191 1.] A Spanish System of Estate Management. 395 



be most carefully considered, and anything attempted in this 

 direction is likely to be of utility with a view to the practical 

 realisation of the great reforms needed in agricultural produc- 

 tion and cultivation. 



Numerous though the industrial population of the world 

 may be, their number is small in comparison with the 

 enormous population which lives exclusively by the cultivation 

 of the soil. This long-suffering class is at least equally 

 worthy of consideration and guidance in order to enable it to 

 attain improvement and well-being. 



Problems relating to agriculture are unquestionably of a 

 very complex nature, and consequently difficult of successful 

 solution, for in no other human science does theory differ so 

 much from practice. 



The steps which are being taken to encourage and maintain 

 the system of small ownership, and to bring about the imme- 

 diate or gradual conversion of the tenant into the owner, are 

 certainly worthy of all consideration and praise; but, unfor- 

 tunately, for several reasons, action in this direction cannot 

 be taken everywhere, and, indeed, in many cases is not desir- 

 able. Moreover, in view of the slowness of the change, we 

 must endeavour to find in existing conditions of ownership 

 and rural labour means of immediately improving the 

 position of the labourer, and of strengthening the ties which 

 bind him to his landlord, and thus placing him in a position 

 to abandon the routine unfortunately so common in the case 

 of the mass of agricultural labourers of the whole world, so 

 that, without the tenant leaving the soil which saw his birth, 

 or the owner abandoning the fruit of the economy and labour 

 of his ancestors, they may put into practice the splendid 

 results of modern agricultural science, to the spread of which, 

 assemblies like our own contribute in such an important 

 manner. 



Far be it from me to pretend to offer a solution of this 

 difficult question. It will be sufficient for me to present to 

 you an account of an attempt which I have made, and which 

 has happily given excellent results, in one of the most 

 important districts from the point of view of agriculture in my 

 own country. 



The different systems generally in use for the cultivation 



