16th Aug. "Tits iden," says the Spectator, "that silver cannot be extracted to pay a profit at 2s. an ounce—that is over £3,580 a ton—is an illusion. Copper does not cost £50." Just before making this remark the Spectator notes that the metal had been sold in London at less than 2s. 6d, an ounce, which "is less than half its normal price." Monometallists contend that too much silver can be produced, and has been produced, at far less than 5s. an ounce, and that the fall in silver, as compared with gold, is due to this fact. Bimetallists contend that the rise in gold, as compared with silver and nearly all other commodities, is due to adverse legislation, and that if the world would only agree to "remonetise" silver, all our currency troubles would be at an end. The New York Nation, a thoughtful paper, and an acknowledged authority on financial questions, says "All the more highly civilised nations of the earth, including the democratic ones, such as England, France, Italy, Holland, Switzerland, and Belgium, and the more monarchical, such as Germany and Austria, have for nearly twenty years been slowly discarding silver as a standard of value, owing to the great increase in its production; the chief nse of money being, in their estimation, the supply of a measure of value for commodities and contracts. -This has been done with the utmost publicity, after much discussion, by men who have
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.