Feb 
ru 
ary 
21. 
1918 
Land & Water 
23 
-power, and are so sc:ittered that the value of their votes is lost. 
As a voting power, therefore, they are a negligible quantity. 
The.' cannot concentrate, because their properties and con- 
Si.quently their votes are fixed. 
We might learn an interesting bit of EngUsh history by 
reading the Duke of Bedford s book, which tells of that fertile 
tract of land situated chiefly in Bedfordshire, and partly in 
the adjoining counties. The fascinating stories of Hereward 
the Wake comprise all that most of us know of that district, 
and lovers of Kingsley may regret the loss of romance which 
vanished with the \Aaters and desolation of this area; but the 
Earls and Dukes of Bedford did more for England by driving 
■off the water, and reclaiming — no, not reclaiming, but making 
— the land which is now one of our chief food-growing 
districts, than ever Hereward accomplished. In 1630-33 
Francis, Earl of Bedford, spent ;fioo,ooo (equal to about 
^300,000 to-day) in draining. And that was merely the be- 
ginning, vast sums having been spent since in larger and 
better drainage schemes. Between 1816 and 1S95 the outlay 
on the land was i'4,240,539, yet at the time of writing (1897) 
the estate accounts showed an annual loss of o\-er £7,000 per 
annum, ajiart from any expenditure on Wobum Abbey, 
park, or experimental arm ; whUe the average net income 
from Thorney for 20 years previously — without allowing 
-anything for death duties,was only 2] per cent, on the capital 
outlay on new works which between 1816 and 1895 amounted 
to £65,155. In the same period. the net return from the 
Wobum estat : was only one per cent, on the capital outlay 
■on new works, which amounted to £537,347. 
The financial history of these estates is typical of hundreds 
of others, but the degree of loss in this case is probably heavier 
than the average, and there are certain points worth noting. 
For instance the initial outlay of over £4,000,000 was much 
^greater tliaii average, and this outlay ought (and did) put the 
profKirty into a better condition to meet the shock of de- 
pression than most. The annual expenditure on equipment 
and upkeep was larger than most estates could incur, and the 
size of the property would render the establishment charges 
less per acre than on smaller ones. There was no single case 
of disturbing a tenant, and thus insecurity of tenure did not 
conduce to bad farming. During the period of 20 yeaite 
ri ferred to four or five years are included before the depression 
became really acute, which makes the real loss greater than 
is apparent. 
O e may well ask why, under such circumstances, did owners 
continue, not merely to own, but to pour out money over 
land which brought in no return ? It was unsound business, 
it was commercially and economically indefensible. Hundreds 
of families impoverished, hundreds of men drawing wealth 
from other sources, and sinking it in agriculture. But they 
kept the flag of agriculture flying, and faced every attack 
(wliicli were numerous) with the pluck that carries through 
a forlorn hope. The general result was that for thirty years 
the consumer was fed at a price below the cost of production ; 
supplied with cheap bread, cheap meat, milk, butter and 
cheese, cheap clothes, and cheap boots at the expense of the 
British landowner, and at the end of that time he (the con- 
sumer) has come to look upon these abnormally low prices 
as an inalienable right. 
. It is not suggested that among owners there was general 
recognition of the fact that they were gratuitously presenting 
the populace with the necessaries of life at uneconomic rates. 
It was a case of circumstance acting upon unorganised units ; 
but the great majority of those units had been trained in a 
school which imbued its scholars with the idea that nobles,se 
oblige is the guiding principle of life. When, therefore, they 
found not only their income, but capital as well, rapidly dis- 
appearing, they instinctively held on, for they had ties they 
could not break ; sentiment, perhaps foolish sentiment, 
which bound them to the homes of their ancestors, and to 
tenants they would not forsake ; and often, they could not 
sell even if they desired. 
The vivid imagination of certain pwliticians depict them 
as a rack-renting, overbearing set of tyrants, ruling their 
tenants as despots. Or they are lazy, living lives of indul- 
gence and amusement, or wasting their time in hunting or 
other sp(jrt. Luckily the country gentleman is usually a 
sportsman. If he had not been a hunting man, a supporter 
of hurdle-racing, and a breeder of racehorses, the country 
must either have sjjent large sums of money every year in 
maintaining a horse supply for the army, or the outbreak of 
war would liave found us without remounts. 
The first legislative proposals towards reconstructing agri- 
culture arc contained in the Com Production Act, and while 
some of them are good, others are anything but happy. 
