138 THE IRISH AGRARIAN PROBLEM. 



20 per cent., and cannot exceed 40 per cent. In 

 the case of a second-term rent, the reduction 

 must be between 10 and 30 per cent.^ The 

 ' Zones ' have made it possible to do away with a 

 tedious investigation into the security offered by 

 the holding for the advance and for safe-guarding 

 the interests of the next heir.- They have been 

 vehemently attacked by the Irish Radicals as 

 they form a limit to possible reductions. If a 

 second-term rent amounts to ^100, then the 

 yearly payments of the purchasing tenant must 

 be at least ^70, and cannot be more than ^90 ; 

 this on the basis of ^-^ per cent, interest amounts 

 to a maximum purchase price of ^2769 4s. 7d., 

 and a minimum of ;^2i53 I7s.^ A landlord 

 therefore cannot receive more than 277, nor less 

 than 2 1 "5 times his second-term judicial rent. 

 The capital value of a first-term rent varies 

 between 24-5 and i8'5 times the rent."* 



A transaction in land-purchase is carried out 

 by the whole body of the tenants on an estate 

 agreeing with the landlord as to a purchase price, 



^ In the case of tenants who are not judicial tenants, a 

 corresponding arrangement of rent has first to be undertaken. 



2 See pp. 93, 96. 



'' Johnson, "Handbook of Land Purchase in Ireland," p. 15. 



^ This would seem to make the new provisions much harder 

 for the tenant than those of the Ashbourne Act, under which 

 he usually paid only eighteen times the rent. But the rents 

 under the Ashbourne Act were frequently not reduced rents, 

 while a second term judicial rent represents a reduction of 

 about 40 per cent. In order to pay ;^i,6oo under the 



