MR GLADSTONE ON FARMING.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 1835, 9 January 1880, Page 3

MR GLADSTONE ON FARMING.

The following letter has been received by Mr Joseph Arch in reply to a communication sent by him to the Eight Hon. W. B. Gladstone, M.P., on the small farm system, in which Mr Arch is a strong believer: —“ Hawarden, November 13th. Dear Sir, —In replying to your letter 1 must disclaim all pretension to authority on matters of agricultural practice and arrangement. Under this reservation I am one of those who like to see, what I am glad to say we have here, a great variety in the size of holdings, and especially a liberal proportion of small or moderate holdings. I must not claim any merit in professing this opinion, for in this neighbourhood large farms, unless when in the hands of first-rate tenants, give us most trouble. But quite apart from this, I have always regretted the tendency, in some cases almost a mania, for absorbing small holdings by consolidation. During the present period ot pressure I fiud in the reports from a variety of quarters that the difficulty is felt most with the large farms ; and I trust the distress may produce, among other good fruits, a return to a better balanced judgment about the size of farms, and may check all measures to a contrary effect. I hope it will also tend to strengthen the current of feeling favourable to such legislation as shall set the land free from present restraints. Nor can I abandon the hope of an era when we shall see a great extension of fruit, vegetable, and even flower culture as part of our agricultural system, with an increased demand for rural labour.—l am, dear sir, your faithful servant, W. E, Gladstone.”