HOW BRITISH AGRICULTURE WAS DESTROYED 15 



its way into foreign countries that to-day Great Britain receives 

 about £100,000,000 annually in interest on her foreign 

 investments. 



Agkiculture Incompatible with growth of Population 



It was contended that the maintenance of Great Britain as 

 a self- siippor ting country was altogether incompatible with the 

 growth of her population, and that if agriculture were persisted 

 in as a gi"eat national industry, " her population must have 

 remained smaller," while her resources in other industrial 

 directions could not have been utilised. 



It is now claimed for the British system that the statistics 

 of wealth, commerce, savings, and rates of wages, as also of 

 revenue and the expansion of the staple trades of the country, 

 offer, in themselves, irrefutable evidence of the enormous bene- 

 fits of Free-trade ; and we are constantly reminded that these 

 benefits, together with that inconceivable standard of comfort 

 now enjoyed by a free people, could not possibly have been 

 secured by other means. British trade, which aggregated but 

 £160,000,000 in 1845, reached the enormous sum of £738,000,000 

 in 189G, and this instance of progressive commercial expansion 

 is held to offer indubitable proof of the phenomenal and peculiar 

 advantages which attach to the Free-trade system. 



Coupled with the great trade expansion which the country 

 has experienced since the late Queen Victoria ascended the 

 throne, the enormous development of the railway system of 

 Great Britain is claimed as one of the results of Free-trade. It 

 is pointed out that while in 1845 there were but 2400 miles 

 laid down, fifty years later this had been increased to upwards 

 of 21,000 miles. Then the increase in the mineral wealth of 

 the country is also said to be due to the adoption of the new 

 conditions of trade which came in after the repeal of the Corn 

 Laws, coal and iron being especially cited in support of the con- 

 tention. The capitalised wealth of the country, which has risen 

 from about £400,000,000 in 1840 to over £1,100,000,000 in 

 1896, is next cited as one of the results of Free-trade ; while 

 the value of house property, which has increased about fourfold 

 during the same period, is also pointed out as another of the 

 results of Great Britain's unique economic system. 



Cricket and Football as a Kesult of Free-trade 



Tlie increase in Savings Banks deposits, which advanced 

 from £24,000,000 in 1841 to £176,000,000 in 1897, offers, it is 

 said, proof of the thrift of the working classes and evidence of 



