The Express.
London, England, 1851-03-05 00:00:00

ESTATES OF ENGLAND.

Wreathe Deily New.)
WELBECK AND CLUMBER (CoNTINuED).

WITH A. GLANCE AT HADDON.
In my last communication it was said that a cir-
cuit, starting from Blythe, on the Yorkshire border
of Nottinghamshire, would he taken through the
latter county into iterhyshire over a tract trodden
by Arthur Young eighty years ago, to compare his
record of rents, rates, and prices with those of 1851.
I find, however, that the comparison made around
Blythe in my lust would apply elsewhere. The only
correction should be in the weight of the fleece of
wool: it has been sold at is. 6d. per fleece, as I
stated, but that is above the average. Arthur
Young found the average price of wool in the dis-
trict over a series of years to have been 31,d. per lb.
Over a like series of years ending isao the average
price has been la. per lb. ; and, though the wool
picked from a three and called " prime" is said to
have deteriorated in the last fin years, the fleece has
1 increased inweight at least 1 lib.; so that ill had said
Bs. 6d. instead of is. 6d. the farmers concerned in my
report would have been satisfied; as it was, they
have complained that I gave them too much wool.
The fact remains, however, that poor ratisi are lower
than eighty years ago ; that county rates would be
lower, too, it the single item of prosecution and keep
of poachers in prison were deducted. Rant is three
times the amount of what it was in 1770 ; necessaries
and luxuries for rent-owners not dearer; some of
them, as silks, fine cloths, carriages, and furniture,
are cheaper. Amusements are more expensive ;
e keeping was then exceptional, now it is a rule
of which presently); the cost of a duke's journey
Calli
rom hence to London was an untold sum in the
days of the coach-and-six with outriders, the cost
now, with rent trebled, is like that of the Sheffield
cutler, for which see Bradshaw. Workmen's wages,
it is true, are nearly (in West Yorkshire, Derby, and
Nottinghamshire tufty) doubled, while bread at
present is at the same price; but this is so recent a
circumstance as to be exceptional to the improved
condition of the landlords. Their's is of fifty years'
standing at least. Why then are they distressed ?
It must he through family or creditor encumbrances
on their estates, or through enjoying sport and plea-
sure upon a scale which is always on the verge of
income, to abridge which is "distress," entitling
them to the commiseration of the Queen's speech.
As to the tenant farmers they are really distressed.
They provide the capital to cultivate the land, meet
all the risks of seasons, markets, and legislation ;
pay local and national taxes; pay rent for leave to
run those risks; provide the landlord, his family, and
friends with sport ; feed and preserve the game,
prosecute the poachers, keep them in prison upon
county rates, and their wives and children in the
workhouse on poor rates. They submit to conditions
of bondage not to " lop, top, or grub" up this
nuisance to agriculture, or remove or disturb, or
allow others to disturb, that ; not to plough, sow,
mow, or sell their produce otherwise than per-
mitted and directed by the landlord and lawyer;
and to " row in the same boat," or " sink

or swim " with the landlord ; while, throughout
their season of transition, fear, and peril—{of five
years' duration, the Marquis of Granby said in the
late debate]--not one abatement of burden or privi-
ledge has been made by the landlords, other than in
some instances a deducted per cottage of rent for the
time being, on condition of prompt payment of the
remainder. "Every one is against the farmer," said
Mr. E—, in Worksop market, speaking to me for
himself and others standing around, " landlord,
labourer, mod free trailer. 'f he free trader calls UN
clodhoppers, to begin with, clodhcads, and what
not; we could live over insolence, but have worse to
contend against. What are we to do with the la-
bourer? Ile has tasted the cheap loaf, and won't
give it up. we can't offer him less wages, for o@' Ile
goes to Sheffield or Manchester; there he feeds on
foreign corn. If we would sell him potatoes or roots
of any kind when he is in Sheffield or Manchester,
to eat with his meat, we must not. And that brings
me to the landlord—what are we to do with hint ?

