LEASES AND YEARLY TENANCY. 73 



certainly tend to make matters any better. The tenants under such a 

 rule are not only prohibited from shooting or otherwise destroying game, 

 but it is also stated that they " shall have no claim on the proprietor for 

 recompense or damage for, or in respect of, any injury which he may 

 sustain in the occupation of the lands let, by or through the instrument- 

 ality of game themselves, or by reason of any increase thereof." A farmer 

 certainly cannot rest contented with the knowledge that he is rearing 

 crops to feed game ; and nothing can be more hurtful to a man's feelings, 

 and to his pocket also, to find, on walking round his farm, that his grain 

 and green crops are being destroyed by game which he dare not interfere 

 with. It is of little avail to insert a clause to the effect of " reserving to 

 the tenant any claim which he can substantiate against the party actually 

 sporting, hunting, or fishing, for any injury or damage which may be 

 thereby done to new grass, grain, or green crops." 



Leases are often met with containing such a clause, and it certainly 

 is not creditable to the present generation that such is the case. No 

 doubt a proprietor has a right to deal with his lands as he may think 

 best, and to give the use of it to a tenant under any conditions he may 

 feel disposed to stipulate, as generally there are always farmers to be 

 found who will take farms under almost any conditions. Many blame the 

 landlord alone for such a state of things, but in my opinion both parties 

 are in the wrong. It requires two to make the bargain, and all tenants 

 should object to such a condition about game in their leases, and on no 

 account to take a farm with such restrictions. From the experience I 

 have had of farmers, I feel satisfied that the greater number of them 

 feel pleased in seeing their landlords shoot over their farms in a sports- 

 man-like manner, but they cannot be otherwise than dissatisfied when 

 their crops are being reduced by hares and rabbits. I am of opinion 

 that a respectable class of tenants would make the best gamekeepers; 

 at all events, landlords should insist on having all hares and rabbits kept 

 down on their estates it is for their own interest that this should be done. 

 Cropping. This is one of the most important clauses in a lease. I 

 have already stated that no intelligent farmer should be strictly confined 

 to any such form of rotation, and yet it must be admitted that the land- 

 lord should have some power over bad tenants, to prevent them injuring 

 the farm. When a good tenant, who is known to be a thorough farmer, 

 is strictly confined to a certain course of cropping, it is hostile to both 

 the landlord's and the tenant's interests, and causing injury to the farm. 

 I knew an instance last season (1867) in which a crop of clover entirely 

 failed in the spring of the year, and the tenant was not at liberty, and was 

 not allowed, to plough the field and sow another kind of crop. Some 

 may assert that if he had been a good farmer the clover crop would not 



