110 THE EFFECTS OF CHAP. xx. 



the community ; which is more copiously and re- 

 gularly supplied with all the products of the soil, 

 and on more advantageous terms, than by any 

 other known system. 



If the mere labourers in agriculture be looked 

 at, it is to be feared that their condition will not 

 appear to have been benefited by the great advance 

 of prices. The rates of wages to day labourers 

 do not seem to have risen in the same proportion 

 as the necessaries of life, and the laws passed 

 under Elizabeth for the relief of the poor are suf- 

 ficient evidence of their wretched condition. It 

 may deserve some slight investigation, not cer- 

 tainly with a view to any benefit to the same class 

 in the present day, whose whole circumstances are 

 so totally different, but to account for the un- 

 doubted fact at the period now under consideration. 



In consequence of the great advance of prices, 

 each cultivator was solicitous to fix on objects 

 whose produce would sell most readily, and for 

 the highest prices. The extension of the woollen 

 manufactory in England, and the great demand 

 for English wool in Flanders, had raised the price 

 of that product at a much greater rate than was 

 experienced in corn and other vegetable substances. 

 The conversion of arable land into sheep walks, 

 which was the common subject of complaint, and 

 forbidden by laws enacted for the purpose, caused 

 a diminution of the demand for labourers, and 

 that in two ways : a flock of sheep required few 



