people, who, however distant from us, are in truth related to us, and whose interests do, in some degree, concern every one who can say, Homo sum, &c."

Scheme of a voyage, by subscription, to convey the conveniences of life, as fowls, hogs, goats, cattle, corn, iron, &c, to those remote regions, which are destitute of them, and to bring from thence such productions, as can be cultivated in this kingdom to the advantage of society, in a ship under the command of Alexander Dalrymple.

Catt or bark, from the coal trade,

of 350 tons, estimated at about Extra expences, stores, boats, &c.

£

2000

3000

The expences of this expedition are calculated for three years: but the greatest part of the amount of wages will not be wanted till the ship returns, and a great part of the expence of provisions will be saved by what is

obtained

obtained in the course of the voyage, by barter, or otherwise, though it is proper to make provision for contingencies.

TO DR. PERCIVAL.

Concerning the Provision made in China against Famine.

I HAVE somewhere read, that in China an account is yearly taken of the number of people, and the quantities of provision produced. This account is transmitted to the emperor, whose ministers can thence foresee a scarcity, likely to happen in any province, and from what province it can best be supplied in good time. To facilitate the collecting of this account, and prevent the necessity of entering houses and spending time in asking and answering questions, each house is furnished with a little board, to be hung without the door during a certain time each year; on which board are marked certain words, against which the inhabitant is to mark number and quantity, somewhat in this

manner:

Men,
Women,
Children,

Rice, or Wheat,
Flesh, &c.

All under sixteen are accounted children, and all above, men and women. Any other particulars, which the government desires information of, are occasionally marked

2 D 4

marked on the same boards. Thus the officers, appointed to collect the accounts in each district, have only to pass before the doors, and enter into their book what they find marked on the board, without giving the least trouble to the family. There is a penalty on marking falsely, and as neighbours must know nearly the truth of each others account, they dare not expose themselves, by a false one, to each others accusation. Perhaps such a regulation is scarcely practicable with us*.

Positions to be examined, concerning national Wealth †.

1. ALL food or subsistence for mankind arise from the earth or waters.

2. Necessaries of life, that are not foods, and all other conveniences, have their values estimated by the proportion of food consumed while we are employed in procuring them.

3. A small people, with a large territory, may subsist on the productions of nature, with no other labour than that of gathering the vegetables and catching the animals.

4. A large people, with a small territory, finds these insufficient, and, to subsist, must labour the earth, to make it produce greater quantities of vegetable food,

* The above passage is taken from Dr. Percival's Essays, Vol. III. p. 25, being an extract from a letter written to him, by Dr. Franklin, on the subject of his observations on the state of population in Manchester and other adjacent places. B. V.

This article has been inserted in The Repository for select Papers on Agriculture, Arts, and Manufactures. Vol. I. p. 850, B.V.

suitable for the nourishment of men, and of the animals they intend to eat.

5. From this labour arises a great increase of vegeta ble and animal food, and of materials for clothing, as flax, wool, silk, &c. The superfluity of these is wealth. With this wealth we pay for the labour employed in building our houses, cities, &c. which are therefore only subsistence thus metamorphosed.

6. Manufactures are only another shape into which so much provisions and subsistence are turned, as were equal in value to the manufactures produced. This appears from hence, that the manufacturer does not, in fact, obtain from the employer, for his labour, more than a mere subsistence, including raiment, fuel, and shelter: all which derive their value from the provisions consumed in procuring them.

7. The produce of the earth, thus converted into manufactures, may be more easily carried to distant markets than before such conversion.

8. Fuir commerce is, where equal values are exchanged for equal, the expence of transport included. Thus, if it costs A in England as much labour and charge to raise a bushel of wheat, as it costs B in France to produce four gallons of wine, then are four gallons of wine the fair exchange for a bushel of wheat, A and B meeting at half distance with their commodities to make the exchange. The advantage of this fair commerce is, that each party increases the number of his enjoyments, having, instead of wheat alone, or wine alone, the use of both wheat and wine.

9. Where the labour and expence of producing both commodities are known to both parties, bargains will generally be fair and equal. Where they are known te

one

one party only, bargains will often be unequal, knowledge taking its advantage of ignorance.

10. Thus he, that carries one thousand bushels of wheat abroad to sell, may not probably obtain so great a profit thereon, as if he had first turned the wheat into manufactures, by subsisting therewith the workmen while producing those manufactures: since there are many expediting and facilitating methods of working, not generally known; and strangers to the manufactures, though they know pretty well the expence of raising wheat, are unacquainted with those short methods of working, and thence, being apt to suppose more labour employed in the manufactures than there really is, are more easily imposed on in their value, and induced to allow more for them than they are honestly worth.

11. Thus the advantage of having manufactures in a country does not consist, as is commonly supposed, in their highly advancing the value of rough materials, of which they are formed; since, though six-pennyworth of flax may be worth twenty shillings when worked into lace, yet the very cause of its being worth twenty shillings, is, that, besides the flax, it has cost nineteen shillings and sixpence in subsistence to the manufacturer. But the advantage of manufactures is, that under their shape provisions may be more easily carried to a foreign market; and by their means our traders may more easily cheat strangers. Few, where it is not made, are judges of the value of lace. The importer may demand forty, and perhaps, get thirty shillings for that, which cost him but twenty.

12. Finally, there seem to be but three ways for a nation to acquire wealth. The first is by war, as the