The Wealth of Nations

F THE AGRICULTURAL SYSTEMS, OR OF
THOSE SYSTEMS OF POLITICAL ECONOMY WHICH REPRESENT THE PRODUCE OF LAND, AS
EITHER THE SOLE OR THE PRINCIPAL SOURCE OF THE REVENUE AND WEALTH OF EVERY
COUNTRY.

The agricultural systems of political economy will not require so long an
explanation as that which I have thought it necessary to bestow upon the
mercantile or commercial system.

That system which represents the produce of land as the sole source of the
revenue and wealth of every country, has so far as I know, never been
adopted by any nation, and it at present exists only in the speculations
of a few men of great learning and ingenuity in France. It would not,
surely, be worth while to examine at great length the errors of a system
which never has done, and probably never will do, any harm in any part of
the world. I shall endeavour to explain, however, as distinctly as I can,
the great outlines of this very ingenious system.

Mr Colbert, the famous minister of Lewis XIV. was a man of probity, of
great industry, and knowledge of detail; of great experience and acuteness
in the examination of public accounts; and of abilities, in short, every
way fitted for introducing method and good order into the collection and
expenditure of the public revenue. That minister had unfortunately
embraced all the prejudices of the mercantile system, in its nature and
essence a system of restraint and regulation, and such as could scarce
fail to be agreeable to a laborious and plodding man of business, who had
been accustomed to regulate the different departments of public offices,
and to establish the necessary checks and controls for confining each to
its proper sphere. The industry and commerce of a great country, he
endeavoured to regulate upon the same model as the departments of a public
office; and instead of allowing every man to pursue his own interest his
own way, upon the liberal plan of equality, liberty, and justice, he
bestowed upon certain branches of industry extraordinary privileges, while
he laid others under as extraordinary restraints. He was not only
disposed, like other European ministers, to encourage more the industry of
the towns than that of the country; but, in order to support the industry
of the towns, he was willing even to depress and keep down that of the
country. In order to render provisions cheap to the inhabitants of the
towns, and thereby to encourage manufactures and foreign commerce, he
prohibited altogether the exportation of corn, and thus excluded the
inhabitants of the country from every foreign market, for by far the most
important part of the produce of their industry. This prohibition, joined
to the restraints imposed by the ancient provincial laws of France upon
the transportation of corn from one province to another, and to the
arbitrary and degrading taxes which are levied upon the cultivators in
almost all the provinces, discouraged and kept down the agriculture of
that country very much below the state to which it would naturally have
risen in so very fertile a soil, and so very happy a climate. This state
of discouragement and depression was felt more or less in every different
part of the country, and many different inquiries were set on foot
concerning the causes of it. One of those causes appeared to be the
preference given, by the institutions of Mr Colbert, to the industry of
the towns above that of the country.

If the rod be bent too much one way, says the proverb, in order to make it
straight, you must bend it as much the other. The French philosophers, who
have proposed the system which represents agriculture as the sole source
of the revenue and wealth of every country, seem to have adopted this
proverbial maxim; and, as in the plan of Mr Colbert, the industry of the
towns was certainly overvalued in comparison with that of the country, so
in their system it seems to be as certainly under-valued.

The different orders of people, who have ever been supposed to contribute
in any respect towards the annual produce of the land and labour of the
country, they divide into three classes. The first is the class of the
proprietors of land. The second is the class of the cultivators, of
farmers and country labourers, whom they honour with the peculiar
appellation of the productive class. The third is the class of artificers,
manufacturers, and merchants, whom they endeavour to degrade by the
humiliating appellation of the barren or unproductive class.

The class of proprietors contributes to the annual produce, by the expense
which they may occasionally lay out upon the improvement of the land, upon
the buildings, drains, inclosures, and other ameliorations, which they may
either make or maintain upon it, and by means of which the cultivators are
enabled, with the same capital, to raise a greater produce, and
consequently to pay a greater rent. This advanced rent may be considered
as the interest or profit due to the proprietor, upon the expense or
capital which he thus employs in the improvement of his land. Such
expenses are in this system called ground expenses (depenses foncieres).

The cultivators or farmers contribute to the annual produce, by what are
in this system called the original and annual expenses (depenses
primitives, et depenses annuelles), which they lay out upon the
cultivation of the land. The original expenses consist in the instruments
of husbandry, in the stock of cattle, in the seed, and in the maintenance
of the farmer’s family, servants, and cattle, during at least a great part
of the first year of his occupancy, or till he can receive some return
from the land. The annual expenses consist in the seed, in the wear and
tear of instruments of husbandry, and in the annual maintenance of the
farmer’s servants and cattle, and of his family too, so far as any part of
them can be considered as servants employed in cultivation. That part of
the produce of the land which remains to him after paying the rent, ought
to be sufficient, first, to replace to him, within a reasonable time, at
least during the term of his occupancy, the whole of his original
expenses, together with the ordinary profits of stock; and, secondly, to
replace to him annually the whole of his annual expenses, together
likewise with the ordinary profits of stock. Those two sorts of expenses
are two capitals which the farmer employs in cultivation; and unless they
are regularly restored to him, together with a reasonable profit, he
cannot carry on his employment upon a level with other employments; but,
from a regard to his own interest, must desert it as soon as possible, and
seek some other. That part of the produce of the land which is thus
necessary for enabling the farmer to continue his business, ought to be
considered as a fund sacred to cultivation, which, if the landlord
violates, he necessarily reduces the produce of his own land, and, in a
few years, not only disables the farmer from paying this racked rent, but
from paying the reasonable rent which he might otherwise have got for his
land. The rent which properly belongs to the landlord, is no more than the
neat produce which remains after paying, in the completest manner, all the
necessary expenses which must be previously laid out, in order to raise
the gross or the whole produce. It is because the labour of the
cultivators, over and above paying completely all those necessary
expenses, affords a neat produce of this kind, that this class of people
are in this system peculiarly distinguished by the honourable appellation
of the productive class. Their original and annual expenses are for the
same reason called, In this system, productive expenses, because, over and
above replacing their own value, they occasion the annual reproduction of
this neat produce.

The ground expenses, as they are called, or what the landlord lays out
upon the improvement of his land, are, in this system, too, honoured with
the appellation of productive expenses. Till the whole of those expenses,
together with the ordinary profits of stock, have been completely repaid
to him by the advanced rent which he gets from his land, that advanced
rent ought to be regarded as sacred and inviolable, both by the church and
by the king; ought to be subject neither to tithe nor to taxation. If it
is otherwise, by discouraging the improvement of land, the church
discourages the future increase of her own tithes, and the king the future
increase of his own taxes. As in a well ordered state of things,
therefore, those ground expenses, over and above reproducing in the
completest manner their own value, occasion likewise, after a certain
time, a reproduction of a neat produce, they are in this system considered
as productive expenses.

