54 AGRICULTURAL DEPRESSION 



>/ tural produce in 1891, at the current prices of 189 1, is 

 given as ;^222,9i 5,000. But if prices had remained at the 

 . figures of 1874 the money value of the total produce of 

 ^. 1 89 1 would have been ;^298,997,ooo.^ 



Corn Prices. 



Since 1891 prices have fallen considerably. The 

 later position is strikingly shown in a report of the 

 Norfolk Chamber of Agriculture. Taking the whole 

 production of wheat and barley together, the value of the 

 two crops in 1874 was £4,0^,^,666, from 379,790 acres, 

 and in 1894 was only ^1,279,261 from SS6,y6y acres, 

 taking the prices of October 1894, and allowing for half 

 the barley being unfit for malting, and only used for 

 stock feeding. The value per acre of the two crops 

 averaged in 1874, -^lO 2s ; in 1894, ^3 i6s. This is a 

 drop in gross produce of £6 6s per acre, and a " loss of 

 nearly £6 per head for every man, woman, and child 

 in Norfolk." ^ 



A similar calculation made for Lincolnshire, by Mr 

 Roberts, shows that the average annual value of the 

 total wheat crop in that county, taking the ten years 

 1874-84, was i^2,443,590, while the average for the years 

 1884-94 was only j[ 1,406,46^, a decrease of 42-21 per 

 cent. The corresponding fall for barley alone was 14-06 

 per cent. Taking the total wheat and barley crops 

 together, the average annual values were for 1874-84 

 ;^3.7^9.538, and for 1884-94, ^^2,554,635, a fall of 32-2 

 per cent. Again, taking separately the years 1 874 and 

 1894, and the average produce of those years, viz., m 

 1874, 4| quarters of wheat per acre and 5 quarters of 

 barley, and in 1894 3i quarters of wheat and 3 quarters 

 of saleable barley, and i quarter of " hinderends " at los ; 

 the value of the total crops of wheat and barley together 

 at the prices of the two years was in 1874, i^4,8 15,951, 

 and in 1894 no more than ;^ 1,3 50,929. This shows a 



' Vol. II., Appendix VI. 



* Rew, Norfolk, Appendix, B, I, p. 78. 



