Let those who believe that, by high farming, the soil can be stimulated so as to produce enormously augmented crops, at a large additional profit, consider the above statistics well. They are the statistics of the very highest farming in Scotland. The English agriculturist has been taunted for his backwardness in not adopting the improvements of his northern neighbour, who, with a worse climate, has made the most of the soil. Such has been the language used by some of the advocates and apologists of free trade, who are now urging the farmer to lay out more capital in draining and manures—assuring him that, by doing so, the returns will far exceed the interest of the outlay. With a fine disregard for the elements of arithmetic, they insist that low prices can in no way interfere with his success, and that only exertion and enterprise are wanting to raise him above the reach of foreign competition. The above tables exhibit the experiment, worked out to its highest point. In these cases capital has been liberally expended, energy tasked to the utmost, and every means, which science can devise or experience suggest, called into active operation. The farmers of Mid-Lothian, Berwickshire and Forfarshire may fairly challenge the world in point of professional attainments. They have done all that man can do, and here is the reward of their toil.
Supposing, then, that hereafter the permanent price of wheat were to be 40s. a quarter; that other cereal produce remained at corresponding rates; and that the value of live stock did not diminish—points, upon all of which we are truly more than sceptical—it will follow that high farming, such as is at present practised in the best agricultural districts of Scotland, cannot by possibility be carried on. No possible reduction of rent would suffice to enable the farmer to continue his competition. Such a fall must necessarily have the effect of annihilating one of the two classes; for the landlord, burdened as he is, would cease to draw the means of maintenance from his estate, and it is questionable whether the residue would suffice to pay the interest of the mortgages and preferable burdens. To the people of Scotland this is the most vital question that has engaged their attention since the Union. Our national prosperity does not depend upon manufactures to the same degree as that of England. By far the greater portion of our wealth arises directly from the soil: by far the larger number of our population depend upon that for their subsistence. Even if Manchester statistics were applicable to England, the case is different here. If the prices of agricultural produce should continue as low as at present—and we cannot see what chance exists of their rising, in the face of such a tremendous import—the effect upon this country must be disastrous. Such prices would reduce Scotland, at one fell swoop, to the condition of Ireland: paralyse the home market for manufactures; throw hundreds of thousands out of employment; lower the revenue; augment the poor-rates; and utterly disorganise society. And yet what help for it? The farmer cannot be expected to pay for the privilege of losing several hundreds per annum by cultivation. Let Mr Watson's statement be examined, and it will appear that the enterprising and skilful tenant of a farm of five hundred acres, in the best corn district of Forfar, cannot clear his expenses unless the rent of the land is reduced by one-half, and, even if that were done, he could only realise a profit of sixpence per acre! Such a result, we fairly allow, would appear, at first sight, to be incredible; yet there it is—vouched for by men of name, character, and high reputation. This is the extreme case; but, if we pass to Berwickshire, we shall find that a reduction of half the rent would barely place the tenant in the same position which he occupied previous to the withdrawal of protection. Look at No. IV., and the result will appear worse. Even were one half of the rent remitted, the profits of the tenants, at present prices, would be less by £100 than they were at the former rates of corn. Very nearly the same results will be brought out, if we calculate the necessary reductions on the rents of the Mid-Lothian farms. Lord Kinnaird may see in those tables the fate which is in store for him; and he cannot hope to escape it long, even by inserting, in his new leases, the most stringent stipulations as to money payments which legal ingenuity can devise. It is just possible that "men of business habits," retired shopkeepers, and others of that class, may be coaxed and persuaded into trying their hands at a trade of which they know literally nothing. They may be incautious enough to put their names to covenants, not conceived according to Mr Caird's liberal principle, and so pledge their capital for the fulfilment of a bargain which common sense declares, and experience proves, to be preposterous. The necessary consequence will be, that the rent must be paid out of capital, a process which cannot last long; and the unhappy speculator, as he finds his earnings disappearing, will curse the hour when he yielded to the delusion, that high farming must be profitable in spite of the variations of price. The poor seamstress, who weekly turns out of hand her augmented number of improved shirts—and who lately, though on exceedingly erroneous principles, has found a warm advocate in the kind-hearted Mr Sydney Herbert—has, in her own way, tested the value of the experiment. There is more cotton to be shaped, and more work to be done, but the prices continue to fall. She makes two additional shirts, but she receives nothing for the additional labour, because the remuneration for each is beaten down. The free-trade tariffs are the cause of her distress, but the unfortunate creature is not learned in statistics, and therefore does not understand the source of her present misery. No more, probably, do the female population of the Orkney islands, whom Sir Robert Peel reduced to penury some years ago, by a single stroke of his pen, through the article of straw-plait. From Lerwick to the Scilly Isles, the poor industrious classes were made the earliest victims. The tiller of the land is liable to the operation of the same rules. By the outlay of capital, he forces an additional crop, but, the value of produce having fallen, his returns, estimated in money, are just the same as before. If the maintenance of rents throughout the United Kingdom depends simply upon the supply of dupes, we are afraid that the Whig landlords will speedily find themselves in a sorry case.
