peasant proprietary, the average rent of middling land has risen to £4 and £6 per acre. The same figure in Switzerland. Whereas in England 30s. an acre would be thought a fair and rather a high rent.

"In France, according to M. Lavergne's "Economie Rurale,"

50,000 proprietors hold an average of 750 acres each.

"This measure of the late Earl Cairns makes no change in the law of settlement, and under its provisions a testator has all his old liberty of tying up his landed property. The difference introduced briefly amounts to this-that after his death his successor may, under certain conditions, convert the land into money or securities, if content that the limitations should still apply. This is to lock up property in consols and debentures, or in freshly-acquired land, and it is but a tinkering reform after all. The scope given by this measure for the discharge or redemption of incumbrances

affecting the inheritance of settled land has not been largely availed of, but some 183 applications have been made in the first two years under its improvement clauses.”

UNCULTIVATED AND UNUSED LAND.

"In the Statistical Abstract the cultivated area of Great Britain and Ireland is given, in 1884, as 32,465,861 acres for Great Britain, and 15,242,837 acres for Ireland, making a total nominal acreage of cultivated land in the United Kingdom of 47,708,698, out of 77,606,146 acres. The agricultural return for 1885 gives total area of land and water, including Isle of Man and Channel Islands, at 77,799,793 acres, of which 47,895,770 is given as the cultivated area : England, total area,

32,597,398; cultivated, 24,844,490. Wales, total, 4,721,823; cultivated, 2,809,558. Scotland, total, 19,466,978; cultivated, 4,845,805. Ireland, total, 20,819,847; cultivated, 15,242,837.

"Roughly, 30,000,000 of acres are thus given as not under cultivation. In 1870 it was estimated by Admiral Maxse, in an article in the Fortnightly Review for August 1st, that the space occupied by

towns, villages, water, road, and rail traffic was 3,898,839 acres."

In the return, the cultivated and uncultivated acreage in the separate counties is given. There are altogether, as nearly as can be estimated from the various sources of information, about 30,000,000 out of 70,000,000 acres of cultivable land, uncultivated and wasted. Why is this?

In Prussia, the law considers the rights of the INHABITANTS of the land, as well as those of the

OWNERS.

If the full use of the land would afford abundance of profitable employment for its poorer inhabitants, and the owner has neither capital nor inclination to use it, in that case the State buys out the unprofitable owner at a fair price, and sells the land to an enterprising owner for the purpose of affording employment to the poorer inhabitants. The State assists the new enterprising owner, by mortgage on buildings, by a concession for minerals dug out, and otherwise. The old unprofitable owner, who has been paid out at a fair price, can generally derive a larger income than he had before, by investing the money in Government stock.

Land being limited in quantity, unless FREE

TRADE IN LAND becomes the law of the United Kingdom, the question of wasting cultivable land by keeping any part perfectly uncultivated or unused, will grow graver as the population in

creases.

PRIMOGENITURE.

The law of primogeniture, which gives all the land of intestates to the eldest son, is a relic of the feudal system and is of no use now. So far from the principle of primogeniture having divine right in it, as some persons affirm but fail to prove, it does not accord with either nature, reason, or Scripture. It is not natural to prefer one child to another. Reason would choose the fittest, not the eldest if unfit. And in Scripture, Jacob, Benjamin, David, and Solomon are instances as opposed to the principle of primogeniture. In feudal times, primogeniture was necessary and unavoidable in the case of the feudal lord, as it is in the case of the king, where only one person can succeed to the position. As an example of the incongruity of this law, imagine two wealthy

widowers, who have invested their money, one in freehold, and the other in leasehold property, both dying intestate, and leaving large families of children. In one case the eldest son takes the whole of the property, while all his brothers and sisters are left paupers. Now, in the other case, all the children divide the property equally between them. Which is the best plan? Why should the law make any difference between real and personal estate in this respect? The law of primogeniture is quite unnecessary. Any one may leave all his property to his eldest son if he wishes to do so without the law of primogeniture. This law seems to work much evil and to be devoid of good.

HOUSE OF LORDS.

An essay by the Right Hon. W. E. Baxter, M.P., entitled, "Our Land Laws of the Past" (Cassell and Co.), says on page 6, "Mr. Arthur Arnold writes: 'When the House of Lords was crowded prior to the most memorable division on the Irish Land Bill, a friend who was with me, looking down upon