201

arace.

XXXVI.

A WALK OVER.

MR. GIFFEN's brilliant gallop over the statistical course does not prove much. It is somewhat like a walk over for He declares his horse Free Trade is the best horse in the world, but he does not prove it by galloping him over the course alone. If Mr. Giffen wishes to prove to us that the industrial progress of England and Ireland during the last forty years under free trade has been greater than the industrial progress of every other nation under protection, he has only to give us some corresponding statistics relating to France, Germany, Italy, Austria, Belgium, Holland, and America, and we shall be satisfied. Figures, like fire, are good servants and bad masters. Whether Mr. Giffen is master or servant I do not presume to say, but certainly there are many facts, or at any rate ' authoritative statements,' that tell against him.

In Mulhall's Wealth of the World' I read that the increase of property subject to legacy duty in France and England is as follows:

So that whilst England was 10s. per inhabitant richer in 1826, and 198. per inhabitant richer in 1859, she was 58. per inhabitant poorer in 1877. This looks as if the wealth of France had increased more rapidly than the wealth of England.

Again, the consumption of wheat per inhabitant in England and France is stated thus:

So that in forty years the consumption of wheat increased 126lb. per inhabitant in France, and only 53lb. per inhabitant in England. This looks as if the material progress of the people had been greater in France than in England. Again, a correspondent of the Daily News, November 16, says that 'wages in many industries in London are steadily settling down to 1s. a day.' At the same time I read in a recent number of the Revue des Deux Mondes that 'wages in all the industries in Paris have risen from 30 to 60 per cent. in the last ten years.' Again, the increase of commerce between 1868 and 1877

In France there was an increase of 39 per cent. in area under wheat and other cereals between 1863 and 1875. In England there has been a diminution of 25 per cent. in area under wheat in ten years. In Great Britain, on January 1, 1881, there were over 1,000,000 of persons on the books in receipt of parish relief, a number which, according to Mr. Purdy, of the Poor Law Board, represents a total of 3,500,000 applying for parish relief during 1880. Mr. Hoyle argues from this that the whole pauper class of the community-that is to say, those bordering on a state of destitution-in England and Wales is somewhere near 7,000,000! Is this a proof of prosperity? One million of acres, out of a total of 4,000,000 of acres, have gone out of wheat cultivation in England and Wales during the last ten years, and 1,300,000 acres, of which 326,000 acres were in potatoes, have gone out of grain and root

cultivation in Ireland during the last twenty years. Is this a proof of prosperity?

The significance of these figures is apparent when we remember that every acre of wheat grows eight times the amount of human food that an acre of grass does, and employs three times as much labour, and that arable farming will rear and fat three times the number of beasts, and fat them in a year's less time than simple grazing. Mr. Bright says that the agricultural class have lost 200,000,000l. in five years. Lord Granville says the ironmasters have lost 140,000,000l. in a few years. Mr. Smith, M.P. for Liverpool, says the cotton industry, that supports 3,000,000 of people, has only made 5 per cent. profit per annum during the last ten years, and that it has only done this with a strain and wear and tear on the part of those managing that cannot continue. The proprietors of the Wharncliffe Silkstone Colliery say they have made no profit during the last five years. The condition of the silk and woollen industries is deplorable. The value of land and houses has fallen 25 per cent. in the last three years. Who, then, is making all the money?

The Pall Mall Gazette, December 20, 1882, says that 'the only chance for the declining industries of Great Britain is in America adopting free trade.' Lord Derby advises those employed in industries which are not likely soon to revive to emigrate beyond the seas. Mr. Chamberlain and Lord Grey sing seconds to Lord Derby, and advise the operatives to give up 'weak industries' and learn new ones. All this does not read like evidence of great prosperity. It is the same story all through-nothing like leather, only leather doesn't pay.'

Mr. Ashworth, chairman of the Manchester Chamber of Commerce, enumerates France, Spain, Italy, Switzerland, Portugal, Germany, Austria, as negotiating treaties whose purpose and intention is to place English manufacturers at a disadvantage. Mr. Ashworth, apparently, believes in a widespread industrial conspiracy against

6

England—in other words, he believes that foreign nations are 'Boycotting' English manufactures and English operatives. This can scarcely be considered an evidence of prosperous fiscal conditions. Crime,' says Mr. Giffen, 'shows a satisfactory diminution.' This assertion is strange in the face of the fact that the number of summary convictions before magistrates increased from 233.757 in 1859 to 506,281 in 1879! Of this number no less than 52,021 were for assaults-many of the most brutal kind. The poor and police rates together, that is, the cost of controlling pauperism and crime, amounted in 1880 to 16,165,000l., the largest sum ever paid in one year.

"The distribution of wealth increases,' says Mr. Giffen; but figures scarcely support the statement. Fifty years ago there were 281,000 holders of Government stock ; there are now 225,000, a falling off of 25 per cent. Thirty years ago there were in France 1,000,000 holders of Government rentes; there are now 4,000,000. At the same time, every year land is getting into fewer hands, because, with the present low price of produce, the yeoman and small proprietor cannot cultivate it. The 'wealth of a country is the value of what it produces,' we are told. The chief sources of our production are agriculture and manufactures. It is a strange proof of our prosperity that a man should be looked upon as mad who invests his money in agriculture; that the majority of our manufacturers would be happy to retire at once if they could get back their capital, or, indeed, even half of it, and that the shrinkage in the value of manufacturing joint-stock capital during the last few years is estimated at from 25 to 75 per cent. Wheat, Mr. Giffen says, is 10s. a quarter cheaper, and meat 3d. per lb. dearer than it was twenty years ago, and therefore the poor are much better fed. Are they? Taking these figures, and I believe they are correct, what is the profit and loss to each individual from these changes in prices of food? Each adult on the average consumes six bushels of wheat in the year, so that he saves by the fall in the price of wheat 78. 6d. per annum.

On