192 



LETTERS FROM PROFESSOR CARLYLE 



human food, has, I fear, by this means, been gradually lessening, the 

 population of the country has undoubtedly increased, till the average 

 produce of the land is no longer equal to the consumption ; for though 

 a number of commons and what are called waste lands have been 

 divided and inclosed, the manner in which they have been allotted 

 and managed has, I fear, tended to counteract much of the benefit that 

 would otherwise have resulted from them. 



In the meeting in Oxfordshire, to which I before alluded, I ob- 

 serve that an idea is thrown out of receiving rents ip a different 

 manner from a fixed pecuniary payment. As something of this kind 

 is practised throughout the whole of Asia Minor, not only in paying 

 rents but wages, perhaps Your Lordship will not dislike to have a 

 short account of it. 



Almost all the lands in Anatolia and Caramania are let from year 

 to year ; the rent of every farm is partly fixed and partly variable. 

 The fixed part (which goes to the Seigneur of the district) is paid in 

 money ; the variable part (which belongs to the immediate land- 

 holder) differs in different places ; sometimes it amounts only to a 

 tenth of the produce, but the most general rent throughout the whole 

 of Asia Minor is a quantity of grain equal to the quantity sown, or 

 the sum of money which this quantity would bring at the time of pay- 

 ment. This, my Lord, approaches nearer to a corn rent than I should 

 have expected to have met with in these countries. 



The mode of settling wages seems to be regulated upon similar 

 principles. The servant hired by the year, as well as the day- 

 labourer, receives part of his pay in money, and the rest in necessaries 

 or an equivalent for them. Thus, in Anatolia the wages of a servant 

 hired for the year amount to about forty shillings, together with a 

 shirt and trowsers, and a claim for a couple of pounds of food, 

 which is generally pilaw, per diem, i. e. boiled rice mixed up with 

 grease. The day-labourer receives about two-pence-halfpenny a-day, 

 together with the same quantity of pilaw as the other. In Caramania 

 the same custom obtains, only that in that part of the country as 



