ITS LESSONS AND ITS WARNINGS 65 



purchase money was to be repaid in forty years 

 by annual instalments equal to 4 per cent on the 

 purchase money, which sum included a sinking 

 fund, to recoup the Council for their outlay. 

 This farm was previously occupied by one 

 farmer, who employed a couple of penniless 

 labourers and who failed and was sold up. The 

 land was poor when bought, but now under in- 

 tensive cultivation it is very rich. The price, 

 40 an acre, was very high, and the holdings 

 were too small. In spite of these drawbacks 

 there is to be seen at the present time thirty-two 

 families peasant proprietors on the estate, 

 who for the past twenty years have existed there 

 in a prosperous condition. Each man who re- 

 quires it has a cottage homestead provided for 

 him by the County Council, on slightly higher 

 terms than those charged for the land, the period 

 of repayment, however, being the same. Since 

 the establishment of this colony there has been 

 no able-bodied pauper in the parish. 1 



1 For particulars, plans of the division of the land, 

 elevation of cottages, etc., see " Land Reform," Chapter XV. 



