EXCESSIVE RENTS 95 



to year. There has been either a melting away of the 

 working capital represented by live stock, accompanied 

 by necessary indebtedness to tradesmen, dependence 

 on dealers, and all-round deterioration in farming, and 

 ending in bankruptcy or abandonment, or the private 

 banking account and investments have been drawn upon 

 to meet liabilities." 



Mr Foster, a Northumberland farmer, whose rent 

 stood at £7 SO for a farm of 500 acres in 1875, and at 

 ^"525 in 1893, puts his expenses in 1875, including rent, 

 at ^2056. His savings on labour, manures, and feeding 

 stuffs, and rent, amount to ^381. But, owing to the fall 

 in prices (taken at 30 per cent), the same amount of 

 produce which would have paid his expenses in 1875, 

 would now bring only ^^1439, while the expenses now, 

 after deducting the various savings, would still be ^1675. 

 Thus "a reduction in rent of 61 per cent, instead of 30 

 per cent, would be required to recoup losses through fall 

 in prices." 



Mr Epton, a large Lincolnshire farmer, who gave 

 remarkable evidence as to farming expenditure and 

 losses, showed that his receipts are £2600 less than 

 twenty years ago, while his rent is only ^1000 less. 

 While avowedly reluctant to press his landlord and 

 considerate of his interests, he says : " all my profit is 

 gone, and I am losing money besides." "If prices do not 

 rise, the ultimate remedy must be a further reduction of 

 rent." " The tenants are losing a deal more than the 

 landlords now." In the previous reduction of rent, the 

 landlord took over the tithe, and interest on loan for im- 

 provements, together ^^615. But as Mr Epton, paying 

 the rent of ;^I900 in 1893, lost ^800, both those burdens, 

 and still more of the economic losses, rest on his shoulders. 



Mr Bowen Jones (Shropshire) says : " In the last 

 twenty years my returns have fallen £1^00 a year, and 

 my rent and rates have fallen only ;^300. I cannot go 

 on making losses at the same rate as I am doing now, 

 or I shall be bankrupt in a few years. If J:he rent was 

 all.taken off I should have done no good, that is the real 

 position we are in now." 



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