terminable at the end of forty-nine years--the Government supplying
him with the entire purchase-money, to be repaid during those
forty-nine years at 4 per cent. This annual payment of £4 for every
£100 borrowed covers both principal and interest. Thus, if a tenant,
already paying a statutory rent of £50, agrees to buy from his
landlord at twenty years' purchase (or £1,000) the Government will
lend him the money, his rent will at once cease, and he will not pay
£50, but £40, yearly for forty-nine years, and then become the owner
of his holding, free of rent. It is hardly necessary to point out
that, as these forty-nine years of payment roll by, the interest of
the tenant in his holding increases rapidly in value. (Land Purchase
Act, 1885, secs. 2, 3, and 4.)

Under the Land Act of 1887, the tenants received the following still
greater and always one-sided privileges, (i) By this Act leases are
allowed to be broken by the tenant, but not by the landlord. All
leaseholders whose leases would expire within ninety-nine years after
the passing of the Act have the option of going into court and getting
their contracts broken and a judicial rent fixed. No equivalent power
is given to the landlords. (Land Act of 1887, secs, 1 and 2.) (2) The
Act varies rent already judicially fixed for fifteen years by the
Land Courts in the years 1881, 1882, 1883, 1884, and 1885. (Sec. 29.)
(3) It stays evictions, and allows rent to be paid by instalments. In
the case of tenants whose valuation does not exceed £50, the court
before which proceedings are being taken for the recovery of _any_
debt due by the tenant is empowered to stay his eviction, and may give
him liberty to pay his creditors by instalments, and can extend the
time for such payment as it thinks proper. (Land Act of 1887, sec.
30.)