The best feature is the bracketing together of a minimum 
wage for the workers and a guaranteed minimum price for 
certain of our principal crops; the worst is the cynical 
provision that landowners shall not reap any benefit from 
enhanced prices for agricultural products. The former was 
opposed by that section of pohticians who stand to gain by 
sowing dissension between classes, their reason, it must be 
supposed, being that it gave proof of the identity of interest 
between employer and employed, which mutual interest 
they have always denied. The same group supported the 
provision which prevents owners gaining any advantage, the 
reason (we are justified in assuming) being that as a class 
they are political opponents. Those whose financial interests 
are in foreign production or in transport, were among the most 
vocal of that group. It has among its friends many who are 
fond of talking loudly about the " duties " of landowners, 
ignoring the fact that no less than other classes they may 
also have rights. Some of them urge that because land b 
limited in quantity no individual has a right to own any of 
it, as such ownership implies power to prevent public access 
to it. Do they imagine, if the State owned it, that pubUc 
access would follow as a matter of course ? WTiat a grotesque 
idea! The State now owns plenty of land for experimental 
purposes. Let those who hold these views endeavour to 
obtain public access to this Jand as a demonstration. 
If this Act had provided that owners were to gain some 
part of the benefit of enhanced prices, even if it were only to 
recoup them in part for the losses of prfevious decades, there 
would be some ground upon which to talk of duties, and there 
could then be no question as to the Government having the 
right to dictate how a man should use his property ; but when 
it decides that he must bear all the losses without sharing in 
any advantages there is no logical ground for talking of duties. 
As a class they have done their duty in a way that offers a 
shining example to every other section of the community. 
Peasant Proprietors 
This latter provision of the Act wiU have — is indeed already 
bringing about — a change quite imforeseen by those who 
so eagerly helped to carry it through Parliament. For 
years they have opposed any proposals for legislation which 
would help to increase the number of owners. While urging 
the creation of small holdings, which are to be held by 
tenants at a perpetual and never-lessening rent, the proposal 
that sitting tenants should be aided in purchasing their farms, 
or that peasant propriett rs should be created, has always met 
with their hostility. Now the large owner? are offering their 
land for sale, and, to a very large extent, it is being purchased 
by the tenants. A certain type of farmer is objecting to this 
change taking place, and they are urging that sales should be 
prohibited untU after the war, giving as their reason that such 
sales create a feeling of unrest among tenants, and thereby 
tend to inferior cultivation. Such an attitude is not difficult 
to understand. 
The paternal interest of owners has already been referred 
to, as having given tenants a sort of prescriptive right to the 
benevolence of their landlords. They have enjoyed this 
benevolence so long that they naturally prefer to go on as 
tenants, getting higher prices for their produce, and with 
rents fixed at the level of the lowest period of the depression, 
but still with a landlord whom they can call upon to keep 
their places in order. Many others would hke to gamble on the 
terms of " heads I win, tails you lose," but it is unreason- 
able, and un-English, to ask for such confiscation. 
It is not surprising that so many landlords having been 
forced to take upother businesses, they arenowapplying better 
business methods to their estates, than did those of the 'eighties 
and 'nineties. It is much wiser to sell now than it was to 
hang on then, while every sale gives tenants an opportunity 
to obtain the most perfect form of security of tenure possible, 
by purchasing their own farms. Owners of land have only 
one other alternative of avoiding a continual loss, and that is 
to farm their estates themselves. Let them take a lesson 
from Denmark, and farm extensively. It will decrease the 
cost of production, and farming generally would, under such 
conditions, be more productive than ever it has been. 
For the sake of brevity all reference to the continuously 
increasing burdens uf)on land in the shape of rates and taxes, 
mainly bome by the owners, has been omitted. It is a long 
story, and a somewhat dry one, for all but the sufferers, but it 
would be easy to show that owners have bome more than their 
fair share of such burdens for the last forty years. Moreover, 
they have shouldered voluntary burdens in addition to those 
imposed upon them by law; especially has this been the case in 
connection with the cost of national education. It is a curious 
but interesting fact that among the strongest opponents to 
the financial provisions of the Education Bill of 1902 were 
landowners, who would have been relieved of a voluntary rate. 
amounting in cases to many hundreds of pxDunds per annum, 
in place of which they would have had to pay a much smaller 
education rate. It had become a sort of hereditary burden, 
and those who could afford it resented its removal. 
