XIV. THE TRUE PRINCIPLE OF VALUATION. 



The true principle of valuation is, that the landlord's 

 share is the surplus which remains of the produce of the 

 land, after defraying all the expenses incident to its culti- 

 vation, including interest in the capital employed, and a 

 fair allowance for superintendence. 



If a proprietor farm his own lands, he is obliged to pay 

 for seed, labour, taxes, implements, stock, and superin- 

 tendence ; and whether he have the capital within himself 

 which all these require, or whether he have to borrow 

 from another what is necessary, in either case he looks 

 to receive interest on that capital. 



The only possible advantage he can derive from his 

 land, is the surplus which he realizes, after all these 

 charges have been defrayed. 



If the proprietor be averse to the responsibility and 

 annoyance of the personal management of his lands, and 

 let them to others, he expects to receive in rent an equi- 

 valent for that surplus which he derived from his own 

 occupation. 



The tenant with whom he treats being subject to the 

 same charges, and entitled to the same allowances, saves 

 the item which the proprietor paid for superintendence, 

 and satisfied with the moderate, but constant reward of 

 his industry, hands the surplus to his landlord. 



The proportion which this surplus bears to the gross 

 produce, is varying and uncertain, and cannot, as a general 

 rule, be exactly defined on lands of known quality ; it may 

 bear a certain average ratio it may be a fourth, a fifth, 

 a sixth, or it may be none of them. That it may have 

 frequently stood to the gross produce in the ratio of some 

 of these numbers cannot be denied ; but this, under any 

 circumstance, must have been fortuitous; and to make 

 an accidental coincidence of this nature, a rule to deter- 

 mine all cases, no matter how dissimilar, is manifestly 

 absurd. 



The object of correct valuation is, therefore, not to 

 assume a certain fanciful proportion between rent and 



