126 THE STATE AS FARMER 



exertions, against ourselves. The valuation of 

 land has proceeded some distance, but until 

 that is completed our hands are paralysed. 

 And when it is completed without public 

 ownership, we shall be equally paralysed by 

 the new duty of appraising certain incre- 

 ments of value. And why should we as a 

 people secure only twenty per cent, of the 

 improvements that we have effected ? It 

 becomes imperative for this, and for another 

 more urgent reason that I shall refer to 

 immediately, to deal with public ownership 

 soon in such a way that the completion of the 

 valuation and the resumption of active posses- 

 sion by the State shall occur simultaneously. 

 When this great double event occurs its effect 

 will be that though the tenants will have 

 changed their landlords, as they do continu- 

 ally when an heir enters into possession, 

 the landlords themselves will have become 

 tenants too. It is probable — for we see 

 the carefulness exhibited in the Small Holdings 

 Act — that in a change so fundamental as 

 this there would be as little dislocation as 

 possible caused in these domestic tenures 

 where noble dwellings, the pride of many a 



