in England, decreased from one fourth to one tenth of the whole population; and the money annually expended in relief of the English poor has decreased during the same period from the proportion of one half to one seventh of the public revenue; and from the proportion of one third to one eleventh of the exports. Granting that the value of money in Britain suffers an average depreciation of five per cent. every year; that is to say, that the price of living costs about double the money-value every succeeding twenty years; then the £.840,000, of 1673 multiplied by 6 in order to bring it to its comparative value in 1803, a period of more than 120 years, will give more than £.5,348,205; and consequently allow rather less money relatively to the price of living in 1803, to be expended in relieving 9,000,000, than was expended in 1673, in relieving 5,000,000, of people. It is but just to state that Mr. Colquhoun draws exactly opposite conclusions from these same premises; namely, the increase of poor in number and expense. The Parliamentary returns in 1803,give the following results as to the English poor. Paupers relieved out of work-houses, not including children, 336,199 ;-pauper-children under five years relieved, 120,236;-pauper-children from five to fourteen years relieved, 194,914;-paupers relieved in work-houses, including children, 83,468;— paupers, supposed to be chiefly mendicants, occasionally relieved, 305,899. Total, 1,040,716. Mr. Colquhoun estimates the number of persons who are burdens on the community, thus;-indigent persons, 1,040,716;-mendicants, 50,000;-vagrants, gypsies, &c, 20,000;-idle and immoral, 10,000;depraved women, 100,000;-vagabonds, various, 10,000; lottery-vagrants, 10,000; criminal offenders, 80,000;—Total 1,320,716. His Majesty's principal Secretary of State for the home department having anthorized Mr. Martin of Westminster, to ascertain the state of mendicity in London, he prosecuted his inquiries for several years, until the end of 1802, when his report, published in March 1803, gave the following results. 1. Mendicants belonging to adults. children. total. 2,541,—4,152,—6,693, tant parishes having set-1,137,-1,467,-2,604, The annual expense of these medicants to the pub. lic is about £.90,000. The proportion of poor per county in England and Wales, is; per cent. on the population. 5. Cumberland, Cornwall, Lan-` caster, Nottingham, and East-Riding of Yorkshire; 7, less than 1-15th. number of paupers in each 1000 of the population. 3. Derby, Middlesex, and Rut land. 8, less than 1-13th. per cent. on the population. 4. Lincoln, Northumberland, Staf ford and North-Riding of York-9, above 1-11th. shire. 4. West-Riding of York, Durham, 10,above 1-10th, Monmouth, and Salop. 4. Bedford, Chester, Somerset, & Westmorland. 6. Cambridge, Devon, Hereford, 12, under 1-8th, Huntingdon, Surrey, and Wor-13, above 1-8th. cester. 3. Herts, Dorset, Kent, 4. Gloucester, Leicester, South-15, above 1-7th. ampton, and Warwick. 2. Norfolk, and Northampton, 2. Essex and Suffolk, 1. Buckinghamshire, 1. Oxfordshire, 1. Berkshire, 14, above 1-7th, 23, nearly 1-4th. 2. Sussex, and Wiltshire, 12. Counties in Wales, averaging, 9, above 1-11th. In England and Wales, somewhat less than one ninth of the population were paupers in 1803. That the British poor are better fed, clothed and lodged now than their ancestors were we have the unequivocal testimony of Mr.Burke in his" Thoughts and details on Scarcity," before cited. "Whether what may be called the moral or philosophical happiness of the laborious classes, is increased or not I cannot say. The seat of that species of happiness is in the mind; and there are few data to ascertain the comparative state of the mind at any two periods. Philosophical happiness is to want little. Civil or vulgar happiness is to want much and to enjoy much. If the happiness of the animal man, which certainly goes somewhere towards the happiness of the rational man, be the object of our estimate; then I assert without the least hesitation that the condition of those who labor, in all descriptions of labor, and in all graduations of labor, from the highest to the lowest inclusively is on the whole extremely meliorated; if more and better food is any standard of melioration. They work more it is certain; but they have the advantage of their augmented labor. As to the fact of the melioration of their diet, I shall enter into the detail of proof whenever I am called upon; in the mean time, the known difficulty of contenting them with any thing but bread made of the finest flour, and meat of the first quality, is proof sufficient. I further assert that even under all the hardships of the last year (1795, a year of uncommon scarcity in Britain) the laboring people did either out of their direct gains or from charity, in fact fare better than they did in seasons of common plenty, fifty or sixty years ago; or even at the period of my English observation which is about forty-four years. I even assert that full as many in that class as ever were known to do it before, continued to save money; and this I can prove so far as my own information and experience extend." A decisive proof that the condition of the lower orders of the people in Britain at present is superior in the essential articles of food, clothing,and lodging to that of the same class at any former period; is to be found in the decreasing proportion of her annual deaths. Mr. Malthus in the 1st. Vol. pp. 468, 481, of his invaluable "Essay on Population," says that the average duration of life in England is supposed to have increased in the proportion of 117 to 100, from the year 1780 to 1804; or at any rate the deaths to have been at least one in forty in 1804, and only one in thirty-six in 1780, giving an improved healthiness. of more than ten per cent. throughout the country in a period of twenty-four years; which, as the lower orders form so large a majority of the whole population, demonstrates a very great improvement in their condition and general happiness. The following prices of labor and wheat, &c. are taken from the 5th volume of "Communications to the Board of Agriculture." The average increase in the price of agricultural labor in 1804 above that in 1790, throughout England, was 47 per cent.; of blacksmith's work in tin, plough-irons, chains, shoeing, 35 per cent.; of the carpenter, mason, thatcher, collar maker, 41 per cent.; average increase of rent, tithe, parish-taxes, 59 per cent.; of an acre of turnips, barley, wheat, 38 per cent.; of manure, 62 per cent.; making a total average increase in price of 52 per cent, in fourteen years. The average increase throughout Scotland during the same period is, of rent, 73 per cent.; rates, 69 per cent.; agricultural labor, 56 per cent.; artisans, 65 per cent.; manure, 89 per cent.; total average increase in price, of 70 per cent. In 1790 the average price of wheat per bushel was 6s.; in 1800, 7s. 6d.; in 1804, 8s. 44d. This statement shows that the price of labor in Britain fully keeps pace in its increase with the rise in expense of provisions and the other means of living. See 7. Burke, pp. 379, 399, for the reasons why labor and provisions should be suffered, like all other commodities, to find their level of price according to the effectual demand for them in the existing market. And study the whole of Dr. Smith's "Wealth of Nations," &c. the great leading object of this incomparable work being to prove that the most effectual mode of conducting a nation to permanent wealth and power is to follow the natural order of things, to allow every individual within the limits of justice, to pursue the instinct of his nature to better his own condition, to promote his own interest in his own way and to bring his capital of talent, knowledge, property, and labor, into the freest competition with that of his fellow-citizens in every market. |