the relief of the destitute, upon the monstrous principle that the poor creatures were to be fully worked, and in requital were to be only half-fed; we deem to be a doctrine of devils, instead of the natural justice which should influence a conscientious communitynot to speak of the infinitely higher motives which derive their source from pure Christianity. Never was there a more fatal failure than the mal-administration of the noble fund intended for the relief and welfare of the afflicted Highland population. We cannot be mistaken in our views. Without having any personal interests to subserve, or any prejudices to bias or mislead us, we inquired closely and impartially into the Relief Board's proceedings throughout the Highlands and Islands, and the result is a clear conviction that the public confidence has been shamefully abused; that the poor have been cheated, degraded, and demoralised; and that funds intended for the indigent have been largely squandered upon a needless staff of pampered officials. How extensively Highland proprietors shared in the spoil will never be acurately apprehended, until the board shall think proper to publish their accounts; an event which will in all likelihood take date with the Greek kalends.

PART VI.

ARTICLES RELATIVE TO LANDLORD AND TENANT, PROTECTION AND FREE TRADE.

THE LAWS AFFECTING AGRICULTURE.

This is the title given to one of the most sensible pamphlets we have read for many a day; and the writer is Mr F. Calvert, Q.C., who shapes his views in a short letter to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Sir Charles Wood. There is nothing of striking speculation or ambitious effort in the plain pages of Mr Calvert; and, therefore, we are eager to bestow a measure of notice upon him, which we should think ourselves bound conscientiously to withhold from the clap trap schemers of these days of deception. The simple and intelligibly expressed object of Mr Calvert is to demonstrate that no relief can be reached to the cultivators of the

soil where the proprietors of land have only a life-interest in their possessions. He shews that, of all improvements bearing upon agriculture, drainage is likely to prove the most profitable; and, yet, from this mode of amelioration, a landowner, who is only tenant for life, was practically barred by the restricted character of his rights over the soil. But, in the machinery of the Drainage Act, 9th and 10th Vict., c. 101, this difficulty is removed by the supply of capital borrowed from the government, upon a certain security of land for a term of twenty-two years. Thus, for one purpose of agricultural improvement, the tenant for life is furnished with an interest independent of the contingency of his own life; and his tenure becomes equally advantageous with that of a tenant in fee. Now, Mr Calvert suggests that this relaxation of the system of settlement ought to be applied more extensively; and that the security upon land ought to be available for money borrowed from private individuals, as well as for money borrowed from the government.

The next suggestion offered by Mr Calvert is one to which we attach much importance, for it formed the basis of our original representations to the Earl of Clarendon, which undoubtedly harbingered the Irish Encumbered Estates' Act. Mr Calvert proposes that tenants for life be empowered, under proper safeguards, to sell so much of the settled estates as will be sufficient for the discharge of incumbrances fixed upon them by the settlement, or under powers contained in it. The expression "with proper safeguards," is explained by referring to the present practice of the Court of Chancery, which gives a right to a party entitled under a will to a charge upon land, to file a bill, for the purpose of having so much of the estate sold as will produce a sum sufficient for the satisfaction of the charge. All incumbrancers are made parties to the suit, so that every interest may be protected; and upon the confirmation of a Master's Report, a decree is made for sale. Availing himself of this analogy, Mr Calvert contends that the principle might be turned to account by sanctioning the sale of a selected portion of an estate held by a life tenant, with such conditions imposed as should ensure regard being had to the benefit of the inheritance. Mr Calvert sketches with great truth and much lucidness, the misery, abjectness, and uselessness of a life tenant who is borne down with the burdens of an encumbered estate. He is an ostensible landowner; but he has only the sorrowful shadow

of a sway over property, while the real dominators, in a possessory sense, are mortgagees and creditors. He cannot infuse any profitable element into his nominal management of an estate which yields an intolerable amount of income to strangers. With deficient means, he has to support a false position by expensive expedients, which involve him in deeper difficulties. He is expected to uphold a family repute for hospitality, and to exercise those acts of liberality and kindness which constitute the charm of neighbourhood, as well as the charities of social existence. Pride forbids him either to avow his embarrassments, or to retrench his expenditure; and yet his ignoble secrets ooze out in spite of all subterfuges; and the very persons who partake of his good cheer covertly censure his imprudent lavishness. We draw this picture from what we have painfully remarked in England; but is it not equally true with respect to the Highlands of Scotland? Are there not many, very many, proprietors, men of intelligence and integrity, capable of conferring benefits on the social system which surrounds them, but irreversibly hampered by inherited embarrassments, which no existing law can possibly extricate them from? Their domains are wide, but their dominion is a nullity; They resemble the last of the Moguls, blind Schah Allum, whose power had passed away, but who groped daily to his hall of audience, and dangled a disregarded sceptre from a despised throne ! We are not prone to pry into distresses which evade the public eye; but we can hardly imagine a case of sorer humiliation than that of a descendant of a long line of Highland chiefs, living in felt insolvency and pining powerlessness, in the home of his ancestors; disabled from discharging just debts, and yet beholding incumbrancers deriving ample revenues from his desolated possessions! But if, by carrying out the principle which in former days authorised the sale of bankrupt estates (every vestige of the law of entail being erased from the statute-book) proprietors were empowered to relieve themselves from the overwhelming weight of settlements, and to dispose of such a portion of landed property as would clear off bondaging incumbrances, what light, and joy, and prosperity would spring up in many a Scottish region, now marked with the line of confusion, and the stones of emptiness! It, however, must be admitted that to part with any portion of lands which have immemorially belonged to a lofty line, is a severance which would inflict a bitter pang upon many an aristocratic