The ground expenses of the landlord, however, together with the original
and the annual expenses of the farmer, are the only three sorts of
expenses which in this system are considered as productive. All other
expenses, and all other orders of people, even those who, in the common
apprehensions of men, are regarded as the most productive, are, in this
account of things, represented as altogether barren and unproductive.

Artificers and manufacturers, in particular, whose industry, in the common
apprehensions of men, increases so much the value of the rude produce of
land, are in this system represented as a class of people altogether
barren and unproductive. Their labour, it is said, replaces only the stock
which employs them, together with its ordinary profits. That stock
consists in the materials, tools, and wages, advanced to them by their
employer; and is the fund destined for their employment and maintenance.
Its profits are the fund destined for the maintenance of their employer.
Their employer, as he advances to them the stock of materials, tools, and
wages, necessary for their employment, so he advances to himself what is
necessary for his own maintenance; and this maintenance he generally
proportions to the profit which he expects to make by the price of their
work. Unless its price repays to him the maintenance which he advances to
himself, as well as the materials, tools, and wages, which he advances to
his workmen, it evidently does not repay to him the whole expense which he
lays out upon it. The profits of manufacturing stock, therefore, are not,
like the rent of land, a neat produce which remains after completely
repaying the whole expense which must be laid out in order to obtain them.
The stock of the farmer yields him a profit, as well as that of the master
manufacturer; and it yields a rent likewise to another person, which that
of the master manufacturer does not. The expense, therefore, laid out in
employing and maintaining artificers and manufacturers, does no more than
continue, if one may say so, the existence of its own value, and does not
produce any new value. It is, therefore, altogether a barren and
unproductive expense. The expense, on the contrary, laid out in employing
farmers and country labourers, over and above continuing the existence of
its own value, produces a new value the rent of the landlord. It is,
therefore, a productive expense.

Mercantile stock is equally barren and unproductive with manufacturing
stock. It only continues the existence of its own value, without producing
any new value. Its profits are only the repayment of the maintenance which
its employer advances to himself during the time that he employs it, or
till he receives the returns of it. They are only the repayment of a part
of the expense which must be laid out in employing it.

The labour of artificers and manufacturers never adds any thing to the
value of the whole annual amount of the rude produce of the land. It adds,
indeed, greatly to the value of some particular parts of it. But the
consumption which, in the mean time, it occasions of other parts, is
precisely equal to the value which it adds to those parts; so that the
value of the whole amount is not, at any one moment of time, in the least
augmented by it. The person who works the lace of a pair of fine ruffles
for example, will sometimes raise the value of, perhaps, a pennyworth of
flax to £30 sterling. But though, at first sight, he appears thereby to
multiply the value of a part of the rude produce about seven thousand and
two hundred times, he in reality adds nothing to the value of the whole
annual amount of the rude produce. The working of that lace costs him,
perhaps, two years labour. The £30 which he gets for it when it is
finished, is no more than the repayment of the subsistence which he
advances to himself during the two years that he is employed about it. The
value which, by every day’s, month’s, or year’s labour, he adds to the
flax, does no more than replace the value of his own consumption during
that day, month, or year. At no moment of time, therefore, does he add any
thing to the value of the whole annual amount of the rude produce of the
land: the portion of that produce which he is continually consuming, being
always equal to the value which he is continually producing. The extreme
poverty of the greater part of the persons employed in this expensive,
though trifling manufacture, may satisfy us that the price of their work
does not, in ordinary cases, exceed the value of their subsistence. It is
otherwise with the work of farmers and country labourers. The rent of the
landlord is a value which, in ordinary cases, it is continually producing
over and above replacing, in the most complete manner, the whole
consumption, the whole expense laid out upon the employment and
maintenance both of the workmen and of their employer.

Artificers, manufacturers, and merchants, can augment the revenue and
wealth of their society by parsimony only; or, as it is expressed in this
system, by privation, that is, by depriving themselves of a part of the
funds destined for their own subsistence. They annually reproduce nothing
but those funds. Unless, therefore, they annually save some part of them,
unless they annually deprive themselves of the enjoyment of some part of
them, the revenue and wealth of their society can never be, in the
smallest degree, augmented by means of their industry. Farmers and country
labourers, on the contrary, may enjoy completely the whole funds destined
for their own subsistence, and yet augment, at the same time, the revenue
and wealth of their society. Over and above what is destined for their own
subsistence, their industry annually affords a neat produce, of which the
augmentation necessarily augments the revenue and wealth of their society.
Nations, therefore, which, like France or England, consist in a great
measure, of proprietors and cultivators, can be enriched by industry and
enjoyment. Nations, on the contrary, which, like Holland and Hamburgh, are
composed chiefly of merchants, artificers, and manufacturers, can grow
rich only through parsimony and privation. As the interest of nations so
differently circumstanced is very different, so is likewise the common
character of the people. In those of the former kind, liberality,
frankness, and good fellowship, naturally make a part of their common
character; in the latter, narrowness, meanness, and a selfish disposition,
averse to all social pleasure and enjoyment.

The unproductive class, that of merchants, artificers, and manufacturers,
is maintained and employed altogether at the expense of the two other
classes, of that of proprietors, and of that of cultivators. They furnish
it both with the materials of its work, and with the fund of its
subsistence, with the corn and cattle which it consumes while it is
employed about that work. The proprietors and cultivators finally pay both
the wages of all the workmen of the unproductive class, and the profits of
all their employers. Those workmen and their employers are properly the
servants of the proprietors and cultivators. They are only servants who
work without doors, as menial servants work within. Both the one and the
other, however, are equally maintained at the expense of the same masters.
The labour of both is equally unproductive. It adds nothing to the value
of the sum total of the rude produce of the land. Instead of increasing
the value of that sum total, it is a charge and expense which must be paid
out of it.

The unproductive class, however, is not only useful, but greatly useful,
to the other two classes. By means of the industry of merchants,
artificers, and manufacturers, the proprietors and cultivators can
purchase both the foreign goods and the manufactured produce of their own
country, which they have occasion for, with the produce of a much smaller
quantity of their own labour, than what they would be obliged to employ,
if they were to attempt, in an awkward and unskilful manner, either to
import the one, or to make the other, for their own use. By means of the
unproductive class, the cultivators are delivered from many cares, which
would otherwise distract their attention from the cultivation of land. The
superiority of produce, which in consequence of this undivided attention,
they are enabled to raise, is fully sufficient to pay the whole expense
which the maintenance and employment of the unproductive class costs
either the proprietors or themselves. The industry of merchants,
artificers, and manufacturers, though in its own nature altogether
unproductive, yet contributes in this manner indirectly to increase the
produce of the land. It increases the productive powers of productive
labour, by leaving it at liberty to confine itself to its proper
employment, the cultivation of land; and the plough goes frequently the
easier and the better, by means of the labour of the man whose business is
most remote from the plough.

