On the other hand, it is contended by Mr. Chalmers in the edition of his Estimate published in 1794, from data which he has particularly stated, that the present population of England and Wales exceeds eight millions; and that since the Revolution there has been an augmentation of a million and a half.1 *Mr. Howlett, in a pamphlet published in 1797, states the augmentation at a little less than two millions.2 According to some later writers, even Mr. Howlett's computations fall greatly short of the truth. In a pamphlet (for example) published a few months ago (1800) by Arthur Young, entitled "The Question of Scarcity plainly stated," I find the following passage:

"Some years ago, I calculated that England and Wales contained ten millions of souls. This was the result of comparing the population as estimated by Dr. Price, from the houses returned to the tax-office, with the errors discovered in these lists by actual enumeration; and it ought farther to be observed, that the indefatigable researches of Sir John Call, Bart., in every county of the kingdom, have proved fully to his satisfaction, that the people have increased one-third in ten years, that is, from 1787 to 1797."

If this very astonishing fact should be admitted, the people of England and Wales (as Mr. Young remarks) cannot be short of twelve millions.

I confess, for my own part, I have no great faith in the accuracy of any of these results; and my scepticism on the subject is not a little increased by observing at the end of Mr. Middleton's View of the Agriculture of Middlesex, (published 1798,) a letter from Mr. Howlett, (a very able writer on Population, and formerly extremely dogmatical in his assertions,) a frank avowal of the exaggerations into which he had inadvertently been led in the course of his controversy with Dr. Price.

"In my Examination," he observes, " of Dr. Price's Essay, I made the population of the kingdom to be between eight and nine millions. This estimate was formed upon principles so

1 Chalmers, [Estimate,] p. 221.

[From this to the end of the refer

ence to Middleton's Report, (infra, p. 245,) added in 1800.]

2 Dispersion, &c., p. 9.

extremely unfounded, which I did not then know, but very soon discovered, as rendered the final result utterly erroneous. From a more minute and accurate investigation of the subject, about fourteen or fifteen years, (which I intended to publish, but did not, and I believe never shall,) I am nearly confident our population did not then amount to seven millions and a half, and that at present it does not exceed eight millions. It is somewhat extraordinary that the fallacy which misled me, neither the public nor the keen penetrating eyes of Dr. Price, ever saw. The Doctor, indeed, pointed out an apprehension which he supposed me to be under; but that was entirely groundless." The difference in these statements will appear the less wonderful when we consider the difficulty which has been experienced in arriving at anything like certainty with respect to the population of London. The inquiry has of late years occupied the industry of a number of writers of acknowledged abilities, and yet their results vary from each other by more than 400,000.

Dr. Price published very plausible reasons in support of the opinion, that about one in twenty and three-fourths died annually in London between the years 1758 and 1769. And, taking the interments at 29,000, it produced him the number 601,750, as the amount of the whole population within the bills of mortality.

Mr. Wales, in 1771, states them at 625,131. Dr. Fordyce within these few years states them at 1,000,000; and still more lately, Mr. Colquhoun asserts that the inhabitants of the Metropolis amount to 1,200,000.

Mr. Howlett, in a pamphlet published about 1782, computed the number of inhabitants within the bills of mortality at between eight and nine hundred thousand. In his late letter, however, addressed to Mr. Middleton, he confesses that the data on which the reasonings and deductions, which appear in his pamphlet in answer to Dr. Price, were founded, are too vague and precarious to be safely depended on, and that he has long been inclined to think that the number of inhabitants within the bills have never yet amounted to 700,000.

Mr. Middleton, from a calculation founded on some sugges

tions of Mr. Howlett's, computes "the total present population within the bills to be 628,484."1

During the last hundred years, Mr. Chalmers thinks that Ireland has done more than treble its inhabitants. And although this computation may perhaps be somewhat exaggerated, yet the data on which he proceeds sufficiently demonstrate a great progressive population, and afford a strong collateral argument against the reasonings of those who are of opinion that the population of England has been decreasing during the same period. According to some late statements, Mr. Chalmers's estimate falls short of the truth. From the Report of the Secret Committee of the Irish Parliament, published in 1798, Dr. Emmet appears to have stated the actual population of Ireland "at five millions," whereas, " at the time of the Revolution, it did not much exceed a million and a half." (The same gentleman is said to have acknowledged that this symptom of national prosperity had grown out of the connexion of Ireland with Great Britain.) 2

