NOTES. 87 



7 The superior influence of the farmer, in promoting national circulation, is 

 as important a discovery in politics, as that of Sir Isaac Newton, who first ascer- 

 tained the principle on which the heavenly bodies circulated, was in astronomy. 

 It is founded on the system of country banking, which ought to be encouraged, and 

 placed on the securest possible footing. Those nations can alone be eminently, 

 and permanently prosperous, whose governments will act upon that system. 



8 It is supposed by some, that the merchants and manufacturers, did not pay 

 so high a proportion of their profits, as was paid out of the incomes of the land- 

 ed interest. But this has always been denied by the parties themselves. 



9 It may be proper to state the amount of the income-tax, an. 1814, the last 

 year that the assessments were imposed, under all its several heads : 



1. Agricultural classes, L.6, 433,475 



2. Commercial classes, 2,000,000 



3. Professional classes, 1,021,187 



4. Tax on houses, .. 1,625,939 



5. Tax on the funds, 3,004,861 



6. Provincial offices, L.188,932 



7. Naval, military, and civil establishment, 924,312 



. 1,113,244 



Total gross amount, L.I 5,1 98,706 



The net produce was, L. 14,545,279, of which foreign commerce did not pro- 

 bably pay half a million. 



10 It is this respectable class of occupiers, who are most to be depended up- 

 on, for the improvement of a country. Small farms, at a low rent, may do 

 without science, but great farms, with a high rent, cannot be carried on success- 

 fully, without the advantages of theoretical knowledge, united to skilful prac- 

 tice. 



11 The 589,374 are those who occupy land ; the 895,998 families include 

 married servants, and labourers employed in husbandry, also agricultural me- 

 chanics, as plough-makers, &c. 



12 It is hardly to be credited, how little the superior importance of agricul- 

 ture, was known to the ministers and statesmen of this country, before a Board 

 of Agriculture was established. Proofs of a circumstance of so extraordinary 

 a nature, will be found in the Appendix. 



13 Mr Curwen justly observes, that our internal or domestic resources have 

 been greatly undervalued and neglected, while the benefits of foreign com- 

 merce have been greatly over-rated, and assiduously protected. This in a 

 great measure may be attributed to a want of knowledge of their substantial 

 interests, on the part of the landed representatives, when opposed in the legis- 

 lative assembly, to the plausible representations, and sagacious adroitness, of 

 commercial members, whenever, or wherever, their immediate or remote in- 

 terests are likely to become affected. There is no species of property in this 

 country, the intrinsic or relative value of which, is so little the study of those 

 to whom it belongs, or the important and latent interests of which, are so little 

 understood or so much neglected, as the surface territory of Great Britain. 

 Curwen' s Report, p. 8. 



14 But if this is bad policy, as it relates to Great Britain, is it not still worse 

 with respect to Ireland, where agriculture is the chief source of wealth, and re- 

 venue ; and where its population is principally supported by the cultivation and 

 produce of the soil ? During the late wars, Ireland was a flourishing country ; 

 her fanners had encouragement to improve and cultivate, and were well paid for 

 their exertions ; and the landed proprietors, had the means of contributing large- 

 ly to the wants of the state, from the ample revenues which they enjoyed. But 

 in the present state of agricultural depression, many branches of the community 

 are either bankrupt, or reduced to distress ; and it does not appear, that any part 

 of it has been benefited. Remarks by Edward liurrouglis, Esq. 



15 The only plausible objection, to a General Bill of Inclosures, is, that it 