It can never be the interest of the proprietors and cultivators, to
restrain or to discourage, in any respect, the industry of merchants,
artificers, and manufacturers. The greater the liberty which this
unproductive class enjoys, the greater will be the competition in all the
different trades which compose it, and the cheaper will the other two
classes be supplied, both with foreign goods and with the manufactured
produce of their own country.

It can never be the interest of the unproductive class to oppress the
other two classes. It is the surplus produce of the land, or what remains
after deducting the maintenance, first of the cultivators, and afterwards
of the proprietors, that maintains and employs the unproductive class. The
greater this surplus, the greater must likewise be the maintenance and
employment of that class. The establishment of perfect justice, of perfect
liberty, and of perfect equality, is the very simple secret which most
effectually secures the highest degree of prosperity to all the three
classes.

The merchants, artificers, and manufacturers of those mercantile states,
which, like Holland and Hamburgh, consist chiefly of this unproductive
class, are in the same manner maintained and employed altogether at the
expense of the proprietors and cultivators of land. The only difference
is, that those proprietors and cultivators are, the greater part of them,
placed at a most inconvenient distance from the merchants, artificers, and
manufacturers, whom they supply with the materials of their work and the
fund of their subsistence; are the inhabitants of other countries, and the
subjects of other governments.

Such mercantile states, however, are not only useful, but greatly useful,
to the inhabitants of those other countries. They fill up, in some
measure, a very important void; and supply the place of the merchants,
artificers, and manufacturers, whom the inhabitants of those countries
ought to find at home, but whom, from some defect in their policy, they do
not find at home.

It can never be the interest of those landed nations, if I may call them
so, to discourage or distress the industry of such mercantile states, by
imposing high duties upon their trade, or upon the commodities which they
furnish. Such duties, by rendering those commodities dearer, could serve
only to sink the real value of the surplus produce of their own land, with
which, or, what comes to the same thing, with the price of which those
commodities are purchased. Such duties could only serve to discourage the
increase of that surplus produce, and consequently the improvement and
cultivation of their own land. The most effectual expedient, on the
contrary, for raising the value of that surplus produce, for encouraging
its increase, and consequently the improvement and cultivation of their
own land, would be to allow the most perfect freedom to the trade of all
such mercantile nations.

This perfect freedom of trade would even be the most effectual expedient
for supplying them, in due time, with all the artificers, manufacturers,
and merchants, whom they wanted at home; and for filling up, in the
properest and most advantageous manner, that very important void which
they felt there.

The continual increase of the surplus produce of their land would, in due
time, create a greater capital than what would be employed with the
ordinary rate of profit in the improvement and cultivation of land; and
the surplus part of it would naturally turn itself to the employment of
artificers and manufacturers, at home. But these artificers and
manufacturers, finding at home both the materials of their work and the
fund of their subsistence, might immediately, even with much less art and
skill be able to work as cheap as the little artificers and manufacturers
of such mercantile states, who had both to bring from a greater distance.
Even though, from want of art and skill, they might not for some time be
able to work as cheap, yet, finding a market at home, they might be able
to sell their work there as cheap as that of the artificers and
manufacturers of such mercantile states, which could not be brought to
that market but from so great a distance; and as their art and skill
improved, they would soon be able to sell it cheaper. The artificers and
manufacturers of such mercantile states, therefore, would immediately be
rivalled in the market of those landed nations, and soon after undersold
and justled out of it altogether. The cheapness of the manufactures of
those landed nations, in consequence of the gradual improvements of art
and skill, would, in due time, extend their sale beyond the home market,
and carry them to many foreign markets, from which they would, in the same
manner, gradually justle out many of the manufacturers of such mercantile
nations.

This continual increase, both of the rude and manufactured produce of
those landed nations, would, in due time, create a greater capital than
could, with the ordinary rate of profit, be employed either in agriculture
or in manufactures. The surplus of this capital would naturally turn
itself to foreign trade and be employed in exporting, to foreign
countries, such parts of the rude and manufactured produce of its own
country, as exceeded the demand of the home market. In the exportation of
the produce of their own country, the merchants of a landed nation would
have an advantage of the same kind over those of mercantile nations, which
its artificers and manufacturers had over the artificers and manufacturers
of such nations; the advantage of finding at home that cargo, and those
stores and provisions, which the others were obliged to seek for at a
distance. With inferior art and skill in navigation, therefore, they would
be able to sell that cargo as cheap in foreign markets as the merchants of
such mercantile nations; and with equal art and skill they would be able
to sell it cheaper. They would soon, therefore, rival those mercantile
nations in this branch of foreign trade, and, in due time, would justle
them out of it altogether.

According to this liberal and generous system, therefore, the most
advantageous method in which a landed nation can raise up artificers,
manufacturers, and merchants of its own, is to grant the most perfect
freedom of trade to the artificers, manufacturers, and merchants of all
other nations. It thereby raises the value of the surplus produce of its
own land, of which the continual increase gradually establishes a fund,
which, in due time, necessarily raises up all the artificers,
manufacturers, and merchants, whom it has occasion for.

When a landed nation on the contrary, oppresses, either by high duties or
by prohibitions, the trade of foreign nations, it necessarily hurts its
own interest in two different ways. First, by raising the price of all
foreign goods, and of all sorts of manufactures, it necessarily sinks the
real value of the surplus produce of its own land, with which, or, what
comes to the same thing, with the price of which, it purchases those
foreign goods and manufactures. Secondly, by giving a sort of monopoly of
the home market to its own merchants, artificers, and manufacturers, it
raises the rate of mercantile and manufacturing profit, in proportion to
that of agricultural profit; and, consequently, either draws from
agriculture a part of the capital which had before been employed in it, or
hinders from going to it a part of what would otherwise have gone to it.
This policy, therefore, discourages agriculture in two different ways;
first, by sinking the real value of its produce, and thereby lowering the
rate of its profits; and, secondly, by raising the rate of profit in all
other employments. Agriculture is rendered less advantageous, and trade
and manufactures more advantageous, than they otherwise would be; and
every man is tempted by his own interest to turn, as much as he can, both
his capital and his industry from the former to the latter employments.

