“The effect of the Revolution,” wrote Malthus in 1817, “has been to make every person depend more upon himself and less upon others. The labouring classes have therefore become more industrious, more saving, and more prudent in marriage than formerly; and it is quite certain that without these effects the Revolution would have done nothing for them.”[336] The country districts which took the least active part in the Revolution have been the most resolute in conserving the results of it. Over-population in France is known only in the towns. At the beginning of the eighteenth century—say one hundred and fifty years ago (1732)—under Louis XV. the population of France was estimated at twenty millions of people.[337] There is good reason to believe that the habits of the people were entirely different from what they are now; they were even said to be famous for their large families.[338] In 1776 their numbers were about twenty-four millions,[339] at the Revolution of 1789 about twenty-six millions,[340] in 1831 thirty-two and a half, and in 1866 thirty-eight. At the present time, from loss of territory and from decrease of numbers in certain parts of the country, they are little more than thirty-seven and a half millions—not much more than the population of Great Britain, a country neither so large nor so fertile. Even in 1815 Malthus spoke of France as having a more stationary and less crowded population than Britain, though it was richer in corn.[341] The population of 1881 showed an increase of 766,260 over that of 1876, and was in all 37,672,048.[342] It increases not by augmentation in the number of births, for that has been actually lessening, but by diminution in the deaths. The population of Britain has trebled itself within the present century; that of France has not even doubled itself in a century and a half, with every allowance for a varying frontier. The fears which Malthus expressed,[343] that the law of inheritance and compulsory division of property would lead to an excessive and impoverished country population, have not been realized. The industrial progress of the country has been very great. Fifty years ago the production of wheat was only the half of what it is to-day, of meat less than the half. In almost every crop and every kind of food France is richer now than then in the proportion of more than 2 to 1. In all the conveniences of life (if food be the necessaries) the increased supply is as 4 to 1, while foreign trade has become as 6 to 1. Since property is more widely distributed in France than elsewhere, an increase of production is much more certain to mean a benefit to the whole people. But there are certain classes of goods, chiefly necessaries, of which (even in a land like England, where the great wealth is in a few hands) it is impossible profitably to extend the production without _pari passu_ extending the distribution. When articles of food are imported in