Strona 190 z 2651

Thirdly, as the price of provisions varies more from year to year

than the wages of labour, so, on the other hand, the wages of

labour vary more from place to place than the price of

provisions. The prices of bread and butchers' meat are generally

the same, or very nearly the same, through the greater part of

the united kingdom. These, and most other things which are sold

by retail, the way in which the labouring poor buy all things,

are generally fully as cheap, or cheaper, in great towns than in

the remoter parts of the country, for reasons which I shall have

occasion to explain hereafter. But the wages of labour in a great

town and its neighbourhood are frequently a fourth or a fifth

part, twenty or five-and-twenty per cent. higher than at a few

miles distance. Eighteen pence a day may be reckoned the common

price of labour in London and its neighbourhood. At a few miles

distance, it falls to fourteen and fifteen pence.