Dictionary published in 1842, he sets down the consumption in 1842 at 228,542,340 lbs. for the metropolis, and consequently assigns 120 lbs. to each individual. This may, however, be possibly a little above the mark, as the convenience of transport by railroad has made Smithfield the central market of a far larger circle than heretofore.

The returns obtained by the Statistical Society of Manchester, as to the cattle sold in the markets of that town, furnish an annual consumption of not less than 105 lbs. of butcher's meat for each inhabitant. In Paris, on the other hand, the quantity has been estimated by M. Chabrol at from 85 to 86 lbs. per head; and in Brussels it is supposed to average 89 lbs. We thus find that the consumption of animal food in the towns of England far exceeds that of foreign cities; and as this consumption has gone on steadily increasing, we are warranted in concluding that the labour of the English people is not only more efficient as compared with that of other nations, but is daily acquiring greater efficiency, if the present be contrasted with previous results.

It will be unnecessary to pursue this examination further, as few persons will deny that the absolute increase of the population of England and Wales has been accompanied not merely with

a proportionate, but a relative augmentation of material prosperity; nor do I think that it can be disputed, that an absolute increase of national prosperity will be invariably attended with an increase of population. Where the means of subsistence are more easily procured, the natural impulse of man will lead him to marry. Celibacy cannot be a matter of indifference in a healthy state of society, as it is essentially an incomplete state of existence.

The circumstances of Ireland are not identical with those of England; nor can we apply the same simple tests of the improved condition of its population. Of the 8,000,000 of its people, 5,000,000 are, according to Mr. M'Culloch, principally dependent upon the potato for support, and 2,500,000 upon oats. We may form an approximate estimate of the present comparative consumption of the Irish and British people, as indicative of their respective productive power, in the following rough manner. The money value of the entire annual produce of the land in Ireland has been calculated at 45,000,000l. Of this amount about 10,000,000%. may be deducted for various outgoings, under which the nett rent paid to absentees is reckoned, so that about 35,000,000l. of agricultural produce would remain to be divided amongst a population of about eight millions. This would allow

a consumption of rather more than 47. in value to each individual. In Great Britain, a population of rather more than eighteen millions consumes agricultural produce of the value of about 143,000,000l., which allows nearly the value of 81. to each individual. We might perhaps be justified in making some allowance in the Irish estimate, from the greater exchangeable value which money possesses in Ireland: on the other hand, if the commercial exports of agricultural produce should be found to exceed the amount of nett rental paid to absentees, the balance would have to be deducted from the home consumption.

But in estimating the comparative progress made by the two countries, there are greater difficulties from this circumstance, that whilst the quality of the food used by the English people has improved, the reverse has taken place in the case of the Irish people; so that the increased value of the gross amount of agricultural produce would not correspond to the increased quantity of produce available for consumption. If it be a correct statement, that, whilst the population of Great Britain has doubled, the quantity of agricultural produce of a given kind has quadrupled, the efficiency of the labour employed in raising that produce will at least have doubled; but if the produce, as in Ireland, whilst it has increased in quantity,

has deteriorated in quality, the efficiency of the labour of the agricultural population will not have increased pari passu with the quantity.

In 1778, Arthur Young estimated the gross rental of Ireland at 6,000,000l.: in the present day it is calculated to amount to 12,715,4787. In 1771, A. Young estimated the rental of England and Wales at 16,000,000l.: it was calculated in 1836 to have been a little below 30,000,000l., though in 1815 it was as high as 34,330,4627. If now it be correct to refer the increase of the gross rentals of the two countries to analogous facts, whatever they may be, connected with the increased gross amount of agricultural produce, the value of that gross amount must be supposed to have quadrupled in Ireland, as in the case of England. But during this interval of less than 70 years, the population of Ireland has trebled itself, for the number of souls which in 1777 amounted to 2,690,556 had increased in 1841 to 8,175,124, whilst the English population has only doubled itself. The progress, therefore, of the Irish people, in respect of the increased efficiency of their labour, will only have been half as great as that which the English returns exhibit. This circumstance is at once accounted for by the substitution of an inferior article of food, such as the potato, in place of grain; and though the quantity of agricultural produce must have in

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creased to support the increased numbers of the population, its value has not increased in proportion, from its quality being inferior.

It has been remarked that in Ireland the population has increased in a more rapid ratio in those provinces in which agriculture has made the slowest improvement. Thus from the tables of the census of 1831, it appears that in the province of Leinster, where there are several very large towns, and where the agricultural system has very considerably improved by the side of an increased growth of trade and manufactures, the increase of the population in the preceding ten years was only 9 per cent.; whilst in Connaught, the agriculture of which has scarcely improved at all, and the manufactures are hardly worthy of notice, the increase has not been less than 22 per cent. To a similar purport we find, from the census of 1841, that in Leinster the annual proportion of births to the mean population was 1 in 32.3, whilst in Connaught it was 1 in 28; and whilst the increment of population in the former province has been rather less than one thirtieth, that of the latter has been rather more than one twentieth of the respective numbers in 1831. The prosperity however of Connaught has not been commensurate. Mr. M'Culloch, in his Statistical Account of the British Empire, seems to consider it beyond