We by no means wish to treat this question as if Scotland alone were concerned. The English agriculturist, who knows that strict economy is the rule in northern farming, will readily acknowledge that our observations have even greater force when applied to his own case. It would have been presumption in us, had we passed beyond the limits of our own field of illustration, which, however, will bear comparison with any other. On the whole, we think it will hardly be questioned, that, if high farming in the Lothians or on the Border is a losing trade, it cannot be made profitable elsewhere within the boundaries of Britain.
We are told that this is a landlord's question; and we find Messrs Bright and Cobden, with more than their usual malignity, chuckling over the prospects of the downfall of a class which they honour with their rancorous hatred. They do not affect to disguise the pleasure which they derive from knowing that, at this moment, the rents are being paid from the farmer's capital; and, so far, they bear important testimony to the truth of the calculations we have submitted. It is not our business at present to diverge into ethics, else we might be tempted to hazard a few observations on the brutal and un-British spirit which pervades the whole of their late harangues. All that we shall do now is to remark that they are trying, by every means in their power, to persuade the tenantry of Britain that this is a mere landlords' question; and we are bound to confess, that such writers as Lord Kinnaird have materially contributed towards fostering this delusion. A very little consideration, however, will show the utter fallacy of such an opinion; and we feel convinced that the good sense of the tenantry of Scotland will interfere to prevent them from being led astray by the devices of their inveterate enemies.
So far as we can gather from the opinions enunciated by the leaders of the Manchester school, at their late gatherings, their view resolves itself into this. Abolish the rents, and agriculture will go on as before. Little argument is necessary to show, that the proposition, even were it admitted, is by no means in favour of the farmer.
Our excellent contemporary, The Standard, has already disposed of it in a single sentence:—Wipe off the rents, and you wipe away the class which heretofore has paid the rents. Mr Bright would fain attempt to persuade the farmers that they are altogether independent of the landlords, and that no suffering can reach them. Have then the landlords, in most instances, expended nothing on the soil? Their outlay does not appear in balance sheets, however large may be its amount; but, were that outlay added to the farmer's expenditure of capital, there can be no doubt that, even without rent, at present prices, farming would be otherwise than profitable. But did it never strike Mr Bright that, failing rents, the landlords must necessarily take their farms into their own hands, as indeed has occurred already in several districts of the country? We presume he does not contemplate a quiet confiscation of estates—if he does, confiscation will not stop there. We suppose the owner must still have the option of keeping his property; and if so, as he will derive no profit from it in the shape of rent, he must either farm it himself, or act as labourer on wages under a farmer. We apprehend there can be little doubt as to the course he will take, when driven to such an extremity. As a body, tenant-farmers will cease to exist. They may go to Poland if they please, and employ their practical skill, and such remnant of capital as they can save from the wreck of their fortunes, in the patriotic task of growing wheat cheaper than before, for the British manufacturing market; but in this country there will be no longer any room for them. We shall be thankful to know if any course more feasible can be suggested; but indeed ingenuity seems to be at fault, and the Free-traders hardly affect to conceal their conviction that such must be the result. The following extract from a leading article in the Times of 6th December, will show the views entertained by that very influential journal.
