THE ALDERNEY BREED. 337 



populous as Jersey. The children, in succeeding to the par- 

 celled inheritance, make such arrangements with one another 

 as their interests require. The younger sells to the elder, 

 and he who does not wish for land to him who does ; and 

 thus, besides the law of mortality, which unites, from time 

 to time, the scattered possessions into one, the interests of 

 the possessors present a barrier to an indefinite subdivision. 

 The law, founded on the simple principle, that every man is 

 bound to provide equally for his children out of his stock in 

 land, and that every lawful child has an equal right to the 

 inheritance of his father, is cherished by these islanders as 

 the most venerable of their institutions. It was derived by 

 them from their Norwegian ancestors, in whose country it 

 exists to the present hour ; and where, after the lapse of 

 more than a thousand years, it has not produced an excessive 

 subdivision of estates. The land of Norway is indeed more 

 divided than it would have been under the feudal system, 

 but not into smaller possessions than the interests of the in- 

 heritors demand ; and in no country in Europe does there 

 exist a happier and more independent race of yeomanry than 

 the Udal proprietors of Norway. In Jersey, and its sister 

 islands, the division has been more minute, merely because 

 a greater number of families can subsist on a given space of 

 ground. 



All the practices of rural industry in these islands are mo- 

 dified by this ancient institution. The land thus partitioned 

 is cultivated in the manner of a garden, and the industry of 

 the people supplies the place of that art which simplifies and 

 economises labour ; and that the substitution is sufficient ap- 

 pears from this, that larger returns in produce and money are 

 here obtained than in the richest parts of the British Islands ; 

 and in the island of Jersey, in the cases where it is let on 

 lease, brings from L.4 to L.5 and upwards the acre ; and 

 in the neighbourhood of St Helier, the principal town, it lets 

 as high as from L.8 to L.12 ; and at these enormous rents, it 

 is to be observed, families are reared in humble affluence on 