mourner; but to this we would reply, surely a moderate independence is preferable to splendid slavery! Is not substantial ownership better than nominal sovereignty? Thus far regarding the proprietor; but we must enlarge our apprehensions, and take a proper view of the state of dependants under an improved condition of things. Tenants on the sold portion of an estate would of course follow its fortunes during their term of occupancy; but we are sure their lot would not be deteriorated; and as for the tenants who remained, they would not fail of deriving benefit from the enfranchisement of the landlord. Liberal concessions would be in the power of the freed proprietor, who, in tasting the sweets of liberty, would feel desirous of imparting advantages. It is absolute ignorance, mingled with folly, to expect that improvements of a permanent cast can ever take place on encumbered estates; for embarrassed landlords are almost certain to have a following of thriftless tenants. This is well and pointedly put by Mr Cal

vert.

"It has evidently been intended in all recent legislation affecting agriculture, that the application of science, capital, enterprize, and activity, shall bring all the inherent powers of the soil into action, and extract from it the largest amount of produce. But while a considerable portion of our landowners, crippled by the present restrictions of a tenancy for life, are checked in their attempts at improvement by a want of power to raise capital, our cultivation must remain in an extremely defective state. The evil consequences will continue to be felt by all classes; by the landlord in the amount of his rent; by the tenant in the amount of his profits; and by the labourers in the precarious supply of employment, and in the very low scale of wages. Were our law altered in the particulars which I have mentioned, I should venture to hope that a great amelioration would take place in the condition and prospects of all these classes. The tenant for life would be enabled to make himself the exclusive beneficial owner of all the property retained in his possession, to raise for himself funds for permanent improvements, or else to grant a term to improving tenants; and improvements in cultivation would produce an increase, not only immediate, but also permanent, in the demand for agricultural labourers."

Such is the synopsis of Mr Calvert's sound suggestions, and we venture to predict, that at no distant day the Legislature will be

employed in giving effect to the leading propositions which he argues with such unostentatious ability. The policy which professes to give freedom to trade, cannot stop short in its course; it must liberate land. Nor must it be forgotten, that although much of the mischievous restrictions which lie as an incubus upon land may be traced to the improvidence of successive proprietors, yet the subtle shackles forged by lawyers must not be omitted in an inventory of wrongs. It is plain to all men of sober judgment, that the mere re-letting of land can yield no real relief to a deeply embarrassed proprietor. We have taken the trouble to count the number of farms in Skye and North Uist, belonging to Lord Macdonald, and which his Lordship's Commissioner advertises to let; and these farm, or parts of farms, amount to 75! Infinite oppression will attend every fresh arrangement; but does any one believe that Lord Macdonald will reap a particle of benefit from the changes now notified? And look at the public considerations which are mixed up with a proprietor's helplessness and insolvency. Behold, too, poor Macleod of Macleod's large territories ruinously ruled by some man of law, who holds a divan at Dunvegan Castle, while the exiled owner broods over the sorrows of sequestration in a Bayswater cottage! We pity Lord Macdonald; we deplore the fall of Macleod; and we shall perhaps ere long be called on to compassionate other aristocratic captives and for the sake of society, which is endangered by their false position, we heartily invoke the aid of the Legislature to sanction the sale of their landed property, or such portion of it as may suffice to clear off their embarrassments. No tyranny under the sun is so terrible as that which is inflicted by the grinding of creditors who have a lien upon land, without taking any interest in its improvement. We will undertake to shew, in a future article, that a simpler measure than the Irish Encumbered Estates' Act would prove a blessing to the Highlands of Scotland; and that a new era of prosperity would take its date from the abolition of every legal restraint which keeps unfruitful landed property in feeble and fettered hands.

THE PROTECTIONISTS.

It is sometimes amusing, and sometimes a matter of melancholy, to note the convulsive efforts made by blind and misguided men