TITHES. 



.;ve as it is by a juJicious ufe of the pkiiigh, is, that the 

 litlic of corn-land is fo very heavy, as deters the fjirmer 

 r:om having recourfe to the plough : whereas in Scotland, 

 wliere tlie corn-tithe is never drawn in kind, immenfe trafts 

 I'f country, which thirty years ago were covered with 

 heath, and totally unproduftive even of grafs itfelf, arc 

 now converted into fertile fields that yield abundant crops 

 of corn and grafs ; and which, if the tithe-laws had there 



xifted, mull, in all probability, have continued unpro- 

 'iaftive until the end of time. This is a contrail that is 

 very linking to every one, it is faid, who travels through 

 thefe parts of that country ; and that it brings forward a 

 pradlical faft, which ought, it is thought, to outweigh a 

 million of fpeculative arguments. 



The intelligent author of the Prefent State of Hufbandry 

 in Great Britain flates, that another grievance to which 

 farmers are fubjefted, in the payment of tithes in kind, 

 arifes from the har(h and oppreflive manner in which the 

 payments are fometimes exa<Sed. The nature and extent 

 of this grievance may, it is faid, be learned by a perufal of 

 the extract which is given below, from the fame writer's 

 Agricultural Report of the County of Northampton ; where 

 it is ftated, that it has happened, (though, to the credit of 

 the tithe-owners be it faid, the inftances are very few or 

 rare,) where, when the tithes have been let for the purpofe 

 of oppreffion, the tithing-man has been known to exert that 

 authoiity with which he was invefted ; that he lias not only 

 taken the tenth fhock of corn, and the tenth cole of hay, 

 but alfo the tenth lamb, pig, hen, egg, &c. ; nay, has even 

 gone into the garden, and taken not only the tenth part of 

 the fruit, but likewife the tenth of the produce of the 

 kitchen-garden. Under fuch circumftances as thefe, it may 

 be aflced, who is the farmer that would not feel himfelf 

 acjgrieved ? From this it mud appear, it is thought, ob- 

 vious, that whether the farmer's intereft or happinefs be 

 confidered, it muft be equally his defire that fome arrange- 

 ment rtiould be efFefted, whereby the payment of tithes in 

 kind Ihould for ever be aboliflied ; for, as the writer of the 

 Agricultural Report of the County of Buckingham very 

 juuly, it is faid, obferves, it may be laid down as a pro- 

 pofition, that whatever profit arifes to the cultivator of the 

 toil, by the force, of fupcrior ingenuity and induftry, fliould 

 be held facred by the church and government. If it be 

 otherwife, it difcourages the improvement of the foil ; and 

 thereby the church prevents the future increafe of her 

 tithes, and the government the future increafe of its taxes. 



