1853, vol. ii. pp. 146, 156; and as to the part of it adjoining the Mandingo country, see Mungo Park's Travels, vol. i. pp. 237, 238. Respecting the country south of Mandara, some scanty information was collected by Denham in the neighbourhood of Lake Tchad. Denham's Northern and Central Africa, pp. 121, 122, 144–146.
52
Richardson, who travelled through it south of Tripoli, notices its ‘features of sterility, of unconquerable barrenness.’ Richardson's Sahara, 1848, vol. i. p. 86; and see the striking picture at p. 409. The long and dreary route from Mourzouk to Yeou, on Lake Tchad, is described by Denham, one of the extremely few Europeans who have performed that hazardous journey. Denham's Central Africa, pp. 2–60. Even on the shore of the Tchad there is hardly any vegetation, ‘a coarse grass and a small bell-flower being the only plants that I could discover,’ p. 90. Compare his remark on Bornou, p. 317. The condition of part of the desert in the fourteenth century is described in the Travels of Ibn Batuta, p. 233, which should be compared with the account given by Diodorus Siculus of the journey of Alexander to the temple of Ammon. Bibliothec. Historic. lib. xvii. vol. vii. p. 348.
53
Richardson, who travelled in 1850 from Tripoli to within a few days of Lake Tchad, was struck by the stationary character of the people. He says, ‘neither in the desert nor in the kingdoms of Central Africa is there any march of civilization. All goes on according to a certain routine established for ages past.’ Mission to Central Africa, vol. i. pp. 304, 305. See similar remarks in Pallme's Travels in Kordofan, pp. 108, 109.
54
Abd-Allatif, who was in Egypt early in the thirteenth century, gives an interesting account of the rising of the Nile, to which Egypt owes its fertility. Abd-Allatif, Relation de l'Egypte, pp. 329–340, 374–376, and Appendix, p. 504. See also on these periodical inundations. Wilkinson's Ancient Egyptians, vol. iv. pp. 101–104; and on the half-astronomical half theological notions connected with them, pp. 372–377, vol. v. pp. 291, 292. Compare on the religious importance of the Nile Bunsen's Egypt, vol. i. p. 409. The expression, therefore, of Herodotus (book ii. chap. v. vol. i. p. 484), δῶρον τοῦ ποταμοῦ is true in a much larger sense than he intended; since to the Nile Egypt owes all the physical peculiarities which distinguish it from Arabia and the great African desert. Compare Heeren's African Nations, vol. ii. p. 58; Reynier, Economie des Arabes, p. 3; Postan's on the Nile and Indus, in Journal of Asiatic Society, vol. vii. p. 275; and on the difference between the soil of the Nile and that of the surrounding desert, see Volney, Voyage en Syrie et en Egypte, vol. i. p. 14.
55
‘The average breadth of the valley from one mountain-range to the other, between Cairo in Lower, and Edfoo in Upper Egypt, is only about seven miles; and that of the cultivable land, whose limits depend on the inundation, scarcely exceeds five and a half.’ Wilkinson's Ancient Egyptians, vol. i. p. 216. According to Gerard, ‘the mean width of the valley between Syene and Cairo is about nine miles.’ Note in Heeren's African Nations, vol. ii. p. 62.
56
I will give one instance of this from an otherwise sensible writer, and a man too of considerable learning: ‘As to the physical knowledge of the Egyptians, their cotemporaries gave them credit for the astonishing power of their magic; and as we cannot suppose that the instances recorded in Scripture were to be attributed to the exertion of supernatural powers, we must conclude that they were in possession of a more intimate knowledge of the laws and combinations of nature than what is professed by the most learned men of the present age.’ Hamilton's Ægyptiaca, pp. 61, 62. It is a shame that such nonsense should be written in the nineteenth century: and yet a still more recent author (Vyse on the Pyramids, vol. i. p. 28) assures us that ‘the Egyptians, for especial purposes, were endowed with great wisdom and science.’ Science properly so called, the Egyptians had none; and as to their wisdom, it was considerable enough to distinguish them from barbarous nations like the old Hebrews, but it was inferior to that of the Greeks, and it was of course immeasurably below that of modern Europe.
57
Indeed many of them are still unknown; for, as M. Rey justly observes, most writers pay too exclusive an attention to the production of wealth, and neglect the laws of its distribution. Rey, Science Sociale, vol. iii. p. 271. In confirmation of this, I may mention the theory of rent, which was only discovered about half a century ago, and which is connected with so many subtle arguments that it is not yet generally adopted; and even some of its advocates have shown themselves unequal to defending their own cause. The great law of the ratio between the cost of labour and the profits of stock, is the highest generalization we have reached respecting the distribution of wealth; but it cannot be consistently admitted by anyone who holds that rent enters into price.
58
In a still more advanced stage, there is a fourth division of wealth, and part of the produce of labour is absorbed by rent. This, however, is not an element of price, but a consequence of it; and in the ordinary march of affairs, considerable time must elapse before it can begin. Rent, in the proper sense of the word, is the price paid for using the natural and indestructible powers of the soil, and must not be confused with rent commonly so called; for this last also includes the profits of stock. I notice this, because several of the opponents of Ricardo have placed the beginning of rent too early, by overlooking the fact that apparent rent is very often profits disguised.
59
‘Wages depend, then, on the proportion between the number of the labouring population, and the capital or other funds devoted to the purchase of labour; we will say, for shortness, the capital. If wages are higher at one time or place than at another, if the subsistence and comfort of the class of hired labourers are more ample, it is, and can be, for no other reason than because capital bears a greater proportion to population. It is not the absolute amount of accumulation or of production that is of importance to the labouring class; it is not the amount even of the funds destined for distribution among the labourers; it is the proportion between those funds and the numbers among whom they are shared. The condition of the class can be bettered in no other way than by altering that proportion to their advantage; and every scheme for their benefit which does not proceed on this as its foundation, is, for all permanent purposes, a delusion.’ Mill's Principles of Political Economy, 1849, vol. i. p. 425. See also vol. ii. pp. 264, 265, and M'Culloch's Political Economy, pp. 379, 380. Ricardo, in his Essay on the Influence of a Low Price of Corn, has stated, with his usual terseness, the three possible forms of this question: ‘The rise or fall of wages is common to all states of society, whether it be the stationary, the advancing, or the retrograde state. In the stationary state, it is regulated wholly by the increase or falling-off of the population. In the advancing state, it depends on whether the capital or the population advance at the more rapid course. In the retrograde state, it depends on whether population or capital decrease with the greater rapidity.’ Ricardo's Works, p. 379.
60
The standard of comfort being of course supposed the same.
61
‘No point is better established, than that the supply of labourers will always ultimately be in proportion to the means of supporting them.’ Principles of Political Economy, chap. xxi. in Ricardo's Works, p. 176. Compare Smith's Wealth of Nations, book i. chap. xi. p. 86, and M'Culloch's Political Economy, p. 222.
62
The division of food into azotized and non-azotized is said to have been first pointed out by Magendie. See Müller's Physiology, vol. i. p. 525. It is now recognised by most of the best authorities. See, for instance, Liebig's Animal Chemistry, p. 134; Carpenter's Human Physiology, p. 685; Brande's Chemistry, vol. ii. pp. 1218, 1870. The first tables of food constructed according to it were by Boussingault; see an elaborate essay by Messrs. Lawes and Gilbert on The Composition of Foods,
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