It is not very likely that the Government, with a
County Organisation Bill on its hands, which, if a good Bill, must half madden the House of Lords, intends this Session to take up the subject of the Land Laws. But a good many well-informed persons seem inclined to think it will. Mr. Massey at Tiver- ton makes opposition to those laws and to the income-tax his principal "points." Mr. Cowper seems willing to accept a stiff tenant-right Bill ; Sir J. Pakington keeps on speaking on the same side ; Mr. Somerset thauniont at Wakefield hints that re- form in tenure is the next Liberal task ; Mr. H. Cowper, who avows that he is almost as much a Tory as a Liberal, declares that he is willing to go as far as Mr. Read, of Norfolk, and not only give, as we understand him, compensation for visible improve- ments, but for improvement in value caused by good cultivation, —a concession so great that we suspect an over-condensed report. As we have said, we do not expect a Bill ; but if the subject is touched at all, we do hope Parliament will make land as [saleable as Consols before it enters upon that endless question of tenant- right. The emancipation of the soil would enrich the proprietors to a degree that would simplify the whole subject of tenant-right. The price of land when an acre can be sold for a shilling and in five minutes would be fifty years' purchase, not thirty-five.
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