Though, by this oppressive policy, a landed nation should be able to raise
up artificers, manufacturers, and merchants of its own, somewhat sooner
than it could do by the freedom of trade; a matter, however, which is not
a little doubtful; yet it would raise them up, if one may say so,
prematurely, and before it was perfectly ripe for them. By raising up too
hastily one species of industry, it would depress another more valuable
species of industry. By raising up too hastily a species of industry which
duly replaces the stock which employs it, together with the ordinary
profit, it would depress a species of industry which, over and above
replacing that stock, with its profit, affords likewise a neat produce, a
free rent to the landlord. It would depress productive labour, by
encouraging too hastily that labour which is altogether barren and
unproductive.

In what manner, according to this system, the sum total of the annual
produce of the land is distributed among the three classes above
mentioned, and in what manner the labour of the unproductive class does no
more than replace the value of its own consumption, without increasing in
any respect the value of that sum total, is represented by Mr Quesnai, the
very ingenious and profound author of this system, in some arithmetical
formularies. The first of these formularies, which, by way of eminence, he
peculiarly distinguishes by the name of the Economical Table, represents
the manner in which he supposes this distribution takes place, in a state
of the most perfect liberty, and, therefore, of the highest prosperity; in
a state where the annual produce is such as to afford the greatest
possible neat produce, and where each class enjoys its proper share of the
whole annual produce. Some subsequent formularies represent the manner in
which he supposes this distribution is made in different states of
restraint and regulation; in which, either the class of proprietors, or
the barren and unproductive class, is more favoured than the class of
cultivators; and in which either the one or the other encroaches, more or
less, upon the share which ought properly to belong to this productive
class. Every such encroachment, every violation of that natural
distribution, which the most perfect liberty would establish, must,
according to this system, necessarily degrade, more or less, from one year
to another, the value and sum total of the annual produce, and must
necessarily occasion a gradual declension in the real wealth and revenue
of the society; a declension, of which the progress must be quicker or
slower, according to the degree of this encroachment, according as that
natural distribution, which the most perfect liberty would establish, is
more or less violated. Those subsequent formularies represent the
different degrees of declension which, according to this system,
correspond to the different degrees in which this natural distribution of
things is violated.

Some speculative physicians seem to have imagined that the health of the
human body could be preserved only by a certain precise regimen of diet
and exercise, of which every, the smallest violation, necessarily
occasioned some degree of disease or disorder proportionate to the degree
of the violation. Experience, however, would seem to shew, that the human
body frequently preserves, to all appearance at least, the most perfect
state of health under a vast variety of different regimens; even under
some which are generally believed to be very far from being perfectly
wholesome. But the healthful state of the human body, it would seem,
contains in itself some unknown principle of preservation, capable either
of preventing or of correcting, in many respects, the bad effects even of
a very faulty regimen. Mr Quesnai, who was himself a physician, and a very
speculative physician, seems to have entertained a notion of the same kind
concerning the political body, and to have imagined that it would thrive
and prosper only under a certain precise regimen, the exact regimen of
perfect liberty and perfect justice. He seems not to have considered, that
in the political body, the natural effort which every man is continually
making to better his own condition, is a principle of preservation capable
of preventing and correcting, in many respects, the bad effects of a
political economy, in some degree both partial and oppressive. Such a
political economy, though it no doubt retards more or less, is not always
capable of stopping altogether, the natural progress of a nation towards
wealth and prosperity, and still less of making it go backwards. If a
nation could not prosper without the enjoyment of perfect liberty and
perfect justice, there is not in the world a nation which could ever have
prospered. In the political body, however, the wisdom of nature has
fortunately made ample provision for remedying many of the bad effects of
the folly and injustice of man; it the same manner as it has done in the
natural body, for remedying those of his sloth and intemperance.

The capital error of this system, however, seems to lie in its
representing the class of artificers, manufacturers, and merchants, as
altogether barren and unproductive. The following observations may serve
to shew the impropriety of this representation:—

First, this class, it is acknowledged, reproduces annually the value of
its own annual consumption, and continues, at least, the existence of the
stock or capital which maintains and employs it. But, upon this account
alone, the denomination of barren or unproductive should seem to be very
improperly applied to it. We should not call a marriage barren or
unproductive, though it produced only a son and a daughter, to replace the
father and mother, and though it did not increase the number of the human
species, but only continued it as it was before. Farmers and country
labourers, indeed, over and above the stock which maintains and employs
them, reproduce annually a neat produce, a free rent to the landlord. As a
marriage which affords three children is certainly more productive than
one which affords only two, so the labour of farmers and country labourers
is certainly more productive than that of merchants, artificers, and
manufacturers. The superior produce of the one class, however, does not,
render the other barren or unproductive.

Secondly, it seems, on this account, altogether improper to consider
artificers, manufacturers, and merchants, in the same light as menial
servants. The labour of menial servants does not continue the existence of
the fund which maintains and employs them. Their maintenance and
employment is altogether at the expense of their masters, and the work
which they perform is not of a nature to repay that expense. That work
consists in services which perish generally in the very instant of their
performance, and does not fix or realize itself in any vendible commodity,
which can replace the value of their wages and maintenance. The labour, on
the contrary, of artificers, manufacturers, and merchants, naturally does
fix and realize itself in some such vendible commodity. It is upon this
account that, in the chapter in which I treat of productive and
unproductive labour, I have classed artificers, manufacturers, and
merchants among the productive labourers, and menial servants among the
barren or unproductive.

Thirdly, it seems, upon every supposition, improper to say, that the
labour of artificers, manufacturers, and merchants, does not increase the
real revenue of the society. Though we should suppose, for example, as it
seems to be supposed in this system, that the value of the daily, monthly,
and yearly consumption of this class was exactly equal to that of its
daily, monthly, and yearly production; yet it would not from thence
follow, that its labour added nothing to the real revenue, to the real
value of the annual produce of the land and labour of the society. An
artificer, for example, who, in the first six months after harvest,
executes ten pounds worth of work, though he should, in the same time,
consume ten pounds worth of corn and other necessaries, yet really adds
the value of ten pounds to the annual produce of the land and labour of
the society. While he has been consuming a half-yearly revenue of ten
pounds worth of corn and other necessaries, he has produced an equal value
of work, capable of purchasing, either to himself, or to some other
person, an equal half-yearly revenue. The value, therefore, of what has
been consumed and produced during these six months, is equal, not to ten,
but to twenty pounds. It is possible, indeed, that no more than ten pounds
worth of this value may ever have existed at any one moment of time. But
if the ten pounds worth of corn and other necessaries which were consumed
by the artificer, had been consumed by a soldier, or by a menial servant,
the value of that part of the annual produce which existed at the end of
the six months, would have been ten pounds less than it actually is in
consequence of the labour of the artificer. Though the value of what the
artificer produces, therefore, should not, at any one moment of time, be
supposed greater than the value he consumes, yet, at every moment of time,
the actually existing value of goods in the market is, in consequence of
what he produces, greater than it otherwise would be.

