CONSIDERATIONS, 



4-c. 



AFTER a careful examination of a numerous body 

 of witnesses, " few of them not practically ex- 

 perienced in the details of the matters to which 

 they deposed," the Committee, appointed to in- 

 quire into the state of agriculture, admit that the 

 farming interest is in a very depressed state ; and, 

 that, the low price of the produce of the soil, since 

 1819, occasioned mainly by the restoration of a 

 metallic currency, which has altered the standard 

 of value without a contemporaneous and accom- 

 panying reduction in parochial, highway, and 

 county rates, and in rent, labour, and the other 

 expenses of production, have been the causes of 

 this depression. The prices of the produce of the 

 soil may now, however, be considered as adjusted, 

 or nearly so, to the increased value of money 

 which the bill of 1819 established; and these 

 prices are not likely to be raised by any parlia- 

 mentary enactment ; or are they likely to be 

 interfered with by " fresh experiments in the 



