fii-# w im >/ • > -j.-v-^f* THE AQRICULTURAL DEPRESSION THE SUFFERINGS OF THE CLERGY. R. E. PROTHERO. FELLOW OP ALL SOULs' COLLEGE, OXFORD. REPRINTED FROM "THE GUARDIAN, London : "GUARDIAN" OFFICE, 5, BURLEIGH STREET, STRAND. 1887. \ CONTENTS. Preface pp. i. — ir. Letter I. The general effect upon clerical incomes of agricultural depression jip. 1 — 7 Letter II. The effect upon the titheowner pp. 8 — 18 Letter III. The effect upon the glebeowner pp. 19 — 31 Letter IV. The relief of the titheowner pp. 32—41 Letter V. The I'elief of the glebeowner ■. pp. 42 — 52 PREFACE. — * — At the close of last year I accepted an offer from the Editor of the Guardian to inquire into the effects on clerical incomes of the prolonged agricultural depression. The results of my inquiry are contained in the following five letters. These so-called letters are really articles. The abstract form and want of local colour are due, partly to the difficulty of investigating the private liabilities of men in the rank of the rural clergy, partly to the necessity, when information of this character was obtained, of avoiding the identification of the informant. The ground on which the pledge of secrecy was in one case exacted was significant enough in its latent meaning — " If names were divulged it might injure my credit." It is not suggested that all clergymen have in an equal degree suffered from the agricultural depression. The inquiry was mainly confined to the counties of Northampton, Huntingdon, and Essex, and the borders of Nottingham, Leicester, Lincoln, North Warwick, and Buckingham, the districts in which the prolonged depression was known to have produced its most disastrous results. Even in these counties only general statements are possible, owing to the vaiying circumstances of different benefices and different localities. Clergymen who are titheowners only, in counties unaffected by anti-tithe agitation, have, at the worst, passed from the enjoyment of ease to the practice of economy ; they have lost their margin of comfort. Clergymen who are titheowners in counties upon which the anti-tithe agitation has taken a firm hold have been compelled to make remissions vaiyiug from 10 to 25 per cent, upon the existing value (90 per cent.) of the tithe rent-charge. Their income has already dropped from the 112 of twelve years since : it is also reduced by arrears. But in case they refuse to make abatements they lose their incomes altogether. Clergymen whose income is derived partly from tithes and partly from glebe, and whose benefices are situated in a county into which the anti-tithe agitation has spread, are still worse off. They sustain a doixble loss. Their tithe is reduced", or refused, and they are obliged to take whatever rent they can get from their glebes. But the clergymen who have suffered most heavily are those whose income is exclusively derived from glebe. If they let their land, the rent falls 33 to 50 per cent. Those who have been compelled from inability to find tenants to farm their own land have lost their rent and their private capital as well. I only encountered a single instance in which glebe owners farming their own land would not have been, but for private means or friendly assistance, literally and without metaphor, starving. Upon the results of my inquiry two general questions seem to arise — (1) what immediate measures of relief are possible? (2) What is to be the ultimate fate of tithe rent-charges and of glebe-lands? Speaking generally on a subject which is treated in detail in my lettei'S, I have come to these conclusions : — • 1. As to Tithes. — As a temporary relief the payment of tithes must be undertaken by the landlords ; but the only final solu- tion of the tithe difiiculty is, I believe, their compulsory redemption,* a course which I venture strongly to advocate. 2. .4s to Glebes. — A gradual sale, wherever reasonable offers can be obtained, is advisable. An immediate sale, forced on by panic, will glut the market with land ; the proceeds of such a sale at present prices would realise little more than the auctioneer's charges. Meanwhile the legal impediments by which glebeowiiers are hampered in the development of their land can be, and ought to be, at once removed. No legislative change will remove the personal and professional difiiculties under which clerical landlords must inevitably labour. But they may be modified. For a discussion of this part of the subject the reader is referred to the third and fifth letters. The difficulty which is experienced in filling up vacant glebe livings may be partially and temporarily met by further amendments of the Pluralities Acts giving increased powers to Bishops to throw livings together. For the immediate distress of glebeowners the following appears to me the most efficacious form of relief. I do not put the scheme forward as one of those many devices for • In describing Mr. Ryde's scheme (Fourth Letter) I only advocate its principle — namely, compulsory redemption by co-operation between the land- loi'ds and the Government. raising money which threaten to turn the year of Jubilee into a year of tribulation. Glebeowners have sunk a large amount of private capital in the improvement of their lands, for the repayment of which they have no security and on which they receive no interest. Again they have charged their glebes with heavy loans raised for the same purpose from Land Improvement Companies. If the land is unlet the premiums fall into arrear, and the com- panies or their assignees are compelled to foreclose. By this process two livings have been already disendowed, and the same fate hangs suspended by a hair over several midland county benefices. All the possible increase on the Ijresent value of the land is for ever lost to the Church. Again, clergymen in more prosperous times incurred charges to Queen Anne's Bounty for building houses ; these charges now hang like millstones round their necks. Again, pensions were granted to retiring incumbents under the Incumbents' Eesignation Act, which were calculated upon the old value of the living, but which have now become wholly dispro- portionate. The result of the loss of private capital and of the incidence of these annual fixed charges is that, as their incomes fall, clergymen are compelled to sell, pledge, or drop their life insurances, and thus to leave their families wholly unpro- vided for. In the