ber, the average of which appears to be about
thirty eight shillings a quarter;(7*) and this was after
disturbances had taken place both at Havre and Dieppe, on account of
the quantity exported, and the rise of prices which it had
occasioned.

It may be said, perhaps, that the last harvest of France has been a
very favourable one, and affords no just criterion of its general
prices. But, from all that I hear, prices have often been as low
during the last ten years. And, an average not exceeding forty
shillings a quarter may, I think, be conclusively inferred from the
price at which exportation is by law to cease.

At a time when, according to Adam Smith, the growing price in this
country was only twenty eight shillings a quarter, and the average
price, including years of scarcity, only thirty three shillings,
exportation was not prohibited till the price rose to forty eight
shillings. It was the intention of the English government, at that
time, to encourage agriculture by giving vent to its produce. We may
presume that the same motive influenced the government of France in
the late act respecting exportation. And it is fair therefore to
conclude, that the price of wheat, in common years, is considerably
less than the price at which exportation is to cease.

With these prices so near us, and with the consequent power of
supplying ourselves with great comparative rapidity, which in the
corn trade is a point of the greatest importance, there can be no
doubt that, if our ports were open, our principal supplies of grain
would come from France; and that, in all years of common plenty in
that country, we should import more largely from it than from the
Baltic. But from this quarter, which would then become our main and
most habitual source of supply, all assistance would be at once cut
off, in every season of only moderate scarcity; and we should have
to look to other quarters, from which it is an established fact,
that large sudden supplies cannot be obtained, not only for our
usual imports, and the natural variations which belong to them, but
for those which had been suddenly cut off from France, and which our
habitually deficient growth had now rendered absolutely necessary.

To open our ports, under these circumstances, is not to obtain a
free trade in corn; and, while I should say, without hesitation,
that a free trade in corn was calculated to produce steadier prices
than the system of restrictions with which it ha