The illusion which has induced men to believe that the productive powers of the soil have an independent value, because they possess Utility, has led to many errors and catastrophes. It has driven them frequently to the premature establishment of colonies, the history of which is nothing else than a lamentable martyrology. They have reasoned in this way: In our own country we can obtain value only by labour, and when we have done our work, we have obtained a value which is only proportionate to our labour. If we emigrate to Guiana, to the banks of the Mississippi, to Australia, to Africa, we shall obtain possession of vast territories, uncultivated but fertile; and our reward will be, that we shall become possessed not of the value we have created, but also of the inherent and independent value of the land we may reclaim. They set out, and a cruel experience soon confirms the truth of the theory which I am now explaining. They labour, they clear, they exhaust themselves; they are exposed to privations, to sufferings, to diseases; and then if they wish to dispose of the land which they have rendered fit for production, they cannot obtain for it what it has cost them, and they are forced to acknowledge that value is of human creation. I defy you to give me an instance of the establishment of a colony which has not at the beginning been attended with disaster. “Upwards of a thousand labourers were sent out to the Swan River Colony; but the extreme cheapness of land (eighteenpence, or less than two francs, an acre) and the extravagant rate of wages, afforded them such facilities and inducements to become landowners, that capitalists could no longer get any one to cultivate their lands. A capital of £200,000 (five millions of francs) was lost in consequence, and the colony became a scene of desolation. The labourers having left their employers from the delusive desire to become landowners, agricultural implements were allowed to rust—seeds rotted—and sheep, cattle, and horses perished for want of attention. A frightful famine [p286] cured the labourers of their infatuation, and they returned to ask employment from the capitalists; but it was too late.”—‹Proceedings of the South Australian Association.› The association, attributing this disaster to the cheapness of land, raised its price to 12s. an acre. But, adds Carey, from whom I borrow this quotation, the real cause was, that the labourers, being persuaded that land possesses an ‹inherent› value, apart from the labour bestowed on it, were anxious to exercise “the power of appropriation,” to which the power to demand Rent is attributed. What follows supplies us with an argument still more conclusive: “In 1836, the landed estates in the colony of Swan River were to be purchased from the original settlers at one shilling an acre.”—‹New Monthly Magazine.›