THE AGRARIAN REFORM OF 1903. in 



mission, prices of 20 to 30 years' purchase 

 were very frequent.^ Of course the particular 

 features of individual farms have their part in 

 these results. Very large farms, for which there 

 are not many farmers with large capital to 

 compete, sell in Limerick for example for 45- 

 years' purchase, while medium-sized farms in the 

 same district fetch g-ii^ years'.^ 



Cases in which the same farm has been 

 several times sold, before and after the rent- 

 reduction, show frequently a marked increase 

 in the number of years' purchase as well as in 

 the sums actually paid — an increase which can- 

 not always be explained by fresh expenditure of 

 capital on the part of the tenant.^ It cannot be 

 said that the rent-reductions have on the average 

 brought down Irish rents too much, nor that 

 they have transferred the landlord's interest to. 

 the tenant in the form of an increased tenant- 

 right ; it is, however, tolerably clear that the 

 rent-reductions have fallen almost exclusively on 

 the capital of the landlord, and that the tenant's 

 interest has not been diminished in like propor- 

 tion. The effect of the blind competition for the 

 land has been abolished in the case of the land- 

 lord, but the tenant can still profit by it in 

 the appreciation of his tenant-right. When the 



^ App. C contains over 5,000 cases, mostly from the North. 

 Among these are of course a number of exceptional cases of 

 unusually high or unusually low prices. 



^ Fry Commission, App. C, p. 256. 



2 Id., App. D, p. 326-343. 



