LAISSEZ FAIRE 
practical monopoly of the wool grown in the country; and 
there was no considerable area to which they could look for 
large additional quantities of raw material. 
and seems There is some reason to, believe that, during the last 
lo have been quarter of the eighteenth century and first few years of 
na, the nineteenth—that is during the period when spinning 
machinery was being introduced —the supply of English wool 
actually diminished’. Enclosing’ in the seventeenth and a 
great part of the eighteenth century had told in favour of 
the improvement of pasture; but it seems that towards its 
close, this was no longer the case. The rising price of corn 
rendered it profitable to convert grass land to tillage, and the 
area available for pasture seems to have decreased. The 
policy of the country, too, had been directed, from the 
fifteenth century onwards, towards rendering corn growing 
more profitable than pasture farming: the landowners in the 
grass countries had never succeeded in the demand that they 
should be treated more or less like the agriculturists and 
have liberty to export their wool’, instead of being limited to 
the home market. The price was thus kept down, and in all 
probability this reacted sooner or later upon the quantity 
produced. At all events it appears that about 1794-6 there 
was a deficiency, which was looked upon as a wool famine; 
and the ordinary conditions of the supply of raw material 
were such, that there was no possibility of a rapid expansion 
of the manufacture. The changes which had been introduced, 
in the breeding of sheep, were not favourable to the wool 
supply, and there was a marked decline in the quality of the 
British clip. From 1800 onwards, there was occasion for an 
344 
A.D. 1776 
—1850. 
1 The price was very low in 1780, and rose rapidly from that time. Long wool 
was quoted at 4d. and in 1791 at 73d.; short at 43d. in 1780 and at 9d. in 1791. 
Bischoff, A Comprehensive History of the Wool and Worsted Manufactures. 
L. 405. 
3 Tn 1816 Lord Milton argued that permission to export would raise the price 
of wool and thus induce landed men to increase the supply (Bischoff, op. cit. 1. 411). 
There had been a similar controversy in 1781, when Sir John Dalrymple urged 
that exportation should be permitted (The Question Constdered). This pamphlet 
called forth answers from Tucker and Forster, and support from Chalmers 
(Propriety of allowing Qualified Ezxportation, 1782). The gentlemen of Lincoln- 
shire formally advocated it, while the manufacturers agitated against it. Short 
7iew of Proceedings, Brit. Mus. B. 546 (13), gives a full account of the controversy. 
a «The heavier the carcase the coarser the fleece.” Mr Hughes’ evidence