Insisting, as we do, on the strength of the facts we have adduced, that, in old Europe, the operation of economic laws affecting land tenure, admits of no exceptions or extenuating circumstances in favour of their violation, it appears impossible, without presumptuous sophistry or political dishonesty, to resist the conclusion, that the infringement of those laws in any part of the United Kingdom could only terminate, infallibly and speedily, in damage to the State, after ruin to the individual.
FOOTNOTES:
[5] The physical results of intermarriage with the object of concentrating property, are very apparent in many of the older Bonde families in Norway.
[6] It would not be right to allow this observation to pass without mentioning, even at the cost of destroying so fascinating a picture of pastoral felicity, that the hard-working dairy-maids of Norway are never accompanied by their sweethearts to the sœters, where, except from Saturday night until Monday morning, when the young men find time to visit them, they lead the most solitary lives, and are busy all day in milking cows and goats and making butter and cheese.
[7] In 1833 the total production of spirits in the rural districts amounted to about 3-1/2 gallons per head of the population. The demoralization that resulted from its increase necessitated the enactment of restrictive measures, and at last, in 1848, the small stills were purchased by the State, and private distillation was prohibited. As in Great Britain, the vice of drunkeness is now decreasing in Norway, owing partly to the reduced means of the population, but chiefly to the influence of education and of temperance societies.
[8] The average proportion of 1851-52 was 9.32 per cent. There is a difference of only 1 per cent, between the rates of illegitimacy in rural and urban districts, to the disadvantage of the latter.
[9] 'The French Constitution of 1791 is one of the principal sources of the Fundamental Law of Norway. The suspensive veto has been derived from it.'—O. I. Broch.
[10] At the end of 1882, the total population was estimated at 1,922,500, or a decrease 3900 as compared with 1881, when the increase was only 1000 from the year preceding.
[11] In 1880, the average rate of wages for labourers engaged by the year in agricultural districts was 8l. 10s. per annum, and that of daily labour, without food, 1s. 9d. per diem; the corresponding rates in towns having been 11l. 6s. 8d. and 2s.
[12] Our readers must, however, bear in mind that we are dealing only with the rural economy of Norway, and that the facts we shall submit on that subject affect but slightly the general financial condition of a country which continues to derive its earnings mainly from the supply of timber, fish, wood-pulp, ice, &c., to foreign countries, and from its extensive carrying trade in sailing vessels and steamers. The prosperity of the towns is influenced chiefly by the state of trade in the rest of Europe, while being (to the extent of 122 out of 128) situated on the seaboard, their successful development reacts but little on the prosperity of the inland agricultural districts.