OCR Text |
Show BREAKING UP ESTATES. Ono of the purposes embraced in Chancellor LloydJGoorgo's tax budget which mado such a sensation in Great Britain four years ago, was openly and avowedly to break up large landed estates es-tates in England. Tho owners of those estates fought tho bill desperately, because be-cause they know that they would cither have to pay taxes beyond all measuro greater than heretofore, or else sell their largo ancestral acres. It appears, however, that tho landed gentry of England Eng-land havo made a tremendous effort to hold on to their cstatos; but now the bill has begun to work its ultimate ends. It was all well onough for the nobility to hold theso great estates as long as they could either oscapo taxation upon them or pay at a rate far below tho taxation upon other lands in their vicinity, vicin-ity, or ns long as thoy could get ten ants to pay thoir taxes for them. But in largo dogrco theso estates wero not tonautod, and wero held as gamo preserves pre-serves and as show places, This tho peers can no longer afford to do under tho Lloyd-Goorgo budget. Accordingly, man3r of theso surplus lnuds aro now being be-ing offered for sale. A few offers wero made of portions of theso estates whilo tho bill was ponding, but it was supposed that these offers wero mado for political effect or in a spiteful effort to discredit tho Ministry. Moro receutl, however, actual sales havo proceeded, and tho amount of land sold has "been heavy out of all comparison compar-ison with previous yoars. In tho third week of Soptomber, tho Duko of Grafton Graf-ton and the Duko of Newcastle parted with large fractions of thoir holdings, and a considerable portion of tho vast acreage held by the Duko of Portland is actually on tho market for salo. Lord Shrowsburj' has sold 3000 acres in Cho-shiro Cho-shiro and Lord Islington has sold 4000 acres in Wilkeshirc. Those noblomcn say that thoy cannot afford to kcop their large estates under tho Lloyd-George Lloyd-George taxation. It was supposed that the tenantry would buy up tho land which tho noblemen noble-men wero thus forced to soil, but this has not generally been tho case. Spoo-ulators Spoo-ulators tako the land, and nro holding it for largo advances and selling it on such advances in small lots to tho actual ac-tual farmers. A few of the peors, however, how-ever, have themselves divided thoir surplus sur-plus acres and aro selling them direct to thoir tenants. There is no question but that these sales will bring a very great change in England. The change will, undoubtedly undoubt-edly bo beneficial in increasing the productiveness pro-ductiveness of the farming areas of that country, but it will destroy the pictur-osqueness pictur-osqueness of the historic places, and will limit the large estates which have hore-toforo hore-toforo been so imposing and so attractive attract-ive to tourists and artists; but in tho long run the people will be bonefitod, and it is bettor to benofit the peoplo, to enlarge en-large the means of food production, than to preserve historic, picturesque, or artistic boautj England will be forced moro and moro by this measure upon the basis of utility, and the glorious glor-ious traditions of tho noblo houses will be corresponding dimmed. |