26 ESSEX PAST AND PRESENT 



For Essex felt more severely, perhaps, than any 

 other part of the country the depression that set in 

 when the price of wheat fell to 455. the quarter, as it 

 did in 1875. The depression became still more acute 

 with the further decline to 433. xod. in 1879, and the 

 throwing up of farms especially with the advent of bad 

 seasons, as well was resorted to on every hand. As 

 one ruined farmer after another abandoned the struggle, 

 more and more land went out of cultivation, or, left on 

 the hands of the owner, was cultivated by him as best 

 he could for a few years longer, in the hope that some- 

 one would come along and take on the farms at the 

 almost nominal rent to which most of them sank. In 

 some instances land which had been previously let at 

 from 253. to 403. per acre could be had for is. or 2s. the 

 acre, and in others the landlords were willing to leave 

 the question of rent in abeyance for a year or two, if 

 only new tenants would take the farms over and keep 

 them in fair condition. 



When things were absolutely at their worst they 

 began to get better. Far away from Essex, in the 

 dairy districts of Ayrshire, and especially in the neigh- 

 bourhood of Kilmarnock, lived a sturdy race of farmers, 

 who also had troubles of their own to bear. They 

 were unspoiled by prosperity; they were thrifty and 

 hard-working, and they had great force of character ; 

 but there was this drawback to their position : there 

 were too many occupants of the Ayrshire hive, and the 

 time had come for a swarming off of some of them in 

 another direction. Such was the demand for dairy 

 farms in Ayrshire that the rents had increased to a 

 point which left the tenants with little or no margin for 

 profit from arduous labour, especially when the labour 

 itself was devoted to the production of butter and 

 cheese. 



