TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION F. 755 



2. Small Moldings and Allotments} By F. Impet. 



The author entered into the history and condition of the English rural labourer, 

 and pointed out that from the time of Elizabeth till our own times practically no- 

 thing had been done to help the labourer, and the system by which ten million 

 acres of common lands had been enclosed and taken from the poor was the key 

 to most of what was deplored in the condition of the labourer. He claimed that 

 the facts met with established an unanswerable reason for interference with the 

 land system on behalf of the class who hPvd suffered most from its effects. Instances 

 without number existed of exorbitant rents being demanded for allotments, and 

 only public opinion and the growing force of the movement in favour of allotments 

 at a fair rent could at present be brought to bear in bringing about a reduction. 

 * Three Acres and a Cow,' which he wrote, describing the arrangements on Lord 

 ToUemache's estate, by which labourers to the number of 300 were allowed to have 

 three acres of grass and keep a cow, besides encountering much misrepresentation, 

 had called forth statements of similar advantages enjoyed by labourers elsewhere. 

 The Allotments and Small Holdings Association had been accused of desiring to 

 cut England into three-acre plots, and expecting everyone to get a living from 

 them. Nothing was farther from the truth, but experience showed a man could 

 do his duty to an employer, and benefit himself and family by hiring three acres of 

 grass land and keeping a cow. Numerous particulars had been supplied him of 

 properties on which allotments were greatly appreciated. In addition to the efforts 

 of individuals in establishing allotments. Parliament had in a half-hearted way 

 been induced to work in the same direction. It was important to bear in mind 

 that not only — now perhaps chiefly — was the agricultural labourer interested in 

 the allotments and small holdings question, but such a state of things brought 

 about thriving villages, each with numerous persons following handicrafts and other 

 trades, in addition to cultivating their land. The last return respecting allotments 

 was made in 1886, and shows that there are 600,000 cottages with no ground 

 attached to them. Much more land was required for allotments ; and local repre- 

 sentative bodies should have the power to own or hire land for the purpose of 

 letting out to small tenants on the model of the Swiss communal system. Public 

 opinion required a reversal of what had been the nationaV policy for centuries with 

 regard to the land. The first step in the direction of placing land within reach of 

 small as well as large cultivators was the establishment of a national system of 

 allotments and small holdings ; and they need not go abroad, as had often been 

 the case, to find out the good results of the system. The mistaken policy of the 

 State had inflicted enormous and bitter wrong on a once helpless class, but what 

 Parliament had done it might be called upon to help in amending. Irish local 

 authorities were begged to apply for loans at 3j per cent, interest, to provide houses 

 and land for labourers, and no proposals for dealing with English rural self-govern- 

 ment would be acceptable which did not contain similar provisions. The breath 

 of popular life and power was being felt among the dry bones of the decaying 

 system of their present rural institutions. The future had in store beneficent and 

 far-reaching change, which it was the highest privilege of all who loved their 

 country to help in bringing about. 



3. Feasant Properties and Protection. By Lady Veknet. 



Peasant properties have grown up in curiously different ways in different 

 countries. In France they were found to a great extent before the Revolution. 

 Arthur Young says ^ throughout ' a third of the kingdom in 1789 ' the custom, 

 though not the law of equal inheritance existed. In Russia, created by the stroke 

 of the pen of a benevolent despot, twenty-five years have sufficed to ruin the 

 landed proprietors, while their successors, the peasants, are wretched. 



' Republished under title of Hoxised Beggars; or, the Bight of the Labourer to 

 Allotments and Small Holdings. White and Pike, Birmingham. Price Zd. 



" De Foville says proportion not so great, but equally good authorities assert the 

 correctness of the estimate. 



3 c 2 