Ile has high rents and high privileges • the law
secures hint on every side. If we would borrow
money, or seek credit, nobody will give it us, because
the landlord, who risks nothing, sweeps all off in
preference to every other creditor. We must be the
scapegoat, the butt of everybody ; clodheads, Cobden
calls us, d— him! Then they tell us about taking
off taxi.u; but what good would the absence of the
malt tax be to we? If a farmer of 300 acres uses

10/. worth of beer or malt in the year, it is as much
as he does. We are ail barley growers hem ; the
barley is malted in 'Worksop, Retford, Newark, and
hereabout ; but who drinks the ale ? Who but the
frectraders in Sheffield and Manchester, Derby, Not-
tingham, Leeds, and all about those towns? The
taking off the malt tax would only make ale
cheaper for they ; not a sixpence better would it be
to we. If all taxes were taken off, and put on pro-
perty and profits, as some talk ,f, some good might ,
full to us, who make no profit; so, too, if we might
farm in our own way, without restrictions;
so, too, if we had no game to keep, ,
and no poachers to pay rates for ; but all would be
nothing without pmtection, and protection we must
have, or there will be such things done as have not
been seen in England for these two hundred years."
A person listening said it would cost all the coro-
nets in 1e the dukery ;" and another, all the coronets
in the country, to re-enact the corn laws. To which
it was rejoined by several farmers, " What have the
coronets to do with it ? they do not find money and
stock to cultivate the farms; they will get rent so
long as a sixpence remains. See if they find us going
in the same boat with them as once we did." (Cries
of " Look at next elections.") The elections gene-
rally were here alluded to ; but that pending in
South Nottinghamshire between Lord Newark, can-
didate of the landlords, son of Earl Manners, and
Mr. Barrow, the candidate of the tenant farmers,
was specially alluded to, as a proof that
the farmers were no longer in the " same
boat " with the landlords ; that they would not
longer trust that privileged class which enforced all
its pmileges and exclusive rights, urged its exac-
tions, giving the farmers sympathy in words, but in
words only. And now I come to that matter which
at beginning, I intended to be more particularly the
subject of this letter—the game-tax upon the farmers,
and the "peculiar burdens on land," spoken of in the
late debate.
It was given in evidence, by Captain Williams, the
inspector of prisons, to the game-law committee of
the Commons, in 1846, that of all England the
counties of Nottingham, Derby, Suffolk, Norfolk,
Rutland, Cambridge, and Huntingdon, stand highest
in prison statistics for the supply of poachers to fill
the prisons, Nottingham and Derby, of which I
now particularly wrote, being foremost in that desti-
nation. It is difficult to say who are the most dis-
tinguished game preservers; but the Duke of Rut-
land's family. are not the least so; their property
is extensive in the counties named; their sport-
ing amusements expensive, and their position as
complainers of distress, prominent. The Marquis
of Granbv, heir to the dukedom, member for Stam-
ford (the Marquis of Exeter's borough), spoke in the
debate on Mr. Disraeli's motion for a re' ision of
taxation for relief of the farmers. From tables of
figures which were given to the committee of parlia-
ment by official valuers—l quote here from the pub-
lished evidence—it will be seen that the Rutland
family. impose a burden on their agriculture far
exceeding that local taxation which the marquis
pleads before parliament and the nation to have re-
moved or reduced for their relief. It exceeds the
local taxation, even where compensation is given ;
but in those counties compensation is not the rule,
except on the Duke of Rutland's estate at Haddon
Hall.
Mr. William Gauntlet', a land surveyor and
farmer in Derbyshire, had valued the damage done
by game on the Haddon estate for thirteen years
with another valuer ; he for the tenants and the
other valuer, Mr. Harrison, for the duke. Mr.
Gauntley said:
"The district to which I refer contains 3,773 acres
of arable, meadow, and pasture land, the property of
the Duke of Rutland. The land is let to tenants in
quantities varying, from two acres to two hundred
and fifty or three hundred acres, and is situate in
several townships, one adjoining to another; the
names of which townships are Haddon, Hastle,
Alpert, Great Rowsley, Little Itowsley, Stanton,
Birchover, Bakewell, and Over lladdon, varying. in
value from 75. to 435. per acre, and averaging 28s.
per acre. It has been the practice for many years
(by direction of the landlord), to send valuers over
such of the lands as were growing corn, to make a
valuation of the damage done by game to the corn