foregoing paragraph'are summed up some of the most disastrous results to the Church and the clergy of the agricul- tural depression. Is there any remedy? I should propose that a fund be raised for the purpose of redeeming the charges held by Land Improvement Companies and, in cases where the charge was reasonably incurred, by Queen Anne's Bounty, and extending the period over which is to be spread the repayment of princiijal and interest. The relief to individuals would be great and immediate ; and the Church would escajDe the danger of being disendowed through foreclosure of mortgages. The income or, if a sufficient sum were raised, the surplus might be devoted towards the following purposes : — 1. In case of the death or resignation of glebeowners, who have sunk private capital on their glebes in structui-al improvements or improve- ments of so permanent a nature as drainage, compensation should be offered to them, or their representatives, and a charge be taken upon the benefice for the repayment of the amount, priuciiJal and interest. 2. An amendment of the Incumbents' Eesignation Act seems imminent ; a sliding scale aud minimum income for the real incumbent will be fixed. But no amending Act can be retrospective in its operation. In the case of pensions settled before the impending amendment, the real incumbent might be paid the difference between the sum which he pays for the fixed pension and that which he would pay under the sliding scale. 3. The abandonment or the mortgage of life insurances is the most lamentable result of agricultural depression. A clergyman becomes unable from diminution of professional income to keei3 up his insurances ; the society might on the security of his policy give that temporary aid which often is all that is required ; or, if from the same cause he was forced to drop the policy, and the case were one of genuine distress, the society might deal more leniently with the vendor than any public company which has to consider the interests of its shareholders. I need not indicate the many forms such leniency might assume. What sum of money would be required for this task ? In the diocese of Peterborough alone upwards of 50,000J. of private capital has been sunk in the improvement of glebe, and an equal amount has been raised for the same jiurposes by charges from Land Improvement Companies. Of this latter sum a considerable portion has been now paid off. It is probable that 150,000Z. would go a long way towards redeeming all the land improvement charges throughout the country. It is to be remembered that great mineral wealth in the shape of iron- stone is to be found under the glebes in Northants ; in some instances this source of wealth is untouched owing to a dead-lock between the Ecclesiastical Commissioners and the patrons. If legislation facilitated the development of the minerals under glebe-lands throughout the county, a sum could be raised which, supplemented by i^rivate subscriptions, and applied as I have indicated, would confer an inestimable boon on the distressed clergy. The work of redeeming land charges might be effected piecemeal : it might be commenced even with 1,000L If once the society were launched it would float of itself, and, as a Clerical Land Improvement Company, would prove an invaluable means of removing the stigma of bad farming which not unfairly lies on glebe-lands. With its aid glebes would become more lettable and more salable. January 28, 1887. R. E. Prothero. I.— THE GEXERAL EFFECT UPON CLERICAL INCOMES OF AGRICULTURAL DEPRESSION. At the present day it is impossible to regard the lot of landlords who depend for their incomes solely on their rents as altogether enviable. Their social position has ceased to be exceptionally dignified or secure. Among the many illnsions which the experience of the nineteenth century has removed, none has been more rudely dispelled than this unsubstantial dream of the felicity of the landlords. The idyllic squire has taken his place with the Arcadian shepherd as the most unreal of poetic fictions. But the public mind is unsatisfied without an ideal of pastoral happiness. In the absence of other competitors the country clergyman has been selected to play the part. The delusion gathers strength, fostered by the misrepresentations of agitators and encouraged by the silence of the clergy them- selves, that the parsons during the past ten years have enjoyed a comfortable shelter on the lee-side of the storm. It is admitted that lay landlords have lost at least a third of their rents, and tenant farmers a large portion, if not the whole, of their working capital ; but it is assumed that incum- bents continue to receive their revenues from land, little, if at all, diminished in amount by agricultural distress. Incumbents are held up to public condemnation as extortioners who squeeze blood out of stones, as sleeping partners in a losing business, as drones who paralyse the energies of farmers, and cripple the resources of landlords, by drawing from the land, without risk or anxiety, comfortable fixed incomes which can only be paid out of the capital of working agriculturists. It is at least an open question whether the connection of the clergy with the land is desirable in the best interests both of the Church and of the nation. Life tenancies and fixed money pay- ments charged upon the land are necessarily incumbrances to agi'iculture. On the advantages or inconveniences of rent- charges or glebe lands I shall have something to say hereafter ; nor is it my present purpose to discuss the amount of truth contained in the complaint against clerical landlords. The point upon which I am now insisting is that the connection of the clergy with the land has created a widespread discontent, and that this discontent is in a large measure due to the impression that the clergy have neither borne their fair share of agricultural distress, nor done their utmost to raise the burdens Tinder which landed interests have collapsed. This feeling is fed from many other sources, such as the covetonsness -which the possession of land always engenders in the landless, or the con- viction that it is impossible for the clergy to be good landlords. But leaving out of sight all other sources of discontent except the belief in the immunity and the apathy of the clergy, it is manifest that judgment cannot safely be permitted to issue against the parsons