When the patrons of this system assert, that the consumption of
artificers, manufacturers, and merchants, is equal to the value of what
they produce, they probably mean no more than that their revenue, or the
fund destined for their consumption, is equal to it. But if they had
expressed themselves more accurately, and only asserted, that the revenue
of this class was equal to the value of what they produced, it might
readily have occurred to the reader, that what would naturally be saved
out of this revenue, must necessarily increase more or less the real
wealth of the society. In order, therefore, to make out something like an
argument, it was necessary that they should express themselves as they
have done; and this argument, even supposing things actually were as it
seems to presume them to be, turns out to be a very inconclusive one.

Fourthly, farmers and country labourers can no more augment, without
parsimony, the real revenue, the annual produce of the land and labour of
their society, than artificers, manufacturers, and merchants. The annual
produce of the land and labour of any society can be augmented only in two
ways; either, first, by some improvement in the productive powers of the
useful labour actually maintained within it; or, secondly, by some
increase in the quantity of that labour.

The improvement in the productive powers of useful labour depends, first,
upon the improvement in the ability of the workman; and, secondly, upon
that of the machinery with which he works. But the labour of artificers
and manufacturers, as it is capable of being more subdivided, and the
labour of each workman reduced to a greater simplicity of operation, than
that of farmers and country labourers; so it is likewise capable of both
these sorts of improvement in a much higher degree {See book i chap. 1.}
In this respect, therefore, the class of cultivators can have no sort of
advantage over that of artificers and manufacturers.

The increase in the quantity of useful labour actually employed within any
society must depend altogether upon the increase of the capital which
employs it; and the increase of that capital, again, must be exactly equal
to the amount of the savings from the revenue, either of the particular
persons who manage and direct the employment of that capital, or of some
other persons, who lend it to them. If merchants, artificers, and
manufacturers are, as this system seems to suppose, naturally more
inclined to parsimony and saving than proprietors and cultivators, they
are, so far, more likely to augment the quantity of useful labour employed
within their society, and consequently to increase its real revenue, the
annual produce of its land and labour.

Fifthly and lastly, though the revenue of the inhabitants of every country
was supposed to consist altogether, as this system seems to suppose, in
the quantity of subsistence which their industry could procure to them;
yet, even upon this supposition, the revenue of a trading and
manufacturing country must, other things being equal, always be much
greater than that of one without trade or manufactures. By means of trade
and manufactures, a greater quantity of subsistence can be annually
imported into a particular country, than what its own lands, in the actual
state of their cultivation, could afford. The inhabitants of a town,
though they frequently possess no lands of their own, yet draw to
themselves, by their industry, such a quantity of the rude produce of the
lands of other people, as supplies them, not only with the materials of
their work, but with the fund of their subsistence. What a town always is
with regard to the country in its neighbourhood, one independent state or
country may frequently be with regard to other independent states or
countries. It is thus that Holland draws a great part of its subsistence
from other countries; live cattle from Holstein and Jutland, and corn from
almost all the different countries of Europe. A small quantity of
manufactured produce, purchases a great quantity of rude produce. A
trading and manufacturing country, therefore, naturally purchases, with a
small part of its manufactured produce, a great part of the rude produce
of other countries; while, on the contrary, a country without trade and
manufactures is generally obliged to purchase, at the expense of a great
part of its rude produce, a very small part of the manufactured produce of
other countries. The one exports what can subsist and accommodate but a
very few, and imports the subsistence and accommodation of a great number.
The other exports the accommodation and subsistence of a great number, and
imports that of a very few only. The inhabitants of the one must always
enjoy a much greater quantity of subsistence than what their own lands, in
the actual state of their cultivation, could afford. The inhabitants of
the other must always enjoy a much smaller quantity.

This system, however, with all its imperfections, is perhaps the nearest
approximation to the truth that has yet been published upon the subject of
political economy; and is upon that account, well worth the consideration
of every man who wishes to examine with attention the principles of that
very important science. Though in representing the labour which is
employed upon land as the only productive labour, the notions which it
inculcates are, perhaps, too narrow and confined; yet in representing the
wealth of nations as consisting, not in the unconsumable riches of money,
but in the consumable goods annually reproduced by the labour of the
society, and in representing perfect liberty as the only effectual
expedient for rendering this annual reproduction the greatest possible,
its doctrine seems to be in every respect as just as it is generous and
liberal. Its followers are very numerous; and as men are fond of
paradoxes, and of appearing to understand what surpasses the
comprehensions of ordinary people, the paradox which it maintains,
concerning the unproductive nature of manufacturing labour, has not,
perhaps, contributed a little to increase the number of its admirers. They
have for some years past made a pretty considerable sect, distinguished in
the French republic of letters by the name of the Economists. Their works
have certainly been of some service to their country; not only by bringing
into general discussion, many subjects which had never been well examined
before, but by influencing, in some measure, the public administration in
favour of agriculture. It has been in consequence of their
representations, accordingly, that the agriculture of France has been
delivered from several of the oppressions which it before laboured under.
The term, during which such a lease can be granted, as will be valid
against every future purchaser or proprietor of the land, has been
prolonged from nine to twenty-seven years. The ancient provincial
restraints upon the transportation of corn from one province of the
kingdom to another, have been entirely taken away; and the liberty of
exporting it to all foreign countries, has been established as the common
law of the kingdom in all ordinary cases. This sect, in their works, which
are very numerous, and which treat not only of what is properly called
Political Economy, or of the nature and causes or the wealth of nations,
but of every other branch of the system of civil government, all follow
implicitly, and without any sensible variation, the doctrine of Mr
Qttesnai. There is, upon this account, little variety in the greater part
of their works. The most distinct and best connected account of this
doctrine is to be found in a little book written by Mr Mercier de la
Riviere, some time intendant of Martinico, entitled, The natural and
essential Order of Political Societies. The admiration of this whole sect
for their master, who was himself a man of the greatest modesty and
simplicity, is not inferior to that of any of the ancient philosophers for
the founders of their respective systems. ‘There have been since the world
began,’ says a very diligent and respectable author, the Marquis de
Mirabeau, ‘three great inventions which have principally given stability
to political societies, independent of many other inventions which have
enriched and adorned them. The first is the invention of writing, which
alone gives human nature the power of transmitting, without alteration,
its laws, its contracts, its annals, and its discoveries. The second is
the invention of money, which binds together all the relations between
civilized societies. The third is the economical table, the result of the
other two, which completes them both by perfecting their object; the great
discovery of our age, but of which our posterity will reap the benefit.’

