The Sun.
London, England, 1858-10-08 00:00:00

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the service via Suez.'

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-57

PRICE 4D. STAMPED, SD.

in the Bank in reserve, and when the bullion would
be about £14,000,000 and the rate of discount 3 .to
32 per cent. Has it been shown that any advantage
is derived by the .Bank or the community at large
by going:beyond 'this position' If a baSe :of
£14,000,000 .of bullion, or nny_other sum that may
bo ag.teed on, provides us with a sufficient cuirenev,
why go beyond this Suffieiency a single poond•?
" Suppose the bullion in the Bank to increase to
£30,000,000 of £35,000,000—by no moans an im-
possible or unlikely event—are we prepared for the
consequences of. an augmentation of the notes
issued' to £45,000,000 or £50,000,000., knowing,
as we do, the average actual requirements of the
country to be a circulation of £20,000,000, or there-
abouts, and that under these circumstances the re-
serve of the Bank would reach the prodigious alti-
tude of £25,000,000 or £30,000,000_?
" What interest would suffer, what principle
would be violated, were the directors of the Bank
empowered, whenever the bullion reached
£14,000,000, or any other point that may be deemed
sufficient, to exercise their discretion whether they
shall purchase more bullion or not ; and in the
exercise of that discretion should issue bullion re-
'eipts at £3 17s. 9d. per_ ounce, payable to order,
in exchange for all bullion brought to them in de-
posit thereafter until the bullion in hand. shall sink
below £14,000,000, or until any other contingency
should arise which, in the opinion of the directors,
would render it desirable for them to resume the
purchase of bullion ?
"By such an arrangement bullion arriving in
this country at any time when the Bank is al-
ready sufficiently supplied, instead of being in-
stantly converted into bank notes, no matter what
abundance of money may already exist, would
take its natural place with silver, copper, or other
ores as a commodity, "an& cease to be the fruitful
source of monetary derangement which it now is,
while the bullion receipts, instead of adding to the
circulation, would tend rather to give increased
employment to the circulation already in existence.
"-By some such alteration in the Act of 1844 as
that now suggested we might hope to render our
monetary system tolerably equable in its move-
ment, whereas the system at present is confessedly
one of periodic convulsion, its machinery having to
be suspended and the law to be violated ohce in
every 10 years to save the country from general
dislocation.
" Wehave now entered another monetary decade,
and the question is, shall we follow the same course
of action which at least contributed to, if it did not
create the panics of 1847 and 1857, or shall we try
another ?
" We can hardly do worse than we have hereto-
fore done, and there is' at least a chance that by a
different line of action we may do better_?".

TIE AUSTRALIAN MAIL SERVICE.!

Mr. Edward Wilson writes to a contemporary as

" A glance at the new form of tender for the
Australian mail service just issued by the Govern-
ment leads to serious misgivings in my mind that
the fat is all going into the fire again in this direction.
"We are not to have a fortnightly mail by way
of Suez, but it is the intention of the Government

to call for tenders for • a monthly steam communi-
cation with Australia via Panama, in addition to

" Within the last few months this subject has
been so closely discussed among those most • into-
rested. that the result is looked upon almost as a
matter of certainty, and the Panama route being
many hundreds of miles further than that via Suez,
it is perceived by all but a few enthusiastic people
connected with New South Wales that a postal
service by that route, to keep time with the service
by way of Suez, is quite out of the question. This
will be plain enough to any one who recollects that
Sydney is in east longitude 152 deg., so that in
sailing for Panama we have 28 degrees of longitude
to pass over before we cross the meridian opposite
to that of Greenwich; which, with 28 degrees on
the other side to counterbalance them, makes 56

degrees of longitude of 40 to 45 miles each to spin
out the distance by Panama beyond that by Suez.
Let anyone pass a thread across the globe each way,
noticing how far either route diverges from the
straight line, and then judge for himself.
" The respective routes are pretty accurately de-
fined in a table issued by the Australian Associa-
tion. -It is necessary to premise that the distances
laid down are those noW travelled by the mails,
letters to Adelaide coming back 500 miles from
Melbourne, while those to Sydney go on 568 miles,
thus making only 68 miles apparent difference be-
tween two places nearly 1,100 miles apart :