by default, that it is not only just but prudent to lay the true facts before the public, and that both the sufferings of the clergy and the peculiar conditions by which, as agriculturists, they are hampered, are too little known or too genei'ally ignored. It is with this object that the present inquiry has been instituted. The investigation has been principally confined to the dioceses of Peterborough, Ely, St. Albans, Lincoln, and Oxford ; but the area has been considerably extended by the information of well-known and experienced land agents, whose wide business connections have made them acquainted with other parts of the country. The result of the inquiry shows that, in the first place, so far from enjoying any immunity from agricultural loss, the clergy have suffered as acutely as any other class ; and that, in the second place, their great and self-denying efforts to meet the agricultural crisis have been thwarted by impediments from which lay landlords and tenants have been long relieved. They have a claim on sympathy ; they have also a claim for redress. The prudence of raising the question can hardly be challenged. Agricultural distress has reached such a point of depression that it is no longer wise to conceal the sufferings of the clergy. If the turning-point in the lane were reached, it might be possible to keep silence ; but the turn is still out of sight. If agriculture is indeed passing through the tail of the storm there is a terrible sting in the tail. Wheat continues to pour into the country at a price with which English farmers cannot hope to compete ; barley cannot be grown with profit ; stock still shows a downward tendency ; few farmers are able to make their rents. At a fat-stock market held within the last fortnight in the midland counties the highest prices which were realised ranged from 101. to 121. lower than those of 1885 ; and while 401. was the selling price of prize animals last year 301. was the largest sum paid in 1886. Money has been made in inferior beasts which have turned out well ; it has been lost over the higher class. On Lord Exeter's Burghley estate fourteen tenants have recently given notice to quit ; other Northants landlords, like the Duke of Buccleuch, Lord Lilford, Sir Frederick Robinson, and Mrs. Stopford Sackville, are hardly in a better position. On the heavy land districts of Essex much land fell out of cultivation after the wet seasons of 1870, 1880, 1881 ; most of it has since been brought back into some sort of occupation ; but it is often let for such grazing value as it produces, or is held on at nominal rents by tenants who are only bound to continue to cultivate and to pay the outgoings. The area of corn cultivation, if the price of horses affords any indication, is rapidly contracting. Farm horses, which in 1882 fetched 351. a piece, arc now sold for 101. In some portions of the country farmers are leaving the sinking ship at any sacrifice, throwing up their farms, and realising what they can get. Six working horses, old, bat serviceable and good, were offered six weeks since in Peterborough market at 301. As yet agricul- tural labourers have suffered comparatively little. But farmers can no longer afford to employ an adequate amount of labour. If nothing is done to relieve depression, hundreds of agricultural labourers will this winter be turned off to swell the starving and desperate mass of the unemployed which fringes the borders of our glittering civilisation. Meanwhile all the profits of agricul- ture are passing into the hands of the butchers and the bakers. The price paid by the consumer is wholly disproportionate to the sum paid to the producer. It was suggested to me by a gentleman of considerable agricultural experience that if the Government fixed week by week the price of bread and meat on a fluctuating scale determined by the selling price of wheat and stock, together with an allowance of a fair profit for middlemen, they might not only reduce the price of meat and of bread for the consumers, but impose a small import duty on foreign produce. Agriculture has reached so low a level in this country that in many districts it is almost au expiring industry. Under such circumstances the most rigid economists might defend the imposition of an import duty, provided that it can be accompanied by a cheapened loaf and a cheapened joint. The present state of agriculture is a formidable danger to the property of the clergy. In moments of popular panic somebody is always hanged, and the victim who is dragged to the lantern is generally innocent. Necessity knows no laws ; in stormy times the Church is a convenient Jonah for all political parties. Too many statesmen appear to think that the violation of established and fundamental laws is an evil of less magnitude than a political inconsistency or an avowed change of opinion. Men will drive a coach-and-four through a hundred Acts of Parliament sooner than bate one jot of their economical theories. It may be at once conceded that a pressure so severe as the present agricultural distress demands that the land should be as free as possible from all incumbrances. But until the clergy are placed in the same position as lay landlords and lay tenants, they have fiot received fair play or enjoyed the same opportunities of doinj? their duty by the land. To force on a compulsory sale of glebe lands would at the present moment ruin parochial endowments ; such a step could only be justified, if it were proved that the clergy, enjoying the same advantages as other landlords, neglected the duties and accepted only the privileges which belong to property. An inquiry into the effects on clerical incomes of agricultural depression necessarily widens out into an investigation of the peculiar conditions of clerical laud-holding and a survey of the different schemes put forward in the interests either of the clergy or of agriculture. The result of the whole will, I venture to think, evoke widespread sympathy for the hardships of the clergy, establish a conclusive case for the extension to the parsons of advantages already conceded to lay landlords and tenants, and possibly incidentally suggest some reasons why legislators should hesitate before pi-oposing or sanctioning hasty schemes for dealing with tithe rent-charges or glebe lands. So far I have insisted only on the worldly prudence of bringing before the public the