nces which determine the rate of wages, might prevent ectual check being given to matrimonial connexions, sequently to the rate at which fresh labourers were com o market, until the misery occasioned by the restricted nd for labour on the one hand, and its undiminished sup the other, were generally and widely felt. It is this circumstance the impossibility of speedily adj the supply of labour proportionally to variations in the wages-that gives to these variations their peculiar werful influence over the condition of the labouring classes e supply of labour were suddenly increased when wages at rise would be of no advantage to the labourers. It wo crease their number; but it would not enable them to the scale of society, or to acquire a greater command o cessaries and conveniences. And on the other hand, 1 of wages proportionally diminished the number of urers, such diminution would hinder it from degrad e habits or the condition of those that survived. E the vast majority of instances, before a rise of wa n be countervailed by the greater number of labour ich it may be supposed to be the means of bringing into arket, time is afforded for the formation of those new proved tastes and habits, which are not the hasty prod a day, a month, or a year, but the late result of a long se continuous impressions. After these tastes have been ired, population will advance in a slower ratio, as compa ith capital, than formerly; and the labourers will be osed rather to defer the period of marriage, than by enter

prices should be to lower, not to raise wages. But those will fall into the greatest imaginable error who suppose that, because this is the immediate, it is also the permanent effect of such rise. It is obvious, indeed, that the fall of wages, which is thus occasioned, and the greater exertions which the rise of prices forces labourers to make, must tend, as well by lessening their supplies of food as by adding to the severity of their labour, to increase the rate of mortality, and consequently, by diminishing their numbers, to hasten that rise of wages which will certainly take place if prices continue high.

In endeavouring to show that the market rate of wages cannot be permanently reduced below the amount required to supply the labourers with necessaries, it is not meant to represent the latter as fixed and unvarying. If a given quantity of certain articles were absolutely necessary to enable work people to subsist and continue their race, then it is clear that no lasting deduction could be made from that quantity. But such is not the case. By the natural or necessary rate of wages, is meant only, in the words of Adam Smith, such a rate as will enable the labourer to obtain, "not only the commodities that are indispensably necessary for the support of life, but whatever the custom of the country renders it indecent for creditable people, even of the lowest order, to be without." It is plain, as well from this definition as from the previous statements, that there can be no invariable standard of natural or necessary wages. It is impossible to say what articles are indispensable for subsistence; inasmuch as they depend essentially on the physical circumstances under which every people is placed, and on custom and habit. Differences of climate, for example, by giving rise to very different wants in the inhabitants of different countries, necessarily occasion corresponding variations in the rate of wages. necessary Labourers in cold climates, who must be warmly clad, and whose cottages must be built of solid materials and heated with fires, could not subsist on the wages that suffice to supply

NECESSARY RATE OF WAGES.

3

all the wants of those who inhabit more genial climates, wher clothing, lodging, and fire, are of inferior importance. Hum boldt mentions, that there is a difference of nearly a third i the cost of his maintenance, and consequently in the necessar wages of a labourer, in the hot and temperate districts Mexico. The food, too, of work people in different and di tant countries varies extremely. In some it is both expensiv and abundant, compared to what it is in others. In England for example, the lower classes principally live on wheate bread and butcher's-meat, in Ireland on potatoes, and in Chin and Hindostan on rice. In many provinces of France an Spain an allowance of wine is considered indispensable. I England the labouring class entertain nearly the same opinio with respect to porter, beer, and cider; whereas the Chines and Hindoos drink only water. The peasantry of Irelan have hitherto lived in miserable mud cabins, without either window or a chimney, or anything that can be called furniture while in England, the cottages of the peasantry have glas windows and chimneys, are well furnished, and are as muc distinguished for their neatness, cleanliness, and comfort, those of the Irish have been for their filth and misery. Thes differences in their manner of living occasion equal difference in their wages; so that, while the average price of a day labour in England may be taken at from 20d. to 23., it canno be taken at more than 8d. or 10d. in Ireland and 3d. i Hindostan. The habits of the people of the same countries a different periods, and the articles which they have been accus tomed to regard as indispensable, have been equally fluctuatin and various. Everybody knows that the customary mode living of the English and Scottish labourers of the presen day is as widely different from that of their ancestors in th reigns of Elizabeth, James I., and Charles I., as it is from th mode of living of the labourers of France or Spain. The stan dard by which their wages was formerly regulated has bec raised; there has been a greater prevalence of moral restraint the proportion of capital to population has been increased and the poor have learnt to form more elevated opinion

D

respecting the amount of necessaries and conveniences required for their subsistence.

But it is not necessary to travel beyond the confines of England to be satisfied of the great extent to which the rate of wages is dependant on the food and condition of the labourers. At present (1853) the wages of common field labour in Yorkshire and most parts of the north and east of England may be reckoned at about 15s. a week, whereas in Dorset, Somerset, and other south-western counties, it is little, if anything, more than half that amount. This comparative lowness of their wages is at once a consequence and a cause of the depressed condition of the peasantry in the counties referred to. Their greater dependence on the potato, by enabling them to subsist and increase their numbers on a less expensive food, has reduced their wages; and this reduction, by encroaching on their other comforts, has depressed their condition still lower.

The natural or necessary rate of wages is not, therefore, fixed and unvarying. It has a tendency to rise when the market rate rises, and to fall when it falls. The reason is, that the supply of labourers in the market can neither be speedily increased when wages rise, nor speedily diminished when they fall. When wages rise, a period of eighteen or twenty years must elapse before the stimulus which the rise gives to the principle of population can be felt in the market. And during all this period, the labourers have a greater command over necessaries and conveniences. Their habits are in consequence improved. And as they learn to form more elevated notions of what is required for their comfortable and decent support, the natural or necessary rate of wages is gradually augmented. But, on the other hand, when wages fall, either in consequence of a diminution of capital, or of a disproportionate increase of population, no corresponding dimi nution can immediately take place in the number of labourers, unless they have been previously subsisting on the smallest quantity of the cheapest species of food required to support mere animal existence. If they have have not been placed so

ces which determine the rate of wages, might prevent ctual check being given to matrimonial connexions, sequently to the rate at which fresh labourers were con market, until the misery occasioned by the restricted ad for labour on the one hand, and its undiminished suj the other, were generally and widely felt.

t is this circumstance the impossibility of speedily adj the supply of labour proportionally to variations in the wages-that gives to these variations their peculiar werful influence over the condition of the labouring classes supply of labour were suddenly increased when wages t rise would be of no advantage to the labourers. It wo rease their number; but it would not enable them to the scale of society, or to acquire a greater command o essaries and conveniences. And on the other hand, i of wages proportionally diminished the number of rers, such diminution would hinder it from degrad habits or the condition of those that survived. B the vast majority of instances, before a rise of was be countervailed by the greater number of labour ch it may be supposed to be the means of bringing into ket, time is afforded for the formation of those new a roved tastes and habits, which are not the hasty prod day, a month, or a year, but the late result of a long ser continuous impressions. After these tastes have been ed, population will advance in a slower ratio, as compa 1 capital, than formerly; and the labourers will be d ed rather to defer the period of marriage, than by enter