Tallis's London Weekly Paper (Newspaper) - March 12, 1853, London, Middlesex TALLISS 1 nf roil THE GOLD TUE silver mine of Potosi registered by tho Spanish in the year according to Adam its effects began lo be felt in Europe about the year The prices of commodities rose and the relative values of gold and silver were The foresight of the statesmen of Queen Elizabeth prompted to measures to sustain the rents of the Universities of Oxford and mid of Eton mid Winchester threatened with reduction by the increasing Hood of bullion in it was enacted flint a third of the rent of nil college leases should be reserved in to be paid either in or according to the current prices at the nearest public states the money arising from originally but onethird of the ill his double of what arose from the other On this sagacious operation Adam Smith remarks that the old money rents of colleges according to this have sunk almost to u fourth part of their ancient value or are worth little more than u fourth part of the corn which they were formerly And be this degradation in the of the money rents of collides 1ms arisen altogether from the iu the value of This legislative prece dent is worthy of the attention of trustees and assuming that Ihe mines of California and Australia pro duce a depreciation in gold similar to that which happened lo silver after the South American It is worthy of notice whether the act which compels trustees guardians to invest the property of minors mid wards in the funds should not be modified or The mines of Potosi were discovered by an who pulled a bush out of the to the fibres of a of silver globules was mid this led to The vein was so rich that all the other mines were comparatively labour being on The at the sudden influx of wealth was according to the lhat in ten years from the an iron horseshoe in the neigh came to be worth nearly its weight in II gives some curious particulars in his history of of the rise of The most ordinary articles only be had for exorbitant lie tells us that a quire of paper sold for ten pesos do oro a bottle ol wine for sixty a sword for forty or more a pair of shoes cost thirty or forty pesos tie and a good horse could not be had for less than twentyfive Some brought a still higher Every article rose ii value as gold und the of and in seemed to bo the only things in Cuzco that were not According to Ihe quantity of silver taken from the American mines has exceeded that of gold in the ratio of six to one and Michel in his book to which we referred last estimates the total yield of silver from the Potosi mint since its discovery to the present time ut not less thai Tho conquest of Mexico and Peru thus led to a monetary and wo know precisely that it was caused bj the of the precious metals and it is this accu rate knowledge which ought to teach nn instructive lessoi to modern It may be observed that our time and circumstances are widely different from of om ancestors who lived in the period to which we havens yet Then there wus no monied class in existent similar to that by which we are The funding was unknown were no insurance companies loaded with gigantic no private or banks no colossal trading on mid for monopoly tho labour of the masses wus not mortgaged to pay the dividends of Land was nearly the sole source of so that rent was the mil form of property that immediately felt the shoek of American But if the productiveness of and Australia continues to increase in the future in n ratio similar to the u monetary revolution may ensue us terrific in its action on all credit securities as the of a volcanic mountain on the cities and fields of the sub jacent What happened in Peru may happen in We have seen in that the weight of metal in an iron horseshoe wus worth nearly us much as un equal weight in If u similar degradation is re for tlie will gaze with rueful coun on a and remember with bitterness of that famous definition of a pound in inspired them with confidence mid gladdened their In one of the early numbers of this newspaper we pub u tabular statement showing variations in our Coinage from 1G01 to those variations being the result of the degradation of silver us compared witli in con sequence of the American supplies mid if we now reprint From Spanish authorities consulted by Prescott it appears the and peso do oro wore of equivalent commercial each worth In our money two pounds twelve shillings mid sixpence latest MARCH PRICE it 03 illustrating our immediate we trust to be ex fused by our older as our circulation has in threefold since that and it is desirable thai ur recent supporters should be in possession of that table V now append Ounce coined into into Elizabeth James 321 tb James 377 1 3th Charles 314 2 d George 317104 It wi un observed that the money denomination o the mls never changed during this t HtL legal tender to any amount equally with gold ind it 1818 that the ounce of silver wa mined into and limited as legal tender to a in nnl The old policy was to the relations between gold and silver as com thin values being measured in the labour ex ended iii them from the mines mid bringing them to more in the bread corn consumed i their being th universal 1 of The denominations o those natural who une ounce of gold bullion wus exactly equivalent to te minces of silver ill the policy was to preserve tin purity when the bul ion was minted into money thei one ounce of silver coined into one ounce o gold would be coined u ito ten times or 8d By the third of had advance so considerably in roluti on to one ounce of th former hud become fifteen ounces of the whe the ounce of gold was into We Urn arrive ut an easy rule of since every of an ounce is indicated a corresponding variation o H is by watching changing proportions tha we shall know with the effect of the no gold mines on disturbing the relations exist tween the two initials Im suppose that one ounce of go should only become worth fourteen ounces of the it would no be coined into but hit and us the proportions have to In struck off for every It is in this that the debtor classes would be relieved and the credito classes injured for according to the acts of 1819 an 18 the national debt and nil private thong called debts in a debts in ounces o and in yold since the double standard was superseded in when the silver was depreciated ten per and restricted as legal to at one The creditor classes are well aware of the danger tha threatens their aud some among them have already proposed to add to the weight of the sovereign in the even of gold becoming This is the argument 9 Professor of in a controversial corre which he recently held with Francis Ben of hi the Belfast in the professor invoked the authority of the late Sir Hubert Out of that controversy Bennoch came and we could add nothing to the force of his reason but we can refer to a letter from Sir Kobert Peel to Sir Roderick from which it is evident that Sir never would have consented to increase the weight of the sovereign to compensate for the of the dated contains the fol lowing On the Jib til in bringing in the Bank 1 adverted to the rapid increase of the annual sup ply of gold from mines within the dominions of and recommended those who wished for a diminution in the standard of value to benefit the to consider whether their objects might not be by natural decreasing relative value of gold in consequence of mote abundant supply the aid of