food have been gained from land which formerly was kept in pasture, or, if in arable, lay fallow one year in four. 2. The effect of the repeal of the Corn Laws has been to enforce improvements on both landowners and tenants. Landlords have been anxious to enable their tenants to raise corn more cheaply, and have been improving their lands and buildings, and giving a freer use of their farms; and farmers have sought relief in higher cultivation, a better practice, and the introduction of improved implements and machinery; and there is no doubt that in this way the production of the soil has been largely increased, at the same time that cultivation has been carried on at less expense. In this period, in many instances, the farmers have been made to pay higher rents, and the income of those cultivating their own farms must have been benefited. In the last five years the sale price of land has considerably advanced, for not only has the rent of land increased, but also the number of years' purchase given for it. 3. The changes in this period have increased the labourers' consumption of bread and meat, for the additional employment found them on the land, and the general improvement of the country, have secured them more constant employment and higher wages." To adopt the eloquent language of the biographer of the greatest of the name, "In no long time a hundred years will have elapsed from the day when David Hume told the world what the legislature of this country is now declaring, that national exclusiveness in trade was as foolish as it was wicked; that no nation could profit by stopping the natural flood of commerce between itself and the rest of the world; that commercial restrictions deprive the nations of the earth of that free communication and exchange, which the author of the world has intended, by giving them soils, climates, and geniuses so different from each other, and that like the healthy circulation of the blood in living bodies, freetrade is the vital principle by which the nations of the earth are to become united in one harmonious whole,”* We must not close this chapter without remarking that though during the progress of the Corn Bill through Parliament, and for some years after, Mr. Macgregor continued Secretary at the Board of Trade, the success of the measure, and the active part which he bore in it, proved too much for the weaker part of his character. It is true Mr. Deacon Hume had regarded his appointment with satisfaction. He was better aware probably than any one else of his abilities, his vast information, his powers of application, and his zeal in the cause of commercial emancipation. He could not have failed to observe, that vanity was the sin which most easily beset him; though he could never have contemplated that it would rise to such a height, and conduct to such lamentable results, as was eventually the case. But as Burke severely, but justly says, "though in a small degree, and conversant in little things, vanity is of little moment, when full grown, it is the worst of vices, and the occasional mimic of them all. It makes the whole man false. It leaves nothing sincere or trustworthy * Burton's Life of David Hume, vol. ii. about him. His best qualities are poisoned and perverted by it, and operate exactly as the worst." This passion, Mr. Macgregor latterly in no way endeavoured to control. It was consequently ever upon the increase, until at last it leavened thoroughly the whole man. Mr. Hume did not live long enough to see him two years in office, and his death in 1842 caused him, happily, to remain for ever ignorant of what would have deeply pained him. The climax of Mr. Macgregor's self-esteem, we are told," led him to resign his office of Secretary, with its salary of 1,500l. a year, from a delusive persuasion that he was about to become a member of Lord John Russell's new Cabinet." Having deliberately prepared the way he became a candidate for the city of Glasgow in July, 1847, opposing the old liberal members, Mr. Oswald and Mr. John Dennistoun. Unfortunately for himself, as the writer above quoted has remarked, he headed the poll. 66 Upon the subject of the Royal British Bank, which he established, Mr. Macgregor would take no counsel, or if he promised to abide by any friendly advice, he was sure to relapse to his own opinion of his entire self-sufficiency. He was more a nominal than a real manager. He had resigned the chair three years previous to its recent bankruptcy, but the disclosures as to the mismanagement of the institution, and his own unsecured debt to the shareholders, overwhelmed a shattered body and a wounded spirit." A curious note has been pointed out in the first volume of his "Note Book," published in 1835, detailing the ruin of the old bank of Amsterdam, instituted in 1689, as a bank of deposit, "broken by an inconvenient mode of transferring sums from the account of one individual to another," and by the directors secretly lending and "locking up" 10,000,000 florins to the provinces of Holland and Friesland, "notwithstanding its original constitution bound the directors to have bullion in their coffers equal to the amount of its liabilities." This old story, it has been suggested, might have saved Mr. Macgregor from much misconduct of the Royal British Bank. But theory and practice are different matters.' 66 It is scarcely necessary to add, after what has been said, that Mr. Macgregor's character contrasted unfavourably in many important respects with that of his predecessor. He was succeeded in office by Mr. Porter, a man of inferior calibre to either, though a most useful and upright person, earnest in his convictions, as well as able and clear-headed in the transaction of public business. We have seen it stated that Mr. Porter, "by his skilful compilations, monopolized the fame, much of which belonged to Mr. Deacon Hume." The remark is undoubtedly correct; but it might have been said as justly of Mr. Macgregor as of his successor. Merit like that of Mr. Deacon Hume is not the less palpable because its complete recognition is the growth of time. On the contrary, that is the most enduring which is tardy in its development. *The Times. Mr. Macgregor died at Boulogne on the 23rd of April, 1857. 330 CHAPTER XIII. AND WRITTEN-HIS MR. DEACON HUME'S PRODUCTIONS, ORAL REMARKS. TESTIMONIES HIS "His conversation was pithy, and he wrote much in little room : but some of these labours of his never saw the light. Many persons that privately did converse with him, lighted their candles at his.”— CLARKE ON CARTER, 1662. MR. DEACON HUME's merits as a writer will perhaps be sufficiently apparent from what the reader has met with in this volume. He wrote more than his friends are aware of. He was an occasional contributor to some of the daily and weekly journals, as well as to a quarterly periodical. He wrote an article in the Times on the subject of the Prussian commercial system, in answer to one which was commonly attributed to Baron Brunow, the Prussian Minister at our court. His letters to friends, or public individuals who sought his opinion, sometimes amounted to short treatises. He was the author of a great variety of papers not intended for publication; many of which, doubtless, might be published, not only without inconvenience, but with advantage. Upon his retirement from office he put many of his manuscripts into the hands of a gentleman who begged the loan of them, believing that they might |