TBANSACTIONS OF SECTION F, 837 



and remember lie but shares the present fate of every profession and trade. Also 

 that he now has all the necessaries of life cheaper than heretofore. 



2. The hours and system of rural schools might be altered. After children 

 attained ten they might have the mornings free, and the teaching be confined to 

 afternoon, and spread over more years ; and from thirteen to sixteen be distinctly 

 agricultural and practical in its character. 



3. The farmer himself wants training ; English farming is ' Rule of Thumb,' 

 there is little or no scientific knowledge or practice. He should make it a trade. 

 Be careful for little things, value small profits, and shun small losses. 



4. Existing depression should lead to landlords planting more timber, and 

 to its more systematic culture. Government to find the first cost at 31. per cent, 

 interest. Orchard culture and combined dairies should be also followed out. 



Lastly, the agricultural interest is so vast and so wide in its ramifications, that 

 we may well insist on a Minister of Agriculture with under-secretaries who have, 

 as a qualification, attended a full course in some agricultural college, and who shall 

 also be owners of landed estates ; these should keep an eye on all foreign and 

 English agricultural statistics, and distribute them in accessible form ; have, perhaps, 

 travelling inspectors, and above all watch the legislation which is brought forward 

 in the House of Commons, and preserve us from those measures which, however 

 well-intentioned, are deleterious in their effects, and too often the crude ideas of 

 doctrinaires who have never owned an acre of land or grown a sack of wheat. 



5. Land Tenure in Bosnia and the Herzegovina. By Miss Irbt. 



By the Treaty of Berlin, 1878, Austria-Hungary undertook to administer the 

 Turkish provinces of Bosnia and the Herzegovina in accordance with existing laws. 

 Many of these laws, which remained a half-dead letter under Turkish rule, are 

 admirable and worthy of our own consideration. 



Passing over the Turkish definitions of the various kinds of land, and many 

 interesting and disputed questions as to their historic origin, the paper proceeded 

 to describe the actual and present conditions of landholding in Bosnia and the 

 Herzegovina. 



At this moment (in 1 887) all land which is neither State property, nor Vakouf, 

 i.e., mosque property, nor common nor waste land is held on one or other of the 

 three following tenures : — 



1. As freehold property, by the owner farming it himself. 2. On simple lease. 

 3. On what is known in France, Spain, and Italy as the Metayer tenancy. 



By the Metayer system the landlord, or aga, and the cultivator, or Timet, share 

 the produce in kind in a proportion fixed by the custom of the district. The tenth, 

 due to the Government, is paid in money previously by the kmet. The kmet, or 

 tenant, cannot be ejected so long as he pays his dues and cultivates the land no 

 worse than his neighbours. As the standard of cultivation is extremely low, this 

 system renders the progress of agriculture very slow. It will take a long time for 

 them all to improve together. But this system is invaluable in Bosnia, as preserv- 

 ing the very existence of the native population, who must be given time to im- 

 prove. Here, as elsewhere, social and political interests do not appear at first sight 

 to coincide, but justice is ever the best policy. 



SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 3. 



The following Papers were read : — 



1. A Tlanfor County Councils. By J. Tatloe Kay. 



The British political instinct has been largely in favour of local self-govern- 

 ment, instanced in our earlier history by the number of boroughs and guildg 



