There is a third public source available to the landed proprietors for loans on mortgages and on bonds or bills, namely the Savings Banks. In 1884, the savings-banks, in rural districts alone, held in 'mortgage bonds' and in 'bonds and bills' a sum of about 3,553,000l.; but in what proportion that debt was incurred by local traders and by farmers, it is impossible to say. It is, however, clear that the yeomen farmers have benefited largely by the deposits made in those banks by the comparatively few who have been able to accumulate, instead of borrowing, money. Thus, the Prefect of Hedemarken reports that, 'while large amounts, realized by the sale of timber, were deposited in the savings-banks, extensive loans were made by those establishments to persons in less favourable circumstances,' and that 'the savings-banks, to be found in so many parishes, have, by the easy access they afford to loans, beguiled many into a needless borrowing of money, subsequently squandered.' Over and above these facilities for borrowing money from public institutions, the yeomen farmers are undoubtedly heavily in debt to local storekeepers, and to merchants and traders in the towns. In fact the great bulk of the landed proprietors have been borrowing in every direction as much as they could raise by mortgage or by bill. Owing to the excellent system of registration that exists in Norway, there is no difficulty in ascertaining the extent to which the charges on real property in rural districts have increased between the years 1876 and 1880. It appears from the Reports of the Prefects that, between those dates, the balance of mortgages newly effected over those extinguished in rural districts amounted to a sum of about four millions sterling. The State Mortgage Bank is bound not to advance more than six-tenths of the value of land and buildings (forests excepted), and it is supposed that the loans have so far not exceeded four-tenths of the value of mortgaged property; but as the yeomen farmers generally contrive to borrow on second mortgages, it may safely be assumed, that their estates are charged with interest at 4-1/4 to 6 per cent. on a considerable part of the nominal value of what is not purely forest land, in addition to an annual repayment of 3 per cent. of the capital borrowed from the State Mortgage Bank. The forests, on the other hand, have been largely used up in paying the interest and capital on those loans, either by cutting them down, or by leasing or pawning them to traders, or to yeomen who have been able to keep their heads above water and to profit by the economic distress of the great majority of their fellow-landowners. The difficulty experienced by that majority in meeting the payment of interest and capital, especially at a time when the value of agricultural produce has been considerably diminished by American competition, and when also the competition of American and Baltic timber has simultaneously reduced the profits of the forest