or 14d. for a woman reaper. We find the same discrepancies from generation to generation, showing that the demand for labour must have been much greater in some parts than in others. The Act of Settlement seems expressly framed to prevent labourers gaining any advantage from this.
The whole case for labour is given in those words of the old Intelligencer of 1649: "Labour is cheaper and food twice dearer than formerly." Prices rose, but wages did not rise in proportion. They were not allowed to do so. It is literally true that from 1563 to 1824 there was a legal conspiracy to cheat the English workman of his wages. The masters combined to keep wages down, and the law made the offence of "Conspiracy" extend to workmen who combined to raise them.[1]
At the end of the seventeenth century, Gregory King gave the first trustworthy statistics of the state of the country.[2] He was much troubled at the decrease in the revenue[3] (a million less in 1695 than in 1688), and the increase in expenditure, and foresaw that "if the war continues to 1698 inclusive," the national income will have fallen £4,000,000. He gives an elaborate table of statistics. In 1696 the arable land of England was 11,000,000 acres, and the pasture and meadow 19,000,000. "Moor, Mountain, and Barren lands," another 10,000,000; and woods and forests,
- ↑ "We have no acts of parliament against combining to lower the price of work, but many against combining to raise it. Masters are always and everywhere in a sort of tacit, but constant and uniform combination, not to raise the wages of labour."—"Wealth of Nations," Bk. 1. chap. viii.
- ↑ He was also the first to make a Survey of London on the seale of 100 feet to the inch, which expressed the ground plot of every house and garden. He surveyed many counties of England.
- ↑ From £42,500,000 to £38,500,000. "The kingdom is yearly decreasing three millions." This was the beginning of a serious National Debt. At this time the population was increasing at the rate of 6000 or 7000 a year. King gave the population as about 5,318,000, and thought that by the year 2300 we should have 11,000,000, and in 3500 years 22,000,000! He was a sagacious observer; but the 600 years of war from the first coming of the Saxons to the reign of the Confessor, the constant revolutions, insurrections, and wars from 1066 to Magna Charta (the Conqueror depopulated the whole country from Humber to Tees), the Hundred Years' War, the Black Death, had made increase of population so very slow that he supposed he was making a very bold forecast. He estimated the population in 1696 at 5,180,000.
