to the manifest advantage of the neighborhood, as well
as to the interest of the parties directly concerned. Finally, in
1893, by the Commons Law Amendment Act, it was required that every
proposed enclosure of any kind should first be advertised and
opportunity given for objection, then submitted to the Board of
Agriculture for its approval, and this approval should only be given
when such an enclosure was for the general benefit of the public. No
desire of a lord of a manor to enclose ground for his private park or
game preserve, or to use it for building ground, would now be allowed
to succeed. The interest of the community at large has been placed
above the private advantage and even liberty of action of landholders.
The authorities do not merely see that justice is done between lord
and commoners on the manor, but that both alike shall be restrained
from doing what is not to the public advantage. Indeed, Parliament
went one step further, and by an order passed in 1893 set a precedent
for taking a common entirely out of the hands of the lord of the
manor, and putting it in the hands of a board to keep it for public
uses. Thus not only had the enclosing movement diminished for lack of
open farming land to enclose, but public opinion and law between 1864
and 1893 interposed to preserve such remaining open land as had not
been already divided. Whatever land remained that was not in
individual ownership and occupancy was to be retained under control
for the community at large.

*73. Allotments.*--But this change of attitude was not merely negative.
There were many instances of government interposition for the
encouragement of agriculture and for the modification of the relations
between landlord and tenant. In 1875, 1882, and 1900 the "Agricultural
Holdings Acts" were passed, by which, when improvements are made by
the tenant during the period in which he holds the land, compensation
must be given by the landlord to the tenant when the latter retires.
No agreement between the landlord and tenant by which the latter gives
up this right is valid. This policy of controlling the conditions of
landholding with the object of enforcing justice to the tenant has
been carried to very great lengths in the Irish Land Bills and the
Scotch Crofters' Acts, but the conditions that called for such
legislation in those countries have not existed in England itself.
There has been, however, much effort in England to bring at least some