PROGRESS OF SMALL HOLDINGS IN ENGLAND.

Manawatu Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 7998, 21 June 1904, Page 2

PROGRESS OF SMALL HOLDINGS IN ENGLAND.

A correspondent of the Westminster Gazette describes a journey to Holmwood station, beyond Letherhead, on the Dorking line, to visit the land selected by the Small Holdings . Association at Newdigate, in Surrey. A trap. had been sent to the station by the managing director, Professor Long, well known as an authority on agricultural qnestions, as it is a drive of some four miles through winding lanes in country pretty at any time, but charming in the first days of spring, to the oldfashioned manor house where he and the secretary (his son) reside. A most interesting afternoon may be spent tramping over the fields from holding to holding, inspecting the nine cottages, some actually inhabited, others being built or just finished, and noting the progress made. One four-roomed cottage has just been built for a retired London dressmaker, who intends to turn her needle into a spade and live an outdoor life in future. She is not the only small holder of her sex, for Professor Long's daughter has, since July, cultivated her own allotment, doing everything except that she does not actually plough it. A field of some 13 or 14 acres, most of which was neatly laid out in rows of rhubarb, currant, and gooseberry bushes, and young fruit trees, testified to her hard work. She keeps poultry, too, and takes it to market herself, and what with chickens and cultivating she is out and about from seven in the morning till seven and eight at night. Of course she has had practical training in agriculture; but when one noticed her bronzed cheeks and evident health, and remembered the many pale amemic faces one sees in London, one could but wish that more girls would have the patience and could find the capital to persist in the necessary course of training that would qualify them to succeed in an outdoor life. Professor Long's son, the secretary, said that the demand for the holdings had been astonishing. Out of fortyfive, all but nine are now taken up. It is not, however, always easy to suit the requirements of intending holders, in spite of the fact that the land varies a good deal in character in different parts. For one man's needs it. would be too light; for those of another too heavy. The land is generally fairly high, and from some of tho knolls are views of Box Hill, of Meredithian fame. It was easy to understand the novelist's choice of locality. The holdings vary from three to twentyfive acres in extent, and the land is valued at from £20 to £30 an acre. A holder's house may be either erected by himself, or arrangements may be made with the association to build him one varying in size according to whether he has a family or not. They are charming : littlo houses, some of those just erected, with sunny aspects and beautiful views from every window. Some have already quite a home-like air, with their little gardens gay with clumps of the " prfforoses which abound in every copse and under every hedgerow on the estate.