As the political economy of the nations of modern Europe has been more
favourable to manufactures and foreign trade, the industry of the towns,
than to agriculture, the industry of the country; so that of other nations
has followed a different plan, and has been more favourable to agriculture
than to manufactures and foreign trade.

The policy of China favours agriculture more than all other employments.
In China, the condition of a labourer is said to be as much superior to
that of an artificer, as in most parts of Europe that of an artificer is
to that of a labourer. In China, the great ambition of every man is to get
possession of a little bit of land, either in property or in lease; and
leases are there said to be granted upon very moderate terms, and to be
sufficiently secured to the lessees. The Chinese have little respect for
foreign trade. Your beggarly commerce! was the language in which the
mandarins of Pekin used to talk to Mr De Lange, the Russian envoy,
concerning it {See the Journal of Mr De Lange, in Bell’s Travels, vol.
ii. p. 258, 276, 293.}. Except with Japan, the Chinese carry on,
themselves, and in their own bottoms, little or no foreign trade; and it
is only into one or two ports of their kingdom that they even admit the
ships of foreign nations. Foreign trade, therefore, is, in China, every
way confined within a much narrower circle than that to which it would
naturally extend itself, if more freedom was allowed to it, either in
their own ships, or in those of foreign nations.

Manufactures, as in a small bulk they frequently contain a great value,
and can upon that account be transported at less expense from one country
to another than most parts of rude produce, are, in almost all countries,
the principal support of foreign trade. In countries, besides, less
extensive, and less favourably circumstanced for inferior commerce than
China, they generally require the support of foreign trade. Without an
extensive foreign market, they could not well flourish, either in
countries so moderately extensive as to afford but a narrow home market,
or in countries where the communication between one province and another
was so difficult, as to render it impossible for the goods of any
particular place to enjoy the whole of that home market which the country
could afford. The perfection of manufacturing industry, it must be
remembered, depends altogether upon the division of labour; and the degree
to which the division of labour can be introduced into any manufacture, is
necessarily regulated, it has already been shewn, by the extent of the
market. But the great extent of the empire of China, the vast multitude of
its inhabitants, the variety of climate, and consequently of productions
in its different provinces, and the easy communication by means of
water-carriage between the greater part of them, render the home market of
that country of so great extent, as to be alone sufficient to support very
great manufactures, and to admit of very considerable subdivisions of
labour. The home market of China is, perhaps, in extent, not much inferior
to the market of all the different countries of Europe put together. A
more extensive foreign trade, however, which to this great home market
added the foreign market of all the rest of the world, especially if any
considerable part of this trade was carried on in Chinese ships, could
scarce fail to increase very much the manufactures of China, and to
improve very much the productive powers of its manufacturing industry. By
a more extensive navigation, the Chinese would naturally learn the art of
using and constructing, themselves, all the different machines made use of
in other countries, as well as the other improvements of art and industry
which are practised in all the different parts of the world. Upon their
present plan, they have little opportunity of improving themselves by the
example of any other nation, except that of the Japanese.

The policy of ancient Egypt, too, and that of the Gentoo government of
Indostan, seem to have favoured agriculture more than all other
employments.

Both in ancient Egypt and Indostan, the whole body of the people was
divided into different casts or tribes each of which was confined, from
father to son, to a particular employment, or class of employments. The
son of a priest was necessarily a priest; the son of a soldier, a soldier;
the son of a labourer, a labourer; the son of a weaver, a weaver; the son
of a tailor, a tailor, etc. In both countries, the cast of the priests
holds the highest rank, and that of the soldiers the next; and in both
countries the cast of the farmers and labourers was superior to the casts
of merchants and manufacturers.

The government of both countries was particularly attentive to the
interest of agriculture. The works constructed by the ancient sovereigns
of Egypt, for the proper distribution of the waters of the Nile, were
famous in antiquity, and the ruined remains of some of them are still the
admiration of travellers. Those of the same kind which were constructed by
the ancient sovereigns of Indostan, for the proper distribution of the
waters of the Ganges, as well as of many other rivers, though they have
been less celebrated, seem to have been equally great. Both countries,
accordingly, though subject occasionally to dearths, have been famous for
their great fertility. Though both were extremely populous, yet, in years
of moderate plenty, they were both able to export great quantities of
grain to their neighbours.

The ancient Egyptians had a superstitious aversion to the sea; and as the
Gentoo religion does not permit its followers to light a fire, nor
consequently to dress any victuals, upon the water, it, in effect,
prohibits them from all distant sea voyages. Both the Egyptians and
Indians must have depended almost altogether upon the navigation of other
nations for the exportation of their surplus produce; and this dependency,
as it must have confined the market, so it must have discouraged the
increase of this surplus produce. It must have discouraged, too, the
increase of the manufactured produce, more than that of the rude produce.
Manufactures require a much more extensive market than the most important
parts of the rude produce of the land. A single shoemaker will make more
than 300 pairs of shoes in the year; and his own family will not, perhaps,
wear out six pairs. Unless, therefore, he has the custom of, at least, 50
such families as his own, he cannot dispose of the whole product of his
own labour. The most numerous class of artificers will seldom, in a large
country, make more than one in 50, or one in a 100, of the whole number of
families contained in it. But in such large countries, as France and
England, the number of people employed in agriculture has, by some authors
been computed at a half, by others at a third and by no author that I know
of, at less that a fifth of the whole inhabitants of the country. But as
the produce of the agriculture of both France and England is, the far
greater part of it, consumed at home, each person employed in it must,
according to these computations, require little more than the custom of
one, two, or, at most, of four such families as his own, in order to
dispose of the whole produce of his own labour. Agriculture, therefore,
can support itself under the discouragement of a confined market much
better than manufactures. In both ancient Egypt and Indostan, indeed, the
confinement of the foreign market was in some measure compensated by the
conveniency of many inland navigations, which opened, in the most
advantageous manner, the whole extent of the home market to every part of
the produce of every different district of those countries. The great
extent of Indostan, too, rendered the home market of that country very
great, and sufficient to support a great variety of manufactures. But the
small extent of ancient Egypt, which was never equal to England, must at
all times, have rendered the home market of that country too narrow for
supporting any great variety of manufactures. Bengal accordingly, the
province of Indostan which commonly exports the greatest quantity of rice,
has always been more remarkable for the exportation of a great variety of
manufactures, than for that of its grain. Ancient Egypt, on the contrary,
though it exported some manufactures, fine linen in particular, as well as
some other goods, was always most distinguished for its great exportation
of grain. It was long the granary of the Roman empire.

