36 



and vegetable crops; and this quantity of land 

 employs a capital of 20,000,000 and yields 

 12,000,000 value of produce annually , which 

 is divided amongst the agricultural classes, the 

 manufacturers' best customers, and then circulates 

 through every vein of British industry. Put, for a 

 moment, the importance of supporting our own 

 agriculture out of sight, and then I would ask, are 

 foreigners who have 6,000,000 to lay out with 

 our manufacturers, more desirable customers 

 than the agricultural classes who have nearly 

 12,000,000 to expend in articles of consumption, 

 for though a great portion of 3,000,000 be paid 

 in parliamentary and parochial outgoings, in sup- 

 porting the poor, the public establishments, the 

 public officers, and the public creditor, yet a part 

 of this portion goes to maintain consumers of our 

 manufactures : so that, as I have before stated, 

 4,000,000 acres of land, which employs a capital 

 of 20,000,000, and yields produce of the value of 

 12,000,000 a year, which is diffused throughout 

 every branch of national industry, are to be thrown 

 out of cultivation. A happy commencement of 

 the political theorists predicted period of national 

 prosperity ! 



In confirmation of the assertion that a reduced 

 price of corn to 40^., a quarter in consequence of 

 the competition of corn from countries indepen- 

 dent of us, corn not produced by British and 

 Irish capital and labour, would throw out of culti- 

 vation all the poor, inferior, and second rate strong 



