INADEQUATE PRESENTMENT 325 



(2.) That, while in the earliest stage of the depression in- 

 vestigated by the Richmond Commission, bad seasons 

 were the chief cause of mischief, a persistent, though 

 at times fluctuating, fall in prices coincided with 

 the arrival of better seasons and the improvement 

 of the condition of the soil ; 



(3.) That any real and general recovery of agriculture 

 was thus made impossible, because any economic ad- 

 vantages from the better seasons from 1884 to 1890 

 were more than counterbalanced by the fall in prices ; 



(4.) That the three exceptionally bad seasons of 1892, 

 1893, and 1894 coincided with a still deeper fall of 

 prices and culminated in the most acute and wide- 

 spread stage of the depression, in the autumn of 1894 

 and summer of 1895. 



The Dp:pression in England. 



Chapters I and II, stating the condition of agriculture 

 in the arable and in the grazing districts of England, are 

 fairly complete, but, in my opinion, fail to set forth as dis- 

 tinctly and vividly the real position of the majority of agri- 

 culturists in those districts as it has been laid before us in 

 the carefully prepared reports of Mr Rew, Mr Wilson Fox, 

 Mr Pringle, and others, and by many of the ablest agricul- 

 turists who spoke from local knowledge and practical ex- 

 perience. 



Especially I note, in paragraph 40, the inadequate reference 

 to the striking evidence in Mr Pringle's report on the condi- 

 tion of agriculture in Bedfordshire, Huntingdonshire, arid 

 Northamptonshire ; the disastrous effects of the bad seasons, 

 not only on the heavy clay arable land, but on the finet-t 

 pastures in the country, the steady spread of ruin among 

 large classes of farmers, bringing agriculture into the posi- 

 tion of a bankrupt industry, the wholesale changes of tenancy, 

 and the share that excessive rents have had in intensifying 

 the features of the depression. 



As to Hampshire (paragraph 41) a single quotation is 

 selected from Dr Fream's report, to the effect that tenants are 

 in some cases " keeping on their farms at their own rentals," 

 while the statements from the same report, that " north of 