The progressive population of Scotland, from the year 1755, is demonstrated by very authentic documents. In the year 1743, Dr. Webster, an eminent clergyman of this city, and distinguished for his accuracy and skill as a political arithmetician, established a general correspondence over the country, both with clergy and laity, one object of which was to procure lists, either of individuals, or of persons above a certain age, in the different parishes of Scotland. When the lists contained only those above a certain age, he calculated the amount of the whole inhabitants, by the proportion which they might be supposed to bear to the number of souls, according to the most approved tables, compared with the fact in many parts of Scotland, where the ministers, at his desire, not only numbered their parishioners, but distinguished their respective ages. This inquiry was completed in 1755, at which period Dr. Webster

1 Middleton's Report, p. 451.

2 Lord Castlereagh in his speech on

the Union, (1800,) estimated it from 3,500,000 to 4,000,000.-(Added Note.)

computed the number of souls in this part of the United Kingdom at 1,265,380.1

From the statistical accounts published by Sir John Sinclair, it appears, that a very great augmentation has taken place since that period, although, perhaps, not so immense a one as that gentleman at one period apprehended.

In the Statistical Table of Scotland, lately drawn up by Mr. Robertson of Granton, (from the Agricultural Surveys, the Statistical Accounts, and whatever other sources of information on the subject the public is as yet possessed of,) the population of Scotland is stated at 1,227,892. As the principal documents, however, on which he proceeds have been collected during a period of six years, (from 1792 to 1798,) his result, when applied to the population of the country at the present moment, must be understood with a certain degree of latitude. According to these computations, the increase of population from 1755 to 1798 would appear to be 262,512.2

A remarkable illustration of the natural bias even of enlightened minds in favour of times past, is mentioned by Sir John Sinclair, in one of his publications relative to this subject. "I have found the clergy," says he, "in guessing the population in 1755, exceed in every instance the number stated by Dr. Webster, and that they have almost uniformly fallen short of the truth, if they made a rough guess of the number of their parishioners at the time, before undertaking the trouble of an actual enumeration."

I mentioned in a former part of this Lecture, a very curious fact with respect to the state of our corn trade since about the year 1750, [see p. 238,] of which, however, I made no use in the course of my subsequent reasonings. It has, indeed, been often appealed to, by one set of writers, as a palpable proof of an increased population, while others have concluded from it, that the agriculture of the country is going fast to ruin. The truth is, that when considered abstractedly from other circum

1 Chalmers, Estimate, p. 224.

2 The population of Edinburgh is

stated in the same Table at 68,045; that of Leith at 13,241; that of Glasgow at 64,743.

stances, it neither justifies the former inference nor the latter, as the effect is manifestly influenced by a great variety of causes combined together. It may be proper, however, now to state it more particularly.

"From a representation drawn up in the year 1790 by the Lords of the Committee of his Majesty's Council for Trade, ' upon the present State of the Laws for regulating the Importation and the Exportation of Corn,' it appears, that this kingdom which, in former times, used to produce more corn than was necessary for the consumption of the inhabitants, has of late years been under the necessity of depending on foreign countries for a part of its supply." In proof of this their lordships state," that while, upon an average of nineteen years, from 1746 to 1765, the nett returns to the nation from the grain exported is supposed to have been no less than £651,000 per annum, so great is the subsequent change of circumstances, that on an average of eighteen years, from 1770 to 1788, it appears that this country paid to foreign nations no less than £291,000 per annum to supply its inhabitants." I am not in possession of the latest information on the subject; but from a statement some years posterior to the former, it appears that the annual value of imported corn has amounted to about a million sterling.1

In one of the printed reports of the Chamber of Commerce at Glasgow, this change in the circumstances of the corn trade is placed solely to the account of a rapidly increasing population; while a late very respectable writer, Mr. Dirom of Muiresk, ascribes it to the alterations in our old Corn Laws, which began to take place about 1750. "In consequence of these alterations," he observes, "our agriculture, which gradually advanced, from the commencement of the present century, out of the lowest state of depression, till it arrived, between the years 1730 and 1750, at the highest degree of prosperity, has ever since been rapidly declining." He adds, that "the principal increase of our population in the course of this century was prior to 1750, and that 137,256 persons were employed in 1 See Robertson's Report on the Size of Farms.