RISKS TO THE STATE 237 



be a landlord, nor have the powers and rights of a 

 landlord. The State would be simply the receiver, 

 for a limited time, of well-secured charges. These 

 charges may be called quit-rents, to which a large 

 number of freeholds are permanently subject. But 

 to meet the case referred to (which ought to be met), 

 the Bill names no definite number of years at the end 

 of which the repayment of the advance must be com- 

 pleted. To do so would be to make it imperative that 

 each year's instalment should be promptly paid. The 

 Board of Agriculture, therefore, could, and no doubt 

 would, on good cause being shown — such as an excep- 

 tionally bad season or a special outlay on improvements 

 — give the required relief, and would not incur the 

 slightest risk in doing so. 



The English farmer has so long been in the position 

 of a mere tenant, that he has become more or less 

 accustomed to the sort of feudatory subjection which 

 that position necessarily involves. He has learnt too 

 much to see eye to eye with the landlord, to be depen- 

 dent on his will, and to put up with the " good under- 

 standing " on which, as a yearly tenant, he has mainly 

 to rely. 



Sir James Caird, in a sentence already quoted, de- 

 clared some years ago that this "good understanding" 

 could not remain for long a sufficient protection for 

 the British farmer. This opinion he gave " with the 

 responsibility of forty years and with a general know- 

 ledge, both personally and officially, of the agriculture 

 of the United Kingdom, and of the relations between 

 landlord and tenant." 



It is evident that a mere ** understanding" must be 

 unsatisfactory as regards a business in which the inter- 

 ests of parties are so opposed and their powers so 



