170 AGRICULTURAL DEPRESSION 



While approving of the general recommendation as to 

 simultaneous notice, we may perhaps think that such a 

 proviso would tend to nullify its object, and would lead 

 to disputes and litigation by a revival of the counter- 

 claim mischief in a more restricted form. It is pro- 

 bable that fair, prompt, and amicable settlements will 

 be best arrived at by basing the landlord's claim on an 

 inspection of the farm and buildings prior to the date of 

 notice ; and that the re-opening of claims on either side 

 after that date is unnecessary and prejudicial.^ 



Further it would be shorter, simpler, and less 

 likely to lead to litigation if the items of the claims 

 and counterclaims were sent in in the first instance 

 instead of after a preliminary notice. 



It is also suggested by the Central Chamber that 

 landlord and tenant would be placed on an equal footing, 

 and counterclaims would be more likely to be strictly 

 limited to the facts, if there was a schedule of dilapida- 

 tions for landlords, in the same way that there is now a 

 schedule for improvements for tenants.- Mr Druce, who 

 thinks the schedules unnecessary, holds that, if there are 

 to be schedules, there should be one for the landlord's 

 claim as well as for the tenant's.^ 



Mr Read is strongly in favour of this proposal, but 

 apparently his chief reason is that the landlord has, in 

 his common law right, a second string to his bow. This 

 common law right cannot be got rid of, and I am dis- 

 posed to think the suggestion of the landlord's schedule 

 is of little practical value, and that conceivably it might 

 even lead to an ingenious expansion of landlords' claims 

 instead of limiting them. The mere setting forth in an 

 Act of such a schedule as that recommended by the 

 Committee of the Central Chamber might be held to 

 justify claims for specific deteriorations, which were 

 largely due to unfavourable seasons like the wet season 

 of 1879, or the drought of 1893, ^'id for which tenants 

 could not fairly be made accountable. Further, so long 

 as rents are not brought into a reasonable proportion 

 to the value of the produce obtained from the holding 

 ' Rew, Wilts, p. 20. 2 Vol. II, App. VII. » 20,035, 



