An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith (ebook reader with highlighter txt) 📖

can afford, is

necessarily limited by the number of great and small cattle that are kept in

it. The state of its improvement, and the nature of its agriculture, again

necessarily determine this number.

 

The same causes which, in the progress of improvement, gradually raise the

price of butcher’s meat, should have the same effect, it may be thought,

upon the prices of wool and raw hides, and raise them, too, nearly in the

same proportion. It probably would be so, if, in the rude beginnings of

improvement, the market for the latter commodities was confined within as

narrow bounds as that for the former. But the extent of their respective

markets is commonly extremely different.

 

The market for butcher’s meat is almost everywhere confined to the country

which produces it. Ireland, and some part of British America, indeed, carry

on a considerable trade in salt provisions; but they are, I believe, the

only countries in the commercial world which do so, or which export to other

countries any considerable part of their butcher’s meat.

 

The market for wool and raw hides, on the contrary, is, in the rude

beginnings of improvement, very seldom confined to the country which

produces them. They can easily be transported to distant countries ; wool

without any preparation, and raw hides with very little ; and as they are

the materials of many manufactures, the industry of other countries may

occasion a demand for them, though that of the country which produces them

might not occasion any.

 

In countries ill cultivated, and therefore but thinly inhabited, the price

of the wool and the hide bears always a much greater proportion to that of

the whole beast, than in countries where, improvement and population being

further advanced, there is more demand for butcher’s meat. Mr Hume observes,

that in the Saxon times, the fleece was estimated at two-fifths of the value

of the whole sheep and that this was much above the proportion of its

present estimation. In some provinces of Spain, I have been assured, the

sheep is frequently killed merely for the sake of the fleece and the tallow.

The carcase is often left to rot upon the ground, or to be devoured by

beasts and birds of prey. If this sometimes happens even in Spain, it

happens almost constantly in Chili, at Buenos Ayres, and in many other parts

of Spanish America, where the horned cattle are almost constantly killed

merely for the sake of the hide and the tallow. This, too, used to happen

almost constantly in Hispaniola, while it was infested by the buccaneers,

and before the settlement, improvement, and populousness of the French

plantations ( which now extend round the coast of almost the whole western

half of the island) had given some value to the cattle of the Spaniards, who

still continue to possess, not only the eastern part of the coast, but the

whole inland mountainous part of the country.

 

Though, in the progress of improvement and population, the price of the

whole beast necessarily rises, yet the price of the carcase is likely to be

much more affected by this rise than that of the wool and the hide. The

market for the carcase being in the rude state of society confined always to

the country which produces it, must necessarily be extended in proportion to

the improvement and population of that country. But the market for the wool

and the hides, even of a barbarous country, often extending to the whole

commercial world, it can very seldom be enlarged in the same proportion. The

state of the whole commercial world can seldom be much affected by the

improvement of any particular country; and the market for such commodities

may remain the same, or very nearly the same, after such improvements, as

before. It should, however, in the natural course of things, rather, upon

the whole, be somewhat extended in consequence of them. If the manufactures,

especially, of which those commodities are the materials, should ever come

to flourish in the country, the market, though it might not be much

enlarged, would at least be brought much nearer to the place of growth than

before ; and the price of those materials might at least be increased by

what had usually been the expense of transporting them to distant countries.

Though it might not rise, therefore, in the same proportion as that of

butcher’s meat, it ought naturally to rise somewhat, and it ought certainly

not to fall.

 

In England, however, notwithstanding the flourishing state of its woollen

manufacture, the price of English wool has fallen very considerably since

the time of Edward III. There are many authentic records which demonstrate

that, during the reign of that prince (towards the middle of the fourteenth

century, or about 1339), what was reckoned the moderate and reasonable price

of the tod, or twenty-eight pounds of English wool, was not less than ten

shillings of the money of those times {See Smith ‘s Memoirs of Wool, vol. i

c. 5, 6, 7. also vol. ii.}, containing, at the rate of twentypence the

ounce, six ounces of silver, Tower weight, equal to about thirty shillings

of our present money. In the present times, one-and-twenty shillings the tod

may be reckoned a good price for very good English wool. The money price of

wool, therefore, in the time of Edward III. was to its money price in the

present times as ten to seven. The superiority of its real price was still

greater. At the rate of six shillings and eightpence the quarter, ten

shillings was in those ancient times the price of twelve bushels of wheat.