sufferings which the country clergy have undergone in consequence of agricultural depres- sion. No one esteems a soldier who brags of his exploits, or values a parson who boasts of his virtue. Perhaps a layman's experience of the conduct of the clergy under peculiarly trying circumstances may help the public to do more justice to a class which is tonguetied in its own defence by the highest motives of self-respect. Within the last six years the clergy have had the opportunity of showing to the world an example of patient endurance of suffering. Witnesses examined before the Duke of Richmond's Agricultural Commission described the position of glebeowners as " deplorable ;" since that date their position has steadily deteriorated. Yet their hardships have been borne without complaint, in silence, and with quiet dignity. The preservation of self-respect has been their sole reward. But when patience itself, as I have endeavoured to show, becomes the source of misrepresentation, it has been pushed beyond the point where it ceases to be a virtue. Many landlords have shown a most practical and generous sympathy with their suffering neighbours. They have taken the glebe lauds into their own hands, have paid the full rent to the parson, and borne the loss themselves. But it is only the wealthiest squires and men who enjoy an income derived from another source than land who can afford to make such sacrifices. The relief, great though it has been, is necessarily so partial as only to touch the fringe of the distress. Many persons form as false an impression of the lives of the country clergy as our ancestors conceived of the conditions of pastoral felicity. Strephon or Corydon in Chelsea china are as much like the real shepherd as Old Leisure feeliug his apricots on a sunuy wall resembles the modern country parson. The different aspects which the same place may assume convey the lesson of the two aspects presented by clerical life. In spring or summer a prettily built parsonage, with fields sloping down to a bright stream, approached through cool lanes redolent with wild flowers, and resonant with the song of birds, is attractive enough. When the sun shines it is a pleasure to feel that you are six miles from the railway station ; even the village street looks so quaint and picturesque and its inmates so cheery that it seems impossible for the clergyman ever to desire to exchange any extra-parochial thoughts. Visit the same place in the winter after floundering through lanes ankle-deep in mud, with a leaden sky overhead, and a north-east wind chilling to the bone or driving a sleety rain into your face. The only signs or sounds of life in the deserted drijiping village street are the beery steam which issues from the public-house, the wail of some half-fed child, or the shrill scold of an angry wife ; the stream has made an ague-exhaling lake within a few feet of the windows of the parsonage, and it cuts the inmates off from their nearest neighbours by a flood which runs knee-high across the road. Outsiders are far too ready to forget that there are two sides to clerical life in the country, both in its material and in its spiritual aspect. Many men feel capable, when the sun shines, of a burst of momentary enthusiasm ; but they shrink from the constant discharge of duty which often consists in a monotonous round of wearisome details. All the temporal advantages of the clerical profession are, at least in the midland counties, entirely removed. The clergy feel the pinch of poverty, not, perhaps, in its acutest form of actual hunger, but in the loss of all those so-called luxuries which in their position and surroundings are really necessaries. First came inconvenience from delay and nncertainty in receipt of income ; then the humiliating necessity of asking for credit ; then the certainty that rents would not be paid ; then the pressure of creditors and the refusal to give f ui-ther credit ; then the expenditure of private capital and the mortgage of life insur- ances ; then the application to friends. The house and its surroundings are ill-adapted to a constantly narrowing income. The outdoor establishment is reduced, the garden cannot bo maintained, the horse and carriage are sold. The same process is followed indoors. Servant after servant is discharged till not one is left j then follows the careful husbanding of fuel, the severest practice of domestic economy, even the disposal of books, furniture, and apparel. Sons are withdrawn from school or college, daughters are obliged to go out as governesses ; life insurances are sold, pledged, or allowed to drop. Sometimes an effort is made to obtain pupils ; but the connection of the clergyman with school or college has expired, and pnpils are hard to get; if they are found, the hard-worked, dispirited parson doubles his labours and the home circle is invaded by strangers. More often than not no pupils can be obtained, and then begin the ghastly struggle to maintain appearances and the secret grapple with positive want. The clergy have long had to deal with poverty as their only neighbour ; it has now become their own constant and unwelcome guest. Yet all the while, at very heavy personal sacrifices, the clergy have clung to their posts. The Church services must be maintained, and the curate's salary is paid by an incumbent who envies his subordinate his salary, and would gladly, if it were possible, step down in the clerical ladder. No one will give more than the parson, and the clergy are still obliged to head subscriptions to schools and local objects ; the wants of the sick poor have still to be met by soups and jellies and clothing. The farmers cannot afford to give alms, but the parson out of his scanty pittance must supplement the offertory with larger donations that its recipients may not suffer by its diminution. The parson is often the only man of education or refinement in the parish ; he cannot seek the society of his friends, for he has no means of locomotion ; he cannot solace himself with books, for he can no longer afford to buy them, or even to subscribe to a library ; he cannot, like the squire, shut up his house and leave the neighbourhood. He has no fellow- sufferer with whom he can compare notes ; the farmers may understand his loss, but their well-meant sympathy is often expressed with excruciating frankness ; the labourers grumble that he cannot emj^loy