INTRODUCTION. # 



selves, or encouraged their tenants to exertion, establishing 

 for that purpose a most liberal system of connexion between 

 the two classes. 



4. It became a custom in Scotland, at an early period, 

 to grant leases for an adequate term of years, without the 

 possession of which, no material improvement, on the part 

 of the tenant, can possibly be expected ; and to that circum- 

 stance, perhaps more than to any other, is the excellence of 

 Scottish husbandry to be attributed. Indeed, extensive im- 

 provements have not taken place in any part of England, 

 but where the same custom has prevailed. In regard to the 

 granting of leases, nothing can be more ill judged, than for 

 a landlord, both to neglect his immediate interests, and to 

 prevent the future improvement of his estate, in order to 

 procure a little political influence, which a generous pro- 

 prietor can always command, when he may have occasion 

 for it, without keeping his tenants in a state of slavish de- 

 pendence. 



5. In many parts of England, where estates are possess- 

 ed by tenants for life, or under the fetters of a trust, it is 

 questionable, whether leases of a considerable endurance 

 can be granted, or whether old pastures, though in extent 

 beyond any real advantage to the estate, can be broken up ; 

 whereas in Scotland, even when land is under a perpetual 

 and strict entail, leases may be granted for thirty-one years, 

 and upwards, without any unnecessary restrictions against 

 arable cultivation, and the tenant is enabled to do every 

 thing that the proprietor could have done himself, had he 

 retained possession of the land.* 



* The act 10. Geo. IIF, c. 51, A, D. 1770, introduced by the late 

 Sir James Montgomery, is favourable to the improvement of entailed 

 property. By that statute it is enacted, that every proprietor of an en- 

 tailed estate, who shall lay out money in inclosing, planting, draining, or 



