CHAPTER XL 



VALUE OF LAND. 

 SECTION 1. The present Rents of Farms. 



Foil a number of years past, farms that have come into the market to 

 let have in most cases brought considerably higher rents than they were 

 let at previously, even after taking into account the money the pro- 

 prietor had laid out on them to improve them for the better accommo- 

 dation of the new tenant ; and consequent on this the question is very 

 frequently discussed among farmers, Are farms not too high rented 

 now? My answer is, farmers whose means and ideas confine them 

 to the old beaten track will certainly find many farms now too high 

 rented for them to live on with comfort ; but those whose means are 

 enlarged, and who cultivate their land on enlightened principles, find 

 them generally still rented as to enable them to realise fair profits from 

 their business. The proof of this is frequently brought under our notice 

 in various ways ; for example, we often find a farm that has been in the 

 hands of an antiquated tenant on which he could scarcely manage to 

 make income meet expenditure, and which he left from the terror of 

 the advance of rent which was put on it when occupied by a new 

 and enterprising tenant who brought money and superior skill to bear 

 on it, turn out in his hands a highly profitable subject. It is generally 

 men of the old school who grumble as to their farms being too high 

 rented, and seldom those of the new one. Those who act on the 

 principles taught by the latter, when they do complain of their farms 

 not paying them, their complaint is not that it is the fault of the farm, 

 but that they are short of capital to make it more profitable. When 

 I hear farmers complain of their farms being too high rented to enable 

 them to make a comfortable living from them, I invariably suspect 

 that there is something awanting in regard to their case namely, that 

 either they are deficient in the necessary skill to enable them to be 

 profitable farmers, or that they are not in possession of the necessary 

 capital for this. But it is rare to hear a farmer grumble who is 