them as he used, and is less able to minister to their wants. Yet, as has been said, the clergy have not only clung to their posts, but borne their heavy trial with an uncomplaining dignity which is worthy of their noble calling. Every temporal advantage of their position is disappeai-ing ; little remains to encourage the parson in a life which has always had more than its usual share of disappointment, except his faith and the sense of sacred duties conscientiously performed. It may be that the result will be to purify and elevate the character of the country clergy. If so, the refining process will ultimately raise their position and extend their influence, bat meanwhile the furnace is exceeding hot. This is no fancied or exaggerated picture of the sufferings of the country clergy. In its entirety it is true only of indi- viduals ; but, if the clergy were not possessed of private means, it would hold good almost universally of glebeowners in the midland counties. It is upon those clergymen whose incomes are derived solely from land allotted in lieu of tithe, that the blow has fallen with the greateyt severity. But the tithe rent-chargers have also suffered heavily. Their losses are by uo meaus confined to the natural results of the fall in the com averages. If this were all, they would have no ground for complaint. They have experienced difficulty where none has been experienced by lay impropriators in obtaining payment of tithes. In many cases it is impossible to collect tithes at all, and arrears have accumulated for several years, the greater part of which are irrecoverable. In other cases the clergy have only obtained payment by consenting to a reduction of from 10 to 25 per cent., a course in which they are, in my opinion, ill-advised : any readjustment of the tithe rent-charge should be effected by Parliament and be general in its operation. But as compared with glebeowners, even ecclesiastical tithe rent-chargers have been in clover. Of all the classes interested in agriculture, whether landlords, tenants, or labourers, tlie losses of the glebeowners have been by far the most severe. In the succeeding letters I propose to deal in detail with the effect of agricultural depression on the incomes of clerical tithe rent-chargers and glebeowners, to give instances and statistics in support of my conclusions, and finally to discuss the various schemes which have been proposed for the relief of clerical distress. II.— THE EFFECT UPON THE TITHEOWNER. In my fii-sfc letter I endeavoured to show how strong and widespread an impression waa growing up that the parochial clergy ai'e evading their fair share of agricultural loss, or barely touch with their little fingers the heavy burden which has crashed the landed interests. Because the clergy have been patient, long-suffering, and silent, it is supposed that they are in no distress. Under such circumstances they can no longer afford to hide their losses or to conceal their self-denying struggles to do their duty both by the land and their profession. The con- dition of many of the country parsons, and especially of the glebeowners, is disastrous, if it is not absolutely ruinous ; no one who investigates the facts can continue to believe that they either enjoy immunity from agricultural distress, or refuse to extend a hand to sinking tenants. I hope to show that the clergy as a body are bearing an equal, and sometimes an excessive, share in the general calamity, and that, in the face of legal impediments, by which no other class of agriculturists is hampered, they are striving at the cost of heavy self-sacrifices to meet the unexampled difficulties of their present jDosition. In this second letter I propose to deal with the clerical tithe- owners, to show how their incomes have been affected by agricultural depression, and to discuss the honesty of the anti- tithe agitation. From the nature of the subject and the very varying circumstances of different localities, only general state- ments are possible. Cases must necessarily occur in which many of my remarks cease to be applicable or require large modifica- tions. It is possible that at the present moment titheowners, both lay and ecclesiastical, are suffering less than ordinary owners or occupiers of land. Though this seeming inequality is, in the case of clerical titheowners, with which alone I am concerned, more apparent than real, it is aggravated by political agitation and exaggerated by the results of the almost universal arrange- ment which renders occupiers liable for the tithe rent-charge. A popular feeling has been created against tithe which is with difficulty removed. Farmers themselves believe that they pay the tithe out of their own reduced capital ; they see that the present value of the charge is disproportionate to the prices they themselves receive for corn ; and they naturally resent the payment. In point of fact tenant farmers have as little to do with tithe as they have with the land-tax ; they are merely its transmitters, the conduit pipes thi-ough which landowners pay 9 it to titheowners. The Titbe Commutation Act of 1836 treats the tithe as a landlord's charge, a charge upon the land, and not a burden upon its produce. Landlords cannot be acquitted of a large share of the blame for the present resistance to the pay- ment of tithe. The area over which the anti-tithe agitation extends widens rapidly. In Wales the payment of tithe is a burning question. Yet, agriculturally, there is less reason for the agitation in Wales than in England. The tithe is generally less than in this country : and the Welsh farmer, till within the last two or three years, weathered storms which wrecked hundreds of English tenants. In the Principality the agitation, is stimulated by political causes and fomented by Dissenting ministers and the proprietors of vernacular newspapers. It does not fall within my province to discuss the character of a local movement which is directed less towards relief from an agricultural grievance than towards the disestablishment and disendowment of the Church in Wales. In the English counties the movement is more purely agri- cultural, though even here it often assumes a political aspect. Before the pressure of agricultural distress commenced, no opposition was made to the payment of tithe ; and it is therefore to this cause that the present agitation is mainly due. Drowning men clutch