The Sun.
London, England, 1848-12-29 00:00:00

z
ft 1

LONDON, FRIDAY, Df(.511! BER 29, 1848.

Whatever the Americans may think of the riches
to be derived from the mines of gold and quicksilver
discovered in California, they would act more wisely
in observing the admirable results flowing from the
approximation of their commercial system to the prin-
ciples of free trade, than in pursuing the visionary
speculations of a new and more seductive El Dorado.
The recent explosion of the philosophic bubble of M•
CARRT should act as a timely warning to the dreamers
of the United States. Icaria has melted sway from
the prairies of Texas as the mirage melts from the
aridity of the wilderness. Those who, like the credul-
ous son of Monsieur F*****, have relied upon the
truthfulness of the Parisian Philanthropist have
found ashes in their mouths instead of apples, and have
discovered the reputed Paradise to be nothing better
than a pestilential swamp, like the Eden visited by
MARTIN CHUZZLBWIT. According to M. CADET,
Icaria flowed with cream and honey, with the fruit of
the olive and the juice of the grape, while, according to
those who have adventured in search of this beautiful
" land of promise," the whole account has proved to
be in every particular the phantom of a gorgeous
hallucination. The " rubies thick as gravel " are mere
pebbles, the diamonds mere flint, the harvests mere
crops of poisonous weeds. the vintages stagnant pools
reeking with stale exhalations. Such is the reality
which has risen like a ghastly spectre out of the
roseate romance of the Politician. Icaria is hence
forth to be numbered with the island of Atalantia,
with Utopia, with Arcadia, with El Dorado, with
the realms of PRESTER JOHN, with the cave of bullion
penetrated by ALLI BABA, with the valley of brilliants
explored by SINBAD the Sailor, with the garden of
precious stones traversed by ALADDIN, with the ver
dant solitudes of ROBINSON CRUSOE, and the fruitful
seclusion of CALYPSO. And it is after the perusal of
the exposure recently published respecting the de-
lights of Icaria that we can repeat with fresh
enthusiasm that noble ejaculation of ALFRED TEN-
NYSON—

" Better fifty years of Europe
Than a cycle of Cathay I"

With this revealed extravagance confronting them
amidst the forests of Texas, will the people of the
United States abandon themselves blindly to the
fascinating allurements of the wealth said to be stored
in the soil of California ?

From the bold and legible statistics given by
President POLK in his farewell Message, it

is clear that the emoluments arising to
the State, and the comforts simultaneously
enjoyed by the population, in consequence of the
adoption of a reduced and amended tariff, have ex •
ceeded even the most sanguine anticipations. Here,
then, is a solid bottom upon which to build up the
financial hopes of the union. But with California
it is impossible not to perceive that everything as 37( t
is merely visionary. Even the most moderate esti-
mates of the mineral riches buried in those newly ac-
quired territories bear the stamp of the most prepos-
terous exaggeration. Among these, not the least
remarkable is the official dispatch forwarded
to Washington by Colonel MASON, the officer in
command at Monterey—a dispatch which has reached
this country with the last intelligence received from
the United States, and which is published in extenso
by ourselves in another portion of this evening's im-
pression. Were we to believe the accounts given and
evidently credited by this very sanguine gentleman,
we should certainly be compelled to regard the
boyish blunder of SiT RICHARD WHITTINGTON in
imagining the possibility of the streets of London
being paved with gold, as being not by any means
as ridiculous as may have been hitherto conceived.
The document signed by the commanding officer at
Monterey would have made the mouth of ELIVES
water. He talks of the most precious products of the
earth as abounding like dirt. His delineation of the
two hundred men washing for gold in the American
Fork called the Mormon Digging, reminds one of the
magnificent accounts furnished by ORME of the
treasuries in the palace of Moorshedabad. Every
circumstance in the process of purification
is lingered over with the intensest relish—

the men working in the broiling heat of
the tropics—sifting the alluvial deposits of the stream
in perforated tin pans, in the willow baskets woven
by the hands of the Red Indians, or in rude rocking
machines known among the initiated as cradles—
straining off the mingled gold and dust through the
augur holes into a receptacle below, and then blow-
ing away the sand as the husks are blown away by
the breath of the winnow. As to the products
of such strange labour, it is estimated by
Colonel MASON that a party of four men
employed in this manner in the lower mines average
one hundred dollars per diem. Even the gold mines
in the interior of Russia pale in their splendour before
the glittering earth of California.
Employing the undoubted productiveness of the
country just forfeited by Mexico, and employing that
productiveness rationally, the United States may ul-
timately derive extraordinary advantages from the
acquisition. But plunging into wholesale speculation,
like the dupes of the South Sea Delusion, they can only
reap the miseries of beggary and embarrassment.
We are the more disposed to insist upon this from a
sense that the increasing enthusiasm which is already
mauifes'ed throughout the United States in regard to
the mines of California is an augury of the expan-
sion of a Bubble, Formerly the progress of such an
expansion would have been watched with a kind of
jealous satisfaction ; but now that the interests of
different powers are becoming every day more and
more blended together, it can only be observed with
pain and anxiety.

