between the two statements, but this supposition makes the
increase of population since the Revolution to have been very
slow in comparison with the increase of wealth.

That the produce of the land has been decreasing, or even
that it has been absolutely stationary during the last century,
few will be disposed to believe. The enclosure of commons and
waste lands certainly tends to increase the food of the country,
but it has been asserted with confidence that the enclosure of
common fields has frequently had a contrary effect, and that
large tracts of land which formerly produced great quantities of
corn, by being converted into pasture both employ fewer hands and
feed fewer mouths than before their enclosure. It is, indeed, an
acknowledged truth, that pasture land produces a smaller quantity
of human subsistence than corn land of the same natural
fertility, and could it be clearly ascertained that from the
increased demand for butchers' meat of the best quality, and its
increased price in consequence, a greater quantity of good land
has annually been employed in grazing, the diminution of human
subsistence, which this circumstance would occasion, might have
counterbalanced the advantages derived from the enclosure of
waste lands, and the general improvements in husbandry.

It scarcely need be remarked that the high price of butchers'
meat at present, and its low price formerly, were not caused by
the scarcity in the one case or the plenty in the other, but by
the different expense sustained at the different periods, in
preparing cattle for the market. It is, however, possible, that
there might have been more cattle a hundred years ago in the
country than at present; but no doubt can be entertained, that