488 THE NATURE AND CAUSES OF

When the government, in order to remedy the inconveni-encies of a dearth, orders all the dealers to sell their corn atwhat it supposes a reasonable price, it either hinders themfrom bringing it to market, which may sometimes producea famine even in the beginning of the season; or if theybring it thither, it enables the people, and thereby encou-rages them to consume it so fast, as must necessarily producea famine before the end of the season. The unlimited, un-restrained freedom of the corn trade, as it is the only effectualpreventive of the miseries of a famine, so it is the best palli-ative of the inconveniences of a dearth; for the inconveni-encies of a real scarcity cannot be remedied; they can onlybe palliated. No trade deserves more the full protection ofthe law, and no trade requires it so much ; because no tradeis so much exposed to popular odium.

In years of scarcity the inferior ranks of people imputetheir distress to the avarice of the corn merchant, who be-comes the object of their hatred and indignation. Instead ofmaking profit upon such occasions, therefore, he is often indanger of being utterly ruined, and of having his magazinesplundered and destroyed by their violence. It is in years ofscarcity, however, when prices are high, that the corn mer-chant expects to make his principal profit. He is generallyin contract with some farmers to furnish him for a certainnumber of years with a certain quantity of corn at a certainprice. This contract price is settled according to what issupposed to be the moderate and reasonable, that is, the or-dinary or average price, which, before the late years of scar-city, was commonly about cight-and-tvventy shillings for thequarter of wheat, andfor that of other grain in proportion. Inyears of scarcity, therefore, the corn merchant buys a greatpart of his corn for the ordinary price, and sells it for a muchhigher. That this extraordinary profit, however, is no morethan sufficient to put his trade upon a fair level with othertrades, and to compensate the many losses which he sustainsupon other occasions, both from the perishable nature of thecommodity itself, and from the frequent and unforeseen fluc-tuations of its price, seems evident enough, from this singlecircumstance, that great fortunes are seldom made in this asin any other trade. The popular odium, however, which at-tends it in years of scarcity, the only years in which it can bevery profitable, renders people of character and fortune averseto enter into it. It is abandoned to an inferior set of dealers;