This principle exemplified in Australia.It was at first supposed that the gold discoveries in Australia would cripple its agriculture; that labour would be drawn from the farm to the gold mine; that the wages of agricultural labourers would greatly increase; and that under such difficulties agriculture must decline. But although this did in the first instance take place, yet agriculture speedily recovered in Australia, and has within the last few years rapidly advanced. The reason is that the gold discoveries caused the town population to be largely and suddenly increased, and the food which such a town population required was supplied from the agricultural districts. Those who sold the food could purchase, in return, all the products which the commerce of Europe provides; and Victoria has, in a few years, advanced from an aggregation of isolated settlements to the position of a prosperous country, with all the appliances of the oldest and most thriving commercial community. The large yield of gold since the gold discoveries is generally considered to be the source of the increased wealth of Australia. As Prof. Cairnes well remarked,[1] the extent to which the gold discoveries have enriched Australia can be measured by the degree in which she has parted with this gold. In other words, she has been enriched, not by keeping it, but by sending it away in exchange for products from other countries. The gold may have been the primary stimulus of her prosperity; but the gold which has been produced most inadequately represents the extent to which her wealth has been augmented. Not only has all her labour, whether agricultural or not, been rendered more efficient by the increased cooperation of labour which is now practised there, in consequence of the growth of the town population; but even her land has been rendered far more productive of wealth, because, at an earlier period, much of the produce which was obtained from it, was not required, and therefore could not be accounted wealth.
Combination of labour requires good means of communication.There cannot be any extensive cooperation of labour between one employment and another, or between one district and another, unless the means of communication are good. Nothing, probably, has more contributed to- ↑ Essays in Political Economy, Theoretical and Applied. by the late Prof. J. E. Cairnes.
