pursued, drawing the eyes of all others upon him, 
and forcing them to imitate his well-doing. ‘ Imita- 
tion,’ says the Spectator, ‘is, after all, the sincerest 
flattery :’ though here, we think, it pays homage of 
a more sterling character. 
‘* But it may be demurred, before we proceed to 
frame new enactments entirely after this said ex- 
ample, it might be as well to see if there are any 
laws now professing to regulate the transactions be- 
tween landlord and tenant. There are many; though, 
as far as any good or just consideration is concerned, 
they are almost all absolute nullities. To any one 
who could read over the Acts of this kind still re- 
maining on the statute book, the necessity for some 
further addition to, or revision in them, would be 
strikingly apparent. As the state of society im- 
proves, as men gradually advance from comparative 
barbarism to civilization, it may be fairly assumed 
that corresponding alteration in those laws which 
affect their relative positions would accompany and 
facilitate such improvement. With agriculture, 
however, this has not been the case. Acts framed 
and passed when landlords were allowed the power 
of tyrants, and tenants were contented with the con- 
dition of slaves, are yet in existence, if not in actual 
use. So absurd and detrimental, indeed, would any 
application of them be, that landlord and tenant join 
together to prevent all possible reference to such 
relics of a by-gone age. The two unite, in the ab- 
sence of any thing better, to make a law fit for the 
times they live in; and yet what is the consequence 
of this being done by individuals, instead of being 
provided for by government, and so brought into 
general practice? Why, such a substitute becomes, 
in effect, nearly as injurious to the real advance of 
agriculture as the old law in all its one-sided power 
of might would be. ‘The agent whereby the new 
one is attained, and the old one avoided, is the long, 
elaborate, technical agreement, stipulating and pro-. 
viding for everything; and this said long elaborate 
agreement is declared by all practical men to be the 
greatest clog and impediment the tenant farmer can 
be burdened with. It confuses and frightens him, 
stays him from attempting anything not laid down 
exactly by rule and rote in it, and haunts him with 
provisions and penalties prepared by lawyers who 
know little of farming, to be acted upon by farmers 
who know as little of law. The agreement for the 
farmer should be made to suit the nature of the man, 
and be as plain, straight-forward, and as little ver- 
j| bose as possible. In fact, a long ‘comprehensive’ 
one, like a long rambling sentence, too often misses 
the point of that it aims at, and in striving to teach 
too much, finishes by defining little or nothing. To 
be truly useful and impartial, justice must speak the 
language of her people, and avoid in every way fol- 
lowing in the steps of those senators of old who gave 
out their edicts rather to excite the awe than suit 
the understanding of those whose actions they were 
intended to influence. To extend, then, and estab- 
lish that justice involved in the rights of tenants— 
to let all alike participate in their advantages—can 
be accomplished by legislative enactment alone. But 
then comes the difficulty of making this enactment 
practicable, or of carrying out the principle into 
general use. The ways of letting differ so in differ- 
ent counties, we are told—what is indispensable in 
agreement here, is never mentioned there; in a word, 
so many and curious are the customs, that, instead 
of one Act only to embrace all the country, you 
must draw out a different one for every different dis- 
trict. Now we maintain that the legal recognition 
of tenant-right can scarcely be made in terms too 
general. Let it be admitted on the understanding 
that it shall, in effect, embrace every part of the 
country; and let the Act be as simple and as short 
as possible. Let it contain a definition of the prin- 
TENANT RIGHT. 
ciple, ‘a right of claim to compensation for unex- 
hausted improvement,’ and we shall be satisfied. 
Customs may vary, and times for going in and out 
not always the same; but still the main point may 
be made equally applicable everywhere. A man that 
has purchased and put on manures in Devonshire, 
ought surely to have his case as fairly considered and 
adjusted as if he had been living in Lincolnshire. A 
man who has drained or marled Jand in the south 
will do as much good to that land, and so should 
reap as certain a return, as if it had been in the north. 
The rate of labour perhaps, or the price of the mate- 
rial applied, may be higher or lower in one place 
than another; but this, after all, is nothing but what 
may be well met in the valuation. By valuation, 
then, would we make tenant-right feasible; by valu- 
ation would we accomplish for the agriculturist what 
has so long been done by the same means in every 
other kind of business, and than which nothing can 
be more straightforward or simple. 
‘* The items which the tenant should be empow- 
ered to charge upon might be put under two heads, 
—as improvement which it is the proper business of 
the farmer to proceed with, and that which had 
better come direct from the landlord,—‘ Landlord’s 
Improvements’ and ‘ Tenant’s Improvements.’ The 
temporary and durable will be at once admitted as 
fit employment for the capital and labour of the lat- 
ter, embodying as they do the great requisites for 
good and profitable farming; while the permanent— 
the building, road-making, fencing, and so on — 
should, we think, be done by the owner, or, at any 
rate, only undertaken by the holder on some special 
agreement. We have heard it advanced with much 
reason, that to give the merely temporary cultivator 
of the land a power of making and charging for any 
new buildings or fences he may choose to erect, would 
be imbuing him with too great, and the owner with 
too little, command over, and interest in the soil. 
Such a clause too, we fear, gets beyond that extreme 
simplicity with which we would have the measure 
carried out, and, indeed, can scarcely be brought 
within the accepted definition of tenant-right, viz., 
compensation for unexhausted improvement. Now 
the term unexhausted applies clearly to, in different 
degrees, both the temporary and the durable,—the 
means taken for ‘amending the soil;’ while the un- 
exhausted good left at the end of a term in a barn or 
a stable is so entirely a different feature as to war- 
rant, we should say, a different way of meeting it. 
In this view of the matter we are in a great measure 
supported by the opinion of the Tenant Right Com- 
mittee of the London Farmers’ Club, appointed to 
go through the different clauses of Mr. Pusey’s bill, 
who, in their report, thus express themselves on this 
point:—‘ Do recommend that all items respecting 
buildings, roads, and fences, be left out of this bill, 
and that a clause be added, or a supplementary bill 
be prepared, to afford tenant-farmers those privileges 
in the removal of buildings erected by themselves, 
which manufacturers and tradesmen now enjoy—the 
landlord having, in the first place, the option of taking 
all, or any, by valuation.’ This, in fact, is but fur- 
ther evidence of the tenant-farmer being still, as the 
law stands, regarded as little more than a serf, or, at 
least, a steward,—obtaining, may be, some reward 
for his care and industry, but with no recognised 
claim for what he may have spent, on his services 
being dispensed with. Ifa man erects a building for 
any possible purpose but that of agriculture, he may, 
on quitting, pull it down again and take it with him, 
The law allows it to be his: and if the landlord will 
not buy it, the tenant may sell the material to ano- 
ther, or carry it away for use elsewhere. While it 
provides for and protects one, the law oppresses his 
neighbour, by suffering a measure so out of all date 
yet to exist,—an enactment the action of which, if 
