can obtain by cultivating a patch of his own at the margin; and it is pleasanter, besides, to be in the centre of society than on the outskirts of it. The new-comer will himself propose the arrangement; and Adam may retire as an idle landlord with a perpetual pension of £500 rent. The excess of fertility in Adam's land is thenceforth recognized as rent, and paid, as it is to-day, regularly by a worker to a drone."
Mr. Shaw proceeds to a further development as inhabitants pour into the country until the outermost belt of free land is reached, upon which the yield to a man's year's labour is only £100. "Clearly now the rent of Adam's primeval patch has risen to £900, since that is the excess of its produce over what is by this time all that is to be had rent-free. But Adam has yielded up his land for £500 a year to a tenant. It is this tenant accordingly who now lets Adam's patch for £900 a year to the new-comer, who, of course, loses nothing by the bargain, since it leaves him the £100 a year with which he must be content, anyhow. Accordingly he labours on Adam's land; raises £1,000 a year from it; keeps £100 and pays £900 to Adam's tenant, who pays £500 to Adam, keeping £400 for himself, and thus also becoming an idle gentleman, though with a
