Note 157-6 — Chapter II

Malthus, Principles, 231 ff. If the laboring class were to become satisfied with living on potatoes instead of meat and bread as hitherto, rents would immediately and greatly fall, since the necessities of the people might then be obtained from a much smaller superficies. But after a time, the consequent increase in population might lead to a much higher rent than before; since a great deal of land too unfertile for the cultivation of corn might be sown with potatoes, and thus the limits of cultivation be reached much later.