RAPID FALL IN PRICES 319 



cultivated land wide districts, like the rich valley of the Till, which 

 before the period of war prices were wildernesses of underwood. 



Between 1813 and the accession of Queen Victoria falls one of the 

 blackest periods of English farming. Prosperity no longer stimu- 

 lated progress. Except in a few districts, falling prices, dwindling 

 rents, vanishing profits did not even rouse the energy of despair. 

 The growing demoralisation of both employers and employed, which 

 resulted from the administration of the Poor Law, crushed the 

 spirit of agriculturists. " Many horses die while the grass is grow- 

 ing." The men who survived the struggle were rarely the old 

 owners or the old occupiers. They were rather their fortunate 

 successors who entered on the business of land-cultivation on more 

 favourable terms. Prices had begun to fall with the abundant 

 harvest of 1813. The suddenness of the decline is illustrated from 

 the contracts made on behalf of the Royal Navy. At Portsmouth 

 in January, 1813, the price paid for wheat was 123s. 10d., in Novem- 

 ber, 67s. lOd. In February, 1813, at Deptford, flour was contracted 

 for at 100s. 3d. per sack, in November, at 65s. 1 This rapid fall 

 could not at that time have been due to any prospect of peace. 

 It was rather due to over-production, which the House of Commons 

 Committee on the Corn Trade (1814) found to have increased within 

 the last ten years by a fourth. Besides English corn, Scottish and 

 Irish corn were in the market. Since 1806 Irish grain had been 

 admitted into the country free, and it poured into the western 

 counties in considerable quantities. Deficient harvests in 1809-10- 

 11-12 had concealed the potential yield of the increased area under 

 corn ; its full productive power stood revealed by the favourable 

 season of 1813. The two following harvests, 1814 and 1815, were 

 not above the average ; but prices of wheat dropped to 74s. 4d. 

 and 65s. 7d. per quarter respectively. As compared with 1812, 

 the actual receipts of farmers diminished by one hundred millions, 

 and the value of the farming stock was reduced by nearly one- 

 half. The evidence of widespread distress is ample. 2 But it is 



1 Speech of Chas. C. Western, M.P., on moving that the House should resolve 

 itself into a Committee of the Whole House to take into Consideration the Dis- 

 tressed State of the Agriculture of the United Kingdom, March 7, 1816 (Pamph- 

 leteer, vol. vii. p. 608). 



* E.g. 1. A Review of the present Ruined Condition of the Landed and Agri- 

 cultural Interests, etc., by R. Preston, M.P. (1813). 



2. Letters on the Distressed State of Agriculturists, by R. Brown (1816). 



3. Further Observations on the State of the Nation, etc., by R. Preston, M.P. 



(1816). 