The sovereigns of China, of ancient Egypt, and of the different kingdoms
into which Indostan has, at different times, been divided, have always
derived the whole, or by far the most considerable part, of their revenue,
from some sort of land tax or land rent. This land tax, or land rent, like
the tithe in Europe, consisted in a certain proportion, a fifth, it is
said, of the produce of the land, which was either delivered in kind, or
paid in money, according to a certain valuation, and which, therefore,
varied from year to year, according to all the variations of the produce.
It was natural, therefore, that the sovereigns of those countries should
be particularly attentive to the interests of agriculture, upon the
prosperity or declension of which immediately depended the yearly increase
or diminution of their own revenue.

The policy of the ancient republics of Greece, and that of Rome, though it
honoured agriculture more than manufactures or foreign trade, yet seems
rather to have discouraged the latter employments, than to have given any
direct or intentional encouragement to the former. In several of the
ancient states of Greece, foreign trade was prohibited altogether; and in
several others, the employments of artificers and manufacturers were
considered as hurtful to the strength and agility of the human body, as
rendering it incapable of those habits which their military and gymnastic
exercises endeavoured to form in it, and as thereby disqualifying it, more
or less, for undergoing the fatigues and encountering the dangers of war.
Such occupations were considered as fit only for slaves, and the free
citizens of the states were prohibited from exercising them. Even in those
states where no such prohibition took place, as in Rome and Athens, the
great body of the people were in effect excluded from all the trades which
are now commonly exercised by the lower sort of the inhabitants of towns.
Such trades were, at Athens and Rome, all occupied by the slaves of the
rich, who exercised them for the benefit of their masters, whose wealth,
power, and protection, made it almost impossible for a poor freeman to
find a market for his work, when it came into competition with that of the
slaves of the rich. Slaves, however, are very seldom inventive; and all
the most important improvements, either in machinery, or in the
arrangement and distribution of work, which facilitate and abridge labour
have been the discoveries of freemen. Should a slave propose any
improvement of this kind, his master would be very apt to consider the
proposal as the suggestion of laziness, and of a desire to save his own
labour at the master’s expense. The poor slave, instead of reward would
probably meet with much abuse, perhaps with some punishment. In the
manufactures carried on by slaves, therefore, more labour must generally
have been employed to execute the same quantity of work, than in those
carried on by freemen. The work of the farmer must, upon that account,
generally have been dearer than that of the latter. The Hungarian mines,
it is remarked by Mr Montesquieu, though not richer, have always been
wrought with less expense, and therefore with more profit, than the
Turkish mines in their neighbourhood. The Turkish mines are wrought by
slaves; and the arms of those slaves are the only machines which the Turks
have ever thought of employing. The Hungarian mines are wrought by
freemen, who employ a great deal of machinery, by which they facilitate
and abridge their own labour. From the very little that is known about the
price of manufactures in the times of the Greeks and Romans, it would
appear that those of the finer sort were excessively dear. Silk sold for
its weight in gold. It was not, indeed, in those times an European
manufacture; and as it was all brought from the East Indies, the distance
of the carriage may in some measure account for the greatness of the
price. The price, however, which a lady, it is said, would sometimes pay
for a piece of very fine linen, seems to have been equally extravagant;
and as linen was always either an European, or at farthest, an Egyptian
manufacture, this high price can be accounted for only by the great
expense of the labour which must have been employed about It, and the
expense of this labour again could arise from nothing but the awkwardness
of the machinery which is made use of. The price of fine woollens, too,
though not quite so extravagant, seems, however, to have been much above
that of the present times. Some cloths, we are told by Pliny {Plin. 1.
ix.c.39.}, dyed in a particular manner, cost a hundred denarii, or
£3:6s:8d. the pound weight. Others, dyed in another manner, cost a
thousand denarii the pound weight, or £33:6s:8d. The Roman pound, it must
be remembered, contained only twelve of our avoirdupois ounces. This high
price, indeed, seems to have been principally owing to the dye. But had
not the cloths themselves been much dearer than any which are made in the
present times, so very expensive a dye would not probably have been
bestowed upon them. The disproportion would have been too great between
the value of the accessory and that of the principal. The price mentioned
by the same author {Plin. 1. viii.c.48.}, of some triclinaria, a sort of
woollen pillows or cushions made use of to lean upon as they reclined upon
their couches at table, passes all credibility; some of them being said to
have cost more than £30,000, others more than £300,000. This high price,
too, is not said to have arisen from the dye. In the dress of the people
of fashion of both sexes, there seems to have been much less variety, it
is observed by Dr Arbuthnot, in ancient than in modern times; and the
very little variety which we find in that of the ancient statues, confirms
his observation. He infers from this, that their dress must, upon the
whole, have been cheaper than ours; but the conclusion does not seem to
follow. When the expense of fashionable dress is very great, the variety
must be very small. But when, by the improvements in the productive powers
of manufacturing art and industry, the expense of any one dress comes to
be very moderate, the variety will naturally be very great. The rich, not
being able to distinguish themselves by the expense of any one dress, will
naturally endeavour to do so by the multitude and variety of their
dresses.

The greatest and most important branch of the commerce of every nation, it
has already been observed, is that which is carried on between the
inhabitants of the town and those of the country. The inhabitants of the
town draw from the country the rude produce, which constitutes both the
materials of their work and the fund of their subsistence; and they pay
for this rude produce, by sending back to the country a certain portion of
it manufactured and prepared for immediate use. The trade which is carried
on between these two different sets of people, consists ultimately in a
certain quantity of rude produce exchanged for a certain quantity of
manufactured produce. The dearer the latter, therefore, the cheaper the
former; and whatever tends in any country to raise the price of
manufactured produce, tends to lower that of the rude produce of the land,
and thereby to discourage agriculture. The smaller the quantity of
manufactured produce, which any given quantity of rude produce, or, what
comes to the same thing, which the price of any given quantity of rude
produce, is capable of purchasing, the smaller the exchangeable value of
that given quantity of rude produce; the smaller the encouragement which
either the landlord has to increase its quantity by improving, or the
farmer by cultivating the land. Whatever, besides, tends to diminish in
any country the number of artificers and manufacturers, tends to diminish
the home market, the most important of all markets, for the rude produce
of the land, and thereby still further to discourage agriculture.

Those systems, therefore, which preferring agriculture to all other
employments, in order to promote it, impose restraints upon manufactures
and foreign trade, act contrary to the very end which they propose, and
indirectly discourage that very species of industry which they mean to
promote. They are so far, perhaps, more inconsistent than even the
mercantile system. That system, by encouraging manufactures and foreign
trade more than agriculture, turns a certain portion of the capital of the
society, from supporting a more advantageous, to support a less
advantageous species of industry. But still it really, and in the end,
encourages that species of industry which it means to promote. Those
agricultural systems, on the contrary, really, and in the end, discourage
their own favourite species of industry.

