and Charlemagne, her armies have been in turn invading Spain, the Netherlands, Holland, Italy, and Germany; and her waste of wealth in Asia, in the Middle Ages, has been almost paralleled in the present one, by her campaigns in Russia, Egypt, and Algeria. To her, was Europe mainly indebted for that perfection of anarchy, denominated the Feudal System, all of whose tendencies were towards consolidation of the land, enslavement of the people, and suppression of the societary circulation. Land having then but very little value, money-changers, royal and plebeian, reigned supreme-nearly all the property of the kingdom being movable in its character. At the close of the seventeenth century, the land was so far consolidated, that nearly the whole was held by the Church and a few great nobles-paying no taxes, yet dividing among themselves all places of emolument and power, and thus absorbing the contributions of that small portion of the population engaged in the cultivation of their own lands, or in the application of their own labors. Consolidation was a necessary consequence of a system like that of Louis XIV., which combined the expulsion of hundreds of thousands of the most active and industrious portion of the population, with the maintenance of constant wars abroad-requiring incessant contributions of men, and a taxation so severe that more than half of what was yielded by the soil, was required to meet it. Under such circumstances, there could be little circulation, and land remained uncultivated, while the people perished of hunger because unable to sell their labor.

The regency that followed gave rise to the Mississippi scheme, to whose projection we owe, perhaps, the earliest suggestion of the great advantages resulting from an increase in the transferability of landed property. The scheme failed-ruining many, but building up the fortunes of numerous others-thus causing extensive transfers of real estate. "The innumerable changes," says M. Blanqui, "effected under the influence of the system, were the beginnings of the great division of property from which France has so greatly benefited. All classes of society being seized with a spirit of enterprise, the power of association, until then unknown, exhibited itself in new and bold combinations, of which existing operations are but imitations."* * BLANQUI: Histoire de l'Economie Politique, vol. ii, p. 86.

Other circumstances, however, not referred to by M. Blanqui, contributed far more largely to produce the changes here described. The system of Colbert coming fairly into operation, employment became more and more diversified, with great increase of commerce; and therefore it was that land became divided and agriculture improved.* Production increased, and "whereas," says M. de Jonnés, "under le Grand Monarque, the agricultural population had bread only three days in the week, and under Louis XV. but two days out of the three the happy effect of the progress under Louis XVI. was seen in their being able to command its use during three-fourths of the year"— doing this, too, in despite of a system of taxation burthensome beyond any recorded in history in relation to a community claiming to be free. Of twelve parts into which the produce of the land might be divided, nearly seven and a half went to the king, and three and a half to the proprietor of the soil leaving but one-twelfth for the services of the man by whom it was produced. About one-third of the soil was at this time in the hands of small proprietors, upon whom these burthens fell with a severity which tended much to the production of the Revolution. Heavy as they were, they constituted but a portion of the evils resulting from a system, that tended almost entirely to destroy the circulation. †

The Revolution sweeping away the Church and the nobility, their property covering two-thirds of the kingdom was now divided. The exclusive privileges of manufacturing corporations following next, the obstacles to circulation were, thus, to a great extent, removed — the beneficial effects of the change exhibiting themselves in the facts, that, notwithstanding an enormous drain of money and of men, the agricultural popu

* The recent work of M. de Tocqueville furnishes abundant correction of the erroneous impression, so generally prevalent, that the division of the land of France is attributable to the Revolution. The growing tendency in that direction was, as he shows, remarked by Turgot, Neckar, and Arthur Young, all of whose observations tend towards confirmation of the remarks of a writer of the day, who says, that "land is selling above its value, owing to the rage of the peasantry to become land-owners. All the savings of the lower classes," as he continues, "which in other countries are lodged in private hands, or invested in public securities, are in France used for the purchase of land.”—Ancien Régime, p. 41.

For evidence of the rapid growth of commerce at this period, see the extract from M. de Tocquevillle's work, given ante, vol. ii. p. 313.

† For the obstacles above referred to, see ante, vol. ii, p. 51.

lation increased in the succeeding four-and-twenty years more. than thirty-three and a third per cent. the return to labor, meantime, so much increasing, that, whereas, in 1788, an agricultural family could earn but 161 francs a year, they could now earn 400 francs; while the price of wheat had advanced but thirty per cent. Its members could now, therefore, have bread every day in the year, and have a surplus, for other purposes, equal to two-thirds of the whole wages of 1788.* Such were the benefits resulting from an increase in the facility of circulation.

