PEACE AND BEGGARY ^ 317 



triennial average for 1783-4-5, to £5,418,845 in 1815. Nor did the 

 expenditure cease to rise with the close of the war. It continued 

 to increase, in spite of falling prices. In 1818 it had grown to 

 £7,870,801, the highest point which it reached under the old law.i 



For six years after the end of the war the proverbial association 

 of " Peace and Plenty " proved a ghastly mockery to all classes of 

 the community. To agriculturists peace brought only beggary. In 

 the first rush of complaint, some allowance must be made for dis- 

 appointment at the immediate results of the end of the war. But 

 the evidence of commercial depression was real and widespread. 

 The disordered state of the currency continued to injure credit, to 

 disturb trade, to create wild speculation instead of sound business. 

 The labour market was glutted. Discharged sailors, soldiers, and 

 mihtiamen swelled the ranks of the unemployed. The store, 

 transport, and commissariat departments were put on a peace 

 footing. Industries to which the war had given a feverish activity 

 languished. Thousands of spinners, combers, and hand-loom 

 weavers were thrown out of work by the increased introduction of 

 machinery into manufacturing processes. Continental ports were 

 once more opened to Enghsh trade ; but money was scarce, and 

 foreign merchandise excluded by heavy customs duties. It was soon 

 found that home manufactures had exceeded the demand. Ware- 

 houses were overloaded, markets overstocked. Pjwiuce was unsold, 

 or unpaid for^ or bought at prices unremunerative to the producers. 

 Only with America was increased business done. The growing 

 imports of raw cotton were paid for by exports of British goods. 



After 1821 the commercial depression began to disperse. Difficul- 

 ties of the currency had been, to some extent, adjusted ; credit and 

 confidence were reviving. Progress was for a time suspended by 

 the financial crash of 1825. But the interruption was temporary. 

 Trade improved, at first slowly, then rapidly. Agriculture recovered 

 more gradually ; for a protracted period it endured an almost 

 unexampled misery. Landlords, tenant-farmers, and labourers 

 suffered together. It was not till 1836 that any gleam of returning 



12s. 8d. a year. (See Report of the Charity Commissioners, 1842.) No estimate 

 can be formed of the additional sums annually contributed by the charitable. 

 The great increase in the Poor Rate cannot be wholly attributed to an increase 

 in the number of paupers. It was largely due to the greater cost of provisions 

 and to more lax administration. See Appendix II. 



1 NichoU's History of the Poor Law, ed. H. G. Willink (1898), vol. ii. p. 165, 

 and Porter's Progress of the Nation (ed. 1847), p. 527. 



