Rural Denmark by H. Rider Haggard, UK PM Lord Rosebery's copy with ALS 1911

HAGGARD, H. Rider. Rural Denmark and Its Lessons. (UK Prime Minister Lord Rosebery's copy, with an ALS from Haggard to him tucked into the front)
 
London, Longmans, Green and Co., 1911.
 
First edition. xi, 335pp. With 15 illustrations. Publisher’s original dark blue cloth, lettered in gilt.
A very good copy, cloth clean and sound with light rubbing at extremities; prelims toned. Bookplate of Archibald Primrose, 5th Earl of Rosebery, UK Prime Minister to the front pastedown. With the original printed slip “With the Author’s Compliments”, and a four-page autograph letter signed from Haggard to Rosebery, dated 7 April 1911, loosely inserted.
 
The letter refers directly to Haggard’s earlier Rural England, which Rosebery had read. The earlier novel described the issues as seen by Haggard of rural decline in England. In this, his follow up, Haggard sets out his solution: an extension of land ownership and the development of cooperative agricultural systems, drawing on his observations of Danish rural practice. He further discusses his involvement in the proposed Salvation Army settlement scheme, describing its rejection by a government committee as being duly executed by a hatchet squad and lamenting the lost opportunity for both economic and social reform.
 
Written to a former Prime Minister with known interest in questions of land and national efficiency, the letter represents a considered statement of Haggard’s late-career engagement with agrarian reform and rural policy. An interesting association copy between the writer, better known for his fictional novels such as King Solomon's mines, and a UK Prime Minister.