264 THE ENGLISH CORN LAWS 



eliminated ; an explanation must be offered of the facts that in 

 England, during the seventeenth century, wheat averaged only a 

 halfpenny the bushel cheaper than during the eighteenth century, 1 

 and that the general prices of Europe, under different fiscal systems, 

 did not, during the period, materially differ from those of England. 

 Still more difficult would it be to determine whether, taken as a 

 whole and over the entire period of their existence, they have 

 benefited or injured consumers, so far as these can be distinguished 

 from producers. If they aggravated evils in some directions, 

 they compensated them in others. Whatever else the legislation 

 effected, it did, except during the last few years of its operation, 

 steady prices, and to consumers steadiness was perhaps as great 

 a boon as a spasmodic cheapness which alternated with excessive 

 dearness. At a time when England was practically dependent on 

 home-grown supplies, prices of corn were extravagantly sensitive 

 to fluctuations in the yield of harvests. The reason is obvious. 

 Average harvests provided bread enough for the population ; but 

 there was often little margin to spare. A partial failure, therefore, 

 meant the prospect of dearth, if not of famine. In prolonged periods 

 of scarcity, like that of the Napoleonic wars, our ancestors might 

 pass self-denying ordinances to reduce their domestic consumption 

 by one-third, dispense with flour for then 1 own wigs or the hair of 

 their lackeys, substitute clay imitations for the pastry of then: 

 pies, forbid the sale of bread till it was twenty-four hours old, pro- 

 hibit the use of corn in the making of starch or in distilleries. Yet, 

 in the case of a necessary like corn, it was impossible to exercise 

 such economies as would make good any considerable shortage. 

 Hence corn, when a deficient harvest was anticipated, was specially 

 liable to panic-stricken competition. Any falling off in the annual 

 yield caused a far greater advance in price than was justified by 

 the actual shortage. Somewhat similar, though less exaggerated, 

 was the effect of an anticipated abundance. The fall in price was 

 wholly disproportionate to the real surplus. These violent alterna- 

 tions between dearness and cheapness, if they had not been steadied 

 and regulated by the legislature, would have been disastrous to 

 both consumers and producers. 



Beginning in the early Middle Ages, and ending in 1869, the 

 English Corn Laws lasted for upwards of six centuries. Attention 



1 Seventeenth century, 38s. 2d. the quarter ; eighteenth century, 38s. 7d. 

 the quarter (Arthur Young's Progressive Value of Money, p. 76). 



