ay to realise his cent. per cent.

But by degrees the dream faded. He attributed it in the first place to the
stagnation, the almost extinction, of the iron trade, the blowing out of
furnaces, and the consequent cessation of the demand for the best class of
food on the part of thousands of operatives and mechanics, who had
hitherto been the farmers' best customers. They would have the best of
everything when their wages were high; as their wages declined their
purchases declined. In a brief period, far briefer than would be imagined,
this shrinking of demand reacted upon agriculture. The English farmer made
his profit upon superior articles--the cheaper class came from abroad so
copiously that he could not compete against so vast a supply.

When the demand for high-class products fell, the English farmer felt it
directly. Cecil considered that it was the dire distress in the
manufacturing districts, the stagnation of trade and commerce and the
great failures in business centres, that were the chief causes of low
prices and falling agricultural markets. The rise of labour was but a
trifling item. He had always paid good wages to good men, and always meant
to. The succession of wet seasons was more serious, of course; it lowered
the actual yield, and increased the cost of procuring the yield; but as
his lands were well drained, and had been kept clean he believed he could
have withstood the seasons for awhile.

The one heavy cloud that overhung agriculture, in his opinion was the
extraordinary and almost world-spread depression of trade, and his
argument was very simple. When men prospered they bought freely, indulged
in luxurious living, kept horses, servants, gave parties, and consumed
indirectly large quantities of food. As they made fortunes they bought
estates and lived half the year like country gentlemen--that competition
sent up the price of land. The converse was equally true. In times of
pressure households were reduced, servants dismissed, horses sold,
carriages suppressed. Rich and poor acted alike in different degrees but
as the working population was so much more numerous it was through the low
wages of the working population in cities and manufacturing districts that
the farmers suffered most.

It was a period of depression--there was no confidence, no speculation.
For instance a year or two since the crop of standing wheat then growing
on the very field before their eyes was sold by auction, and several