368 THE FUTURE OF OUR AGRICULTURE. 



would like to put it to the managers of manufacturing 

 concerns whether they would be content to put up with 

 such restrictions as accompany the renting of a farm ; 

 and to factory hands whether they would rest satisfied with 

 such conditions as are habitually imposed upon agricultural 

 labourers, in the matter of dwellings, of wages, of hours, and 

 of general dependence. 



However, what Mr. Disraeli evidently intended to convey 

 by his reference to ' ' three livings ' ' was, that the land under 

 our system is made to yield more collectively than it would 

 or could yield under any other system. Now this is in the 

 present day demonstrably the reverse of the fact. Quite 

 necessarily under a system which divides profits among 

 various parties there must be some wastage. There must 

 be bargaining and therefore friction, snipping and toll- 

 taking — let alone that the division may be " leonine " — 

 as in fact it often is — and therefore unfair to one party or 

 the other. And not only will there be conflict of interest, 

 also the substance to be divided is likely to become reduced. 

 For there must necessarily be a hampering understanding 

 as to the use to which the land may be put, which means, 

 that not under all circumstances, perhaps under none, will 

 it be made to yield the maximum return. We admit this 

 in our reasoning in favour of small holdings — most fully 

 in the case of the occupying owner — on whose behalf the 

 plea is rightly put forward that under such arrangements 

 labour will be contributed at lowest cost, whereas part of 

 the produce, at any rate, will be at once placed in the most 

 remunerative market, that is, in that of the ultimate con- 

 sumer. Our small holder is expected to earn more in pro- 

 portion out of his land than can the large owner or farmer. 

 And Mr, Middle! on 's Report shows that in Germany, where 

 the occupier is for the most part also the owner of the 

 land, secure to obtain, ordinarily speaking, the full value 

 of all his improvements, either in increased yield or else in 

 increased selling price for his property, he produces on an 

 average substantially more from the soil than do our farmers 

 under tenancy, while at the same time the fact that the 

 price of land has risen more under the German system than 



