one needs to be VERY careful about "converting" the pound of the early 19th c to modern-day values. One needs to remember that not only has inflation happened, but one pound in 1800 had very much more buying-power than does a pound of to-day. Darce may have had the equivalent of US$700000 per annum (and a nice figure that is), but interest rates were higher then than now, and cost of living was very much lower. We also need to remember that although GB was the home of industrialisation the population was still largely agricultural, and thus self-sufficient for food.