Letters from Illinois / By Morris Birkbeck.

  • Morris Birkbeck
Date:
1818
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Letters from Illinois / By Morris Birkbeck. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    25/140 page 5
    ~ LETTERS FROM ILLINOTS. 5 As to the annual profits here, I am not yet prepared with data for a very particular statement. The price of wheat may be reckoned at three shil- lings and fourpence sterling per bushel, and of beef> and pork at twopence per pound. The land is fer- tile and easy of tillage; the wear of ploughshares almost nothing, as they require sharpening by the smith but once a ‘year; and we shall have la- bourers in plenty at a price not much exceeding that of England: putting horse labour and fnan’s labour together, they will be quite as cheap. Then we have no rent, tithe, or poor’s rate, and scarcely any taxes, bh one farthing Per acre. : But omitting the annual income, Abions which I know enough to feel no anxiety, let us consider that at the end of fourteen years, when we may suppose the lease of the most favoured English farmers to terminate, a stock of various kinds, of great value, will be accumulated by the proprietor here; the worth of his estate, in the regular course of improvement, will be increased to the amount of 6 or 8,000/. and no renewal wanted; also, that _ the capital required by the English farmer of such — an estate, is at least double to that required by the Illinois proprietor at the outset of the under- taking.
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