bringing it to market, in the most liberal way in which
that labour is ever maintained. The surplus too is always more than
sufficient to replace the stock which employed that labour, together
with its profits. Something, therefore, always remains for a rent to the
landlord."

But what proof does he give of this?--no other than the assertion that
"the most desert moors in Norway and Scotland produce some sort of
pasture for cattle, of which the milk and the increase are always more
than sufficient, not only to maintain all the labour necessary for
tending them, and to pay the ordinary profit to the farmer, or owner of
the herd or flock, but to afford some small rent to the landlord." Now
of this I may be permitted to entertain a doubt. I believe that as yet
in every country, from the rudest to the most refined, there is land of
such a quality that it cannot yield a produce more than sufficiently
valuable to replace the stock employed upon it, together with the
profits ordinary and usual in that country. In America we all know that
this is the case, and yet no one maintains that the principles which
regulate rent are different in that country and in Europe. But if it
were true that England had so far advanced in cultivation, that at this
time there were no lands remaining which did not afford a rent, it would
be equally true that there formerly must have been such lands; and that
whether there be or not is of no importance to this question, for it is
the same thing if there be any capital employed in Great Britain on
land which yields only the return of stock with its ordinary profits,
whether it be employed on old or on new land. If a farmer agrees for
land on a lease of seven or fourteen years, he may propose to employ on
it a capital of 10,000_l._, knowing that at the existing price of grain
and raw produce, he can replace that part of his stock which he is
obliged to expend, pay his rent, and obtain the general rate of profit.
He will not employ 11,000_l._, unless the last 1,000_l._ can be employed
so productively as to afford him the usual profits of stock. In his
calculation, whether he shall employ it or not, he considers only
whether the price of raw produce is sufficient to replace his expenses
and profits, for he knows that he shall have no additional rent to pay.
Even at the expiration of his lease his rent will not be raised; for if
his landlord should require rent, because this additional 1000_l._ was
emplo