— 3 — 



tendency that the tillers of land give up their callings for other walks of life, owing to the develop- 

 ment of commerce a id industry and, also, emigration and colonization. Although the Agricultural 

 population is prevented from falling-ofi by its natural increase, the statistics present an indisputable 

 fact that those farmers, whose occupation is agriculture only, are decreasing in number, while those 

 farmers, who follow it together with other callings, are increasing, and that the ratio of farming 

 households against the totil number of households in the country is diminishing gradually. 

 However, when regarded from the viewpoint of labour demand and supply, there are, in the 

 country, many places, where the want of the year- or day-labour is very pronounced at times. 

 Notwithstanding, the point is that such places, as suffer from an utter scarcity of tenant farmers, are 

 rare, save a few exceptions. 



Classes of Farmers. — The farmers are generally classified among three categories, the land- 

 owner, peasant proprietor and the tenant farmer. The first-named farmer is one who rents his land 

 either totally or partly and lives on the rent ; the second named is one, who cultivates his own land 

 and depends chiefly on the harvests raised therefrom for his family's livelihood; and the third-named 

 is one, who rents farms from land-owner and till them himself. According to the statistical reports 

 taken at the end of 191 2, the number of the peasant proprietors amounted to 32 per cent, of the 

 total number of farmers, that of the tenant farmer 28 per cent, and that of those, who are at once 

 peasant proprietors and tenant farmers, reached 40 per cent. It is necessary to mention here, 

 however, that some number of small landowners was included in the peasant proprietors. Besides, 