It is thus that every system which endeavours, either, by extraordinary
encouragements to draw towards a particular species of industry a greater
share of the capital of the society than what would naturally go to it,
or, by extraordinary restraints, to force from a particular species of
industry some share of the capital which would otherwise be employed in
it, is, in reality, subversive of the great purpose which it means to
promote. It retards, instead of accelerating the progress of the society
towards real wealth and greatness; and diminishes, instead of increasing,
the real value of the annual produce of its land and labour.

All systems, either of preference or of restraint, therefore, being thus
completely taken away, the obvious and simple system of natural liberty
establishes itself of its own accord. Every man, as long as he does not
violate the laws of justice, is left perfectly free to pursue his own
interest his own way, and to bring both his industry and capital into
competition with those of any other man, or order of men. The sovereign is
completely discharged from a duty, in the attempting to perform which he
must always be exposed to innumerable delusions, and for the proper
performance of which, no human wisdom or knowledge could ever be
sufficient; the duty of superintending the industry of private people, and
of directing it towards the employments most suitable to the interests of
the society. According to the system of natural liberty, the sovereign has
only three duties to attend to; three duties of great importance, indeed,
but plain and intelligible to common understandings: first, the duty of
protecting the society from the violence and invasion of other independent
societies; secondly, the duty of protecting, as far as possible, every
member of the society from the injustice or oppression of every other
member of it, or the duty of establishing an exact administration of
justice; and, thirdly, the duty of erecting and maintaining certain public
works, and certain public institutions, which it can never be for the
interest of any individual, or small number of individuals to erect and
maintain; because the profit could never repay the expense to any
individual, or small number of individuals, though it may frequently do
much more than repay it to a great society.

The proper performance of those several duties of the sovereign
necessarily supposes a certain expense; and this expense again necessarily
requires a certain revenue to support it. In the following book,
therefore, I shall endeavour to explain, first, what are the necessary
expenses of the sovereign or commonwealth; and which of those expenses
ought to be defrayed by the general contribution of the whole society; and
which of them, by that of some particular part only, or of some particular
members of the society: secondly, what are the different methods in which
the whole society may be made to contribute towards defraying the expenses
incumbent on the whole society; and what are the principal advantages and
inconveniencies of each of those methods: and thirdly, what are the
reasons and causes which have induced almost all modern governments to
mortgage some part of this revenue, or to contract debts; and what have
been the effects of those debts upon the real wealth, the annual produce
of the land and labour of the society. The following book, therefore, will
naturally be divided into three chapters.

APPENDIX TO BOOK IV

The two following accounts are subjoined, in order to illustrate and
confirm what is said in the fifth chapter of the fourth book, concerning
the Tonnage Bounty to the Whit-herring Fishery. The reader, I believe, may
depend upon the accuracy of both accounts.

An account of Busses fitted out in Scotland for eleven Years, with the
Number of empty Barrels carried out, and the Number of Barrels of Herrings
caught; also the Bounty, at a Medium, on each Barrel of Sea-sricks, and on
each Barrel when fully packed.

Years Number of Empty Barrels Barrels of Her- Bounty paid on
Busses carried out rings caught the Busses
£. s. d.
1771 29 5,948 2,832 2,885 0 0
1772 168 41,316 22,237 11,055 7 6
1773 190 42,333 42,055 12,510 8 6
1774 240 59,303 56,365 26,932 2 6
1775 275 69,144 52,879 19,315 15 0
1776 294 76,329 51,863 21,290 7 6
1777 240 62,679 43,313 17,592 2 6
1778 220 56,390 40,958 16,316 2 6
1779 206 55,194 29,367 15,287 0 0
1780 181 48,315 19,885 13,445 12 6
1781 135 33,992 16,593 9,613 15 6

Totals 2,186 550,943 378,347 £165,463 14 0

Sea-sticks 378,347 Bounty, at a medium, for each
barrel of sea-sticks, £ 0 8 2¼
But a barrel of sea-sticks
being only reckoned two thirds
of a barrel fully packed, one
third to be deducted, which
⅓ deducted 126,115 brings the bounty to £ 0 12 3¾
Barrels fully
packed 252,231

And if the herrings are exported, there is besides a
premium of £ 0 2 8
So the bounty paid by government in money for each
barrel is £ 0 14 11¾

But if to this, the duty of the salt usually taken
credit for as expended in curing each barrel, which
at a medium, is, of foreign, one bushel and one-
fourth of a bushel, at 10s. a-bushel, be added, viz 0 12 6
the bounty on each barrel would amount to £ 1 7 5¾

If the herrings are cured with British salt, it will
stand thus, viz.
Bounty as before £ 0 14 11¾
But if to this bounty, the duty on two bushels of
Scotch salt, at 1s.6d. per bushel, supposed to be
the quantity, at a medium, used in curing each
barrel is added, viz. 0 3 0
The bounty on each barrel will amount to £ 0 17 11¾

And when buss herrings are entered for home
consumption in Scotland, and pay the shilling a
barrel of duty, the bounty stands thus, to wit,
as before £ 0 12 3¾
From which the shilling a barrel is to be deducted 0 1 0
£ 0 11 3¾

But to that there is to be added again, the duty of
the foreign salt used curing a barrel of herring viz 0 12 6
So that the premium allowed for each barrel of her-
rings entered for home consumption is £ 1 3 9¾

If the herrings are cured in British salt, it will
stand as follows viz.
Bounty on each barrel brought in by the busses, as
above £ 0 12 3¾
From which deduct 1s. a-barrel, paid at the time
they are entered for home consumption 0 1 0
£ 0 11 3¾

But if to the bounty, the the duty on two bushel
of Scotch salt, at 1s.6d. per bushel supposed to
be the quantity, at a medium, used in curing each
barrel, is added, viz 0 3 0
the premium for each barrel entered for home
consumption will be £ 1 14 3¾

Though the loss of duties upon herrings exported cannot, perhaps, properly
be considered as bounty, that upon herrings entered for home consumption
certainly may.

An account of the Quantity of Foreign Salt imported into Scotland, and of
Scotch Salt delivered Duty-free from the Works there, for the Fishery,
from the 5th. of April 1771 to the 5th. of April 1782 with the Medium of
both for one Year.

Foreign Salt Scotch Salt delivered
PERIOD imported from the Works
Bushels Bushels

From 5th. April 1771 to
5th. April 1782 936,974 168,226
Medium for one year 85,159½ 15,293¼

It is to be observed, that the bushel of foreign salt weighs 48lbs., that
of British weighs 56lbs. only.

BOOK V.
OF THE REVENUE OF THE SOVEREIGN OR COMMONWEALTH