Where the want of employment had been so great as to cause a rapid depopulation, where the demand for labour had almost entirely ceased, it was a necessary result, that during the process, prices should be low, even in the presence of foreign soldiery, and despite the inflamed' profits, which such capitalists as remained required, by way not only of profit but insurance, in such troublous times.

Accordingly, for the last year or two, the price of rye at Antwerp and Brussels had been one florin for the veertel (three bushels) of one hundred and twenty pounds; that of wheat, about one-third of a florin more.

Five pounds of rye, therefore, were worth, one penny sterling, reckoning, as was then usual, two shillings to the florin.

A pound weight of wheat was worth about one farthing.

Yet this was forty-one years after the discovery of the mines of Potosi (A.D.