No 6. 



Farms on Leases. 



173 



would have cause to pay the greatest vene- 

 ration to his memory. He may be said to 

 have been the first agricultural patriot; for 

 the man who endeavours by incessant exer- 

 tions to improve the animal creation, is fully 

 as deserving of that distinctive appellation, 

 as is the statesman whose exertions are em- 

 ployed for the perpetuation of the rights and 

 privileges, of his fellow-countrymen. 



We are proud of being able to pay this 

 slight tribute of respect to the memory of a 

 great and amiable man, who, by his genius 

 has created and scattered over the green 

 hills and verdant meadows of his native land, 

 an animal whose beauty and usefulness will 

 ever be a living monument to record his 

 name. To him the English agriculturists 

 owe an imperishable debt of gratitude ; and 

 we will conclude with a quotation from Ar- 

 thur Young, who says : " Let me exhort the 

 farmers of this kingdom to take Mr. Bake- 

 well as a pattern in many points of great 

 importance ; they will find their account in 

 it, and the kingdom in general be benefited 

 not a little." 



Mr. Bake well died October 1st, 1795. 

 London Farmers' Mag. 



For the Farmers' Cabinet. 

 Farms on Leases. 



Nothing appears more rational, than the 

 views that have been taken in the Cabinet, 

 of the English system of Leasing; at the 

 same time, I suppose it must be admitted, 

 that the difference between the situation and 

 circumstances of this country and Europe, 

 precludes the adoption of much that has 

 proved of the most essential importance, in 

 a land where the mode of cultivation, ap- 

 pears to have reached a sort of ultimatum, 

 created and fostered by the mutual security, 

 afforded by it, to both landlord and tenant. 

 In a late conversation on this interesting 

 subject, with a fellow subscriber, — one who 

 has lands which he lets, either on shares or 

 money rent, — I read to him, from a late 

 number of the Quarterly Journal of Agricul- 

 ture, some observations, which have gone far 

 to satisfy us, that the idea, of engrafting upon 

 our mode of letting, a portion of a system 

 that has worked so well, and produced such 

 unequivocal marks of good understanding 

 and excellent management in the old coun- 

 try, is not so preposterous as we at first 

 imagined. True, there are tenants who 

 would not be willing to bind themselves for 

 life, or twenty years, to the cultivation of 

 another man's land ; and there are landlords, 

 who could not, and would not be willing to 

 put their lands, for so long a period, out of 



their immediate possession; but there are 

 many of both, who would be ready to enter 

 into such an arrangement, could it be made 

 plain that such would be to their mutual ad- 

 vantage, — an easy task, it now appears, both 

 to my friend and myself, and affording the 

 most pleasing prospect of future and ulti- 

 mate gain to landlord and tenant. 



To those who have not studied the sub- 

 ject, the thing will be apt to be considered 

 difficult of application ; but it would, in re- 

 ality, be unattended by any thing but good ; 

 and the rules for guidance, laid down in the 

 work above mentioned, are so plain and sat- 

 isfactory, that nothing of the kind would be 

 experienced. Allow me to transcribe from 

 its pages, a few passages that will, I con- 

 ceive, be of considerable interest to your 

 readers. 



" One objection, which I anticipate to the 

 extensive letting of farms on lease is, that 

 it would render the farmer too independent. 

 Now, that it would injure the fair and legi- 

 timate influence which the land-owner ought 

 to have over the cultivator of the soil, I de- 

 ny. The source of a land-owner's legitimate 

 influence, consists, not in his power to do 

 evil, but in his ability to do good : indeed, 

 the connection between landlord and tenant 

 is too intimate ; their interests are too much 

 alike, and the value of a good understanding 

 at all times too apparent, to cause any dimi- 

 nution of the landlord's proper influence, or 

 any abuse of the tenant's temporary power 

 under the lease system. And that the ten- 

 ant's temporary power or independence 

 would lead him to neglect his farm, is 

 equally unlikely ; his own interest being 

 guaranty that he would not injure his land 

 by improper management during the earlier 

 years of his lease, while an effective covenant 

 or stipulation would guard the latter years. 

 Thus, if we let a farm for twenty years, al- 

 low the tenant to manage as he thinks best, 

 for sixteen years, — a few injurious crops or 

 injudicious rotation excepted, — but compel 

 him by a precautionary clause in his lease, 

 to pursue a certain course of cropping and 

 tillage for the last four years : upon this plan, 

 if the tenant's system be judicious, he might 

 have his lease renewed at the expiration of 

 the sixteen years, when he would again be 

 at liberty to pursue his own course, and the 

 compulsory clause would never come into 

 operation. In every lease, however, as few 

 astringent covenants as possible should be 

 introduced, — they merely retard and annoy 

 the good farmer, and rarely improve the un- 

 skilful. We all know, and freely admit, that 

 a tradesman should be left perfectly free 

 in his operations and the management of 

 his affairs, and can easily perceive how inju- 



