The Agricultural Holdings [England) Act, 1875. 
141 
to each its proper period of unexhaustion. This will be the 
business of the valuers. The remarks which follow, there- 
fore, upon each class of improvement, must be understood with 
the qualification that a tenant acquires no absolute vested inte- 
rest extending over the maximum period applicable to the 
three classes of improvements. His interest is conditional, 
depending upon the question whether, in the opinion of the 
referees, umpire, or judge, the particular improvement is unex- 
hausted when the tenancy determines. It may deserve notice, 
however, that it is open to the landlord and tenant by special 
agreement to fix prospectively the period during which the im- 
provement shall be deemed unexhausted, instead of leaving that 
matter to be dealt with retrospectively. In the opinion of some 
persons, a definite arrangement of this kind may be advantageous 
to both parties. 
The thirteen improvements of the first class may be deemed 
unexhausted, and the tenant's claim for compensation therefore 
may continue in respect of them, for twenty years, dating from the 
end of the year of tenancy during which the outlay has been made 
(§ 6). Thus, assuming that the year of tenancy upon a holding 
to which the Act applies expires at Michaelmas, 1876, and any 
one of these thirteen improvements is made upon this holding, 
with the safeguards and conditions imposed by the Act, between 
February 14 and Michaelmas, the twenty years will begin to run 
with the next year of tenancy, 1876-7. 
In dealing with an absolute owner, the basis of the tenant's 
compensation will be the cost price of each improvement, with 
a proportionate deduction for each year subsequent to that in 
which the outlay is made, until either the term of twenty years 
expires, and the improvement thus becomes, in a legal sense, 
exhausted (§ 7) ; or until the period of actual exhaustion fixed 
by the valuers in the particular case. By § 31 the award is to 
find and state the time at which each improvement is taken to 
be exhausted. Therefore, the period during which compensation 
can be given depends upon the finding of the valuers or arbitrator 
as to the period during which the improvement will remain unex- 
hausted after the tenancy determines. This period must in no 
case exceed twenty years, and it may fall far short of twenty years 
if the valuers so determine. In either event, the longer the tenancy 
continues, the smaller the compensation which falls to be paid by 
the landlord. Assuming that the improvement is one which the 
valuers will pronounce to remain unexhausted during the full 
term limited by the Act, the tenant will be entitled to receive 
back again, out of the land, in twenty equal yearly instalments, 
the money which he put into or upon the land ; and if he leaves 
his holding before the end of twenty years, and is thus unable 
to recoup himself, his landlord will become bound to pav the 
