agriculture of Great Britain remained nearly stationary, notwithstanding the enormous increase in the population. The multitude of additional hands had been obliged to find work in other departments. The total male population of Great Britain, twenty years of age and upwards, was, in 1831, 3,199,984; and in 1841, 3,829,668, showing an increase in ten years of about 630,000 adult males. Hardly one of these additional men had been able to find employment in agriculture. The agricultural occupiers and labourers were, in 1831, 980,750, and in 1841, only 961,585. Allowing here for a correction pointed out by the enumerators, it still appeared that at the end of the decennial period, there was either no increase, or a very small one, in the number of adult males employed in agriculture. The numbers employed in commerce, trade, and manufactures were, in 1831, 1,278,283, and in 1841 they amounted to 1,682,044, showing that those branches of industry had found employment for more than 400,000 additional persons of the class before mentioned. The preface to the abstract contains the following observations:—
"In columns 28 and 29 are given proportional tables of the two great classes of occupations, viz., agricultural and commercial (or trade and manufactures). In the former are included all farmers, graziers, nurserymen, &c., together with the whole number of persons returned as agricultural labourers; in the latter, all shopkeepers and manufacturers, with those working under them"; while from both classes are excluded those returned as domestic servants or general labourers, together with all professional persons. It will be seen that for all England trade and manufacture include rather more than double the numbers included under the head of agriculture.
"The altered proportion which the agricultural bears to the commercial classes for Great Britain generally, will at first, perhaps, excite surprise. The proportions which the agricultural, the commercial, and the miscellaneous classes bore to each other were in
| Agricultural. | Commercial. | Miscellaneous. | |
| 1811 | 35 | 44 | 21 |
| 1821 | 33 | 46 | 21 |
| 1831 | 28 | 42 | 30 |
| While they were respectively in | |||
| 1841 | 22 | 46 | 32 |
