The conditions of land-tenure in Luzon Island under Spanish rule stood briefly thus:--The owners either held the lands by virtue of undisturbed possession or by transferable State grant. The tenants--the actual tillers--were one degree advanced beyond the state of slave cultivators, inasmuch as they could accumulate property and were free to transfer their services. They corresponded to that class of farmers known in France as _metayers_ and amongst the Romans of old as _Coloni Partiarii_, with no right in the land, but entitled to one-half of its produce. Like the ancients, they had to perform a number of services to the proprietor which were not specified in writing, but enforced by usage. Tenants of this kind recently subsisted--and perhaps still do--in Scotland (_vide_ "Wealth of Nations," by Adam Smith, edition of 1886, p. 160). Leases for long periods were exceptional, and I never heard of compensation being granted for improvements of Philippine estates. The conditions in Visayas are explained on p. 274. The value of land suitable for _Sugar-cane_ growing varies considerably, being dependent on proximity to a port, or sugar-market, and on quality, facilities for drainage, transport, site, boundaries, etc. In the Province of Bulacan, land which in a great measure is exhausted and yields only an average of 21 tons of cane per acre, was valued (prior to the American occupation), on account of its nearness to the capital, at P115 per acre. In Pampanga Province, a little further north, the average value of land, yielding, say, 30 tons of cane per acre, was P75 per acre. Still further north, in the Province of Nueva Ecija, whence transport to the sugar-market is difficult and can only be economically effected in the wet season by river, land producing an average of 35 tons of cane per acre would hardly fetch more than P30 per acre. Railroads will no doubt eventually level these values. In reality, Bulacan land is priced higher than its intrinsic value as ascertained by yield and economy of produce-transport. The natives are, everywhere in the Colony, more or less averse to alienating real estate inherited from their forefathers, and as Bulacan is one of the first provinces where lands were taken up, centuries ago, an attachment to the soil is particularly noticeable. In that province, as a rule, only genuine necessity, or a fancy price far in excess of producing-worth, would induce an owner to sell his land.