Letter to the Right Honourable Lord Viscount Melbourne on the Cause of the Higher Average Price of Grain in Britain than on the the Continent

I shall now proceed to state a few facts taken from Mr Jacob's report, which prove the very reverse to be the truth. I may begin by observing, that to any one who has travelled over the north of Germany or Poland, any argument to prove that poorer land is cultivated in these countries than in Britain is superfluous – the general aspect of these countries being that of a sandy desert. Mr Jacob states, that the land in Prussia is cultivated by a class of persons in some respects slaves, and, in most respects, but little removed from that state; and that there is no class in this country with whom their condition can be compared. He states, that the average return of wheat, oats, barley, and rye, is four for one – in Britain the same average is, at least, eight for one. He states, that the stock of sheep and cattle, in proportion to the surface, will be at least four times greater in Britain than in Prussia. In a country such as Britain, maintaining four times the number of cattle, and giving double the return of grain per acre, it is rather too much to assume, without even an attempt at inquiry, that an immense extent of poor and unprofitable land is cultivated. The cultivation of poorer land in Britain than in other countries, being the key-stone of the arch on which such a mass of argument rests, it seems most strange that no attempt should ever have been made to establish the fact. The higher price of grain may so clearly be produced by other causes besides monopoly, and the consequent cultivation of poorer land, that the abolitionists were bound to prove monopoly to be the sole agent. So far from doing this, many of their own champions admit the force of other causes, as being most efficient in maintaining the higher averages of grain in Britain. Colonel Torrance, who, I believe, is considered a high authority with the abolitionists, states, that if, by taxing our land, we increase the expense of growing corn at home beyond the expense of producing it in other countries, our prices will be higher than theirs. In this opinion I fully agree with Colonel Torrance, though I do as decidedly differ in an opinion he states immediately preceding that above quoted, where he asserts that the happiest consequences follow from leaving importation free. When what he terms artificial sterility is produced by the pressure of taxation on the land, the Colonel does not explain, in his elaborate work, how, if the cause of higher price is taxation, the same amount of taxation is to be paid by the land, when the value of its produce is reduced from the effects of importation. But even if we admit that a great reduction in the value of the agricultural produce in Britain would not make it more difficult to collect the immense revenue required by this country, still the debt is considered to press with sufficient weight on the energies of the country as it is. As a permanent reduction in the value of the agricultural produce of Britain would give the national creditor the power to purchase a much larger quantity of it than he now enjoys, to that extent it would increase the pressure of the debt, by adding most materially to its real value. In short, the British labourer consumes, or has the power of consuming, at least double the quantity of wheat that a Prussian or Polish labourer has. The soil of Britain, in proportion to its cultivated surface, produces double the quantity of grain, and maintains four times the number of cattle that is maintained by the land in Prussia or Poland. Taxation is admitted by all to raise the money price of grain; and, according to Colonel Torrance, taxation will even produce artificial sterility in land. The amount of the population engaged in British agriculture is less in proportion to the amount engaged in trade and manufactures than in any country in the world, yet this small proportion of the people of Britain raises a larger supply of food for the whole population than is enjoyed by any nation of similar magnitude: the whole population consume, or has the power of consuming, double the quantity of food that the Poles or Prussians have.