156 J dual State of the British Empire. 



land is insufficient to support its poor, and where the soil has 

 consequently been abandoned. It is not at all surprising that 

 these reports have spread an universal anxiety, and a general 

 sense of insecurity amongst persons of property. Every pro- 

 ject for the abolition of the poor-laws is, of course, eagerly 

 entertained. 



It will not be difficult to show, without much consumption 

 of time, that these apprehensions are as much exaggerated as 

 the remedy they would suggest is inapplicable, unjust, and im- 

 practicable. The whole argument rests on a hollow founda- 

 tion. About a twelvemonth ago I transmitted to a periodical 

 work a statement respecting the gradual rise of the poor- 

 rates, in which I endeavoured to show that the public were 

 under great misapprehensions on this important subject. My 

 object was to prove that the augmented amount of the poor- 

 rates was not more than commensurate with the change in the 

 value of money, and the increased amount of our population, 

 especially of that part of our population which nourishes and 

 sustains the mighty mass of pauperism. This position I en- 

 deavoured to support by a comparison of the sums expended 

 on the poor, the value of money, and the extent of the na- 

 tional population, at a period of forty or fifty years ago and at 

 the present time. These points, however, have been stated 

 with much more accuracy and detail in a pamphlet published 

 a short time since by a gentleman of the name of Barton, 

 Adopting as a datum what I presume will not be disputed, 

 that the value of money is to be estimated by the relative 

 price of corn, he has reduced the contribution of every indi- 

 vidual to the poor-rates into its proper value in Avheat, and 

 has found that the charge per head on the whole population 

 of the realm was, in 1776, forty-four pints of wheat ; in 1785, 

 fifty-three pints of wheat ; and in 1815, fifty pints of wheat. 

 There is, therefore, a small advance from 1776, but a decline 

 from 1785, in the real relative amount of our assessments to 

 the poor. 



But this statement, striking as it is, does not by any means 

 show the extent of our misapprehensions. It is well known 

 that the late rapid increase of our population has taken place 

 principally in great towns, or in manufacturing and com- 



