unable to spend as much, either in the articles of their respective trades, or for the luxuries, comforts, or ne cessaries of life: hence, the evil spread to other descriptions of people; and as, when a stone is thrown into the water, the circle widens as it moves from the place of the first impulse, so the evil covered a larger space, as it afflicted those who were more remote from its first seat.

We have already in our former volume pointed out the causes of this depression of agriculture. Before, however, we proceed to describe the state of the agricultural population during the year 1817, it may be proper briefly to recapitulate those causes. In consequence of several years of comparative scarcity occurring while we were at war; and when, of course, there was not only an increased demand for provisions, but also greater difficulty and expense in getting corn from foreign countries; the rent and value of land had risen greatly in Britain. Much land was brought into cultivation, or cropped with wheat, which, if provisions had been lower, would not have paid the rent and expenses. The farmers possessed of a valuable produce, found no difficulty in procuring from the country banks almost any sums that they required, either to render it unnecessary for them to sell their corn, because they were pressed for money, or to extend their farms, or to improve them. While things were in this state, peace came:-the demand for corn, on account of government, almost entirelyceased, while the supply was increased by the importation of foreign grain; the necessary consequence of a diminished demand and an increased supply followed. The price fell much, and rapidly: the country bankers, alarmed at

seeing the farmer's produce, on which they had, in fact, lent their money, becoming much less valuable, pressed the farmer to repay them. This he could not do, unless by bringing into market a larger proportion, than he would otherwise have done, of that produce: the supply being thus still further increased, the price fell still more'; and the banker's alarm increasing in proportion, the farmer was still more strongly pressed for money. It is needless to point out more fully the operation of those causes, or to add any further illustration of the dreadful state to which the agricultural interests were thus reduced, than barely to state, that while the value of his produce thus rapidly and greatly fell, the burthen of the poor-rates grew heavier, and till he was relieved of the income tax, his taxes were the same ;-that is, with much less money coming in for his corn, &c. he had more to pay for the support of the poor, as much to pay to government, and in general as much to his landlord.

While agriculture was labouring under these disadvantages, the dreadful harvest of 1816 occurred; this, though it necessarily raised the price of corn, brought no allevia tion of his distresses to the farmer. Indeed, those who, when corn had been raised to an unnatural_price during the war, had taken farms, which could only pay while prices were high, and the crops raised on them were good, were by this harvest totally ruined; while, even on land naturally fertile, the produce this year was so scanty, and of such bad quality, that, at the highest price at which it could be sold, it by no means remunerated the farmer for his rent, capital, taxes, and labour. It will be recollected,

that

that by the last corn law, the im portation of foreign corn was allowed, whenever the average of the maritime districts rose above 80s. per quarter: in consequence of the bad harvest of 1816, the price soon rose above that sum; from Europe, at least from every part of Europe except Poland, little corn could be procured; but from Poland and from the United States of America the importations were immense. The country at large were of course greatly benefited by these importations; but the farmer was not benefited; in fact, he was injured in two ways: in the first place, the value of his scanty crop was diminished by the great supply from abroad; and in the second place, a great deal of his grain, being of very bad quality, was rejected for the superior grain thus imported.

It was hoped that the harvest of 1817 would prove more beneficial than that of 1816, both to the farmer and the public; but the climate, which during the latter year seemed to have received a rude shock, from some unknown but powerful cause, did not recover itself during 1817. The spring was distinguished by cold dry weather of uncommon duration. This was succeeded by a short space of intensely hot weather: but the months of July and August -those months so trying to the corn crops in this island, were remarkably cold and wet. Fine weather set in in September; but it seems to have come too late to secure a good harvest, either in respect to quantity or quality, in Scotland and the north of England; and even in some districts of the south of England, the farmers, alarmed by what they suffered in 1816, were so eager to finish their harvest operations, that they injured the quality of their grain. On the whole, however, the 1817.

late harvest may fairly be said to have been considerably more beneficial both to the interests of agriculture and of the country at large, than the harvest of 1816. In consequence of this, an increased demand for good land, on account of its having been proved that inferior land would not pay, unless both abundant produce and high prices could be secured, and of capital, from the low state of interest in the funds, being again directed to agriculture, it is certainly beginning to recover, and will probably assume a more healthy appearance and a stronger constitution than it ever possessed before.

