one of these torpare. Moreover, they frequently 

 live out in the forest, far from the home station, and their 



