CONSTRUCTION OF A FARM-HOUSE AND OFFICES. 9 



only a life-interest in the property, and cannot borrow mo- 

 ney for expensive erections, notwithstanding the provisions 

 of an act for promoting the improvement of such estates. 

 Sometimes, also, the tenant has a greater command of ready 

 money than the landlord, and will lay it out with more eco- 

 nomy, and to more advantage. In that case it may be most 

 advisable for both parties to arrange a plan, by which the 

 buildings are to be erected by the tenant, the farm being 

 let proportionally, at a lower rent, and he receiving a cer- 

 tain sum for those buildings, according to their value, at 

 the termination of his lease. * It must be acknowledged at 

 the same time, that every plan, which tends to abstract the 

 tenant's capital from the culture of the grounds, is unfriend- 

 ly to the interest of agriculture. 



As to repairs, the farm-houses and offices in the more 

 improved districts of Scotland, are usually built in a sub- 



* Mr Milne of Alvah, near Banff, remarks on the subject of farm- 

 buildings, that few farmers have capital sufficient for a farm of 200 acres, 

 the expence of stocking which, at a moderate computation, costs L.2000 

 sterling ; and if new houses are required, which very often happens, 

 great deal more is necessary. Any allowance the proprietor gives for 

 building, is seldom or ever paid until the end of the lease ; the tenant's 

 capital is thereby very much drained, before the fields can receive much 

 benefit. It also often happens, that the outgoing tenant has a consider- 

 able claim for houses, and in many instances they are so ruinous, that the 

 farmer can neither trust himself or cattle with any degree of safety, but 

 he must be at a great expence in repairing them. In such cases, the 

 landlord should certainly give every assistance he can afford. In regard 

 to the plan of valuing the whole premises at a tenant's entry, and again 

 when he removes, it is remarked by an intelligent correspondent, that 

 such a system is rather hazardous. The price of wood, its workmanship, 

 and other materials, vary so much in the course of a lease of even nine- 

 teen years, that he has known a tenant, to receive a great surplus sum at 

 his removal, without his having laid out a single shilling, the value of 

 building materials having so much increased. 



