420 THE MIDLAND MILK BELT 



starvation rent. These were the cases, according to 

 our host, which justified the outcry of the small holders 

 against the farmers for engrossing the land ; in his 

 own opinion 150 acres was about as much as a 

 working farmer needed or could handle to the best 

 advantage. He equally inveighed against the capitalist 

 farmer, of whom one meets with many examples 

 throughout England, who holds half a dozen or 

 more scattered farms, aggregating 2000 to 3000 

 acres, each managed with a cheap bailiff no better 

 than a promoted labourer. We have often marvelled 

 at the methods of such men ; they have no business 

 organization, often keeping no accounts beyond their 

 cheque-book, but they are shrewd buyers and sellers, 

 and they risk little in the way of expenditure upon 

 the land. We have never met one of them who would 

 pay for skilled assistance and organize his business 

 as a manufacturer would do; they are content to 

 take the small profits which the land itself will bring 

 in under cheap farming, and are not too greatly 

 concerned at being robbed by their bailiffs, provided 

 the robber is cunning enough to leave them a profit. 

 As a rule, such men found their opportunity and got 

 their many farms during the depression twenty years 

 ago : they were the men who learnt the art of working 

 cheaply to meet the fall in prices ; farms were thrust 

 upon them and no questions asked about the manage- 

 ment, provided they could pay the rents. But rising 

 prices and rising rents must compel them into better 

 methods. 



We were interested to find a farmer in the very 

 heart of Leicestershire, with the Quorn kennels almost 

 within view, breeding heavy horses ; light horses he 

 had abandoned as too speculative a business for a 

 farmer, and no assistance in the way of nominations 



