Now I cannot conceive that any alteration in the issue of bank of England notes which bear so very small a part, in amunot, in the circulation of the trade of the country, can produce the great enhancement in the price of bullion, which has lately taken place: doubtless some part of the effect is owing to that cause, but assuredly not the whole of it. That encrease depends on many circumstances. 1st. As every commodity will rise in price in proportion to its scarcity, some part of this encrease must be owing to the hoarding up of coin: an effect however gradually diminishing in England. 2ly. The restriction act, has also tended to produce a scarcity of coin, which can now no longer be obtained at the bank for bank notes. 3ly. The wants of the army and navy, take away a great deal of actual cash. 4ly. The sources of bullion supply from Spain and Portugal, have not been so abundant as heretofore, owing to the calamitous situation of these countries. 5ly. The exchange of late years has not been favourable to England: and this calls for cash to pay balances of mercantile transactions. 6ly. Prodigious quantities of coin have been exported, partly on a bullion speculation, and partly to purchase grain, an article of the first necessity. On the 26 July, 1811, lord Sheffield at the Wool fair at Leeds, stated that the value of grain imported into Great Britain in 1800 and 1801, amounted to 19 millions sterling. "IMPORTS. From a return just presented to the House of Commons, it appears that we imported in 1810 1,387,200 Quarters of Wheat, 503,122 Quarters of Oats, and Of this quantity the imports were— From France, 334,806 Quarters of Wheat, and 202,922 Cwt. of Flour. From Holland, 189,016 Quarters of Wheat, From Germany 145,186 do. and From Poland and Prussia, 296,756, From Denmark and Norway, 110,935 Qrs. From America, 34,829 Quarters of Wheat, and 210,209 Cwt of Flour. Hence more than one-third of the Wheat, and nearly one-third of the Flour, came from France and Holland; while from Ame It is to all these causes together, that the scarcity of coin is owing; and therefore they furnish no reason whatever why the bank should be again compelled to pay in specie. The prohibition was a very bold measure, but under the circumstances, in my opinion, a very wise one. But the paper system of that country has undergone a change, which totally alters the nature and complexion of it; and will certainly at some time or other shake to the foundation the whole system of paper credit. The current medium of England was formerly, the current medium of the world: viz. silver and gold. These were representatives of articles that constituted wealth: that is, of those articles which by exchange could command labour, which is the only universal exponent or prototype of wealth. Then, paper money, on account of its facilitating the operations of trade, supplied in a great degree, and dispensed with gold and silver; but paper money for a long time, remained the exponent or representative of real coin. It is no longer so. It is now, not the representative of real coin which in England is nearly banished, but of personal credit; that credit being deemed the exponent or representative of actual, valuable, convertible property, real or personal, which it may be or may not be; but in that country it is so in a reasonable degree. The circulating medium of England then, being no longer the circulating medium of the rest of the world, this state of things will continue and only continue, while the course of exchange remains favourable to that country, or the surplus profits of internal commerce, after maintaining the people, and paying the taxes, is sufficient to counterbalance any unfavourable state of foreign trade. For it is upon its internal commerce that England must ultimately depend: she is rich, not by her foreign trade, but in spite of her foreign trade. But those who guide the helm of that national vessel, are running very close to the wind. The standard or bank price of gold being 13 17 10, the paper price of it at the close of 1812, was / 5. 8. 0. In this country, bank paper is not upon so good a footing as in England. The maxim here is, to bring dead capital into activity, rica we imported not more Flour than we did from the countries with which we are at war; and the quantity of Wheat from Ame rica did not exceed one-fortieth part of the whole quantity import ed." which to a moderate degree is good. But under this notion, banks are created, and paper money issued indefinitely: and it is encreasing to such an extent, that its gradual depreciation is unavoidable, as the reader may well judge from the table, that I shall give in my next. Nobody supposes for a moment now, that a bank note of any kind, is the representative of cash. Nor is our paper equally stable with the British in respect of the following circumstances. 1st. The real actual wealth, upon which the personal credit of that country is founded, is more marketable, than ours: owing to the greater facility of sales from the greater riches of that country. 2ly. Accommodation notes are greatly discountenanced there. 3ly. Every bank, but the bank of England, is founded, not on the limited security of the amount of joint stock, but upon the known character and solvency of the individual partners who compose the firm. Our unlimited issues of paper currency, must ultimately tend to drive away all coin, to raise the paper price of every commodity, to encrease the number of forgeries and the difficulty of detection, and ultimately to sink the value of the paper itself. Banks are now founded, not on the necessities of the country, but of the speculators who set them up. In the end, the evil will cure itself; but it will be severely felt. The advocates of banks, say, wherever a bank is established, land encreases in value, all kinds of property advance. It is not so; no value is added to land, but the value of paper money is lessened, as is the case with every commodity wherewith the market is overstocked. So far as banks give a temporary facility to public enterprizes, they are of use: they are of great use also in checking the monopolies of monied men, and equalizing, in some degree, purchasers in the commercial markets: but these benefits are greatly overbalanced by the evils arising from their unlimited extension. They banish the precious metals; they tend to check exportation by raising the nominal price of commodities; they encourage irregular trade on fictitious capital; they promote wild speculation; and they strongly tempt to unwarrantable expence and extravagance in the manner of living. In this country, the many kinds of bank paper, will soon make it hazardous to take any; for by and by we shall have no means of detecting the spurious notes. The British government transmitted to France immense quantities of forged assignats. The for geries of American papers have been a trade in London; need we be surprised if we should be inundated with forged notes? A national bank in this country, would be an excellent establishment, if well planned and conducted; but the constitutional Simulated Papers.