of corn, and which occasion the differences in this price, so
observable in different countries.

I have no hesitation in stating that, independently of
irregularities in the currency of a country,(13) and other
temporary and accidental circumstances, the cause of the high
comparative money price of corn is its high comparative real
price, or the greater quantity of capital and labour which must
be employed to produce it: and that the reason why the real price
of corn is higher and continually rising in countries which are
already rich, and still advancing in prosperity and population,
is to be found in the necessity of resorting constantly to poorer
land - to machines which require a greater expenditure to work
them - and which consequently occasion each fresh addition to the
raw produce of the country to be purchased at a greater cost - in
short, it is to be found in the important truth that corn, in a
progressive country, is sold at the price necessary to yield the
actual supply; and that, as this supply becomes more and more
difficult, the price rises in proportion.(14)

The price of corn, as determined by these causes, will of
course be greatly modified by other circumstances; by direct and
indirect taxation; by improvements in the modes of cultivation;
by the saving of labour on the land; and particularly by the
importations of foreign corn. The latter cause, indeed, may do
away, in a considerable degree, the usual effects of great wealth
on the price of corn; and this wealth will then show itself in a
different form.

Let us suppose seven or eight large countries not very