420 
debts, provided the party is but in pof- 
feffion of property to command fuch cir-, 
culation. Inattention to this fubject pro- 
duced one of the fundamental errors in 
Paine’s work upon finance—z pamphlet 
that may be regarded as a phenomenon: in 
the hemifphere of difeuffion, inafmuch as 
it arrives at a concluifion which ts truth tt- 
Self; by premifes, almoft every one of 
which are palpably erroneous. Havin 
ealculated the quantity of ‘bullion fup- 
pofed to be in the bank, he fuppofes this. 
to be the fum total of the dividend it can 
make to its creditors, not confidering that 
if it had no other property than the mo- 
ney in its coffers, banking muft always 
have been a lofing game; and that if it 
has fuch other property, this muft bring 
back into thefe coffers to-morrow, &c. 
part, at leaft, of the money it pays out 
to-day. Similar is the error of your cor- 
refpondent CARACTACUS (p.266). “If 
the national debt is to be difcharged, 
through what circulating medium fhall 
we difcharge it? Not by the paper, large 
as it is, now in circulation, much lefs 
by the fpecie; nor, indeed, by both 
united.”” And why not? In this very 
paffage, where he talks fo much about 
circulation, the writer forgets that any 
fuch precefs as circulation exifts. The 
queftion, in reality, ftands thus: Is all 
the property of the-nation equivalent in 
value to the amount of the national debt ? 
If fo, and the proprietors are difpofed to 
pay it, the debt may be as eafily, though 
not quite fo quickly, difcharged,byacircu- 
- lating medium of 500]. as of 500,000,000; 
for the medium muft, of neceflity, return 
to the proprietors as often as they want 
it, till the commodities themfelves are 
exhaufted. The difficulty of difcharging 
the national debt, then, arifes from a very 
different reaton than the want of a medium 
of exchange. 
Wafte Lands. — Your. correfpondent 
AGRICOLA (p. 269) fays, “* There is no 
fand, either im Scotland or England, 
which has its furfaze at all covered with 
herbage, that ought not to afford at leaft 
fixpence an acre, in the year, to the land- 
ford.”?) I fubmit the following queftions 
to his confideration:—Can there be, in 
common juitice or common fenfe, any 
fuch thing as property inland, but that 
which. arifes from the improvement of 
labour and cultivation? Is it expedient 
either for individuals or the community 
at large, that ene man who will not cul- 
tivate fhould preclude another who would ? 
_ On what pretence, then, fhould any land-. 
lord exa&t even fixpence a year per acre 
Circulating Medium. —Wafte Lands. 
for wafle land? Would it not be a de. 
firable thing that an a& thould be pafied, 
that upon all waftes, the cultivation: of 
which fhould not at leaft be commenced by 
@ time fpecified, any perfons (under cer- 
tain regulations for prevention of tumult 
and contention) fhould be permitted to 
take poffeffion of a fpecific quantity (four 
or five acres for example) for a given 
number of years, or fer lifey wpon con- 
dition of building a cottage, and bringing 
the ground into immediate cultivation ; 
the wafte ground in the parith or diftriét, 
to be let out again in the fame fmall 
lots at moderate! rents, and the produce 
to form a fund for the education of the 
children of hufbandmen, cottagers, &c. > 
This laft idea was fugeelted to my 
mind by @ circumftance of which I was 
witnefs during a late vifit to Hereford. 
Walking on the caftle-hilk with an inha- 
bitant aclat city, he direéted my atten- 
tion to one of the neighbouring hills; now 
in a ftate of high cultivation even to the 
furnmit, informing me at the fame time, 
that when the eftate firft came into poi- 
feflion of the prefent proprietor, the whole 
hill was a perfe&t wildernefs; and that 
the means he had adopted to bring it m- 
to its prefent ftate, was to build feveral 
{mall cottages at convenient diftances, 
and let them out to labouring men, on 
leafes of twelve or fourteen years, at very 
moderate rents, together with as much 
furrounding land as the cottager would 
undertake to cultivate.. By this means a 
benefit has been conferred upon feveral 
poor families and upon the public; and a 
confiderable reverfionary property has been 
in a manner created to the proprietor and 
his family. Among the Welfh moun- 
tains many little patches are to be met 
with, that have all the appearanee of hav- 
ing been brought into cultivation in a 
way not much diflimilar: and even) at 
this inftant, through the branches of my 
orchard, I perceive the fmoke rifing from 
a little cottage on the brow of one’ of 
thofe rude eminences’ that over-hang the 
Wye, in happy illuftration of my fubject. 
The venerable: labourer, whofe evening’s 
mefs is now preparing on that {pot, pei- 
fefles about ten or twelve acres around his 
humble fhed, including his garden: and 
his orchard, which he holds under three 
different lords of manors, for the term of 
his wife's life, at the moderate rent of 
feven fhillings a year to each. ‘Phere he 
keeps his cow, and his four or five fheep; 
and did keep, til very lately, his little 
rugged Weiflr poney; on which: he rode 
to his work of a morning, &e. But the 
Welih 
