185 



Miscellaneous. 



stituting the joint guarantee of all the proprietors of land for that of individuals, 

 and establishing a book in which the Land Stock should be registered, and be 

 made transferable, and have the dividends paid, exactly in the same way as in the 

 Public Funds. The credit of the Association was therefore always interposed between 

 the lenders and the borrowers. Those who bought the stock looked only to the 

 Association for the payment of their dividends, and the borrowers paid all interest 

 to the Association which took upon itself all questions of title and security. The 

 whole of the obligations were turned into stock transferable in all respects like the 

 Public Funds. The first land bank (Landschaften) on the model suggested by 

 Buring was established in Silesia in 175(5 by the hat of King Frederick the Great. 

 The usefulness of these banks became so great and so universally recognised that 

 they were introduced in quick succession into other countries. According to 

 Monsieur Josseau, they were introduced into Brandenberg in 1777, Pomerania in 

 1781, Hamburg in 1782, West Prussia in 1787, East Prussia in 1788, Luneberg in 1791, 

 Esthonia and Livonia in 1803, Schleswick-Holstein in 1811, Mecklenberg in 1818, Posen 

 in 1822, Poland in 1825, Kalenberg, Grubenhagen and Hildsheim in 1826, Wurtemberg 

 in 1827, Hesse Cassel in 1832, Westphalia in 1835, Gallicia in 1841, Hanover in 1842, 

 Saxony in 1844 and France in 1852. 



All these banks do nothing more than convert mortages into stock, and 

 none of them is said to issue paper money. They make advances from one-half to 

 two-thirds of the estimated value of a property, in small bonds varying from £5 to 

 £100 bearing interest from 3£ to 4 per cent. The bonds are transferable by endorse- 

 ment or delivery. Every six months the fixed dues which include interest and 

 sinking fund are paid in by the borrowers. The sinking fund, which reduces the 

 principal debt by small instalments, begins at half per cent and gradually increases 

 each half year as the principal is paid off and as the charge for interest therefore 

 decreases. Every proprietor has a right to a loan according to the value of his 

 property. The holder of the bonds has as security for their payment the whole 

 capital of the bank plus the lands specially mortaged to the bank. The borrowers 

 may pay either in money or in the bonds of the company which they may purchase 

 from the public. These land banks have had the most marvellous effects in 

 developing the agriculture of the countries in which they have been formed, 

 exactly similar to the cash credits of Scotland. What is most remarkable about 

 the bonds of the land banks is, that in times of panic caused through war, 

 revolution, or monetary crisis, they have maintained a steadiness of value beyond all 

 other securities, not excepting Government Stocks. Monsieur Josseau, to whose 

 book I am indebted for much of the above inormation, says that in the revolutionary 

 period of 1848, while the Prussian funds fell to 69, shares of the Bank of Prussia to 

 63, and the shares in railroads from 30 to 90 per cent, the bonds of the land banks 

 producing Si per cent interest stood at 93 in Silesia and Pomerania, at 83 in West 

 Prussia and at 96 in East Prussia ! The reason is not far to seek, for in times of 

 revolution or war, Governments may disappear or States may become bankrupt, but 

 the lands, the stock in trade of the land banks are there always as immovable as ever. 



(To be conli)iued.) 



AGRICULTURE IN THE K ADA W ATA AND MEDA KORLES. 



By S. D. Mahawautenne. 

 The Balangoda district, comprising Kadawata and the Meda Korles, a chief 

 Headman's division, is about 300 sq. miles in area with a population of about 22,536 

 Sinhalese and 5,891 immigrant Tamils, distributed about 25 to the sq. mile. In 1901 

 when the last census was taken we had 7,988 employed in agriculture, 500 in com- 

 merce, 46 in the manufacture of earthenware, 61 working in metal, 23 in jewellery 

 and 118 in other manufactories. These figures exclude the Tamil coolies 