—It is an undeniable fact that the greater part of the difficulties our commerce has felt from the continental powers of Europe have had their origin in the frauds and forgeries of the British. Protected by the cannon of their navy, five thousand voyages have been annually made with ships bearing the American flag, and completely provided with counterfeited papers, which may be purchased in London and elsewhere as unceremoniously as a puckage of pins. The vessels thus furnished, and in many instances laden with the productions of the United States, are safely convoyed to the neighbourhood of places to which a simple clearance, from a real American custom-house, would render the vessel liable to seizure and condemnation, the moment she left the waters of the United States! Here is the operation of the orders in council. Englishmen in America begin to blush at the outrageous falsehoods they told in maintaining that these orders were intended to retaliate on the Berlin and Milan decrees.-They were originally designed for the simple object of destroying the trade of the United States; or, more extensively speaking, of forcing the commerce of the world through British ports, The manufacture of simulated papers has become a regular business in England. The workmen, like other mechanics, publicly recommend themselves to notice for their great experience, &c. and in this they are countenanced by the ministry. In the course of his late speech in parliament, Mr. Brougham read the following circular letter from a "house" in Liverpool, announcing that the persons by whom it was subscribed, after labouring some time as apprentices, and being well versed in the craft, had commenced as masters for them, sclves :(2 Niles's Reg. 166.) "LIVERPOOL, “ Gentlemen—We take the liberty herewith to inform you, that we have established ourselves in this town for the purpose of making simulated pa pers-(Hear! hear!)-which we are enabled to do in a way which will give ample satisfaction to our employers, not only being in possession of the origi nal documents of the ships' papers, and clearances to various ports, a list of which we annex ; but our Mr. G— B- having worked with his brother, Mr. J-B-, in the same line, for the last two years, and understanding all the necessary languages. "Of any changes that may occur in the different places on the continent, we are careful to have the earliest information, not only from our own connections, but from Mr. J-B-, who has proffered his assistance in every way, and who has for some time past made simulated papers for Messrs. Band P, of this town, to whom we beg leave to refer you for further infor mation. We remain, &c. Then follows a list of about twenty places, from and to which they can forge papers, having all the clearances ready by them, from the different public agents, the moment they receive intelligence that any merchant may need their assistance in this scheme of fabrication." objection to it is so strong, that it ought to be fairly gotten rid of, by an amendment to the constitution in the first instance. I may probably take up this question again in a future number, When I arrive at the banking part of the United States' statistics. The circulation of Bank of England paper in that country, has already been given. In noticing this matter Mr. Stephens said, “he would ask gentlemen sincerely were they prepared to abandon all trade to the continent of Europe on account of these objections in point of morality, which had been stated by the hon. mover? [Mr. Brougham.] He felt himself perfectly ready to meet any gentleman upon this ground; and he really believed that he would find few who had weakness enough to think, or hypocrisy enough to assert, that the whole trade of Europe ought to be abandoned on account of the immorality of FRAUDS necessarily practised in the carrying it on. As to the forging papers and French consuls' certificates of origin, he was convinced that neither this, nor shewing fulse colours to the enemy, would be supposed so serious an immorality as to make us consent to abandon all our trade." Mr. Stephens is the author of the pamphlet entitled 'war in disguise-or the frauds of neutrál flage! British Manufactures.-To such manufactures as are publicly and unblushingly offered for sale in the following advertisement, copied from the London Morning Chronicle, of June 12, 1812, we are indebted for a great part of the losses, privations and perplexities suffered on the European continent for many years past. We record the whole notice as a curious article. 3 Niles, 63. "To ship brokers, custom-house agents, notaries public, merchants, &c. Simulated papers and seals, capital counting-house fixtures, 20 very excellent and expensive charts and maps, &c.-By Mr. Sampson, at his warehouse, 16, Size-lane, Bucklersbury, on Thursday next, at 11, by direction of the assignees, The valuable fixtures and fittings up of the counting-houses, 34 boxes containing simulated ships' papers and seals for foreign countries, various coloured Inks, foreign writing paper, &c. of Mr. Peter Vander, A. A. merchant, a bankrupt, (removed from his offices, No. 9, Water-lane, Tower-st.) compris ing 7 mahogany 1 flap and 2 lap counting-house desks, bock case, two capital library and writing tables, with drawers, stamping and sealing presses, a patent instantaneous light machine, an excellent mahogany portable writing desk with secret drawers, two patent polygraphs, several capital charts, amongst which are the Northern Sea, the Cattegat, the Azores, the Atlantic Ocean, the Baltic Pilot, West Indies, British Channel, coasts of England and Holland, Mediterranean, Europe, Asia, and America; Mercator's World; Laurie and Whittle's new map of the British Isles, on spring rollers and boxes: Carey's universal Atlas; a new ledger, journal and waste books, 5 vols. of the beauties of England and Wales, and 95 numbers of do. 6 morrocco leather cases, &c. To be viewed two days preceding the sale, at the broker's warehouses; catalogues may be had of Messrs. Sweet and Stokes, solicitors, Bausinghal street, and of Mr. Sampson, 16, Size-lane, Bucklersbury." |