Secondly, it is not true that the last wheat crop was the largest ever known in England. This is a wild and utterly extravagant assertion. The bygone crop was a good one, less on account of quality than of gift; but every agriculturist knows that, within the experience of the present generation, we have had far finer crops. That of 1815 was enormous in its yield--so great that we did not import a single quarter of grain, and the average price of wheat for that year was 63s. 8d. The crop of 1822 was not very much inferior. These are notorious instances; but in order to ascertain, with as much precision as possible, the relative quality of the bygone crop, we submitted the statement of Mr. Gladstone to one of the most extensive corn-dealers in Leith, and the following is his reply. "Mr. Gladstone's statement is certainly very unlike that of a person of his high authority; though I conceive it as calculated to do much mischief in the present depressed state of the corn-trade, as many people will judge of it from Mr. Gladstone's high standing. In my opinion, however, nothing can be more absurd than estimating a crop by a _yard_ in any field, or by a single acre. We hear now a great deal of the land being more productive, by draining and other improvements; and it was to be expected that, when a good wheat season occurred, we should have more wheat than in previous years; but, from all the confirmation we have yet obtained, I am by no means disposed to believe that the last crop is a great one, far less that it is greater than ever known. The present generation, I have no doubt, have seen larger crops of wheat than our forefathers; but I think 1814, 1815, 1822, 1825, 1831, 1832, 1833, 1834, 1835, 1841, and 1842, were better seasons than the last. Essex, and several other English counties which had bad crops in 1848, have much greater crops in 1849; but Lincolnshire, and several other very important counties, have very deficient crops on certain varieties of soil. All that can be said of the present crop is, that it is a full one, generally speaking. More of it, I am sure, will yield under 40 bushels an acre than over 40; and very little, indeed, 60 or 68, as Mr. Gladstone says a _single_ acre has produced." So much for the general yield; let us now revert to the seasons which Mr. Gladstone has selected for comparison. The crop of 1835 was not only larger than that of 1849, but it came to us under circumstances which entirely preclude a comparison of the years, if prices are to be taken as a criterion. THE CROP OF 1835 WAS THE LAST OF A SERIES OF FINE ONES. We subjoin the statistics from 1830, which was a bad season, to 1836, when the harvest was again unfavourable:--