The Sun.
London, England, 1841-07-22 00:00:00

TO LORD STANLEY.

DIT LORD,—Your name stands conspicuous as a pa-
tron of agriculture, and, I am sorry to say it, as the
first political renegade of the Derby family. You have,
to serve the objects of the party for which you have de-
serted your own, made statements which, as a practical
agriculturist, you must have known are delusive. Your
Lordship is far too well versed in agricultural details, to
place the slightest reliance on the correctness of the
statements with which you treated your political sup-
porters at Lancaster. You well knew the intellectual
calibre of those you were addressing, and took ad-
vantage of the occasion to " rig the yokels," as
your Lordship would elegantly express it. Facts and
figures, though produced by a peasant, cannot be over-
thrown by bold assertions, though emanating from a
Lord. No one knows better than your Lordship does,
that the prosperity of agriculture must depend upon the
amount of capital employed, and upon the judgment with
which that capital is invested. Your Lordship must also
be well aware, that, under common tillage, the number
of returns per acre upon the seed sown is the legitimate
test by which rent can be justly apportioned ; and that
in a healthy political state, unshackled by legislative
intermeddling, the prices of agricultural produce will al-
ways be fairly regulated by the proportion that the sup-
ply and the demand bear to each other. In your Lord-
ship's reported Lancaster addresses, high prices are
assumed as identical with remunerating prices, and
treated as essential to the prosperity of the agricultural
community. A greater fallacy could not be propounded.
I will not so far libel your Lordship's understanding as
to suppose that such a proposition was laid down with
any other view than to answer a temporary party pur-
pose, and to prove how far your Lordship might pre-
sume upon the gross ignorance upon agricultural affairs,
that pervaded the great bulk of the Tory constituency
then assembled. High prices upon agricultural produce
do not constitute remunerating prices, but remunerating
prices constitute agricultural prosperity. Corn, by being
made by a tax to sell at higher prices than what will
fairly remunerate the agriculturist for its production, in-
flicts an injury upon every honest portion of the com-
munity. Remunerating prices, however low they may
be, are not only beneficial to those employed in trade
and manufactures, but the well-being and prosperity of
the agricultural classes are essentially dependent upon
realizing them. Taking the agricultural statistics, as
laid down by Mr. M'Queen, to be correct, the land-
rents of the United Kingdom do not average quite
16s. Gd. per acre. And, according to the same authority,
if the Kingdom was equally divided, every 146 acres
would have located upon them sixteen and a half indivi-
duals employed in or directly dependent upon agricul-
ture. The rent would be 1201., and there would be an-
nually ten acres under wheat, four acres under barley,
and sixteen acres under oats. It is not important at
present to inquire how the remaining portion of the land
may be cropped ; but the value of the fat and lean stock,
butter, cheese, milk, wool, poultry, &c., to be annually
sold off from that extent of land, would be 260/. Accord-
ing to the best agricultural authorities, taking the king-
dom through, the average quantity of seed corn, and the
average returns per acre, and the prices per quarter, he
stated as follows :
Seed. Produce. ' Price.
Wheat 3 bushels ... 24 bushels s6s.
Barley 4 bushels ... 32 bushels 32s.
Oats
The Corn account, on 146 acres, would stand thus
s. d.
Wheat 240 bushels, at 7s. per bushel ... 84 0 0
Barley I2S bushels, at 4s. per bushel ... 25 12 0
Oats 640 bushels, at 3s. per bushel ... 96 0 0

£205 12 0
Available for sale in the
market :

There would be required
for consumption by the
agriculturist and his de-
pendents : X s. d.
Wheatl4Bbushelssl 16 0
Barley 78 ditt0...15 12 0
Oats 506 ditto ...75 18 0

£ s. d.
92 bushels 32 4 0
50 bushels lO 0 0
134 bushels

£143 6 0
Value of portion consumed by
far—ter and his family as
food, seed corn, and in feed-
ing stock
Value of portion consumed by
labourers and their families 56 9 0

£62 6 0