at straws ; farmers welcome any prospect of relief from the disbursement of cash ; many are sincerely convinced that they pay tithes not as part of, but in addition to, the rent. If the only remedy proposed for the present agitation is that the tithe should be paid by the landlords farmers will scarcely be satisfied. They paid the tithe while it was rising ; now that it is falling they are told that it will be undertaken by landlords. Eesistauce to tithe is spreading rapidly in England ; it is encouraged for their own purposes by political tramps ; it is even in some instances supijorted by landowners. Along the Welsh borders, in Monmouthshire, Herefordshire, and Cheshire, opposition has already made considerable progress. In Kent the Extraordinary Tithe Redemption Act of 1886 (-19 and 50 Vict., c. 54) has diminished the unpopularity of one form of tithes, though it cannot be said to have satisfactorily settled the question. But ordinary titheowners have also encountered great opposition in the collection of their tithes. Tithes in Kent are extremely high ; and the incongruities, especially in such districts as Romney Marsh, exceptionally great. Rich pasture which makes the rent pays a modus of Is. ; and arable land on the other side of the hedge, which is often a dead loss to the farmer, pays a tithe of 12s. an acre. The difference arose from the diflBculty exiDerienced in taking a tithe of grass ; the titheowner accepted a customary payment called a modus decimandi in lieu of his tenth. These arrangements were left untouched by the 10 Tithe Commissioners in 1836. Remissions have been made on many estates, and by many clergymen, of 10 and 15 per cent. In all abatements, or claims for abatement, the reduction is made not upon the par value, bnt upon the 90 per cent, which represents the i^resent value of the tithe rent-charge. In Hampshire farraei'S demand a reduction of 25 per cent, on the tithe ; their demand has not been acceded to, and at Andover they have opened a subscription list to resist any action taken for the recovery of the charge. In Essex large arrears have accumulated through the unvrillingness of titheowners to apply the cumbrous and unpopular means of enforcing payment which the law provides. Considerable sums have been altogether lost to titheowners through the operation of the Statute of Limita- tions, or through the land falling out of cultivation ; in many cases payment has only been obtained on the condition of abatements of from 10 to 20 per cent. At the present moment a general tithe war is imminent in the county. Reductions of 20 per cent, have been asked by the tenants of Hatfield Broad Oak and of Great Bardfield. In both cases the titheowners, Trinity College, Cambridge, and Guy's Hospital, have refused to make the reduction claimed. The Essex Chamber of Agriculture recently resolved that a revaluation and reapi^ortionment of the tithe was rendered imperatively necessary by the depreciation of land and the vahie of its products. Elsewhere in the east of England, in Lincolnshire, Norfolk, and Suifolk, there is but little opposition to the payment of tithe. In the midland counties scarcely any difficulty has been experienced in the collection of the money ; this class of property is comparatively rare ; the persons interested in resistance are few and scattered. Yet, even in these favoured districts, abatements have been asked and given of from 5 to 15 per cent. Agricnltui'al depression and political agitation combine to make the country as inflammable as touch- wood. If once resistance takes a hold on a county it will spread like wildfire. Yet, apart from the political question with which the movement is associated, and apart from the advantages of emancipating the land from all fixed charges, no thinking man reasonably acquainted with the nature and history of tithes can sympathise with the anti-tithe agitation or uphold its justice. I have said that at the present moment titheowners, both lay and clerical, are perhaps better off than other landlords. The rent-charge payable this year is possibly more than the tithe- owner would realise if he still continued to take a tenth of the gross produce of ai-able and pasture land. In any such com- parison the amount of produce which is wasted in removing and housing a tenth taken in kind must bo considered. The tithe rent-charge may be more than the titheowner would have realised under the old system ; it is probably not so much aa 11 the landlord would have lost. Even if it were conclusively proved that the tithe rent-charger now enjoys the best of the bargain, and that the diminution in the value of his share of the produce, as shown by the tables, does not equitably represent the share which he ought to bear in the diminished value of the total produce, it by no means follows that his share in the general burden is disproportionately small. In the first place, titheowners are still receiving their shares, hitherto unpaid, of previous prosperity ; at the time they profited less by the increment than any other agricultural class ; their profits are, from the nature of an income which is calculated on averages, spread over several years. In the second place, although war may in the interval send corn up to famine prices, titheowners will continue for the next seven years to suffer from the recent period of distress. So long as the existing arrangements are maintained for the payment of tithes between landlords and occupiers both these considerations introduce an apparent element of injustice into the position of tenant farmers If a farm changed hands the farmer who rents in bad times is paying tithes which are abnormally high owing to profits reaped by his predecessor. Even this appearance of injustice could not exist if landlords had acted up to the spirit of the Commutation Act of 1836. Neither the profits nor the losses of titheowners are immediate ; both are spread over a considerable period of years. Many other considerations must be borne in mind in estimating the amount of the clerical titheowners' share in the general burden. Large arrears are accumulating, the amount of which is not adequately represented upon the books, because large sums are now irrecoverable ; considerable abatements have been made, varying from 5 to 20 per cent. ; tracts of land have fallen out of cultivation, upon which tithe ceases to be payable ; rates fall