26 2

ON THE RURAL ECONOMY

140 lbs. avoirdupois, the value of which was considered to beadequate to the maintenance of himself and family.

The rate of wages before the Union, was from Sd. to 6d.per day, whilst meal on an average of about twenty-five years,prior to 1696', was 9s .per boll, or 6£d .per peck, so that themost indifferent labourer might earn, (when wages were atthe rate of 5d. per day), as much money as was sufficient topurchase, one year with another, fourteen and a half bolls ofmeal, whilst the better sort might earn nineteen and a halfbolls.

The nominal price of grain has certainly risen considerablywithin the last thirty years); yet, by comparing the prices ofoatmeal in 1792 and 1810, (see Tables F and G), with theprices of labour at these two periods, it will clearly be seen,that the rise in the value of labour, has been far greater thanthe advance upon the price of oatmeal. Thus, according tothe table of the prices of provisions, the average price of apeck of oatmeal, about 1792, was Is. Id. when, according tothe table of the value of labour, the average price of a day’slabour in summer, at the same period was Is. I Ad. correspond-ing nearly to the value of a peck of oatmeal; while in 1810,the average price of a peck of oatmeal, was Is. S-Jd. and theaverage price of a day’s labour is Is. 10|d. which shews, inthe most satisfactory manner, the very great improvement thathas taken place in the lot of the labouring classes throughoutthis part of the united kingdom. In England, it appears, thatthe rate of wages has not risen in proportion to the increasedprice of provisions *. This is probably owing to the effectsof the poor laws, which tend to derange the natural progress

* “ By uniting wheat and provisions in one account, and comparing it withlabour, it appears, that food (in England), has risen, through the last three pe-riods of the eighteenth, and the beginning of the nineteenth centuries, in everycase more than labour.” Mr Arthur Young ’s Inquiry into the progressive va-lue of money in England. See Annals of Agriculture, NO. 270, June 1812.