We yesterday explained the manner in which
3,ooo,oool.sterling per annum was lost to the country
by an obstinate and impolitic adherence to the mo-
netary tole established by the Acts of 1819 and
1844, all of which would be saved if national
notes of convenient denominations were issued to the
public. In Scotland and Ireland—where small notes
are sanctioned and admitted—gold is scarcely known
as a circulating medium. The people, gene.
rally speaking, greatly prefer one pound notes
to sovereigns, and if any of the latter should
be received in the course of trade, they .re
f.rthwitb paid into the bank and exchanged for
paper. In the former country, where the science of
banking is perhaps as thoroughly understood as in
any part of the world, and where the people enter-
tain the most profound confidence in the soundness
and stability of the several establishments, the notes
issued for sums under Si. each are more than
double the value of those for 51. and upwards;
and while in England and Ireland the cur-
rency is contracted, and the banks are far
below their fixed issues, in Scotland, on the
other hand, the circulation is extended to the utmost
extent, and we find considerable sums issued against
gold, in addition to the full amount sanctioned by
law. That shrewd and intelligent people are fully
aware of the vast importance of sufficient banking
accommodation to their country. They are aware,
that without it national 1 rosperity cannot be
hoped for, and they, consequently, have pro-
vided for themselves that great desideratum;;
and the result is, an ample supply of the medium of
exchange, and a sound monetary system, by means
whereof:a healthy stimulus is afforded to the trade
and agriculture of the country.
In unfortunate Ireland, however, the deficiency is
painfully apparent. In that unhappy land nearly
one- third of the circulation, allowed by a stringent
and oppressive law, is withheld from the suffering
people. The very life-blood of industry is wanting—
prices are artificially depreciated—production is ar-
rested—and all around is gloom and despair.
The natural result follows. We behold an oppressed
people and an impoverished nation ; ruined proprie-
tors, slothful and apathetic farmers, and starving
peasants. A social revolution is taking place, which
must lead to the most extraordinary changes in
Irish society. And that distress and misery, and
these changes and alterations, may be ascribed in a
great degree to the want of a sufficient measure and
representative of value, a currency proportioned to
the exigencies of the country, by means whereof all
its natural capabilities might be fully developed, and
the immense masses of labour that now remain idle
and unproductive might be set in motion, and made
the sources of national wealth.
Mr. MONTGOMERY MARTIN, in his able work on
Ireland,* has afforded a solution to this problem, and
has explained the true causes of the prosperity
of Scotland and the poverty of Ireland.
He shows that in the former country there
are six chartered banks with a paid-up capital of
6,000,0001. sterling, and 15 unchartered banks with a
paid-up capital of 7,000,0001., while in Ireland there
is but one chartered bank with 3,000,0001. paid up,
and eight unchartered banks with 2,000,0001. paid-up
capital. " Thus (says Mr. MARTIN) Scotland, for
less than 3,000,200 people has 13,000,000/. banking
capital, a valuable system of cash credits, and exten-
sive discounts. Ireland, formore than 8,000,000 people,
has not 5,000,0001. banking capital, for 2,000,0001.
of the Bank of Ireland capital is lent to Government.
Ireland has not, in fact, ten shillings per head of bank-
ing capital, while Scotland has at leastifee pounds per
head of banking capital, in addition to superior and
more numerous monetary establishments." Let us
consider the condition of these countries, both united
to England by indissoluble ties. The one, despite
its inclement climate, great extent of barren
soil, and disadvantageous geographical position,
has attained nearly, if not altogether, an
equality with England in agriculture, in arts,
manufactures, and general commerce. The other,
with a soil of the utmost fertility, a mild and genial
atmosphere, great mineral wealth, with bays, har-
bours, and every natural advantage, has sunk to the
lowest extremity of misery and destitution, and has
become a bye-word and a proverb to the world—a
scandal and reproach to the British name. May it
not reasonably[be concluded that similar results would
have followed, if equal monetary facilities were
afforded in both countries ? And when we regard the
circumstances of our Irish and Scotch brethren, are
we not justified in saying that a saving of even
3,000,000/. sterling, large as it is, would be by no
means the most important benefit resulting front a
change in our monetary system ; the supply of a
currency at all times adequate to the national wants,
and the prevention of the fluctuations in the value of
money, and the rate of interest, all of which blessings
would be attained by the adoption of the plans sug-
gested by the
,Liverpool Currency: Reform Asso-
ciation.

The one thing needful to ensure the successful
working of any scheme of sanitary reform for the
metropolis is an unlimited supply of pure water, not
only to every house, but to every floor in every
house, and to every drain in every floor of every
house, and to every sewer. Without this ample
supply of water, every legislative enactment must
remain to a great extent a dead letter, from the
physical impossibility of carrying out its provisions
effectually. That we have no such supply at present
the bitter experience of every sojourner in the me-
tropolis sufficiently proves ; and those who do not
reside in the metropolitan districts may form some
idea of the filthy nature of the puddle with which
the Londoner is, under the denomination
of water,' scantily supplied, at an enormous
expense, by a perusal of the reports made to
the House of Commons upon this subject by the
two Committees which sat in 1821 and 1827. In
consequence of the report of this latter Committee,
which was presented to the House in 1828, Mr.
TELFORD was authorised to devise some scheme for
supplying the metropolis with pure water. In the
year 1884 Mr. TELFORD'S plan was submitted to the
consideration of a Committee of the House of Com-
mons ; his proposition was to bring the waters of the
River Verulam to London from the neighbourhood
of Watford, but the objections to the project were
found to be insuperable, and it was consequently
abandoned. Indeed it is evident that such a plan as
that proposed by Mr. TELFORD must be totally in-
capable of meeting the evil ; the supply of water to
be obtained from such small streams as the Brent,
the Collie, the Verulam, and the Wandle being
ludicrously inadequate to meet the wants of this
great metropolis. The utmost that such a company
as that proposed by Mr. TELFORD could do would be
to supply a limited district after the same limited
fashion that limited districts are at present supplied
by existing water companies. It would leave the