Page:Malthus 1807 A letter to Samuel Whitbread.djvu/41

 It would appear from the different prices of labour in different parishes, and the different proportions of population relieved, that the farmers, although they bear themselves a large portion of the assessments, have already learned in some places to prefer low wages and high rates, to low rates and high wages. The consequences of this preference I am inclined to believe would have been more marked than they really are, if the demand for men, on account of the war, had not rendered it extremely difficult to keep down the price of labour. But as it is, this circumstance,