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FROM TATE'S CAMBIST.

The par of exchange between London and

Paris,

66

is 25 francs, 22 centimes per £stg. in gold.

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in silver.

66

in gold.

is 11

66 97 66

66

in silver.

Amsterdam,

66

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is 12 guilders, 09 centimes

Hamburgh, is 13 m'cs banco, 10 schillings, 66

Bremen

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is 6094 Rix dollars for 100 stg. in gold.

CHAPTER VI.

ON THE STEADINESS OF TRADE IN COUNTRIES
EMPLOYING A METALLIC CURRENCY.

Ir the principles laid down in the preceding chapters be sound, as it is believed they are, it must necessarily follow that the operations of commerce in countries employing a metallic cúrency, are as regular and as little liable to fluctuations as the nature of things will admit, and more than this can no where be looked for. That there will be occasional overtrading and over-speculation wherever there is credit, is too self-evident to require proof, and hence no country in which credit exists, can be entirely exempt from individual bankruptcies. Foreign wars, domestic disturbances, extensive conflagrations, storms and hurricanes, the failure of crops, the insolvency of foreign debtors, and a variety of other causes, may produce individual or even extensive commercial embarrassment. Too much credit may even lead incautious men into extravagance of expenditure, which may bring on their ruin, but in none of these cases is the currency chargeable with the catastrophe. The mischief, whatever it may be, can only be. ascribed to the operations of credit; but as credit, when properly regulated, is far more influential in

producing good than evil, as will be shown hereafter, it is not to be annihilated on account of the misfortunes or imprudence of a comparatively few individuals.

Such being the theory of this branch of my subject, I have the satisfaction to state in regard to the practice under it, upon the testimony of a respectable American merchant, who resided and carried on extensive operations for near twenty years at Gibraltar, where there has never been any but a metallic currency, that he never knew during that whole period, such a thing as a general pressure for money. He has known individuals fail from incautious speculations, or indiscreet advances, or expensive living; but he never saw a time that money was not readily obtainable, at the ordinary rate of interest, by any merchant in good credit. He assured me, that no such thing as a general rise or fall in the prices of commodities, or property was known there; and that so satisfied were the inhabitants of the advantages they enjoyed from a metallic currency, although attended by the inconvenience of keeping in iron chests, and of counting large sums in Spanish dollars and doubloons, that several attempts to establish a bank there were put down by almost common consent.

Upon this same subject, in reference to the city of Havanna, more satisfactory evidence still, because in an official form, and more in detail, can be adduced. N. P. Trist, Esq., consul of the United States at that port, in a letter addressed to the secretary of the treasury under date of 19th October, 1838, and laid before the senate on the 21st of January following, annexed to a report from the committee of finance, communicated many valuable particulars in reference to the practical working of a metallic currency.

After describing the trade and importance of Cuba, Mr. Trist employs the following language:-

"These are tolerably sure evidences of a state of active industry and prosperous credit. Nor are they

less steady than active. They exhibit no alterations of feverish excitement and prostration; now rising to the energy of delirium, now sinking to correspondent enervation. The sudden stoppage of the current business in all, or in any one of its branches, is a thing as absolutely unknown in this island as the freezing of one of its rivers; and its inhabitants possess as little knowledge of the one phenomenon as they do of the other. Nay, less: for they not only read and hear of the freezing of our waters, as they do of those monetary prodigies in which the streams of industry and credit become arrested in the same way, and with equal suddenness; but, by means of the ice which our country sends hither, they can form a clear conception of the one wonder, and of all the horrors of navigation among its whirling and crushing masses, while no such means of knowledge can be brought home to their feelings in regard to the other.

"I am here indulging in no exaggeration. It is the literal truth; and for the proof that it is so, I refer to the testimony of the leading merchants of all nations established here, which forms a portion of the documents accompanying this letter. It is strictly and literally true, that such a thing as a monetary convulsion is absolutely unknown in any part of this island, which covers an area of about forty-three thousand square miles; has a line of sea-coast of about sixteen hundred miles; has nine ports open to foreign commerce, one of which is a commercial city, second to none in the new world, New York only excepted;' has a population amounting to about one million of souls, who, in the last year, maintained a foreign exporting and importing business exceeding forty-three millions of dollars, after paying taxes to an amount which, in the year 1827, (when its exporting and importing business fell something short of thirty two millions,) exceeded fourteen millions, and the rate of which has not since decreased; and the

government of which is an absolute monarchy, maintained by the bayonet.

"This is the country the inhabitants of which actually have not the slightest knowledge of what a monetary convulsion means; where a general or an extensive stoppage of its commercial movement, (using the words in their most comprehensive sense, embracing all branches of business,) not only has never spontaneously occurred, but has never, for one single instant, been experienced at all; where the utmost effect that any foreign disturbing cause, however terrific its ravages at home, has ever been able to produce, has been a momentary pause-momentary only, and merely prudential--in regard to the particular branches of business, or rather the particular individuals, intimately and directly connected with the scene of the earthquake.

"This, I again repeat, is true to the very letter. The recent convulsion, in which the whole business of our country, from the city of New York to the remotest village in the west, exhibited the spectacle of chaos come again, was literally unfelt here. None but the mercantile class knew that any thing had happened; and of that class, it did not occasiona moment's uneasiness to any, except those whose stability depended upon the punctual fulfilment of engagements by merchants in the United States or in Great Britain. Beyond these, and the few others who may have depended upon credit facilities from them, I do not believe that the business of a single man in the island was so much as sensibly slackened by it for a single day, or that a single individual received or spent one dollar the less, or so much as ever dreamed that any thing was the matter.

"For evidence upon this point, from persons far more competent to give it than I can be, I again refer to the accompanying documents. They afford proof of the fact. To estimate the force of that fact, it is necessary to take into consideration the extent and

intimacy of the commercial connection between the two countries. Of this a conception may be conveyed in a few words. Of the two thousand five hundred and twenty-four vessels of all nations, Spanish included, which entered the ports of the island from other parts of the world, during the last year, one thousand three hundred and nineteen were Americans.

"Here then, are the facts. Here is flourishing industry, flourishing credit; above all, flourishing commerce, if such a thing exists under the sun. These are facts, the reality of which is beyond all question."

Not wishing, however, to rest his statements upon his own evidence alone, Mr. Trist addressed a circular to a number of foreign merchants of the highest respectability residing in Havanna, in which he propounded to them a number of inquiries, the answers to five of which he above alludes to as the documents accompanying his letter.

From these answers the following particulars are gathered:

First. That the imports into the Havanna are mostly on account of the foreign shippers, perhaps a third or a fourth being on home account.

Second. That these imports are mostly sold on credit, varying from one to ten months, upon promissory notes without endorsers, which are paid at maturity with great punctuality.

Third. That the rate of interest fluctuates according to the season.

One of the answers says,

"The usual rate of interest for good paper is per cent. a month, and the extreme points may be placed at to 1 per cent.; but the latter rate is unusual." Another says,

"In spring, when the bulk of the crops is shipped, it is sometimes difficult to get money for notes at 1 per cent.; and in autumn, when shipments are of

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