the cheapening of the necessaries of life.[694] The
great majority of ordinary labourers were hired by the week, except
those boarded in the farm-house, who were generally hired by the year.
Men, also, who looked after the live stock were hired by the year.
Weekly wages ranged from 10s. in Wilts, and Dorset to 18s. in
Lancashire, and averaged 13s. 6d. for the whole country.

The fall in the prices of agricultural produce is best represented in
tabular form:

TRIENNIAL AVERAGE OF BRITISH
WHEAT, BARLEY, AND OATS PER QUARTER.

Wheat. Barley. Oats.
s. d. s. d. s. d.

1876-8 49 9 38 4 25 6
1893-5 24 1 24 0 16 9

Thus wheat had fallen 53 per cent., barley 37, and oats 34.

TRIENNIAL AVERAGE PRICES OF BRITISH CATTLE,
PER STONE OF 8 LB.

Inferior quality. Second quality. First quality.

s. d. s. d. s. d.

1876-8 4 5 5 6 6 0
1893-5 2 8 4 0 4 7

Or a fall of 24 per cent. in the best quality, and 40 per cent. in
inferior grades.

The decline in the prices of all classes of sheep amounted on the
average to from so to 30 per cent., and in the price of wool of from
40 to 50 per cent.; that is, from an average of 1s. 6d. a lb. in
1874-6, to a little over 9d. in 1893-5.

Milk, butter, and cheese were stated to have fallen from 25 to 33 per
cent. between 1874 and 1891, and there had been a further fall since.
In districts, however, near large towns there had been much less
reduction in the price of milk.

This general fall in prices seems to have been directly connected with
the increase of foreign competition.[695] Wheat has been most affected
by this development, and at the date of the Commission the home
production had sunk to 25 per cent. of the total quantity needed for
consumption. Other home-grown cereals had not been similarly
displaced, but the large consumption of maize had affected the price
of feeding barley and oats. As regards meat, while foreign beef and
mutton had seriously affected the price of inferior British grades,
the influence on superior qualities had been much less marked. Foreign
competition had been, on the whole, perhaps more severe in pork than
in other classes of meat, but had been confined mainly to bacon and
hams.

The successful competition of th