148 RURAL ECONOMY OF ENGLAND. 



rotation made its greatest conquests, the doctrines of 

 Bakewell and Arthur Young received a more general 

 application, and large proprietors, such as the Duke 

 of Bedford, Lord Leicester, and many others, were so 

 greatly benefited by their large estates. 



Scotland and Ireland did not share an equal prosperity 

 in 1798, because they were less well governed. Pitt 

 estimated the wealth of Scotland at an eighth of that of 

 England. As the Highlands ought to be taken at 

 scarcely anything in this calculation, this wou]d give an 

 average for the Lowlands of 7s. for the rent, and 4s. for 

 profit per acre ; but in fact Scotland has not enjoyed 

 much order and liberty except for the last fifty years. 

 When treating of Ireland, we shall be better able to 

 judge of the consequences due to the absence of liberty 

 and security. 



It is perfectly evident, then, that both in France and 

 England agricultural development has followed in the 

 train of good government. The rural change which took 

 place in France between 1760 and 1848, had already 

 taken place in England between 1650 and 1800; the 

 producing causes in both cases were the same. The dif- 

 ference between England under the Stuarts and in the 

 time of Pitt, is the same as that of France under Louis 

 XV. and Louis Philippe. But this does not apply to 

 France and England alone. In ancient as well as in 

 modern times, agricultural prosperity came and went 

 with the mode of government. Eepublican Eome culti- 

 vated its fields admirably; enslaved Eome neglected 

 them. Spain, during the middle ages, did wonders in 

 cultivation, while the Spain of Philip II. ceased to work. 

 Switzerland and Holland fertilise rugged mountains and 

 hopeless marshes ; the Sicilian starves on the most fertile 



