562 Population of Great Britain and Ireland [DK c 



obvious first inquiry " Does our population exceed that amount which 

 the soil of our country could find capabilities to nourish?" because 

 we take it to be foreign to the real purpose, unless so far as it bears 

 upon the ulterior question " Can we, subject to the existing and arti- 

 ficial constitution of our society, bring fresh lands into cultivation ?" 

 and yet these numerous considerations which remain, present but a 

 sample of the questions connected with the subject which has en- 

 gaged the Committee ; and which even ten times the extent of the 

 six hundred folio pages of which its Report consists, might perhaps be 

 inadequate competently to discuss; Unhappily, too, this multiplicity of 

 collateral circumstances and inquiries, into which the subject of Emigration 

 branches, while it places the question taken in a true and sufficient light, 

 almost beyond the power of men's patience, or of their comprehension, 

 affords extraordinary facilities to any description of theorists, whose inte- 

 "rests or immature examinations incline them to mislead the public, or 

 deceive themselves : it is but leaving out of view (an omission, in such a 

 crowd, very far from being easily detected) any one of the material con- 

 siderations which should bear upon the subject ; and a most seemingly 

 unanswerable argument may be made up out of the remainder, upon any 

 side of the question which the writer or speaker finds convenient. Pre- 

 mising, therefore, that a Golden Conclusion a plan which shall end all 

 happily (as a wedding, by prescription, terminates a play) is not the de- 

 termination with which we start, we shall endeavour to point out some of 

 the difficulties which encumber the consideration of the subject, and some 

 of the circumstances which ought to be most carefully kept in view in dis- 

 'Ctissing it : as well as (we think, certainly} to demonstrate, that the course 

 proposed by the Committee, upon the very evidence of its own Report, 

 is wholly inadequate and inefficient. If we should be compelled to finish 

 our paper without discovering any mode, by which open to no objection 

 or inconvenience from any party, and tending to the gain and interest of 

 all the existing difficulty can be got rid of, we shall at least have 

 the consolation that our incompetency is not greater than that of our fore- 

 fathers who, for three hundred years past, have failed to come to any 

 satisfactory agreement upon this subject. Witness the discussions of the 

 present year; which otherwise (we apprehend) would not be necessary. 



To begin, then, with that portion of the subject upon which the least 

 difference of opinion is likely to arise the undoubted effect of the evidence 

 .before the Committee, is to shew that, both in Great Britain and Ireland, 

 a heavy amount of population exists, for which the present circumstances 

 of the country afford no employment. Both in agriculture and manufac- 

 tures, the competition of labourers for work has reduced the average of 

 wages down to the very lowest point at which nature can be supported ; 

 and vast numbers of able bodied, willing individuals, even at this insuffi- 

 cient rate of remuneration, arc left without employment. This is the 

 state of things in England and Scotland : in Ireland, the want and desti- 

 tution are still worse. Low as the estimate of that which a man may 

 subsist on is in many pu'ts of England and Scotland, in Ireland the 

 allowance calculated for the same purpose does not reach one-third of the 

 same amount ; and, in many cases, whole crowds of families subsist noto- 

 riously by no other means than charity or depredation. In the British 

 manufacturing districts, the common opinion is, that, unless new markets 

 should arise and of this, to any considerable extent., the witnesses see no 

 probability the increase and improvement of Machinery must lessen the 



