EVIDENCE OF SUCCESSFUL FARMING 3 1 



portion as to his tenants, about 40 per cent. This 

 success in working a large area on one uniform system, 's^ 

 with vigilant economy, but with a full expenditure, leads 

 Lord Wantage to recommend farming on a large scale 

 by syndicates.^ 



This view gets some support from what Mr Clare 

 Sewell Read says of the success, in Norfolk, of a few 

 men of large capital, and business capacity, who have 

 hired vast tracts of land, and worked them thoroughly 

 well with a large head of stock. One of them, who had 

 taken seven farms, thus puts the economy of his attempt 

 to readjust agriculture : " If there were seven farmers on 

 these seven farms, they would all want to make a living ; 

 it is a hard thing if I cannot make one living out of 

 seven farms." 



Again, in Essex, an estate of 3555 acres, in five 

 farms, worked under one management with a capital of 

 ;{^io an acre, has over the whole, good and bad soils 

 together, earned a net annual profit of over 7 per cent, 

 besides paying what in these days is a full rent. Two of 

 these farms are of good mixed soil, with one-third old 

 grass, and carry dairy cows. These farms pay in rents 

 and rates about 25s a year, and earn a profit of over 

 10 per cent. The remainder are heavy clays without 

 much grass. Yet even these pay in rent and rates over 

 l6s an acre, and still make a profit of over i per cent, on 

 capital.^ 



Mr Strutt, as agent for his brother, Lord Rayleigh, 

 farming about 4000 acres in hand, has found that, with 

 the exception of 1893, when there was a loss, the seven 

 years gave a return of about 6 per cent, on a capital of 

 ;^8 an acre, after paying himself a rent of about i8s an 

 acre, including tithe 4s, or a net rent of 14s an acre. 

 This result has been obtained by dairying for the 

 London market. 



' In a letter to Mr Shaw Lefevre, November 15, 1895, Lord Wantage 

 writes that the land in hand has increased to 10,076 acres, and that on the 

 Down lands, comprising nearly 6000 acres, the adverse seasons of 1894-5 

 operated most prejudicially, 



* Pringle, Essex, App. 0. X., p. 75. 



