42 BRITAIN FOR THE BRITON 



people's great source of wealth— agriculture — as the Zealots of 

 Jerusalem, nearly nineteen hundred years ago, brought about 

 the destruction of their country. 



Among other things, anti-Free-traders point to the 

 tremendous loss of agricultural wealth as affording one of 

 many examples of the utter inimicality of Free-trade to 

 national interests. Here is an estimate from the pen of one of 

 our great statisticians — 



Diminution in Owners' capital £1,000,000,000 



„ „ Farmers' „ 100,000,000 



„ „ Farmers' profits 500,000,000 



£1,600,000,000* 



Appalling though this loss is, there has also been far-reach- 

 ing loss, which can only be guessed but hardly estimated, to 

 all who depended upon agriculture for their support — agri- 

 cultural implement makers, mechanics, labourers, harness 

 makers, carpenters, blacksmiths, masons, all of whom have had 

 to leave the rural districts for the urban, and helped to swell 

 the already overcrowded ranks of labour in our centres of 

 population. 



The State then comes in as a great loser, whose tale of 

 losses is counted by many millions annually, and the ultimate 

 result of it all is that the entire burden of our folly or madness 

 falls, as such burdens always must fall, on the ijcople — the 

 working-classes and the tax-payers. 



It is obvious that if a man loses a portion of his capital, his 

 income shrinks generally in exact proportion to the shrinkage 

 of capital, or, to put it in a more concrete form, it is clear that 

 a man trading with £10,000 is sure to derive a larger income 

 from that amount of capital, other things being equal, than he 

 would from £5,000. 



Agricultqkal Wealth — Appalling Losses 



The loss of £1,100,000,000 {eleven hundred millions sterling) 

 in landowners' and farming capital means, at only 4 per cent, 

 profit, an annual loss of income amounting to the colossal sum 

 of £44,000,000 {fortij-four millions sterling) to landlords and 

 farmers alone. The loss of £500,000,000 in farmers' profits is 

 little short of a national disaster. 



The next loss is to the State Exchequer, or in other words — 

 the tax-payers. We all know that if a man be taxed on his 



* Sir (then Mr.) Inglis Palgravc (in a paper read before the Royal Statistical 

 Society in February, 1905). 



