amount to, wlien split up among the various estates in the 
Peninsula, If by their action they were successful in dis- 
covering a real cure, they should have got off cheaply if the 
promised reward had been 10 times as large as it was. 
The Association should continue to press Government 
for a definite statement as to their land policy. It would 
be interesting to know how much land had been taken up 
during the last two years and also liow may thousands of 
pounds had been diverted to Sumatra and other countries 
that would have been invested here, had land Jbeen available 
at cheap rates* This however was looking at the question 
from a point of view that hardly concerned them, who had 
probably got ail the land they wanted, but it might be taken 
lor granted that this country would remain more or less 
stationary for many years to come from an agricultural 
point of view if the present rates of quit rent were enforced. 
In the case of new grants, there was not much use to ask 
for any reduction, but he thought that in all cases when the 
required cultivation clauses had been fulfilled that the quit 
rent on jungle should be reduced to a nominal figure, as 
long as it remained jungle. The advantages to the country 
in having reserves round estates were very great, the re- 
serves would tend to check the spread of disease, they 
would prevent wash and silting up of drains and rivers and 
they would serve as windbelts ; and, to the estates, they 
would be valuable as timber reserves; but no estate could 
afford to pay a rent of $4 per acre for this purpose, and 
unless a reduction was made, either whole areas would be 
cleared of forest or a large amount of land would be sur- 
rendered to Government. 
As regards the cultivation of products other than 
rubber, rents on land should he reduced to a minimum and 
every inducement offered to capital to invest and thus place 
the country in a far sounder position from an agricultural 
point of view than it could ever attain when its interests 
were almost entirely vested in one product. 
.A more generous policy on the part of Government 
during the past year would have prevented many places - 
from getting into serious financial difficulties, but the 
thorough soundness of rubber as in investment was now 
being realised by the investing public and with the advent 
of several new investment companies the difficulties as re- 
gards finance in the future should be far less than they had 
been in the past. 
The very slight hold they had over their labour was 
illustrated by the following figures which he had been able 
