AGRICULTURAL REPORT. It should seem from the collective opinions published by those periodicals which are devoted to agriculture, it is at length come to be admitted that the growth of wheat in England and her dependencies is equal to the consumption, a fact of most momentous importance. Of our belief that it is true, the readers of this portion of our miscellany will long since have had abundant reason to be satisfied, and we hope also to judge of the foundations upon which the conclusion has been built. The harvest last year was early, this year it has been late, and though proceeding to a termination with a rapidity almost unexampled, yet if the whole period be embraced, the time between the introduction of the two crops into the market will be found to have been extended at least three weeks; in plainer terms, the agricultural year has been three weeks longer this than last season: yet, in spite of this fact, adding alone a seventeenth part to the consumption of 1834-1835, it is ascertained beyond all doubt that the stocks of wheat in hand are larger than at the commencement of the harvest of 1834. This statement is met by a countervailing circumstance, viz., that from the very short water and little wind, there is far less flour on hand. It will however avail little, for the truth, we repeat, is at length established, that either from the previous displacing of English growth by the foreign, owing to the English dealer holding, while the foreign merchants sold, or from any similarly acting cause, since 1830, whether from better harvests, or the consumption of more meat, potatoes, and other substitutes for bread, which takes place when the working classes are constantly employed and well paid,-whether, we say, from one or all of these causes, it is now not to be questioned that the growth equals, and probably during the last three years of the harvest of 1835 inclusive, has exceeded the demand. That price must be low, is a necessary and indefeasible consequence-how low it may fall it is not so easy to anticipate. All protective laws must be nullified by the effect. The moment it is decided that recourse must be had to exportation,-a thing hardly to be credited after the Government Reporter Mr. Jacob's calculations and prophecies,the foreign price will then have a greater influence than ever on the British markets. Now this is the time for the Government to set seriously about considering the abolition of the Corn-laws. They have been, now are, and must be for an indefinite period inoperative. It should then seem that they might be gotten rid of without wounding the prejudices, much less injuring the property of the landed interest. Let things find their level; the landlord and the tenant have both been long enough the dupes of a system which requires the one to reduce his merely nominal, yet expected income, by returns of from 10 to 25 per cent., and entails upon the other the humiliating alternative of receiving the donative almost as an act of indispensable charity. -ears The accounts of the product of the present harvest vary exceedingly, some representing the crop to be more than an average, others a moderate average, others teeming with broken straw and its consequence,partially ripened, inferior quality, &c. &c., and the long catalogue of complaints by which, from generation to generation, the farmer has sought to delude himself by deceiving others. But we believe from the collective evidence, not less than from personal observation, that the harvest is abundant, the crop well housed, better perhaps than ever was known, and almost entirely completed, except in the very northern districts. Never within the remembrance of man did so little rain fall, or so little interruption attend the process. The harvest began in the midland counties about July 19. New wheats have been in the markets these three weeks, and the old stock, new supply, and forward harvest have all operated to lower the price. It is, however, curious to see how the Mark-lane Reports are 66 made up. On Monday, July 27, " Wheat," they say, "must be quoted 28. lower;" on Aug. 3, "We have had a dull trade, and a reduction of from 28. to 3s. from last Monday's prices." Aug. 10, The wheat trade was heavy, at a reduction of 1s. to 2s. per quarter from last Monday's prices." Here then we have a decline of at least 6s. per quarter; but upon referring to the price-list we perceive the prices range exactly on the last as on the first day, from 36s. to 50s., upon the different sorts and qualities. It is notwithstanding clear that the price has declined and rapidly, and this in spite of short supplies of flour, short water, and failing wind. The prospect is by no means favourable to agriculture. Nor is it so promising to the flock-farmer as it