At the rate of twenty-eight shillings the quarter, one-and-twenty shillings

is in the present times the price of six bushels only. The proportion

between the real price of ancient and modern times, therefore, is as twelve

to six, or as two to one. In those ancient times, a tod of wool would have

purchased twice the quantity of subsistence which it will purchase at

present, and consequently twice the quantity of labour, if the real

recompence of labour had been the same in both periods.

 

This degradation, both in the real and nominal value of wool, could never

have happened in consequence of the natural course of things. It has

accordingly been the effect of violence and artifice. First, of the absolute

prohibition of exporting wool from England: secondly, of the permission of

importing it from Spain, duty free: thirdly, of the prohibition of exporting

it from Ireland to another country but England. In consequence of these

regulations, the market for English wool, instead of being somewhat

extended, in consequence of the improvement of England, has been confined to

the home market, where the wool of several other countries is allowed to

come into competition with it, and where that of Ireland is forced into

competition with it. As the woollen manufactures, too, of Ireland, are fully

as much discouraged as is consistent with justice and fair dealing, the

Irish can work up but a smaller part of their own wool at home, and are

therefore obliged to send a greater proportion of it to Great Britain, the

only market they are allowed.

 

I have not been able to find any such authentic records concerning the price

of raw hides in ancient times. Wool was commonly paid as a subsidy to the

king, and its valuation in that subsidy ascertains, at least in some degree,

what was its ordinary price. But this seems not to have been the case with

raw hides. Fleetwood, however, from an account in 1425, between the prior of

Burcester Oxford and one of his canons, gives us their price, at least as it

was stated upon that particular occasion, viz. five ox hides at twelve

shillings ; five cow hides at seven shillings and threepence ; thirtysix

sheep skins of two years old at nine shillings; sixteen calf skins at two

shillings. In 1425, twelve shillings contained about the same quantity of

silver as four-and-twenty shillings of our present money. An ox hide,

therefore, was in this account valued at the same quantity of silver as 4s.

4/5ths of our present money. Its nominal price was a good deal lower than at

present. But at the rate of six shillings and eightpence the quarter, twelve

shillings would in those times have purchased fourteen bushels and

four-fifths of a bushel of wheat, which, at three and sixpence the bushel,

would in the present times cost 51s. 4d. An ox hide, therefore, would in

those times have purchased as much corn as ten shillings and threepence

would purchase at present. Its real value was equal to ten shillings and

threepence of our present money. In those ancient times, when the cattle

were half starved during the greater part of the winter, we cannot suppose

that they were of a very large size. An ox hide which weighs four stone of

sixteen pounds of avoirdupois, is not in the present times reckoned a bad

one; and in those ancient times would probably have been reckoned a very

good one. But at half-a-crown the stone, which at this moment (February

1773) I understand to be the common price, such a hide would at present cost

only ten shillings.Through its nominal price, therefore, is higher in the

present than it was in those ancient times, its real price, the real

quantity of subsistence which it will purchase or command, is rather

somewhat lower. The price of cow hides, as stated in the above account, is

nearly in the common proportion to that of ox hides. That of sheep skins is

a good deal above it. They had probably been sold with the wool. That of

calves skins, on the contrary, is greatly below it. In countries where the

price of cattle is very low, the calves, which are not intended to be reared

in order to keep up the stock, are generally killed very young, as was the

case in Scotland twenty or thirty years ago. It saves the milk, which their

price would not pay for. Their skins, therefore, are commonly good for

little.

 

The price of raw hides is a good deal lower at present than it was a few

years ago; owing probably to the taking off the duty upon seal skins, and to

the allowing, for a limited time, the importation of raw hides from Ireland,

and from the plantations, duty free, which was done in 1769. Take the whole

of the present century at an average, their real price has probably been

somewhat higher than it was in those ancient times. The nature of the

commodity renders it not quite so proper for being transported to distant

markets as wool. It suffers more by keeping. A salted hide is reckoned

inferior to a fresh one, and sells for a lower price. This circumstance must

necessarily have some tendency to sink the price of raw hides produced in a

country which does not manufacture them, but is obliged to export them, and

comparatively to raise that of those produced in a country which does

manufacture them. It must have some tendency to sink their price in a

barbarous, and to raise it in an improved and manufacturing country. It must

have had some tendency, therefore, to sink it in ancient, and to raise it in

modern times. Our tanners, besides, have not been quite so successful as our

clothiers, in convincing the wisdom of the nation, that the safety of the

commonwealth depends upon the prosperity of their particular manufacture.

They have accordingly been much less favoured. The exportation of raw hides

has, indeed, been prohibited, and declared a nuisance; but their importation

from foreign countries has been subjected to a duty ; and though this duty

has been taken off from those of Ireland and the plantations (for the