164 



Farming of South Wales. 



to grant a lease for lives, one for a limited number of years might 

 be substituted, having a compensation clause for improvements. An 

 unskilful farmer without capital would not be then a clog for so 

 many years, and there would be ample security for the money 

 expended by the enterprising tenant. All leases should contain 

 clauses prohibiting the occupier from taking more than two white- 

 straw crops in succession, and making it compulsory that all 

 manure, hay, and turnips should be left at the expiration of the 

 term ; the two last to be taken at a valuation by the in-coming 

 tenant. The new comer also to pay for the threshing of the crop, 

 and receive the straw in return. 



Provided the land was properly cultivated, there would be a 

 very scanty supply of labourers, and consequently the poor man 

 would receive better wages. This would soon improve his moral 

 and physical condition. He would be enabled to procure more 

 nourishing food, and the common necessaries of life for himself 

 and family ; then he could perform his daily labour with more 

 ease to himself and satisfaction to his employer. By better food, 

 it is not meant that the best wheaten bread is essential for the 

 hard-working man. The poor of Scotland, who never see any 

 flour diet, are an industrious and healthy race. As it is now 

 admitted that education should be adopted to suit the probable 

 employment of after-life, surely it would conduce much to the 

 comfort of the labouring community if, in our National Schools, 

 where the peasant girls are educated, some brief outline of the 

 first principles of practical Domestic Economy were taught ; for 

 the wife of a poor man should know how to dispose of and 

 manage his small weekly wages with the greatest advantage! 



The best way for an enterprising landlord, in the Welsh 

 parts, to disseminate improved and scientific agriculture among 

 his dependent farmers would be, to encourage the education 

 of the most intelligent of his tenants' sons — to place them in 

 the Royal Agricultural College — to permit him to view various 

 good farming in England and Scotland, and then take him as his 

 farm-bailiff. His practical and theoretical knowledge could be 

 easily explained to the unlearned and unskilful tenantry, and 

 might convince those who, from real ignorance, are often con- 

 sidered obstinate. The Welsh have, moreover, a dislike to any- 

 thing propounded by strangers ; and new practices of husbandry 

 are rarely popular unless introduced by natives of the country. * 

 The very remote position of the country and the Welsh language 

 much retard agricultural improvement. It is curious, thatwhere- 

 ever English is spoken the farming is very superior, and has much 

 progressed of late, whereas in the Welsh parts little improve- 

 in ent can be traced. On the other hand it may be said, the 

 Saxons and Flemings of old selected the most fertile and easily 