Miles via Suez. Miles via Panama,
London to Melbourne 10,625 12,718

11,193 l2
London to Sydney
--- • -

London to Adelaide 11,125 13,218
London to Tasmania
London to New Zealand.... 12,159 11,184

" Except for New Zealand, therefore, it appears
to me inevitable that this line for postal purposes
is, and always will be, a complete delusion. For
other purposes I should be very glad to see it
opened up. But the subsidy is intended for postal
communication, and is, perhaps, not honestly ap-
plicable to any other purpose.
" But this is not the worst feature of the new
contract now impending. The fear is that the
communication by Suez is deliberately to be kept
slow that it may not outrun its Panama competi-
tor. My last letter to you on this subject showed
that the mails could be brought from Melbourne to
London via Marseilles in 41i days. My calcula-
tion has never been challenged. I have since in-
vited criticism upon it that I look upon as about
the best in the world, and the only objection made
was that I had allowed rather short time for coal-
ing at Aden ; but it was admitted that this was
more than made up by time allowed between Mar-
seilles and London. Yet the 10th clause of the new
form of tender says that it is necessary " that the
mails be conveyed to and from Sydney and Great
Britain, via the Straits of Gibraltar, within a period
of 55 days,' and the contract is to last seven years !
Now, if we allow two days from Sydney to Mel-
bourne, and five days' difference in the transmis-
sion of the mails by way of Marseilles and Gibral-
tar, and deduct these seven days from the 55 men-
tioned, we shall have 48 days from Melbourne, in-
stead of 411 • and this to last unaltered, in spite of
all the rapidprogress in the science of steam navi-
gation, for seven long years ! Six days and a-half
too long now ; perhaps twice six days and a-half
by the end of the seven years.
" But even this is not the worst. In one of three
notes attached to the form of tender, and which,
like postscripts in another class of documents, seem
to be reserved for matter of principal importance,
we are informed that tenders will be received
for a service subsidiary to other existing services,
e. g., one between Suez or Point de Galle and
the Australian ports.' In other words, the
Peninsular and Oriental Company, are invited to
send 'in a tender for a branch line from some
port on their Indian line, of course at a pro-
portionately lower figure. This company having
long enjoyed a monopoly of those seas may natu-
rally be supposed to be very jealous of the entrance
there of any other powerful company. I have heard
on pretty good authority that they are not anxious
for the Australian trade, and would only enter it for
the sake of averting rivalry. And if we are to get
a branch line of an unwilling company, at a tole-
rably low rate, and only competing with a far
longer route, we shall have all the elements for a
continuance of that dissatisfaction in the colonies
which during the last seven years has been so un-
remitting, and has been strained almost to the last
point of endurance. A through line, at whatever
expense, has always been a sine qua non with the
people of Victoria, who have been so stanch, so
liberal, so patient, and so consistent in their tone
upon this important subject, and anything cheap
and nasty from the Peninsular and Oriental Com-
pany, or any other quarter, will receive no favour
in Australia. Stanch, liberal, patient, and consistent
as we have been, I do not think that a subsidy will
be voted for any but a through line.
I cannot conclude without adverting_ to the com-
parative numbers interested in and contributing to
this postal service in the several colonies. It is a
point which has been much ignored in the Suez v.
Panama discussions. We number altogether about
1,000,000 of inhabitants, of whom Victoria with her
480,000, South Australia with her 110,000, and
Tasmania with her 70,000, all in favour of the Suez
line, contain 660,000, or about two-thirds, leaving
the other third, or 340,000, for New South Wales
and New Zealand, supposed to be interested in the
other line.
" I cannot see why the interests of two people in
the southern colonies are to be sacrificed to the in-
terests of one in the eastern; even supposing, which
I deny, that the Panama line is more favourable than
that by Suez for the people of New South Wales."

The Postmaster-General gave notice yestei day
that mails will be made up in the General Post-office on the
morning of the 11th for Egypt, India, and the Mauritius,
to be conveyed from Southampton by the steamer Sam