Of the resources of Great Britain and Ireland for the further growth of corn, by the further application of capital to the land, the evidence laid before parliament furnishes the most ample testimony. But it is not necessary, for this purpose, to recur to evidence that may be considered as partial. All the most intelligent works which have been written on agricultural subjects of late years, agree in the same statements; and they are confirmed beyond a possibility of doubt, when we consider the extraordinary improvements, and prodigious increase of produce that have taken place latterly in some districts, which, in point of natural soil, are not superior to others that are still yielding the most scanty and miserable crops. Most of the light soils of the kingdom might, with adequate capital and skill, be made to equal the improved parts of Norfolk; and the vast tracts of clay lands that are yet in a degraded state almost all over the kingdom, are susceptible of a degree of improvement, which it is by no means easy to fix, but which certainly offers a great prospective increase of produce. There is even a chance (but on this I will not insist) of a diminution in the real price of corn,(9*) owing to the extension of those great improvements, and that great economy and good management of labour, of which we have such intelligent accounts from Scotland.(10*) If these clay lands, by draining, and the plentiful application of lime and other manures, could be so far meliorated in quality as to admit of being worked by two horses and a single man, instead of three or four horses with a man and a boy, what a vast saving of labour and expense would at once be effected, at the same time that the crops would be prodigiously increased! And such an improvement may rationally be expected, from what has really been accomplished in particular districts. In short, if merely the best modes of cultivation, now in use in some parts of Great Britain, were generally extended, and the whole country was brought to a level, in proportion to its natural advantages of soil and situation, by the further accumulation and more equable distribution of capital and skill; the quantity of additional produce would be immense, and would afford the means of subsistence to a very great increase of population. In some countries possessed of a small territory, and consisting perhaps chiefly of one or two large cities, it never can be made a question, whether or not they should freely import foreign corn. They exist, in fact, by this importation; and being always, in point of population, inconsiderable, they may, in general, rely upon a pretty regular supply. But whether regular or not, they have no choice. Nature has clearly told them, that if they increase in wealth and power to any extent, it can only be by living upon the raw produce of other countries.