landholding was triplicate. First, there was a diminution in the
amount of labor applicable to the cultivation of land; second,
there was a decrease in the amount of manure applied to the
production of food; and lastly, there was an increase in the demand
for land as a source of investment, by those who, having made money
in trade, sought that social position which follows the possession
of broad acres. Thus the descendants of the feudal aristocracy were
pushed aside by the modern plutocracy.

This state of things had a double effect. Food is the result of two
essential ingredients--land and labor. The diminution in the amount
of labor applied to the soil, consequent upon the removal of the
laborers from the land, lessened the quantity of food; while the
consumption of that food in cities and towns, and the waste of the
fertile ingredients which should be restored to the soil, tended to
exhaust the land, and led to vast importations of foreign and the
manufacture of mineral manures. I shall not detain you by a
discussion of this aspect of the question, which is of very great
moment, consequent upon the removal of large numbers of people from
rural to urban districts; but I may be excused in saying that
agricultural chemistry shows that the soil--"perpetual man"--
contains the ingredients needful to support human life, and feeding
those animals meant for man's use. These ingredients are seized
upon by the roots of plants and converted into aliment. If they are
consumed where grown, and the refuse restored to the soil, its
fertility is preserved; nay, more, the effect of tillage is to
increase its productive power. It is impossible to exhaust land, no
matter how heavy the crops that are grown, if the produce is, after
consumption, restored to the soil. I have shown you how, in the
reign of Queen Elizabeth, a man was not allowed to sell meat off