70 THE MURDER OF AGRICULTURE 



our own countrymen. We do not grudge foreign peoples 

 that measure of success and prosperity which the wiser 

 fiscal laws of their country enable them to enjoy, but we 

 bitterly resent the continuance of inept fiscal laws in our 

 own country, which serve only to limit the success of the 

 British people and deprive them of that prosperity in 

 which it is their right to participate. 



The consideration of this part of the question might 

 be suitably closed by the following extract from the 

 Report : 



" Whilst proceeding from town to town in this busy 

 and prosperous district of the German Empire, we have 

 been forced to face the fact that it has been during the 

 period following upon the introduction of protection 

 duties by Prince Bismarck, in 1879, that Germany has 

 ceased to be poor and has become well-to-do; that her 

 workpeople have received a large increase in wages ; that 

 the general social condition of the latter has improved; 

 that Germany's industry has developed; that she has 

 succeeded in extending her foreign trade and in acquir- 

 ing ready markets for her continuously developing 

 industry. 



" We showed in our report about Essen, that in that 

 district wages had increased by 61 per cent, since 1871, 

 and by 267 per cent, as compared with what they were 

 seventy years ago." 



