ugliness, drunkenness, and a high death-rate.

These are facts.

To begin with, I give you outline maps, copied from Bartholomew's Gazetteer of the British Islands, which is the best work of its class extant.

Map I shows the death-rates in the British Isles.

Map 2 shows the distribution of manufactures in the British Isles.

Examine these maps and you will find that where the manu factures are the greatest the death-rate is the highest, and the population the most dense.

Turn from Bartholomew's Gazetteer to the registrar-general's returns. The average death-rate for England and Wales from 1881 to 1890 was 19.1 in the thousand. The death-rate of Lancashire for the same period was 22.5 per thousand. But to get a fair idea of the difference between town and country, we must contrast Lancashire with the agricultural counties. Here are eight county death-rates from 1881 to 1890:

Surrey, 16.1; Kent, 16.6; Sussex, 15.7; Hants, 16.8; Berks, 16.2; Wilts, 16.9; Dorset, 16.2; Lancashire, 22.5.

In 1887, the latest year for which I have the figures, the death rates in some of the principal Lancashire towns were:

Bolton, 21.31; Oldham, 23.84; Salford, 23.95; Preston, 27.0; Blackburn, 25.48; Manchester, 28 67. And in that year the average death-rate in Surrey and Sussex was 16.3.

Now observe the difference between Lancashire and Surrey. It is a difference of 6 to the thousand. Lancashire in 1881 contained 3 millions of people, or 3,500 thousands, so that the excess of deaths in the cotton county reaches the total of 21,000.

But, again, in the registrar-general's returns for 1891, I find two tables showing the annual deaths per 100,000 of children under one year, for 1889, 1890, 1891. The first table shows the figures for the three counties, Hertford, Wilts, and Dorset; the second for the three towns, Preston, Leicester, and Blackburn. Three farming counties, 9,717. Three manufacturing towns, 21,803. That is to say, that the death-rate of children in those three towns is more than twice as high as the death-rate of children in those three counties.

But, again, Dr. Marshall, giving statistics of recruiting in this country, shows that not only were the country recruits taller than those from the towns, but he adds that "in every case the men born in the country were found to have better chests than those born in towns, the difference in chest measurement being proportionately greater than the difference in stature." According to Dr. Beddoe:

"The natives of Edinburgh and Glasgow are on an average from one to two inches shorter, and about fifteen to twenty pounds lighter, than the rural population of various parts of Scotland. The statistics of the Northumberland Light Infantry give 5ft. 6in, as the height of the natives of Newcastle; while the rural volunteers have an average height of from 5ft. 8in. to 5ft. Ioin., and are of course much heavier than the townsmen.'

Drs. Chassagne and Dally, in a work on gymnasia, gives tables comparing the rustics and townsmen of France, which show the former to be taller and more robust. Indeed, as Mr. Gattie in an article on the physique of European armies, says:

"A glance at the tables suffices to show the physical superiority of the countrymen at all points. Looking more closely, we find that, although the townsmen who had followed outdoor pursuits were shorter and lighter than the rest, they were able to lift and carry much greater weights."

Again, the official statistics of Switzerland tell the same story, thus:

"The butchers and bakers have much the best development, both of arm and chest; the carpenters, blacksmiths, and masons coming next. The bakers are not so tall as the butchers, blacksmiths, and carpenters, and the masons are very much shorter, but their arms are proportionately better developed than those

of the carpenters and blacksmiths. The agricultural laborers and cheesemen are next in order, and then follow the wheelwrights, saddlers, and sedentary operatives, the weakest men of all being the weavers; while the tailors are the shortest, and are scarcely less feeble."

These are facts; and they seem to prove my second point, that the factory system is bad for the public health.

CHAPTER IV.

CAN ENGLAND FEED HERSELF?

This our earth this day produces sufficient for our existence, this our earth produces not only a sufficiency, but a superabundance, and pours a cornucopia of good things down upon us. Further, it produces sufficient for stores and granaries to be filled to the roof-tree for years ahead. I verily believe that the earth in one year produces enough food to last for thirty. Why, then, have we not enough? Why do people die of starvation, or lead a miserable existence on the verge of it? Why have millions upon millions to toil from morning to evening just to gain a mere crust of bread? Because of the absolute lack of organization by which such labor should produce its effect, the absolute lack of distribution, the absolute lack, even, of the very idea that such things are possible. Nay, even to mention such things, to say that they are possible, is criminal with many. Madness could hardly go further.-Richard Jefferies.

If England were swallowed up by the sea to-morrow, which of the two, a hundred years hence, would most excite the love, interest, and admiration of mankind-would most, therefore, show the evidence of having possessed greatness-the England of the last twenty years, or the England of Elizabeth, of a time of splendid spiritual effort, but when our coal, and our industrial operations depending on coal, were very little developed ?— Matthew Arnold.

The absurdity of the attempt as yet to measure the power of subsistence and to declare it to be limited can be demonstrated in two or three simple ways suitable to the use of a statistician like myself, First, no man yet knows the productive capacity of a single acre of land anywhere in respect to food; second, the whole existing population of the globe, estimated at 1,400,000,000 persons, could find comfortable standing room-within the limits of a field ten miles square. The land capable of producing wheat is not occupied to anything like one-twentieth of its extent. We can raise grain enough on a small part of the territory of the United States to feed the world.-Ed. Atkinson.

We come now to the third objection to the factory systemthat it is unnecessary. It is often asserted that this country could not feed all her present population. I will try to show you that this is absurd. But first of all let me recommend to you Sketchley's "Review of European Society," price is. 6d. (William Reeves, London); and "Poverty and the State," by Herbert V. Mills (Kegan Paul, Trench, & Co.).

We have to prove that the British Islands can grow wheat enough to feed 36,000,000 of people.

In Hoyle's "Sources of Wealth" it is stated that Great Britain and Ireland contain about 50,000,000 of acres of good land, unbuilt upon and available for agriculture.

Lord Lauderdale estimates that 500 acres will feed 2,000 people, that is, four to the acre. Therefore if we use all our available land we could feed 200,000,000 of people.

Take a lower estimate. Allison estimates, in his "Principles of Population," that, after allowing for bad land and pasture land, these islands could feed the following numbers:

England and Wales, 60,000,000; Scotland, 15,000,000; Ireland, 48,000,000. Total, 123,000 000.

But these are estimates. Take accomplished facts. The Quarterly Review said in 1873 that in the year 1841 England grew wheat at home for 24,000,000 of people.

Now read this quotation, from a speech of Mr. Cobden's at Manchester:

"I have heard Mr. Ogilvey say and he is willing to go before a committee of the house to prove it-that Cheshire, if properly cultivated, is capable of producing three times as much as it now produces from its surface, and there is not a higher authority in the kingdom.”

That was in 1844, at a time when England grew wheat for 24,000,000 of its people.

The Manchester school would have us believe that we cannot feed 36,000,000. Well, in 1885 we imported nearly £53,000,000 worth of foreign wheat.

Compare that sum with the following statement of Mr. Mechi:

“I have tested this by comparative results, and find that if all the land in the kingdom equal to my own, about 50,000,000 acres, produced as much per acre as mine does, our agricultural produce would be increased by the enormous amount of £421,000,000 annually."

So much for the possible yield of our land under ordinary cultivation.

But now comes the most tremendous idea-the idea of what is called "intensive agriculture."

In an article iu the Forum in 1890, Prince Krapotkin says that when we learn how to use the soil we may feed ten times our population with ease. This, he says has been proved in France. Note this:

"That, by combining a series of such simple operations as the selections of seeds, sowing in rows, and proper manuring, the crops can be increased by at least 75 per cent. over the best