262 THE HIGH COST OF LIVING 



aided by state doles, the nation deteriorated and 

 with it the moral and political fibre of the people. 

 And while ancient Rome is separated by two thou- 

 sand years from the United States, the causes for 

 the decay of Roman life are the same as those which 

 are undermining the farm in America to-day. 



Great Britain has passed through the same evo- 

 lution and for the same reasons. Two centuries ago 

 England was self-contained. She fed herself. The 

 English yeoman is one of the traditions of the na- 

 tion. Industry came. The land which had once 

 been owned in common by all of the people or tilled 

 under a system of freehold or easy feudal tenure, 

 passed into great estates, which were let out to ten- 

 ants at competitive rents, or were dedicated to sport 

 or to grazing. Year by year the number of people 

 engaged in agriculture diminished and year by year 

 the acreage devoted to food was reduced. Those 

 who owned the land lived from the profits of indus- 

 try, shipping, banking, and the ground-rents of the 

 cities. They were indifferent to the land, because 

 it was not necessary that they should cultivate it, 

 while the laws of the country and the system of ten- 

 ancy and of taxation discouraged free ownership 

 and encouraged the idle holding of the land. At the 

 present time one-half of the land of England is owned 

 by 2,500 persons, while scarcely 300,000 people out 

 of 43,000,000 have any interest in the land through 

 ownership at all. There are few owning farmers in 