It has been ably contended by the writer of the Eflays on 

 rural fubjefts, already noticed, that though the tithe-laws 

 are hurtful to the farmer, they are perhaps ftill more fo to 

 the proprietor or land-holder. Whatever checks, it is faid, 

 the induiiry of tlie farmer, muft, in a direft manner, diminifli 



he income of the landlord ; and as the energy of a farmer, 

 when once excited, is well known to augment in proportion 

 to the advances he has made, whatever checks that energy 

 in the bud, occafions in time a diminution of income to the 

 proprietor, much greater than can be eafily conceived. And 

 tliat, as it is fuppofed the proportion of rent which can be 

 afforded for arable land, increafes with the produftivenefs of 

 that land in a much higher degree than in the ratio of the 

 quantum of the crop ; whatever tends to render land per- 

 manently more productive than before, if no deduftion be 

 made from it, tends, at the fame time, to augment the income 

 of the proprietor in a ftill higher degree than that of its pro- 

 duce. But as it is obvious that the tithe operates as a dead 

 bar to the commencement of improvements in agriculture 

 vpon any foil of no great degree of fertility, fo as to pre- 

 vent the beginning of that motion, from the acceleration of 



7 



which alone the proprietor can hope to derive confideraWc 

 increafe of rent ; in all cafes his rent is diminilhed in a much 

 higher ratio than one-tenth, as it might feem to do by thofe 

 who take only a flight view of the matter. It is added, that 

 fliould the proprietor of poor lands, feeing the impofFibihty 

 of the tenant's improving tlicm, attempt to render thefe more 

 permanently fertile by the outlay of ilock upon them, that 

 he never cxpeftcd to draw back ; but would content himfelf 

 with a reafonable return of intcrcll on the capitiJ in the 

 name of rent, lie would not find the cafe much altered. He 

 fets out, it may be fuppofed, with this principle, that if he 

 can fccure a permanent rent, equal to 5 per cent, on the 

 money expended upon them, he will be very well fatisfied 

 with it. Let us fay, then, that twelve buftiels of grain 

 were the neat expence of culture, &c. which, on an aver- 

 age of all forts of corn, was valued at ^. the bufhel ; and 

 that h^ had expended 2c/. the acre, the interell of which, 

 at 5 />;'»■ ff/;/., is 20s. or in other words, five buftiels. Bat 

 that before he can draw this rent free of tithe, the average 

 produce mull be, at leaft, eighteen buftiels, out of which 

 mull be takeu one buftiel and nine-tenths, fo that inftead 

 of five, his rent will be reduced to 3 percent, nearly ; while 

 the tithe-owner will be entitled to draw nearly 2 per cent. 

 for ever, on the capital which the improver i]ad thus ex- 

 pended. It is almoft needlcfs to add, it is faid, that under 

 fuch circumftances it is vain to look for a general fpirit of 

 agriculture, either among proprietors or tenants, to both of 

 which defcriptioiis of perfons the operation of the tithe-laws 

 are, it is contended, highly oppreffive. 



And another inllance is ftated of very mat.^rial import- 

 ance, in which tithe becomes Iingularly pernicious and pre- 

 judicial to proprietors of land. The importance of keeping 

 and preferving the whole produce of the ground upon the 

 farm where it was raifed, for the purpofe of making manure, 

 feems, it is faid, to be very generally underllood ; as a claufe 

 to that eff'eft is univerfally found inferted in the leafes ia 

 every county of England, wherever leafco are granted at all. 

 What puniftiment, it is aflced, would the proprietors of thefe 

 lands deem adequate to the crime of felling off^ the whole 

 prouuce of the farm every tenth year ? Yet great as tliis 

 crime would be, it would not be adequate, in point of da- 

 mage to them, to the right of drawing tithe in kind from 

 their arable lands ; becaule the farmer who fold the pro'duce 

 would, at leaft, become poftefled of money to replace, in 

 fome degree, by means of extraneous manures, the lofs he 

 had incurred by the abftraftion of the home-dung. Thofe 

 who are entitled to draw the tithe in kind are, in faft, by 

 this means, vefted with a power of enriching themfelves, 

 or their own private property, if they be fo inclined, at 

 the expence of every other proprietor around them. In 

 this point of view, therefore, tithes are Iingularly perni- 

 cious to proprietors of land. This is unquellionably an 

 objection to the drawing of tithes in kind that can pro- 

 bably never be well got over by any of thofe who arc fo 

 favourable to the prelent tithing fyftem. It ftrikes at the 

 very vitals of all our improvements in hulbandry and rural 

 bufinefs. 



Befides, the writer of the work on modern hufljandry con- 

 fiders that infomuch as the fpirit of improvemert is depreffed 

 and checked, tlie land-holder muft be injured ; and that as 

 there are no regulations or laws cxifting in this country 

 which have fuch a tendency to impede the introduftion 

 of new or improved modes of huftDandry as thofe of ex- 

 afting the payment of tithes in kind, there are, of courfe, 

 none that operate fo decidedly againll the landed intereft of 

 the kingdom. If, it is faid, the farmer be reftrained from 

 inclofing, draining, purchafing manure, in ftiort, from cul- 

 tivating 