was. There has not been the same, though great, activity in the purchase of wools at the late fairs that might have been expected from the flourishing_state of the trade. A fair has been commenced at Peterborough, where Lord Fitzwilliam presided. In the course of his address to the company assembled, that nobleman said, "Wool has of late been the mainstay of agriculturists; and one cause of the high price of it is the prosperity of the manufacturers, and the other is the diminution in that article, which arose from the serious losses of sheep during 1831, 32, and 33: these are the main causes of wool having been so much higher in proportion to any other article of produce. But now the growth of wool exceeds that of three years ago, because the graziers have reared so many sheep to make up for the losses I have mentioned, and the market is restored to its former state as between demand and supply. I will venture to say, that if the fleeces of this year's clip could be counted, the amount would be more than that of three or four years ago. The manufacturer has his eyes open to all these circumstances which may affect his profits; he takes more means of inquiring into the state of society than the farmer does, and as a proof of this, there is not a manufacturer in Leeds who does not anticipate a reduction in the price of wool, from the information they possess of the increased growth of wool to come into the market; and therefore it is that they bid lower prices." His Lordship's statement accords with the fact, and is well worth the strict attention of the grower. But still it is difficult to account for the activity of the manufactories, except upon a single principle, which is fortunately still, and is likely to continue, in full operation. We entertain the notion that to the abundance of the crops of the European world, arising not alone from auspicious seasons, but even more from the augmented direction of labour to agriculture during so long a period of peace, is owing the employment we are so happy to witness. Barter begins in the exchange of a surplus of food. This surplus, whenever accumulated, finds its way by exchanges for desirable commodities from region to region, extending the circulation of the countries as it goes. Thus, for instance, if the wheat of Poland be exchanged for the wines of Spain or Portugal, in both cases the exchanges may tend to increase in both countries the demand for the merchandise of England, or the tallow of Russia, or West India produce. Add to this spring the increase of the numbers of the people all over the earth, through peace, and a far larger consumption must take place. The resort to England for manufactures is caused by the power and cheapness of producing them, and thus an improved agriculture sets the hand and the machinery of the artisan to work. Such is our theory, and we perceive no other cause equal to the effect. Of one thing we are perfectly satisfied, namely, that if the village-pauper could be elevated into a grower of food (from fresh soil or better cultivation) adequate to his own wants, by so much would the commerce of England increase and multiply beyond its present amount; and this is the principle which all laws for the relief of the unemployed poor ought to recognise and adopt. Relief is no relief to the rate-payer which does not contemplate and include the productive employment of the parties relieved. Sept.-VOL. XLV. NO. CLXXVII. I This brings us to one of the effects of the new Poor-Law. The reader will not probably have forgotten the wretched case of destitution of the labourers at Bledlow and Cranfield, in Buckinghamshire. By the efficient humanity of the rector of the latter parish, the Rev. James Beard, several large families have been sent to Manchester and to Derbyshire, where they have obtained employment at rates which are stated to triple the earnings they could make at home. The benefit is augmented, according to the statements of the men who have written to their late neighbours, extolling in the highest terms the conduct of the master-manufacturers who have taken them into the factories; and they express no less joyfully the superiority of their own condition in every point that concerns their happiness. Surely these facts illustrate the true principle, which is, to give employment. The workhouse, under the system contemplated by the new Poor-Law, ought only, we contend, to be regarded as a place of penal privation for those who will not work, not for those who cannot. It is no more, at best, than a practical expedient-a species of punishment-which never can be generally applied as a mere stimulant to the idle to obtain employment and to follow their occupation. It must fail in all cases where the pauper's character is not of a