A Dictionary, Geographical, Statistical, and Historical, of the Various Countries, Places, and Principal Natural Objects in the World

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General Books, 2013 - 50 pages
This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1852 edition. Excerpt: ... cultivated, or available for cultivation. But from private and general information. I am inclined to calculate that considerably less than half the superficial contents of j continental G reece and the Morea is susceptible of cultivation, and that not one-sixth of this in Koumelia, and les than a fourth in the Morea, are now brought into cultivation; the preference being given to such as are susceptible of irrigation from the proximity of springs or streams. Notwithstanding the continual plunder and illegal appropriation of the national lands, at least two-thirds of the cultivated, and four-fifths of the uncultivated, soil belong to the state. The dational lands were, previously to the revolution, the property of the Turkish inhabitants, to whom the government has succeeded; and though, as now stated, large portions of them have been embezzled in the interim, they still stand toward private property in the proportion 1 bave mentioned. The rent levied on the national land is nominally 10 to 15 per cent, of the gross produce, but by the connivance and venality of public functionaries this rent is no doubt reduced in many instances to an almost nominal amount--a circumstance tending tti deprive private landowners of remunerating rents, unless they themselves are the Immediate cultivators of their property, or that from position, or some other adventitious circumstance, it forms an exception to the surrounding lands. Money rent, with some trifling exceptions is unknown in Greece, the system acted on tteing that worst oi all systems, the Metayer, the landlord receiving as rent a certain proportion--usually a third--of the net produce, or for good lands one-half. The landowner has frequently to furnish, besides the land, the seed, and...

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