legislative interven arguments are powerful to show that Is no probability I should say of precipitate and violent It takes a long time and a great tion in the amount of to the relative throughout the world of two articles us and The united of and California I justify my inference of 1844 that there is a tendency value on the part of An extraordinary increase in the supply of both gold and silver might concurrently take not affecting their relative value between each but affecting all other estimated with reference to tho pre cious and the interests of debtor and only fair construction can bo put on this letter is Sir Peel anxious to give tho debtor classes Ho was too much committed to the bullion hypothesis which rests on the baseless assumption is the of money to possess intrinsic to adopt the wiser courue of legislating for money ua tho symbol representative of value but wo feel in assorting Quarterly j that he would never have interfered with natural such as the discovery of new and counteracted their effects by adding to the weight of the as Professor Hancock Such n course of policy would have been a repetition of the injustice perpetrated on the debtor classes in As individuals are not fair judges in their own private so also the different members of n nation be suspected of partiality iu adjudicating on matters affect particular classes among themselves therefore we will appeal to the tribunal of two distinguished and listen to their Say thus speaks of the resumption of cash payments by England in This matter was very distressing to the industrious classes iu A number of engagements hud been made in u depreciated especially on leases which arc for long 1iirmers in consequence of the depre had been obliged to pay heavy nominal which they did their being paid for iu a currency of less were paid for nominally ut a dearer When the value of the currency was restored prices fell in and they were obliged to iu real obligations which had been contracted in nominal Taxes which had been by reason of the depreciation of the were in like manner obliged to be paid in real value and the expenses of the especially the public the weight of which bad been lightened when its interest was paid iu u depreciated became heavier than They were forced to pay in a currency valuable as gold tho interest of loans during the twelve or fifteen years in n currency worth onefourth or onethird The salaries of public what is and nominally increased during the were paid in real value after tho restoration of tin It was bank added to bankruptcy for engagements are broken not less when we are made to pay more than wp ought than when we cannot pay our all that is their Say rives it as his opinion the course ought to have been to have fixed the standard at per ounce of instead of at being a depreciation of forty per which he considers to have been the depre of He distinctly says f this measure required by justice and and let no one suppose that evil inflicted in 181U has passed It is repeated every payment of the dividends to the for though the race of may have personally the pressure on the indebted classes remains iu force it is to satisfy these aggravated 100 ner if measured in the price of brend only true standard of progress of free is brought a dead Tor week Mr Hume series of resolutions respecting the duties on imported He showed by returns on the table of the that there are 233 entries in the Customhouse tariff list of foreign manufactured articles charged in the year 1851 with duties of import varying in amount froni one to fifty per on the value of such which he classified ill live in the an import duty of There are also entries in the Customhouse tariff of foreign agricultural on which the aggregate duly amounts to notwithstanding we have loudly proclaimed the principle of unrestricted they cloned the revenue would must we feel the permanent of act of We will now refer to oil tlie The depreciation of gold It is the sole of injuriously the recipients of and of all and mul fro those who have undertaken provide or Let us for the Hake of that gold fall half its present in of the influence of the anil Australian If a a supposition bo ere nn In the interest of the to about jv vould not then press more upon the r or would difference of il is nearly equal lol of Britain for her J Such mi alleviation of the burdens of boon to the community at 1 of the Yet complain laws of woro vio uch treatment of The creditor e clear and application of HI it was passed grave and delibe In the strict justice of sentiments we but ve oro not hlmd lo calamities that would follow We of tho same evils as society n but the creditors would suffer instead of tha may be yet time for some honourable the mines may produce the esulto anticipated by amt we wiu hat side of In our OUR PARIS March of domestic ge of engrossing the For Ono can tWO o prin so tons IN the continued absence of foreign affairs have still the attention of The en and even if they as it is ho fov have the effect of inspiring by showing how and by hr general war might spring up in hardly a serious u powers which should not sooner or lat w tt cipal European Conversation of Pans during the fcw daya sively on the results of such a strife TJ of Turkey 1ms been mooted and In such n France would of course strike iu fc or for an If tho international Europe are to he altered and old treaties treated as dei the hankering after frontier may revive Egypt and Syria might be acceptable to England us se curing her communications with India and strength the of fortified posts with which she spans the These are specimens of the speculations suggested by tlm Montenegro and by the Austrian interference it 1ms As regards the position England would Me in the event of any serious attempt on tho integrity of i Ottoman peoples opinion have licen somewhat u settled m consequence of the fluctuating tone taken by cer tain English and especially by tho which two or three weeks ago talked in a sneering and manner of as a country of hardly worth tho fuss often made about Since then the seems to change its note a and to attach more importance to the country whose and independence have certainly long been ble to the maintenance of the balance of European Few things more piteous can bo conceived the jy tion of tho Austrian empire in the event of a SI the Danube to tho r inre of land to it would be convulsed and distr every mans hand would bo against bis neighbour Jl up of the most dissimilar many of bitter animosity to each most of the Government keeps them 1m nein r er tb would bo one vast might mid supposing that g mi a again reduced to Pussa the rel maintained bv nill could sin iii Austria us in Muscovite B0 whenever u movement is made ut Vii immediately glances The in too well known for us to imagine i i DIP miff covetous of a share of the l it or hiA with In case t g of Austria Were to take so enn hardly the chief there can be small doubt the most prominent all English If and silly a which 1 sufferer would be since won u lie and other r Austrian gas com to perfectly well the without England was the Lbov have yet day of the Austrian Lloyd the v o tower of of admiration of terror and detestation m politics have un exploded subject The and Empress take and co to theatres the committees of the Legislative Chamber courtesy so styled hold their sittings fte papers receive when they venture to a two or together in
