The first is, How is the revenue of £55,000,000, and the interest of mortgages at least half as much more,[29] to be provided for under so great a reduction in the value of the staple articles of British agricultural produce? It has been seen that the total value of the agricultural produce of the empire was, anterior to the late changes, about £300,000,000. If prices fall on an average a fourth, in consequence of foreign importations, which is a most moderate supposition, probably much within the truth, this £300,000,000 will be reduced at once to £225,000,000. But the disastrous effect of such a reduction is not to be measured by its absolute amount, considerable as that amount undoubtedly is. Its dreadful effect lies here, that the £75,000,000 thus cut off, absorb nearly the whole profits of cultivation, out of which both the rent is paid to the landlord, and the farmer obtains the means of livelihood. The remainder is the cost of production, and it is not lowered in any sensible degree. _Thus the whole loss falls on the cultivators._ This is just what has happened under a similar course of policy in the West Indies, where the indolent habits of the emancipated slaves, and free trade in sugar, acting together, have destroyed the profits of agriculture; and of course the islands are rapidly returning to the jungle and the forest. [29] The mortgages of England alone are estimated, by the best authorities, at £400,000,000. Those of Ireland and Scotland are certainly at least half as much more, or £200,000,000. Indeed, out of the rental of £14,000,000 a-year, now in part become nominal in the former country, it is usually reckoned that £10,000,000 go to the holders of mortgages. Now, if a deficiency at all approaching to this occurs in the revenue derived from land--the sources of _three-fifths_ of the income of the United Kingdom--how, in the name of common sense, is the revenue to be paid? How are the jointures of the widows, the interest of mortgages, and the other charges on the land, to be made good, when the change of prices has absorbed nearly the whole profit of cultivation? If they are recovered, what is to remain to the landlord? How are the home manufacturers, and the numerous class of shopkeepers in towns, and, above all, in the metropolis, who are supported by their expenditure, to be maintained? It is very easy to say the fall of rents is a landlord's question, and the mass of the people have no interest in it. Who support the manufacturers and shopkeepers over the country? The landlords and holders of securities over the land furnish at the very least a half of that support. Of the £5,400,000 a-year, which the Income Tax produces, £3,200,000, or more than a half, comes from the land. How wide-spread, then, will be the distress produced over the community, and, above all, to the shopkeepers in towns, from a change which threatens to dry up the principal sources from which their sales are paid.