8 Decr 1801

Maximum

8. Local Variation

2

That the allowed price of bread corn could not be adjusted to the living-profit price of breadcorn in every place of the kingdom with as much correctness as in the metropolis the allowed price of bread is to the market price of breadcorn, is an proposition, the truth of which I {am as well satisfied as he can be /see no reason for disputing/.} Whether it would be worth while to attempt to make any difference at all between place and place, between the place /places/ which gives /give/ /average/ upon an average the highest price is a point /question on/ is more than at present, if ever, I should /can/ regard myself as competent to pronounce. But the question is not whether a fixation of this sort could be performed with the utmost degree of correctness that could be wished, but whether it could be performed at all. The Hon:ble Gentleman’s answer is most decidedly, and without {restriction or} limitation or condition in the negative: if therefore any one maximum /fixed/ price be pointed out, that shall at the same time be less /lower/ than the greatest /highest/ free price known and shall at the same time stand clear of the Hon Gentleman’s arguments, the whole apparatus of them falls to the ground. I will venture for illustrations sake to name a price in this view: and let it be the exact[?] double of the highest ordinary /average free/ price at the place at which that price is highest. That a price thus high

would