I bore with great patience the fatigues of the last fortnight in London,
in the hope that on my arrival at Gatcomb I should have the pleasure of
your company for a few days previously to your return to London. It was
a great disappointment to me to learn that you would be travelling to
London the very day after I quitted it, and I see little prospect of
having a visit from you here for some time to come, as your convenience
or inclination will probably lead you to a different part of the country
next year.
I most cordially join with you in the wish that the victory of the Duke
of Wellington will be the means of giving Europe some permanent repose.
There appears every probability that it will be attended with that happy
effect, and I should hope that the late stormy times will afford
instruction both to sovereigns and people, and will secure the world
from the evils of anarchy as well as from those of tyranny and
despotism.
David's ill health has induced us to take him from the Charterhouse....
Mr. Clerk, a neighbour of mine here in Gloucestershire and who is
brother to the East India Director of that name, has just sent his son
George to the East India College, and knowing my intimacy with you has
called upon me to request me to write to you on behalf of his son, that
in case he may st[and] in need of any friendly advice or assistance you
[would have] the goodness to give it to him. I hope [I] am not taking
too great a liberty in asking you to comply with his father's wishes.
The immense concerns in business which I have lately had on my mind had
nearly banished all consideration of subjects connected with political
economy from it. Those concerns are now settled, but they have given me
incessant work in arranging and balancing my accounts ever since I have
been here. I recur now, however, with pleasure to corn, labour, and
bullion. A really high price of corn is always an evil; in this opinion
I think you would concur, because it is always occasioned by difficulty
of production. I know of no other cause, and you allow difficulty of
production not to be desirable in itself. In our own case the high
bullion price of corn is not wholly owing to the barrenness of the land
to be taken into cultivation, but from whatever cause it has arisen it
cannot, I think, have enabled us to grant greater subsidies than we
should otherwise have done, for subsidies as well as all services
performed for us are paid for by the produce of the land and labour of
the people of England. It surely is a palpable contradiction to say that
our power of commanding services is increased, whilst our productions
with which those services are paid are diminished. The principle may be
true when confined to a few commodities of which we either have a
monop[o]ly or peculiar facilities in the production of them, but as a
general preposition it appears to me to be at variance with the best
established doctrines.
If a free trade in corn were allowed with America I should not expect
that the prices would differ more, here and there, than the expenses and
profits of sending it;--as it is I am surprised the price should be so
high. A high money price of wages is I think quite natural.
Ever yours,
DAVID RICARDO.