Land, which had probably become private property in the pastoral state, would certainly become so in the agricultural state. As every material thing, useful to man, is directly or indirectly derived from the soil, it always possessed the first element of exchangeable value, and, as soon as, by the progress of population, it had relative scarcity, or even in anticipation of it, it would also have the second element, and be appropriated by those who chanced to possess power or influence. When once its ownership in perpetuity had a value in exchange or price, so also must its ownership for a year, when its most valuable products are regularly renewed. This is the origin of Kent, which is the necessary consequence of the utility and relative scarcity of land.

In amount, the rent of land is the excess of its products beyond the labor and capital expended in its cultivation, according to the existing rates of remuneration. Such will be the clear profit of the proprietor, if he himself be the cultivator; or, supposing such excess to accord with the average product, in good and bad seasons, it would be the measure of the rent which a tenant could afford to pay, and the landlord be willing to receive. Thus, suppose the average annual product of a piece of land to be 100 bushels of wheat, and that 70 bushels would remunerate the labor and capital spent in its culture, then 30 bushels, the residue, would be the clear annual profit or rent.

When land is abundant, compared with the population, the price of labor, from its relative scarcity, will, according to the laws of value, be naturally high, and that of land and its products, from their abundance, will be low. Rents, therefore, which are the excess in value of those products above the cost of cultivation, will also be low. But as, from the continual increase of population, there is a growing demand for raw produce, and the supply cannot, from the limited extent and productiveness of the soil, be proportionally augmented, there will be a gradual rise in the price of raw produce, and consequently of rents. This rise is as natural and certain as is the rise of corn after a bad harvest. There is, in both cases, the same relative alteration between the supply and demand - the only difference being that, in case of a short harvest, the effect is produced by a deficient supply, but in the other (that of a growing population) it is produced by an increased demand.*

Such would be the rise and progress of rents, if all the land was fertile, uniform in quality, and nearly equi-distant from market, as are the Delta of Egypt, the American bottom in the State of Illinois, and a few other favored spots on the globe; for a difference of fertility, or distance from market, has no more agency in originating rent, than has a difference of color. But in point of fact, there is, in almost every country of tolerable extent, a gradation of soils, varying from great fertility to utter barrenness, which, after the increased demands of a growing population have given existence to rent, do make that rent higher or lower, according to their respective degrees of fertility.

* The same process may be effected by the co-operation of poor laborers, as we see in the familiar practice of log-rolling.

In this diversity of soils, the lands first cultivated are those which are at once most fertile, most accessible, and most easily cultivated. Some of the richest are, in a state of nature, most heavily timbered, and it devolves on those who have the greatest command of capital and labor* to clear lands of this description - it being a matter of calculation, whether it be more profitable to cultivate the richest land, at a greater expense, or inferior lands at a less. But in no long time, the rich alluvial lands are certain to be taken into cultivation.

As population advances, and the demand for raw produce consequently increases, soils of less fertility, yielding less clear profit, will naturally be taken into cultivation to furnish the required supply, which must be obtained at a greater cost of labor. But, to attribute the rise of raw produce which then exists, to this resort to poorer soils, is to mistake an effect for a cause. Raw produce does not rise because inferior soils, yielding a less return to the labor and capital expended on them, are resorted to, but such soils are cultivated in consequence of the rise of raw produce, caused by the increase of population. If raw produce had not previously risen, the inferior soils could not have been taken into cultivation without the prospect of loss.

* Chapter I (Physical Causes Of National Wealth)., §§ 12, 13.

It is obvious, from what has been said, that land must have a degree of fertility more than sufficient to defray the cost of cultivation, before it can yield a rent; yet this limit is constantly receding from the lands of the best quality, and extending the field of cultivable land as the price of raw produce rises.

But while land may be too poor to remunerate the cost of cultivating it, it can rarely ever fail, in a peopled country, to yield some annual profit, and, consequently, rent. It spontaneously furnishes fuel for warmth and cooking, the means of shelter from the elements, different kinds of wild animals and birds, which will more than repay the labor of taking them, as well as pasturage for cattle.