2S 1
Upon the whole, it is indisputable, that, according to thePresent rate of labour,—of all the commodities which thecultivator must purchase,—and of rents and taxes, wheat can-Uot be raised upon the best clays and dry soils of Scotland ,below 11 s., and that its cost may vary from that to 12 s. andupwards, per bushel, according to the greater or less fertility ofthe seasons. Of this the proprietor’s share appears to be a littlemore than one-third, on an average of both kinds of soils. Ifthis is the real cost of a bushel of wheat to the cultivator onthe best soils, under all the advantages of two-horse ploughsand threshing-mills, in aid of what is found by long experienceto be the most productive mode of cultivation, namely, con-vertible husbandry, and, on dry soils, alternate crops of grainand clover or turnips, it must be evident that the produceof inferior soils, and of all land imperfectly cultivated, or onwhich the labour is performed by unnecessarily expensiveteams, must be obtained at a much higher rate.
Though there is much arable land in Scotland upon whichwheat cannot be cultivated with advantage, yet, as the priceof wheat is understood to regulate the price of all other kindsof grain, it was thought sufficient to confine these calcula-tions to such soils as produce this crop. Where the soil andclimate do not permit the growth of wheat, the expence ofcultivation must render barley or big, and oats, still more un-profitable, according to the present importation rates, unlessrents are very low, and the soil is enriched by long intervalsof pasturage,—which, indeed, in all such situations, must everbe the primary object—If the farmer of better soils has not areasonable security for obtaining such prices for corn, as shallreplace his expences with the fair profits of trade, he mustalso lay his land to grass, and leave the supply of the Bri-
°f the clover stubbles to be sown with oats, and of the turnip land with barley.As the same rent is charged as for clay land, the wheat and oats are estimatedto yield the same number of bushels. By this means the difference in the ex-igence of cultivation will he more apparent.