"If any landowners or tenants are thoroughly persuaded that, under the operation of free trade, land will yield no rent to the owner, or no profit to the farmer, let them dispose of their land or their farms. The whole world lies before them. The funds, the share-market, trades and manufactures innumerable and new ones every day, the colonies, the United States, the Antipodes, Europe, and literally the whole surface of the globe, is open to the enterprise of wealthy or ingenious men. Those who regard an English landlord or yeoman as an animal to be kept in a hothouse will think this very cruel advice, but it is advice which nine-tenths of our fellow-subjects have to follow, at least once in their lives. The law of change is impressed on the whole face of society. Man improves by being transplanted to new soils, and grafted on new stocks. Why should not the heroic qualities of our gentry be employed in the improvement of the world, and in the spread of civilisation, religion, and manners? Why should not the skill of our farmers be turned to account in making the whole earth bring forth its full produce? As it happens, there are no classes actually concerned in the material and operations of industry who can change their place with so little difficulty or cost as the owners and cultivators of the soil. The landowner can sell his estate, and buy another, or invest the money in the funds, any day he pleases. The tenant can dispose of his lease and his stock without much sacrifice. Can an attorney, a physician or surgeon, a beneficed clergyman, a merchant, a retail shopkeeper, or, indeed, any commercial or professional person, change his locality ten miles without sacrificing at least 30 or 50 per cent of his present income? Yet many such are obliged to migrate, and resign present income, besides all the other losses involved in a move, in the mere hope of ultimately improving their condition. As for our agricultural labourers, who, we are often told, are the staple of our population, for many years the whole force and pressure of our social institutions has been applied to compel their migration. Landlord, tenant, parson, overseer, and even a man's own fellow-labourers, are all in a conspiracy to elbow him out of the crowd, and the sooner he yields to that pressure the better. Why, then, should it be thought a hard thing to give the same advice to the landowner and the farmer?"
So write the Free-traders, and we wish them joy of their argument. Henceforth, then, we ought to abandon all foolish scruples connected with home, and kindred, and country—all national considerations, all the ties and common feelings that hitherto have held Englishmen together! Truly, the cause which requires such advocacy as this must be in a desperate condition. Such language however, extravagant and puerile as it is, has some extrinsic value; for it shows us the utter selfishness and entire disregard of the Free-traders for every other interest in Britain except their own.
We shall probably be told that we are alarmists. It is no new charge against us. The same thing was said when we denounced the policy of government towards the West Indian interest, and also when we foreshadowed the commercial crisis which overtook us in 1847. One exception may be taken to our agricultural views, on the ground that farms have been let in Scotland without any diminution of rent. We allow that such is the case. We admit that, even during the bygone year, there has been considerable competition for farms; and we know very well that this circumstance has tended to allay the fears of many. But, after all, what does it prove? Nothing more, we apprehend, than that the farmer is most reluctant to abandon the profession to which he has been bred, and in which his capital is invested; and that, in times of notoriously unsettled and vacillating legislation, he may be, perhaps, too sanguine as to the possibility of another change. The fact that some farms, in various parts of the country, have, of late, brought full and even higher rents, is not enough to warrant the idea that present engagements can be met. It does not follow that these will continue to be paid; nor do the parties themselves, we presume, expect to be able to fulfil their engagements, if future prices are such as we have felt constrained to reckon them. We have seen of late, in other matters, how easily people are deceived by sanguine anticipations; and it has recently been lamentably proved, that it is often long before disastrous events produce their due effect in indicating true value. If, in the less intricate matter of railway speculations, we have seen men who boasted of their superior information, involving themselves in the downward course of these unfortunate concerns, under the idea that the turning-point of depression had been attained, and that golden profits might be realised, is it marvellous if the farmer should be deceived in a matter which has been so much mystified, and which his predilections and peculiar position, in most instances, will not admit of his viewing calmly and dispassionately, even if he possessed the means of correct information? His education and habits compel him to endeavour to continue his occupation at all hazards. If once he abandon his calling, he is out of a situation as well as a home. It often happens, besides, and now it is peculiarly the case, that, to dispose of his stocking—a necessity incumbent upon the loss of his farm—is to make a sacrifice of his property. At present, live stock is from 15 to 20 per cent under what he has been in the habit of receiving for the last few years. Hence, upon such a vexed question as the effects of the corn laws, modified and free, have become, it is only natural that, in his doubt, and darkness, and perplexity, he should stretch a point to keep possession of his occupation; trusting that, if matters continue to be adverse, his landlord will have the like commiseration for him which it is his duty to testify for his neighbour, who, under other circumstances, is also writhing beneath the pressure. In such a case, rent becomes altogether a question of chance, left to be modified and controlled by after circumstances.