sonal bondage of the villeins ceased to exist among us. The last claim of villeinage recorded in our courts was in the fifteenth of James I. 1618. Rare instances, perhaps, existed some time after this. In the mean time the stipulated services silently and imperceptibly ceased to be exacted, or were commuted for annual money-payments. Similar changes are now taking place throughout Germany. They are perfected nowhere, and in some large districts exhibit themselves in very backward stages.

The disadvantages of a system of serfship or villeinage are obvious, and are attested by the low state of civilization, the poverty, and imperfect cultivation of the countries in which it prevails. The labour compulsorily exacted from tenants on the grounds or on behoof of their landlords, is sure to be performed in a very slovenly manner. Men do not exert themselves with spirit or effect unless they are working on their own account, and are allowed themselves to reap all the advantages of their superior industry. It has been proved that one Middlesex mower will cut as much grass in a day as three Russian serfs.

And

the necessary absence under such a system of all improved implements or processes of husbandry, augments the comparative inefficiency of serflabour. Indolence and carelessness are the habitual characteristics of a peasantry in this condition; their want of skill, means, and energy, must have a disastrous influence on the annual produce of the land and labour of their territory, and tend to keep the country they inhabit in a state of poverty and political feebleness, from which it will

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be impossible for it to emerge while so deleterious a system is suffered to prevail. These disadvantages are, in fact, very generally recognized by all the enlightened classes in serf countries, and have given rise to the numerous attempts now going on to substitute payments of produce, or money, in lieu of labour, as the rent of land, that is, the conditions upon which the owner allows the cultivator to occupy. The great end in view is, of course, to encourage the industry of the cultivator by placing him in a position to improve his own circumstances, as well as those of his landlord, by increased skill and exertion. For the details of these efforts, and their varied success, we must refer to the valuable work of Mr. Jones.*

The system of serf-cultivation, though formerly common through a very large extent of Europe, was not universally practised. In some countries a different plan has been acted on from a very early period by the landowners, who have accepted from the cultivators of their estates a share of the produce as rent. The existence of such a state of things indicates a more advanced condition of society than that which accompanies the serf system. The serf, in fact, is a mere slave, compelled to till his master's land, and cheaply maintained by the permission to cultivate for himself a patch of soil, barely enough to provide himself with subsistence. The métayer on the contrary is, in all respects, a voluntary tenant, who enters into a sort of joint-stock partnership with his landlord; the latter finding the land, and the seed,

*Jones on Rent. 1831.

tools, and stock, necessary for its cultivation; the former the equally necessary labour. The produce is divided between them, generally in equal shares, from which division the name (métayer, medietarius) is derived. This form of holding is to be traced very clearly to Greece, whence it was introduced among the Romans, and has perpetuated itself, in some degree, in most of the countries which were formerly provinces of that empire; though partly superseded by that of serfship and villeinage, which, as we have seen, grew up under the feudal system. In Italy, Savoy, France, and Spain, métayer tenancy is common, and has a very decided influence on the methods of cultivation, and all those important relations between the different orders of society which originate in the appropriation of the soil and the distribution of its produce. In France, before the revolution, foursevenths of the whole surface was occupied en métairie. Even now, in spite of the multiplication of small proprietors consequent on the revolution, this class of tenants are supposed to cultivate onehalf of France, and the greater part of Italy and Spain.

Though the métayer has many apparent advantages over the serf, in his personal freedom, and the power he enjoys of cultivating his farm as he pleases, freed from the tyranny and irksome superintendence of the proprietor, yet he is found, in practice, to be very little, if at all, more advantageously situated. It would seem, at first sight, that the reward of his toil, consisting in a definite share of the produce, would increase with his industry and skill, and therefore stimulate him to

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exertion. But the shortsighted covetousness of the proprietors has almost everywhere prevented this, by inducing them, when they could not by agreement directly increase their share, to do so indirectly, by throwing the government taxes on the tenant, and claiming for themselves an exemption from all imposts. By this and other similar contrivances, the share of the métayer has been generally so reduced as to leave him but a bare subsistence, and no hope of bettering his condition by any exertion of industry. The métayers of France are described by Turgot before the revolution, and by other writers of the present day, as existing in the depth of misery, always in arrear to their landlord, and consequently entirely at his mercy, from their utter inability even to live upon their half of the produce of their farms. This misery of course reacts injuriously upon their landlords' interests, by giving a careless, slovenly character to their mode of cultivation, and putting anything like energy or a spirit of improvement out of the question.

Again, the divided interest which exists in the produce is a bar to improvement. The tenant is unwilling to listen to the suggestions of his landlord; the landlord to intrust additional means to an ignorant, prejudiced, and careless tenant. When stock is to be advanced by one person and used by another, some waste and neglect in the receiving party, great jealousy and reluctance in the contributing party, naturally ensue. the implements and stock placed at the disposal of -the métayers are, in general, very scanty, and of an indifferent quality; and their land on the whole is

Hence

very imperfectly cultivated. These disadvantages must continue severely to affect the condition of countries in which this imperfect system of landoccupation prevails. Their agriculture must be exceedingly unproductive, as compared with the capacity of the soil and the amount of labour existing upon it; and since the produce of land forms, as we have seen, the substratum of all other wealth, the production of the aggregate stock of the means of enjoyment must be proportionately slow, languid, and contracted.

Such, with very trifling variations, are the imperfect systems on which land is occupied for the purpose of cultivation throughout the entire continent of Asia, and nearly the whole of Europe. In Great Britain, Holland, and the Netherlands, a different mode has been adopted, to which in a great measure is to be ascribed the extraordinary comparative progress which agriculture has made in this corner of Europe.

At a very early period, as has been already mentioned, the stipulated services of the villeins or manorial tenants in England began to be commuted for annual payments in money. About the

same time it became not uncommon for the lord to lease out for the duration of certain lives, or for a term of years, portions of the manorial waste, upon payment of a money fine, to such persons as were desirous and able to reduce it to tillage. As these leases expired, the lands, whose value had increased through the cultivation bestowed on them, were relet for an augmented fine,