Manufactures, during this period, steadily increased-employment becoming more and more diversified. The war-preventing all intercourse with England-operated as a protection to the French artisan, and brought the consumer to the side of the producer thus relieving the latter from that oppressive tax of transportation, which constitutes the essential obstacle to circulation. Since then, statute law has continued the system so well begun by Colbert-the result being seen in the fact, that the price of land and labor is now increasing at a rate more rapid, probably, than that of any other country of the world.

The free circulation of either is still, however, impeded by numerous obstacles—all of them resulting from an excessive political centralization, requiring the maintenance of armies and fleets, for whose support a large amount of contributions is required. Land can neither be sold nor mortgaged, except on the condition of admitting the government as partner in the transaction-paying to it a portion of the proceeds. The octroï obstructs the circulation between the cities and the country, while within the former traders and capitalists enjoy monopolies tending to fill their purses, at the expense of both producer and consumer. Hence arises the difficulty of which French economists so much complain, that of finding consumers for the things produced; as if every man would not, under a system that gave rapidity to the circulation, be a customer to others to the whole extent of his own production. The necessity for new and distant outlets is, therefore, always dwelt upon-it being with special reference to their obtainment, that the government is urged to the

* Annuaire de l'Économie Politique, 1851, p. 380.

re-adoption of the policy of the Eden treaty of 1786, which stopped the circulation, and thus produced the Revolution.

Division of property among the children being provided for by law, it has been hence inferred that the country would become a "great rabbit-warren"- population multiplying with such rapidity as effectually to repress all power of accumulation. Contrary, however, to such predictions, numbers increase but slowly -the process of division moving but little faster. Forty years since, the number of portions of land, town and city lots included, was 10,083,751. Twenty years later, it was 10,893,528-giving an increase of about eight per cent., much of which might be accounted for by the growth of towns and cities, and the consequent division of acres into building-lots. Four years later, in 1842, it had attained the number of 11,511,841-giving a considerable increase; attended, however, with precisely the circumstances that everywhere else attend division a great advance in the price of land and labor.

The rapidity of circulation increases steadily, with extraordinary increase in the productiveness of agriculture. "In the last thirty years," says a distinguished economist, "France has realised a progress of admirable rapidity-her population having everywhere grown-her cities having increased-and activity and comfort having been everywhere produced. These consequences concur in the creation of new wants facilitating the efforts of the agriculturist, and modifying the direction of his labors. Not only has he been compelled to extend the culture of roots and kitchen vegetables, with a view to supply the demands of an increasing population, but also that of the plants required by an extended industry. The more the plants which require the hoe, and the finer vegetables requiring both skill and labor, have taken their places by the side of the earlier plantsthe more la petite culture has been encouraged the more it has rewarded those engaged in their production. It has truly," as he adds, "been said, that it keeps pace with the growth of ease among the people, and with the creation of our manufactures."* The first and most oppressive of all taxes being that of transportation, the tendency of agriculture towards improvement is always in the direct ratio of the emancipation of the * PASSY: Des Systèmes de Culture, Paris, 1852, p. 66.

land from its payment that emancipation being to be effected only by the creation of a market near at hand.

§ 8. In the days of Alfred, landed property was equally divided among the children of the English landholder. The Norman conquest bringing with it the exclusive rights of primogeniture before the lapse of half a century the circulation of property in the soil, as the reader has seen, had almost ceased. Wealth and population, however, growing, we find a gradual tendency towards its re-establishment at times exhibiting itself in the form of acts of Parliament; at others, in the adoption of rules of court facilitating the abolition of entails — the result of which may, perhaps, be seen in the number of small proprietors living in the days of Adam Smith.

Until then, however, nearly all the English tendencies had been towards the removal of restrictions upon the domestic circulation the right of citizens to leave the kingdom having remained untouched, until a few years prior to the publication of the Wealth of Nations. From that time forward, however, all the tendencies were in an opposite direction the prohibition

of emigration having been followed up by various laws prohibiting English mechanics from furnishing other nations with machinery, by means of which their products might be enabled to circulate among themselves, freed from the necessity for being carried to English mills, or for passing through the hands of English merchants, or English workmen. Stoppage of circulation abroad, was thus to be produced by a stoppage of that at home; and, so far as that object could be attained by help of human laws, the close of the century saw the work already done.

Seven-and-thirty years before, the war of 1756 had been succeeded by the peace of Paris-having in its course established the British power in India, and doubled the mortgage upon the land and labor of the kingdom-the national debt having grown from 72 to 146 millions. The class of annuitants had, therefore, increased in due proportion to the growth of admirals, generals, and traders—all of whom desired that labor might be cheap, and man of little value. All of them, too, profited for the moment by stoppage of the circulation — the