RANCHING IN ENGLAND 61 



had only very partially begun to recover as prices 

 improved in the period immediately prior to the war, 

 though in many parts of the country, as, for example, 

 among the Lincolnshire potato growers and the market 

 gardeners, men of enterprise are to be found who are 

 utilizing the advantages derived from better fertilizers, 

 better varieties, and improved machinery that have 

 accrued during the last generation, men who have in- 

 creased the capital employed in their businesses and 

 are making highly efficient use of their land. Neverthe- 

 less, in many districts, especially on the poorer soils, the 

 majority of the holdings are under- farmed and under- 

 capitalized, and the farmers are making their profits 

 out of the natural capacity of the soil to yield some 

 return on a very small expenditure of labour. Some 

 very bad cases of what we may term the exploitation 

 of the soil, as distinct from farming, can be found. In 

 one case one man obtained, in the 'eighties, partly by 

 purchase and partly by hiring, the control of some 

 8,600 acres, which has ever since been worked as a vast 

 sheep farm. On the portion owned the whole of the 

 land has been laid down to grass ; the cottages, and 

 in many cases the farmhouses and buildings, have been 

 allowed to fall into ruin, and two hamlets have been 

 completely depopulated. Just prior to the war, on one 

 property consisting formerly of five farms and totalling 

 1,360 acres, two men only were regularly employed, 

 three of the farm houses were let to private residents, 

 two were left empty. On another group of 1,500 acres 

 four men were regularly employed where about seventy 

 once found work. On the rented farms, where a certain 

 proportion of arable has to be maintained, it was esti- 

 mated that about seventy men and boys remained 