So far the picture of the internal state of Britain during the year 1817 is pleasing and satisfactory.We must next turn our attention to the state of manufactures during the same period. In 1816 they were in a dreadful state of depres sion and embarrassment, arising from several causes. The principal of which were the withdrawing of the demands of government ;-this cause, however, principally affected the iron manufactures;-the poverty and distress of all the European nations, who, labouring under the consequences of a long and burdensome war, aggravated by a bad harvest, could harldly be expected to become purchasers of our manufactures, at a time when they could scarcely afford to purchase food:-while the United States of America, cut off from any commercial communication with us by the war between the two countries, had begun to endeavour to render themselves independent of us, by establishing manufactures of their own. Such was the state of our manufactures in the year 1816, and such the principal causes that had reduced them to that state. In the P

course

course of 1817 they began to revive. It is a curious fact, that one of the principal iron-masters in England, who used, during the war, to supply government, annually, with 6000 tons of cannon, in 1817 employed as many furnaces and men, though of course the government demand for cannon was at an end. Thus it would appear that one branch of our manufacture, which, certainly, more than any other, is fed by war, and which, we know, suffered most dreadfully when peace took place, is recovering fast. This fact, probably, can be accounted for only from the circumstance that iron is now used for an infinite variety of purposes to which it was never put till within these very few years. The other great branches of our manufacture are the woollen and the cotton. In our former volume we stated that the former, not depending so much as the latter on taste, caprice, and the uncertainty of foreign demand, is more steady than the latter; of course it did not suffer so much: and from what it did suffer, it is certainly recovering fast. The continent of Europe is again able to become a purchaser of the comforts and luxuries of life; and the United States of America have forgot their enmity to us, in the wise and politic consideration that their country, for a long time to come, cannot possibly direct their labour and capital to manufactures with nearly so much effect and real wealth as it can to agriculture.

Spanish America, or at least that part of it which is in possession of the insurgents, and the West Indies, have also contributed to the revival of our manufactures: but the most surprising circumstance, in the history of our manufactures and commerce, for the last two years, and

which cannot be paralleled, even in the astonishing circumstances with which the annals of our manufactures and conimerce abound, is yet to be told. To those who are even superficially acquainted with the state of our manufactures, it cannot be unknown, to what a degree ca pital, skill, and machinery will overcome obstacles apparently insurmountable. At first sight it would seem that that country which produced the raw material in the greatest abundance, and at the lowest price-especially if in that country labour was very lowwould be the most favourable for the introduction and prosperity of the manufacture of that material; and that another country not producing the raw material, but obliged to purchase it from the country first alluded to, and more. over labouring under heavy taxes and dear labour, would be utterly incapable of becoming its rival. How completely, and in how many instances, has Britain proved this supposition to be erroneous! Till within these few years, when British iron was rendered equal to Swedish, we brought almost all our iron from Sweden, manufactured it in Britain, and then exported it to that very country from which, in its raw state, we had brought it. A still more striking instance is found in our cotton manufacture: the raw material is brought from a great distance, manufactured here, and then exported among other places, to those countries from which in its raw state it was brought. That machinery is the principal cause of this extraordinary circumstance will appear from the fact, that the silk manufactory, to which machinery is, comparatively, little applicable, or rather little applied, has never flourished among us.

But

But to come more directly to the case to which we alluded above, as at once illustrating the wonderful effects of capital and machinery, and pointing out one cause of the revival of our cotton manufacture. It will be recollected, that when the question regarding the opening of the trade to India was agitated and discussed, it was most confidently asserted by those who opposed the measure, that it would cause the certain and absolute ruin of those who first engaged in the free trade, even if afterwards it should prove lucrative and advantageous. It was said that the East India company already exported a sufficient quantity of all kinds of articles which were in demand among the inhabitants of the East Indies;-that they must be better judges of the wants and demands of those inhabitants than new and inexperienced adven turers; and that their capital would enable them to bear down the private and individual efforts of the adventurers in the free trade. To the opinion that these adventurers would open out to themselves new channels for their goods, or create demands for such kinds as had never been exported, or in demand before, it was answered, that the manners and institutions of the inhabitants of the East Indies were so proverbially fixed and unchangeable, that there was no possibility of altering them so as to induce them to purchase those articles which they had hitherto rejected, or been indifferent to, from the influence of habit or religion.

