Buying or Leasing Land. 151 



very eligible investments for resident tenant- 

 farmers, if they were placed on a par with their 

 Irish brethren in the facilities offered by the 

 Legislature for finding capital to buy them. 

 Outside of such exceptional assistance a British 

 farmer can still employ his limited capital to 

 greater advantage by hiring farms than by 

 buying them. 



The second mode will probably, therefore, 

 be found in the end the most generally applic- 

 able, viz., that of a lengthened leasehold tenure. 

 Time is required in the operations of agriculture. Time 



essential in 



Drainage, clean cultivation, manures of the more the opera- 

 tions of 

 lastinsf kind, and the costly and skilful forma- agricul- 



^ ■' ture. 



tion of a suitable live-stock, each demand a 

 considerable period of years for profitable 

 realisation. A well-organised farm is not only 

 the source of employment to the labour and 

 trades of the neighbourhood, but a school of 

 practical education in which these are trained in 

 the details of work, and become apt in the 

 execution of the views of their employer. Both 

 employer and employed form family connections 

 and local associations, and have their due place 



