He took everything out of the soil that it was possible to take out.

The last Michaelmas was approaching, and he walked round in the warm August sunshine to look at the wheat.
He sat down on an old roller that lay in the corner of the field, and thought over the position of things.

He calculated that it would cost the incoming tenant an expenditure of from one thousand two hundred pounds to one thousand five hundred pounds to put the farm, which was a large one, into proper condition.

It could not be got into such condition under three years of labour.

The new tenant must therefore be prepared to lay out a heavy sum of money, to wait while the improvement went on, must live how he could meanwhile, and look forward some three years for the commencement of his profit.