and the abandonment of the sacrificies necessary to obtain it, is a system of policy equally pernicious and contemptible.

In the early stages of society, before the best lands are all appropriated and brought under cultivation, laws enacting a bounty upon the exportation of corn will give an extraordinary and immediate impulse to agriculture. But as much of the additional quantity of produce thus raised will eventually be brought into the home market, the ultimate result of this temporary rise will be a gradual but considerable and steady diminution in price. This was partially the case in England at the beginning of the last century, when, after a long system of discouragement and of impolitic enactments respecting agriculture, bounties were given upon exportation, and high duties laid upon the importation of corn. These wise alterations operated like magic, and placed England in some respects in the situation of a newly settled country. Good land, long in waste from former discouragements, could be procured at a cheap rate; and the soil being fresh and producing abundantly could be cultivated with a large profit, and returned an abundant surplus produce. The effects were such as might have been expected the people were plentifully supplied with food at a very reduced price, and so large an exportation of grain nevertheless took place, that the annual average was never less than 300,000 quarters; and in the 20 years of greatest prosperity, viz. from 1740, to 1760 it amounted to 700,000 quarters of all kinds of grain. The present condition of the soil of France, lately liberated from the feudal system and other oppressive impediments in the

;

way of agricultural enterprise, may probably lead under proper encouragements to the same results; and corn in that country may for some years be both cheap and very plentiful.

Such is the natural result of corn laws enacting a bounty upon exportation and imposing duties upon importation, during the agricultural state of society, or rather until the best and richest lands of a country are all appropriated and cultivated. But as society advances, as none but inferior lands are left to be brought under cultivation, as capital is gradually diverted to the then more profitable employments of commerce and manufactures, and as a mercantile and manufacturing population absorb by degrees all the surplus produce of the best lands, and create a demand for further produce from soil of an inferior staple; we immediately perceive that the political question is completely altered. Bounties upon exportation are no longer necessary, because the demand which they are intended to produce is already made to a sufficient extent by the mercantile and manufacturing population at home. They would moreover, if enacted, be a mere dead letter, not only because the utmost exertions, which can be made upon the inferior land yet remaining uncultivated, cannot permanently do more than supply the increasing demands of its own inhabitants, but also because, if a surplus produce for exportation could be raised upon such land, no reasonable bounty could enable it successfully to compete in the foreign market with corn grown upon the superior soil of the agricultural countries, especially where any considerable expense, by way of freight or otherwise, is to be incurred in the transport. The bounty

1

therefore can never operate till the domestic supply exceeds the internal demand by some impediments in commercial speculations, forcing an extraordinary portion of capital into those upon land. But this is merely a temporary alteration; and, upon the whole, we may safely assert that bounties upon export cease to operate when a country has decidedly advanced into the commercial and manufacturing state of society, and only inferior lands remain uncultivated. For, to sum up in a few words the preceding argument, the high price of corn induced by the increasing demand for food will always exceed that at which the agricultural nations can raise it, at which therefore other nations may easily purchase it; consequently, at which it can be sold when exported by the manufacturing nation. The law then encouraging exportation must be a mere dead letter, unless it contain the ruinous and unfair enactment of an éxcessively high bounty. Happily, however, it becomes useless too by the force of circumstances, because a superior impulse is given to agriculture by the demand from a commercial and manufacturing community.

,

It

But another system of policy then becomes imperative, namely, to protect the agriculture carried on upon the inferior lands now brought under cultivation from interference and eventual ruin, arising from a competition with corn grown upon the rich and unembarrassed soil of the agricultural countries. is obvious that this can only be done by duties upon importation, tending to keep up the price in the domestic market sufficiently high to remunerate the cultivator of inferior land. From the nature of things these duties must vary, and they must vary

so as to increase as society advances. For of the inferior lands, the best remaining will upon the average be of course first brought under cultivation, leaving at every step in the progress only others still inferior to the last, to be cultivated at an expense continually increasing. The protection therefore to be effectual must vary with every step, so as to cover that continually increasing expense. Thus, as I observed before, a people must pay, and ought justly to expect to pay, for every advantage they draw from their advancing wealth and happiness by the progress of society. They may choose whether they will enjoy or forego those advantages; but having made their election they must not shrink from the necessary consequences of the alternative they have

chosen.

We see then that, to ascertain the nature and extent of the encouragement necessary to the prosperity of domestic agriculture upon inferior soils, many facts must be previously inquired into. As first, the average capability of the country to raise actually, or within a reasonable period of encouragement, produce enough for its own consumption; because upon this will not only depend the possibility of placing it ultimately in a state of independence upon foreign supply; but the circumstance will also materially affect the prospect of immediate competition from the corn-growing countries. This will be treated in the remainder of this chapter.

Next we must also take into our calculation the several component parts of which the expense of raising produce upon inferior land is made up; as 1st, Rent, or landlord's interest and profit upon his capital laid out in purchase or improvement: 2dly, The ex

pence of cultivation, or tenant's interest and profit upon his capital and labour; and lastly, Taxes and all other outgoings imposed upon land. Considering also the variable and uncertain amount of agricultural produce, especially upon inferior soils, we must always recollect that no corn laws can fulfil their object of encouraging the cultivator of such land, unless they secure to him a high price in years of deficient produce, a moderate price, or what is called the growing price, in years of average produce, and a low price in years of extraordinary plenty. Lastly, care must be taken that all these component parts do not make up a total of expense to be paid by the consumers of domestic agricultural produce, that would cramp or discourage the growth of domestic commerce and manufactures, by increasing their necessary cost so as to encourage a competition from the commerce and manufactures of foreign countries. For, after all, the demand created by the increase of a commercial and manufacturing population can alone, for the reasons stated in a former chapter, open a market for the sale of raw produce grown upon soils of a staple continually diminishing in value. These points will be treated in following chapters.

We have now to consider, in the remainder of this chapter, the effect which the capacity of a country to raise within itself produce enough for its own consumption should have upon the nature of the encouragement necessary for the prosperity of domestic agriculture. When a territory is of small extent, and fully peopled with a commercial and manufacturing population collected into large towns, (such as the small European republics exhibited during their vigour and prosperity,) it is evident that it