Clover, first crop, one and a half ton, at 60s., Clover, second crop, one ton, at 40s., Wheat, 32 bushels, at 7s., Wheat straw, one and a half ton, at 36s., 4 10 0 200 11 4 0 2 14 0 The tithe is shown to be 11s. per acre, and is found by dividing by ten, the average value of the produce, not including the hay and turnip crops. If the land be tithefree, the charge would of course be added to the rent. Thus it appears that when the price of wheat averages about 7s. per bushel, and when other profits and expenses are in proportion, the rent of good turnip land, such as is coloured pink in the plan of a farm annexed, may be stated at 17. 17s. per acre. If the price of wheat averaged 6s. per bushel, the rent would be reduced as six to seven, or by one seventh. The current price of grain is the general standard used in computing the profits arising from land; and wheat being a staple article of produce in most districts, a scale may be formed by which the rent of land, after being once fixed by a certain price of grain, may be raised or lowered, according to the current price of wheat, or any other article or ar ticles that may constitute the chief items of produce, and which enter most largely into the computations of the farmer in looking for rent and profits. This may be done by having each field valued according to its relative worth; the whole is then added together, and an average taken of the whole farm, from which a table may be formed in the following manner:— And so on, increasing or diminishing 5s. an acre for every variation of 1s. in the price of a bushel of wheat, providing a corresponding alteration takes place in the price of labour and of other articles. This very seldom happens; for the cost of labour and of tradesmen's work is much more stable than the prices of farm produce, and cannot possibly rise and fall monthly and It will be perceived that this weekly. scale applies to land of very good quality; on soils not producing above twenty bushels of wheat per acre 2s. 6d., or at the utmost 3s. per acre, will be a sufficient alteration in the rent for every 1s. of variation in the price of a bushel of wheat. Such scales may be constructed to suit almost any locality; cheese and wool may form the averages in some places, and oats and the yearly cast of stock in others. A scale on the following principle was long used, and I believe is yet followed, on an extensive clay land estate in one of the northern counties. The full rent was charged when wheat reached 12s. 6d. per bushel, and the fluctuations in the rent decreased by the averages of the market town taken every three months. It gave the farmers much satisfaction, and seemed to answer a good purpose. The circumstances that gave occasion for the use of this scale have now passed away, prices of grain are more steady, and most farms have been relet on a surer foundation; but in many places grain rents yet prevail, convertible by the average price, and have a maximum price fixed beyond which the rent shall not rise, and a minimum below which it shall not fall, in order to guard |