ENGLISH CORN-LAWS. 61 



Hull, from Wallachia, the cost of which in England was but 50 cents a bushel ; 

 while in the Baltimore market it is now selling at from 85 to 90 cents. 



Now, be it remembered that to get wheat or flour to tide-water, from the 

 foot of the mountain region of wheat-growing in this country, costs more than 

 the freight from Germany to England ; but, leaving every one to calculate for 

 himself, according to circumstances, the cost of transportation from the farmer 

 to the port of shipment, he has then to add, according to present prices, 375 cents 

 a barrel for freight to Liverpool. And, while the German laborer lives on his 

 pumpernickel in Europe (and nearly so in this country, from force of habit), even 

 the Virginia negro-laborer (to say nothing of his numerous non-producing at- 

 taches) gets 2k to 32 pounds of fat bacon and meal at pleasure, with an aver- 

 age of as much milk, and vegetables, and fish, besides, as serve to make up the 

 entire subsistence (except the pumpernickel) of German, English, and Irish com- 

 mon FIELD-LABORERS. 



In Westphalia, as has been seen, this low diet supplies the table " as well ot 

 the rich as the poor" — showing how rigid, there, is the habit — we had almost 

 said the instinct — of economy ! 



Now, Heaven forbid that the American farmer should ever be brought to live 

 on pumpernickel ! But do not these stubborn facts show how hard it must be 

 to keep from sinking, in the effort to make grain in this country, with our hab- 

 its — especially Avith slave labor, where the non-producing mouths bear a larger 

 proportion to the producing hands than in other branches of rural, especially in 

 planting, industry ? And, again, do not these facts go to show that the repeal 

 of the English corn-laws is not likely to prove that universal panacea for low 

 prices and hard times which wheat-growers may have been inclined to hope for ? 

 What, then, says the anxious, and, it may be, impatient reader, is to be done? 

 And that is precisely what we, as his friend, and the enemy of the mountebanks 

 and demagogues who are ever ready to deceive and plunder him, would like our- 

 selves to know and be able to advise. 



The question seems at once to suggest the inquiry whether there must not be 

 some radical defect in the policy and spirit of legislation, under which the land- 

 ed interest languishes for want of reward, while all other trades that live on it 

 flourish and prosper ? If this were not the case, why is it that the young men 

 of the country are so eager to get into oflices — to get military commissions — to 

 learn mechanical trades, and to flock to the cities for employment ? Look at the 

 diflerence in the wages of labor in the towns and the country. While in the 

 country the white laborer, through all New-England, rises at 4 in the morning, 

 and works until dark, making fifteen hours a day, for $10 or $12 a month, the 

 town mechanic — even the street-sweeper — gets his $1 to $2 a day, under the 

 " ten hour system " .' 



But this is of itself a subject worthy of, and shall receive, separate discussion. 

 There is at least no danger of being wrong in recommending the farmer to study 

 how he can best and most safely multiply and diversify his crops and sources of 

 income. Let him not for ever drag on listlessly in the old downward path. — 

 There must be a coimnencement to all reforms — to all revolutions and changes in 

 our courses of industry and objects of cultivation ; and he evinces the most sagacity 

 who soonest turns his attention and adapts his labor to those new objects which 

 changes in the relations of supply and demand indicate to be the most profitable. 



Let the farmer, therefore, rouse himself to a habit of ihuikinq. Let him make 

 himself, by reading, and by an active and honorable spirit of inquiry, familiar 



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