§ Lord Dacrepresented a Petition from the Owners and Occupiers of Land, and the Tithe Owners of the Eastern Division of the County of Kent, praying for a Commutation of Tithes. He was anxious to bring under the notice of their Lordships one part of the petitioners' case. They stated, that in their opinion, the adoption of commutation, on a scale of recent payments for tithes, would operate as a permanent exaction of very considerable inequality and great extent. He concurred in opinion with the petitioners, and would add, that if a scale of commutation should be formed from present payment, or upon the value of the present actual produce, it would operate in the same manner, though not in the same degree. In any mode of commuting tithes, the charge of a perpetual annuity on poor land, would be more than equal to the rent, if recently cultivated by the application of extraneous capital.
§ Petition laid on the Table.