FICTITIOUS RENTS 61 



the least. This will admittedly he insufficient in many cases ; 

 hut it will also he amply sufficient in a large number of 

 cases in which the tenant merely shifts to another holding 

 in the same village. The effect upon the landlord will obvi- 

 ously he to (Jiscourage ejectment, unless there he some good 

 reason therefor either that the tenant commits wrongful 

 acts of the kind specified above or the landlord considers 

 the rent of the holding to he much lower than he could get 

 from some other tenant. We must remember that we are 

 dealing with tenants-at-will, or perhaps I ought to say year- 

 ly tenants because in reality I propose that all tenants-at- 

 will should automatically have the status of yearly tenants 

 and in the case of tenants-at-will it is generally admitted 

 that the landlord has a right to raise, the rent to such a 

 figure as would be paid readily by other applicants. 



The question of the level of rents for yearly tenants is, 

 indeed, one which cannot be settled by legislation. It is a 

 question of good estate management. It is a well-understood 

 principle amongst good landlords that they should not try 

 to squeeze the uttermost rent out of each holding, because 

 the highest figure which anybody will bid is in many cases 

 really a "fictitious rent ", that is to say, one which is above 

 the economic rent. When the rent paid by the tenant is 

 fictitious, or above the economic level, it means that he can 

 pay it only in 'one of four ways: (I) by reducing his 

 standard of living, which will generally impair the health 

 of himself and his family, (2) out of some extraneous form 

 of income, such as the earnings of his sons who may have 

 migrated to work at industrials centres, (3) by drawing on 

 his capital, either by selling his goods or getting into .debt, 

 or (4) by exhausting the soil of his holding by successive 

 crops of wheat or sugar-cane without manuring or rotation. 

 In all of these cases the tenant will gst into difficulties after 

 three or four years, and, unless prices happen to rise, will 