kind to submit him to such punishment; where a man is thrown out of work for a time, it would be tyranny in its worst sense to compel the poor creature to break up his house, sell his little all, and transfer himself, wife, and children, to the inferior diet, close confinement, and separation of the workhouse, because he cannot maintain himself. The whole then resolves itself into a discretionary power as heretofore, and we confess we do not expect those very fortunate results, affording so great a relief to the landed interest, that the Chancellor of the Exchequer was led to hope in his speech on the opening of the Budget. We observe that his instances are chiefly drawn from the manufacturing unions. Now there never was a time when the activity of these districts gave such a facility for the introduction of such a measure. But it is not the diminished amount of poor-rate that is to be alone regarded. Let us see how the Bill works during the winter-during the slack time of employment in rural labour; let us know the relative proportions of crime now and before the Bill came into operation; let us hear how many complaints there are of petty plundering which escape punishment; let us have an estimate of the inevitable increase of private alms; let us examine how far the tranquillity of the country is preserved. All these are the criteria by which a judgment of the new Poor-Law Bill must be formed. We entertain not the most remote doubt that much, very much, of fraudulent application for relief will be stopped, but we are no less certain, both from theory and experience, that penal regulation will never convert the inveterate idler nor the impudent impostor into a careful and industrious producer of his own subsistence, any more than it can produce employment for those who cannot, under other circumstances, produce it. Never let it be forgotten that the great evil of the country, touching this particular, is the continually-accumulating increase of numbers beyond the area of employment. New space must be added to keep pace with this augmentation; if not, the plunder or relief will only extend itself proportionately in new and different directions. They who cannot live by their own exertions must live upon society, and they will live upon it. Acre But to return to our more immediate subject. There has been no rain for a month, except a very few and partial showers, which scarcely deserve the name. The effect on the turnips is little short of total ruin. after acre is to be seen without a plant, except where the Northumbrian ridge system is adopted, and even there the injury is enormous. The stock of all descriptions are turned in many districts into the second crop of clovers, which by weather and feeding are anticipated and destroyed. Luckily the hay crop was superabundant, or it would be difficult to say how the cattle would be supported during the coming winter, which we hope and trust will partake of the mild character of the two preceding seasons. Game will, there is reason to believe, be in great quantities, unless the drought should continue long enough to fill the partridges and pheasants with vermin, which has been known to happen in particularly dry weather. The poaching began very early where a sufficient vigilance was not observed; but it is probable that the little gain now to be made will gradually drive the marauder from his illicit and ruinous pursuit. It is a fact perfectly authenticated, that three-fourths of the individuals committed to the county jails commence their career of vice by poaching. After the first night they are destroyed-their character is broken down-their habits gradually yield-and they go from step to step till transportation or the gallows end their miserable lives. USEFUL ARTS. Substitute for Indigo.-We look with interest to whatever relates to the extension of the chemical arts of this country, as opening new channels for the exercise of its productive industry, and as so little attention is unfortunately paid to their fosterment through the medium of public societies, so a greater duty devolves upon the public press to distinguish between the meritorious and the meretricious. It is a matter of surprise that the progress of the chemical arts has not hitherto kept pace with that of the mechanical, although the former has lately began to participate in the spirit of improvement. By a substitution of scientific principles for the vague and uncertain directions of the workman, improvement, instead of being a matter of mere fortuity, is now one of greater certainty; alterations and modifications of processes are dictated by a knowledge of the principles which produce the changes in the substance operated on, and instead of remaining a matter of speculative uncertainty, the