THE PROGRESS OF THE WORKING-CLASSES. 29 



the economic literature of the time are most instructive. M. Quetelet, 

 in his well-known great book, points to the obvious connection between 

 the high price of bread following the bad harvest of 1816 and the 

 excessive rate of mortality which followed. To this day you will find 

 tables in the registrar-general's returns which descend from a time 

 when a distinct connection between these high prices of bread and 

 excessive rates of mortality was traced. But within the last twenty 

 years what do we find ? Wheat has not been, on the average, for a 

 whole year so high as 70^., the highest averages for any year being 

 64s. 5d. in 1887, and 63s. 9f/. in 1868 ; while the highest average of 

 the last ten years alone is 58s. 8c?. in 1873 ; that is only about 10s. 

 above the average of the whole period. In the twenty years, more- 

 over, the highest price touched at any period was just over 70s., viz., 

 7O5. 5c?. in 1867, and 74s. 7c?. in 1868 ; while in the last ten years the 

 figure of 70s. was not even touched, the nearest approach to it being 

 68s. 'dd. in 1877. Thus of late years there has been a steadily low 

 price, which must have been an immense boon to the masses, and 

 especially to the poorest. The rise of money wages has been such, I 

 believe, that working-men, for the most part, could have contended 

 with extreme fluctuations in the price of bread better than they did 

 fifty years ago. But they have not had the fluctuations to contend 

 with. 



It would be useless to go through other articles with the same 

 detail. Wheat had quite a special importance fifty years ago, and the 

 fact that it no longer has the same importance — that we have ceased 

 to think of it as people did fifty years ago — is itself significant. Still, 

 taking one or two other articles, we find on the whole a decline : 



Prices of Various Articles about Fifty Years ago and at Present 



Time. 



?ugar per cwt. 



Cotton cloth exported per yard 



Inferior beasts per 8 pounds 



Second class '• 



Third " « 



Inferior sheep " 



Second class " 



Large hogs " 



I should have liked a longer list of articles, but the difficulty of 

 comparison is very serious. It may be stated broadly, however, that 

 while sugar and such articles have declined largely in price, and while 



* Porter's " Progress of the Nation," p. 543. In the paper as read to the society, I 

 gave the price without the duty, but including the duty the price was what is now given 

 here. The average price, with the duty of the ten years ending 1840, was 5Ss. Ad. 



f Average price of raw sugar imported. 



