790 
Profit-Sharing in Agriculhire. 
more — than the man paid by time." Sir William Gray, skip- 
builder at West Hartlepool, says : " While a rivetter's day wage 
is 6s. 8d., he can earn lis. when paid by piece." And Mr. 
James Laing, of Sunderland, also speaking of rivetters, gives 
it as his opinion that the man paid by the piece is 70 per cent, 
more efficient than the man paid by time. 
According to the census of 1881, there were in the county 
of Northumberland at that time 11,710 agricultural labourers, and 
in the whole of England and Wales, 870,798. 
Supposing it were possible to apply to the farms of Northum- 
berland some principle which, when applied to the mechanical' 
and shipbuilding industries, increases the efficiency of labour 
from 33 per cent, to 70 per cent., it will be seen at a glance 
what is lost to agriculture by the want of such a system. Say 
that we can increase the efficiency of the labourer, by admitting 
him to a share in the profits, not by 70 or 33 per cent., but only 
by a modest 10 per cent., and we at once put upon the soil of 
Northumberland an increased force equal to 1,170 men, and on 
the land of England and Wales an additional army of 87,000 
labourers ! 
There is another feature to which I must shortly refer, 
because it supplies interesting evidence of the manner in which, 
Avhen once a right principle is applied to industrial enterprise, 
it harmonises in ways totally unexpected with existing social 
arrangements. It is well known that the effect of modern 
legislation has been to put into the hands of those householders 
who pay no rates and few taxes the power of rating the owners 
to any extent they please. When one class levies the taxes and 
another pays them, all the conditions are at hand for the pro- 
duction of injustice, turmoil, and discontent. 
The profit-sharing principle helps to put this right. Ou those 
farms where the system is applied, the labourers are as closely 
interested as any owner in the economy of local administration, 
or, rather, I should say, more deeply interested, inasmuch as the 
pressure of the rate falls more heavily upon them in proportion 
to their income than it does upon men of greater means. Tliis 
will be evident when I point out that if no rates had been levied 
off East Learmoutli, the profits for last year would have been 
50/. Os. Id. higher tlian they were. There would have been : — 
121. lis. Gd. more to reserve. 
121. lis. 6d. more to management. 
121. lis. 6d. more to capital. 
12/. 6d. more to labour. 
In the distribution of profits, labour would have been 
entitled to 601. 10s. id. instead of 471. IBs. 7c?., and each hind, 
