10 The Agricultural Holdings (^England) Act, 1883. 
What is the sum fairly representing the value to an incoming- 
tenant of any one or more of the twenty-three improvements 
specified in the Act, after deducting in respect of each " what is 
justly due to the inherent capabilities of the soil " ? Such is the 
knotty problem which Parliament has set to valuers, referees, 
and umpires. 
The basis of compensation under the Act of 1875 was outlay 
by the tenant, limited to periods of twenty, of seven, and of two 
years, after which periods first, second, and third-class improve- 
ments respectively were held to be exhausted. It was for the 
valuers in each case to say, as they are still required to say in 
cases in which that Act remains operative, whether within the 
specified limits of time the improvement was or was not ex- 
hausted. A tenant acquired no absolute interest extending over 
the maximum period applicable to the three classes of improve- 
ments. In the absence of agreement it was for the valuers, 
when a tenancy expired, to fix the term of life, if any, which 
was still left to an improvement. The tenant was paid in 
respect of that unexhausted term, but the valuers might find that 
the improvement was exhausted, in which case he would receive 
nothing, though the maximum period applicable to it under the 
Act had not yet expired. Thus the valuers' task was not 
an easy one, nor could they always award just compensation, 
even when they found the improvement still alive. On this 
point, a valuable note, appended by Mr. J. D. Dent to my 
remarks in the ' Journal ' on this part of the Act of 1875, may 
here be quoted : — "In the laying down of land to permanent 
pasture, the making and planting of osier-beds, making of 
gardens, of fences, planting hops, orchards, reclaiming waste 
land, it is quite manifest that, for some years after the cost of the 
improvements has been incurred, there can be no appreciable 
return to the tenant; while, during the latter period of the 
twenty years, the return may be almost sufficient to recoup the 
whole cost of the operation. The tenant, therefore, whose 
tenancy comes to an end during the earlier period after such an 
improvement has been executed, will not really be reimbursed 
for his outlay in the same proportion as the one who has con- 
tinued to occupy until the remunerative return has commenced." 
It must be admitted that, in principle, compensation on the 
basis of value to an incoming tenant is fairer than compensation 
awarded on the basis of, it may be, ill-advised expenditure by 
the outgoing tenant, as provided in 1875. VVe see that the 
methods for awarding compensation there prescribed were not 
quite so simple as they looked, and did not depend on an easy 
sum in arithmetic ; while, as Mr. Dent showed, they could not 
always be trusted as equitable in practice. But the difficulties 
