AGRICULTURAL DEPRESSION. 159 



to be told that there is similar depression in the 

 agricultural districts of France and Germany, nor 

 is it any satisfaction to him to hear of the rapid 

 growth of agricultural wealth in the Western 

 States across the Atlantic, the competition of 

 which has prevented that rise of price which 

 has hitherto been some compensation to him for 

 unfavourable harvests. In England itself, where 

 the bulk of the wheat crop of the kingdom 

 is grown, there has been lost in the last ten 

 years, by unfavourable seasons, a fourth more 

 than a whole year's wheat crop ; a loss of over 

 thirty millions sterling to the British wheat 

 growers, which has heavily crippled their re- 

 sources. 



That loss which has been brought upon us Produc- 

 tion of 

 by natural causes we may trust to nature with America 



stimulated. 



time to repair. But the agriculture of America 

 has been stimulated in an extraordinary degree 

 by the rising demand occasioned by this long- 

 continued diminution in our own crops, and 

 in those of Western Europe generally. The 

 magnitude which this has attained within the 

 last twenty years is shown by the average 