with increased severity upon tithes iu proportion as the assessment value of farms decreases with the reduced rental. Lastly, clerical incomes are subject to pecu- liarly heavy deductions for the payment of curates and the conduct of divine service, the repair of chancels, the support of schools, the maintenance of local clubs and societies, and the administration of charities. This last class of professional out- goings may be almost regarded as absolute charges upon the income of the clerical titheowner ; the money which they repre- sent is spent in and for the benefit of the parish ; and the burden falls with greater weight upon the parson in consequence of the increase iu the sui'rounding poverty. Figures are generally misleading ; but they render abstract statements more concrete and definite. The total value of tithe rent-charge, as commuted and apportioned in 1836, is in round numbers four millions. Of this three-fifths, or 2,400,000^., are in 12 possession of clerical iucnmbenfcs. From this satn may be deducted 5 per cent, for collection (120 000?.), 10 per cent, for the fall in 1886 from the par valae (240,000L), 10 per cent, for rates and taxes (240,000Z.), 5 per cent, for arrears, abatements, and other losses (120,000?.). The net value of the rent-chargo received by clerical titheowners is, therefore, 2,400,000 — 720,000?.=!, 080,000?. From this snra must be deducted 20 per cent, for the almost absolute charges which fall upon parochial incumbents. The sum which represents tho real value to the parsons of the tithes may be estimated at 1,080,000?. — 33G,000?.=1,34 1,000?. The two doubtful figures, the 5 per cent. for arrears, &c., and the 20 per cent, for clerical outgoings, are probably considerably below the mark ; and it may be doubted whether the ultimate value to incumbents of the tithe greatly exceeds a million pounds a year. In estimating the losses of landowners and tenants one standard by which the loss is measured is the selling value which their respective properties previously possessed. If the same test be applied to tithes, the loss will be far greater than the amount at which it has been calculated above. Thus the selling value of a tithe rent-charge twelve years ago was 125 per cent. If the loss of the titheowner is measured by the difference between 125 per cent, and the present par value of 90 per cent., minus 5 per cent, for arrears, &c., it represents a loss of 40 per cent. Sir James Caird estimated the agricultural loss last year as compared with ten years ago as follows : — Landlords, 30 per cent. ; tenants, 60 per cent. ; labourers, 10 per cent. The rela- tive positions of the losers will probably remain much the same in 1886-7. Upon this scale titheowners raise the average of loss in their class ; among landlords at least they are bearing an equal share of the bui'den. In comparison of their 40 per cent, loss with the 00 per cent, loss of the tenants clerical titheowners are entitled to pray in aid the heavy deduction of 20 per cent, which is made from their incomes for parochial purposes. In discussing the advantages of the I'edemption of tithes it must be remembered that the income of the incumbent is the only income which is and must be spent in and for the parish. From this point of view the testimony of M. de Lavergne as to the effect of the abolition of tithes in rural districts of France is not without its value : — " Cette suppression des dimes a eu en reallte bien moins d'importanee qu'ou le croit. La charge a ete deplacee non di'truite Le clerge y a perdu en tout une vingtaiue de millions de reveiiu ; mais croit-ou que cette somme les contribuables I'avaicnt gagnee? Je lie serais pas hien emharrassd si j'avais d designer dans noire budget actuel, non pas vingt millions, mais cent, moins utilement d4pcnses dans I'interSt des campagnes que le produit des anciennes dimes. D'un autre cote, la rente du sol s'est acirue en gen($ral du montant des dimes et les cultivateurs, pvopre- 13 ment dits, a I'exception de ceus qui etaient proprie^aires, n'ont r'cn gagne." — {Economie Rurale, &e., p. 8, ed. 4, 1874.) If the qnestion of tithes is regarded from the broadest point of view of national interests, is it absolutely certain that the nation would gain by their so-called abolition? History might ^ be searched in vain for an instance in which the plunder of f Churches put a penny into the pockets of the people. ^ I have said that the question of tithes is really one between landowners and titheowners ; and I have endeavoured to show that the arrangement into which tenants enter to pay tithes introduces an apparent element of unfairness. On the other hand, it must be remembered that the farmer has hired his farm with the full knowledge of the amount of the rent-charge, sub- ject only to the fluctuations in the septennial averages, and that for the last few years the fluctuations have been continuously downward and to his advantage. The farmer has assumed the responsibility for the tithe, against the interest of the tithe- owner, and against the policy of an Act of Parliament. So long as the arrangement was to his advantage he remained silent ; now that it has turned against him he complains, and often honestly, of the incidence of the charge. In 18G8 the tithe rent-charge was only worth 100?. 13s. ; but the actual value calculated on the price of corn for that year was 125?. Did the farmers think it necessary then to pay the difference? Will they, supposing that a war sends up prices, think it their duty, if they are now granted abatements, to pay the tithe rent- charges calculated upon the prices of corn in each single year of agricultural prosperity? The titheowner did not profit to the natural extent by the "piping times." It is hard that he should now be asked to share in the loss when he was never offered a share in the gain. Many objections arc taken to tithes. Some of them are wholly frivolous. It is difficult to suppose the statements that tithes raise rents or lower wages to be seriously entertained, j Half the land in England is tithe-fi'ee. In Northants, for | J instance, there is scarcely any tithe. Are wages higher in this j ' county or rents lower? Do farmers who rent tithe-free farms i pay more to their labourers than their neighbours who occupy land subject to tithe? Does a yeoman, farming his own laud tithe-free, give higher wages than those who pay both tithe