When the free trade to India proved, at its commencement, beneficial and lucrative, it was said that it had not yet had a fair and ample trial, though this very success destroyed one of the arguments used against it, namely, that whatever

might be the fate of it subsequently, and when it was conducted with due caution and increased experi❤ ence, it certainly at first would be attended with the pecuniary ruin of the adventurers. It succeeded, however, even at first. It did not, like the trade to Buenos Ayres and other places, when they first were laid open to our commerce, produce immense fortunes to the very first adventurers, and then ruin those who next adventured; for those who embarked in the free trade to India profited by it; those who, imitating their example, next embarked in it, profited by it; and at the close of the year 1817 it became one of the most extensive and lucrative branches of our commerce.

By such as learnt that it had succeeded, and was succeeding so extremely well, it was naturally asked, what were the articles sent out to India which the East India company had not already sent in such abundance as amply and regularly to supply the market; and certainly the surprise occasioned by the information of what these articles principally were, must be much greater even than the surprise occasioned by the knowledge that the free trade had succeeded to such a great degree.

All our readers must be well informed, that the manufacture for which India has been peculiarly distinguished, ever since the earliest periods of history which teach us any thing respecting that country, that is at least 2500 years, is the cotton manufacture. The muslins and calicoes of India must have been common in Britain even in the recollection of most of our readers. There were many circumstances which rendered India the favourite seat of this manufacture: in the first place, the wonderfully low

price of labour; secondly, its being the country where the raw material was produced; and lastly, the circumstance that this, like all other trade and manufactures in India, had been hereditary in families from time immemorial, and consequently by them it must have been carried on with all the advantages of experience and skill. Besides, it is said that the climate of India is peculiarly favourable to the spinning by hand (and no machinery is employed) of a fine, soft, and delicate thread. One would imagine, therefore, it could hardly have entered the thought of any adventurer to send to India that very manufacture for which it had been so long famous; and the certainty of failure would have been confidently predicted, had it been told that such a speculation was in contemplation. There seemed another obstacle to this export to India not yet adverted to; namely, the almost insurmountable religious prejudices of the Hindoos, in every thing that regards their food, dress, &c. If, therefore, cotton goods could be sent out to India, and sold there at a cheaper rate than the cotton goods of the country, it might have been apprehended, that the mere comparative cheapness would not have procured them a market.

It is, however, the fact at present and a fact, perhaps, as astonishing and instructive to political œconomists and commercial men, as any in the whole history of the commerce of this or any other country, not only that the free trade to India has succeeded most surprisinglyso much so indeed as to employ a large number of vessels-fifteen, we believe, from the port of Liver pool alone, and to bring great profits to those who have engaged in it;

but that the principal and most lucrative branch of the trade con. sists in cotton goods. These goods manufactured in Britain-a country some thousand miles distant from the seat of the growth of the raw material, and where labour is higher than in almost any country in the world, and at least 400 per cent. higher than in India-are exported to India, and sold there with a profit, after all the expense of the freight of so long a voyage, and notwithstanding the market to which they are thus brought is in a country producing the raw material, and where it has been manufactured beyond the reach of history or tradition, and among a people the most bigotedly attached to every thing their own beyond any other nation in the world.

It will naturally be asked, How does this happen; how can our manufactures, in a country where labour is so high, and where the raw material is equally high, compete with the manufactures in a country where labour is cheaper than in any other part of the world, where the raw material grows on the spot, and where, of course, the market is at hand, and consequently there is no expense for freight, insurance, &c.; and even if they could overcome these obstacles and difficulties, how have they managed to overcome the religious prejudices of the natives?

The answer to the first inquiry is highly illustrative of the power of machinery and capital;-the answer to the second inquiry, we are afraid, is not very honourable to the character of our manufacturers and commercial men. The wages of a labourer is certainly much higher in Britain than in India: in the latter country it is not more than 3d. or 4d. a-day. In Britain, those

engaged