results may be safely anticipated, whilst the practice of the manufacturer confirm the prediction. Amongst other chemical problems, the improvement of the manufacture of colours has been one that has engaged no ordinary share of attention from scientific as well as practical men for the purpose of producing articles of a greater degree of permanence and brilliance. In dyeing, indigo has heretofore formed the almost exclusive basis of many colours, as blues, blacks, and browns; but in addition to the great expense of this valuable commodity, it has long been considered desirable to substitute for it some mineral substance which, whilst it would be possessed of the greater durability natural to such colours, would not be acted upon in the same manner as the former by heat, light, and a variety of the simplest chemical agents. This substitute, it has been suggested, might be found in Prussian blue, provided some menstruum were discovered capable of dissolving it, which would neither destroy the fibre nor harden the texture of the material. This appears to be realized in the specimens furnished by a company for the introduction of a substitute for indigo, whether judging from the cloth recently dyed, or those which have been long exposed to the influence of those agents which impair the qualities of indigo. Specimens of cloth worn almost threadbare still retain the full brilliancy of the recently dyed cloth. As in this country immense individual resources may at once be brought forward to bear for the furtherance of meritorious designs, the formation of a company for purposes like the present may possibly be viewed with suspicion, but we have seen sufficient to warrant our expressing an opinion favourable to the merits of the invention. We do not see why eventually this substitute for indigo may not form an article of large export, whilst it has the advantage of bringing into use resources which have hitherto proved not only unavailable but obnoxious,-such as refuse animal matters, fish, and even animal dung, extensively used in the manufacture of the prussiate of potash employed in the process. An inhabitant of Sheffield has constructed a beautiful model of a steamengine of an extraordinarily small size. Notwithstanding the weight of the whole, including the fly-wheel, does not exceed two ounces and a half, and its size scarcely exceeds that of a hen's egg, yet the most minute parts are fitted up in a style of the utmost perfection, and the motions are performed with the greatest velocity. BANKRUPTS, FROM JULY 31, тo august 21, 1835, INCLUsive. July 31.-W. ELTON, Basinghall-street, dealer in woollen cloths. J. E. C. BENTLEY, Great Newport-street, Long-acre, dealer in pictures. T. EMMETT, Holborn-hill, pinmaker. W. JONES, Wigmore-street, Maryle-bone, carpenter. F. HIRCHFELD and G. WILKINSON, Windsor terrace, City-road, wax chandlers. J. ALLEN, Bermondsey, brewer. C. SELLEY, Cheltenham, innkeeper. STARLING, Knightwick, Worcestershire, miller. R. W. GOODHALL, Birmingham, florist. W. WRIGHT, Rougham, Norfolk, horse-dealer. R. HAMMOND, Warwick, plumber. C. August 4.-G. PARKER, Higham Ferrers, Northamptonshire, boot and shoe-maker. J. ALRED, Idle, Yorkshire, cloth-manufacturer. J. STELFOX, Manchester, shoedealer. Aug. 7.-B. EAGLETON, Town Malling, Kent, tailor.. J. GREENWOOD, Leeds, music-seller. W. H. HUGHES, Portsmouth, fruit-merchant. T. BEARD, sen., Dursley Cross Inn, Gloucestershire, victualler. T. CROSTON, jun., Liverpool, painter. H. BURDEKIN, Sheffield, table-knife manufacturer. P. BECK, Bolton-le-Moors, Lancashire, grocer. T. FROOD, Plymouth, ironmonger. J. WYATT, Warminster, cabinetmaker. LACE, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, chemist and druggist. J. SCHOFIELD, Moorehouse, Lancashire, woollen-manufacturer. G. BLENKIN and W. SHACKLETON, Kingston-uponHull, merchants. Aug. 14.-R. CLEMENTS, Upper Berkeleystreet West, Connaught-square, bricklayer. J. CANTELLOW, Brownlow-street, Drury-lane, plasterer. E. TAYLOR, Lower-place, near Rochdale, Lancashire, cotton-spinner. R. BATTLEY, South Shields, woollen-draper. S. FRANCEYS, Liverpool, bookseller. J. Aug. 18.-J. HUTTON, Piccadilly, baker. Aug. 21.-J. BAILEY, Elm-street, Gray's Aug. 11.-W. E. LONG, St. John's wharf, Battersea, coal-merchant. E. C. BESSELL, Edward-street, Portman-square, lodginghouse-keeper. E. OTEY, jun., Savagegardens, Trinity-square, Tower-hill, winemerchant. mission-agent. J. LINNET, Austrey, Warwickshire, schoolmaster. R. HUNT, Kingstonupon-Hull, spirit-merchant. G. HOOPER, Downton, Wiltshire, tanner. J. BROOKE, Lincoln, chemist and druggist. W. WAL W. E. WILLIAMSON and E. B. ONSEY, Salford, Lancashire, brewers. W. BLACKLOCK and G. THOMPSON, Chorltonupon-Medlock, Manchester, joiners. H. JOHNSTONE, Sheffield, coach-maker. |