and rent? Neither do tithes raise rents. A B rents a farm of 100 acres at 11. an acre. It makes no difference to him whether, if his land is tithe-free, he pays the whole rent to the sqnire, or, if it is subject to tithe, 18s. to the sqnire and 2s. to the parson for every acre in his holding. The farmer's position is exactly that of a London householder, who, in addition to his rent to the lessor, pays a ground-rent to the ground landlord. A house islet 14 to A B for 2501. ; it cannot make an atom of difference to him whether he pays 501. of this rent as ground-rent to the ground landlord, or pays the whole rent to the landlord, who himself satisfies the claim of the owner of the soil. Other objections possess greater weight. But the Act of 1836, by which the tithe was commuted and apportioned, has been for half a century treated as a final settlement of the question. Land has been bought and sold and tithes have changed hands upon this under- Btanding. It is perilous to tamper with the security of property. But, subject to this general caution, it may remove misconceiJ- tions if some of these objections are examined. It is said, for instance, that titheowners are better ofE under the rent-charge than they would be if they continued to take tithes in kind. Such a comparison is difiicnlt to institute ; it is, in fact, impossible, because it is inconceivable that modern notions of property could coexist with the practice of taking tithes in kind. Men often talk as if corn was the only produce which affects the question. But in all cases in which the pro- visions of the Act were not superseded by voluntary agreements the method adopted took into consideration the gross value of tithes in kind of the produce of meadow, pasture, and arable land, of the tenth pig, the tenth cock of hay, the tenth pail of milk, the tenth fleece, the tenth egg, the tenth calf, the tenth lamb, as well as the tenth sheaf of wheat, barley, or oats. The average annual value of all tithes paid in kind during a period of seven years was ascertained, and the amount, subject to certain deductions within a specified margin, was taken as the sum to be paid as a permanent composition on the lands of the parish. The sum thus ascertained and fixed was then commuted into a corn rent. The sum was divided into three equal parts, and respectively apportioned to wheat, barley, and oats at the prices per imperial bushel of 7s. Ojd. for wheat, 3s. Hid. for barley, and 2s. 9d. for oats. The quantity of corn was fixed by the purchasing power of the sum which was the ascertained annual value of the produce in kind ; the money henceforth to be paid by way of rent-charge varied with the value of the fixed quantity of wheat, barley, and oats. The result of this system is that, in order to compare the relative positions of titheowners in 1836 and in 1886, it is not sufficient to ascertain the different values of corn, but the present value of all produce in kind on which tithe was then payable must bo estimated. Farmers often claim that the corn rent was fixed at Protection, not at Free-trade, prices ; but it is obvious that at the prices of to-day the purchasing power would be increased, and the fixed quantity of corn apportioned to the land would be larger. Similarly it is complained that the tail corn is not now taken into account in estimating the septennial averages. But 15 in 1836, if tail corn had been included in the estimate, the tithe- payer -would have suffered, because the fixed quantity which the mouey would have purchased would have been increased. A more valid objection seems to be that oats and barley, from their cheaper prices and larger quantities, have exercised an undue preponderance in the calculation of the averages. While wheat fell enormously, barley and oats till recently made their old prices, and thus negatived the effect upon the averages of the fall in wheat. If railway rates and other charges for the carriage of corn swell the prices on which the averages are calculated, a case is established for a change in the method of ascertaining the amount of the tithe rent-charge. This is an innovation which the Act of 183G did not contemplate. But, subject to this possible exception, for half a century sales have been determined, contracts entered into, bargains struck, valua- tions made, on the system established by the Tithe Commuta- tion Act. Tenant farmers are not really concerned in the adjustment of the tithe rent-charge, and, as between tithe- owners and landowners, who are the only jjersons concerned, tlie landowners have enjoyed the best of the bargain. As between landowners and titheowners it must be remembered tliat since 1836 rents have nearly doubled ; before the Com- mutation Act a tenth of this increment would have gone to the titheowner. Sir James Caird clearly shows how the Act has operated to the detriment of titheowners. The effect of the Act was to pi'event the clergy progressing in material resources in proportion to the advance of land improvement. Whether or not this was the intention of the Legislature, the result cannot be considered unfair since titheowners do not in any way conti'ibute to agricultural progress. Since 1836 — • " The land rental of England has risen 50 per cent., and all that portion of the inci'ease which previous to 183G would have gone to the Church has gone to the landowners. ... A tenth of that would not, however, by any means adequately represent the loss to the Church and the gain to the landowners ; for the tithe in kind was the tenth of the gross produce which was equal to much more than a tenth of the rent of arable land. In 1836 the money value of tlie tithe, as compared with the land rental, was as 4 millions to 33. In 1876 the tithe was still 4 millions, but the land rental had risen to 50. If the old principle of participation had continued, the annual income of the Church would have been 2 millions greater than it is."— (The Landed Interest, p. 133, Fourth Edition, 1880.) In another respect Sir James Caird shows that landlords have prolited at the expense of the Church. Near large towns land has increased in value 100 per cent. : — " It was never contemplated," writes Sir James, " that the land- owners should thus obtain the whole growing value of the laud without leaving any part of it for the support of religion " (p. 135). The alliance of landowners with tenants in the anti-tithe IG a