The Sun.
London, England, 1844-10-29 00:00:00

AI

LONDON, TUESDAY, OCTOBER 29, 1844.

The remarkable excitement in the market of capi-
tal produced by the announcement of so many rail-
road projects already in course of execution, or pro-
posed to be commenced, is a symptom which citimot
be too carefully noted by those who would study the
phenomena of our social condition. Were it possible
for our earlier authorities on the statistics of capital
and wealth to waken from the sleep of the grave to
the aspects at this moment exhibited by the " money
power " in Great Britain, they would imagine them-
selves resucitated in a new world. They would deem
that a new system of money.

For what are the contrasted features which any
of our daily journals exhibit of the wants and the
wealth, the refinements and the destitution, diffused
through the various classes of the community ?
Pauperism—the abject wretchedness of hundreds of
thousands—attested by vast district or union poor-
houses, swarming with whole colonies, not alone of
the aged and impotent, and helpless infants and youth,
but also of able-bodied -men, still in the prime and
vigour of life, but unable to obtain employment. Poor-
rates for the support and maintenance of these un-
fortunate masses to the annual amount of 5,000,0001.
An aggregate population so far removed from
the general poverty which these premises would
seem, at first sight; to infer, as to pay
annually the largest amount of taxation per-
haps levied on any nation of the world ; yet
burdened with the largest amount of national debt
(800,000,0001.) ever recorded as having been con-
tracted at any former period of history ; the charge
of interest and management alone thereon amounting
to upwards of 28,000,000/, per annum. A commerce
of almost boundless extent, and a mass of accumulated
capital, still awaiting employment, so vast that after
supplying all the enormous funds of our greatest ex-
isting public works, such as docks, railroads, &c.,
now and for some time past in full operation, it is still
further hypothecated, so- to speak, to the incredible
amount of 39,600,000/. for the forty new projects of
railroads, to be carried over 2,100 miles of ex-
tent, of which we have so lately given an ac-
count. If TEMPLE or CBILDE, or if DAVID
HusiE or ADAM SMITH, Or Dr. CAMPBELL,
could contemplate this extraordinary state of things,
or so huge a sum of social misery co-existing with
such enormous advances on domestic opulence—so
fearful a leaven of poverty-in the masses, made only
the more palpable by the imperial wealth concentrated
in class interests, and in the coffers of individual
capitalists—the first inquiry, perhaps, of their saga-
cious and provident minds, would be, what were the
chances of permanency attaching to a system under
which elements of so antagonistic a character could
have attained, coincidently, so striking a develop-
ment ? To determine this question, they would at once
institute a preliminary examination into the nature
of our monetary system, and, probably nothing would
so irresistibly suggest an inquiry into the character
and the amount of our currency as the contemplation
of these gigantic demands of railway speculation. But
this last is a question of too vital and present an inte-
rest to be dismissed, together with any mere theoretical '
assumptions of what the dead economists might think
of us. May they sleep htly,without disturbance
from these misgivings- which w
con-
sidering the probable results ofe own to, while con- •
Sir ROBERT PEEL'S
currency legislation -
under in 1844. tt-a eclidition such as we live
The Act of last session has fixed
`o 6
same • '
amount' o -39, 0 ,000.. ocli as the whole -ominous
they paper currency to he issued by tahrzgate of
of
England and the provincial banks, under the ank
sanction
of the Crown, throughout the whole of the United
Kingdom. The fancied security of this amount and
description of issues is, that "it is intended ultimately

to be lased on Government securities and on gold
cor joi fitly." Any circumstances which tend to dis-
turb or deteriorate the value of either of these ele-

ments, must place their joint aggregate in imminent
jeopardy. Now, of these thirty-nine millions, one
component is, in round numbers, twelve millions of
the Government's own liabilities, held " as securi-
tie3" by the Bank. The Bank is limited to the
issue of such an amount of notes only as it can pay on
demand in gold bullion, eked out, if necessary, by a
permitted per centage of silver bullion. To
answer these conditions in the simplest form, the
Bank ought to command about 22,000,0001. in gold
alone (which it never possessed yet, and in all proba-
bility never will, and 5,000,0001. in silver). Suppos e
the actual stock of gold bullion to be some of these
days drained to the fearfully low ebb at which it has
actually stood within these seven years, by any one
of the causes that certainly and inevitably produce
such a result—as Ist., a commercial panic like that
which ensued within this period, or the acts of insol-
vency announced by the United States banking and
private establishments ; 2d., the efflux occasioned
by loans to foreign states ; 3d., a great disturb-
ance of the balance of trade from any other
causes ; 4th., a failing harvest :—in either of these cases
we should be fain to learn from the supporters of Sir
ROBERT PEEL'S Bank Charter Bill how its mis-
chievously-empirical operation can be controlled !
Where is the gold necessary for that purpose to come
from, unless you are to cut down the dimensions of
your trade, at no longer notice than intervenes be-
tween the weekly advertisement of the Bank in the
Gazette, to the contracted corresponding dimensions
of the Premier's financial capacity and of the Bank of
England's bullion resources. Any one of the four
causes we have just recapitulated, excepting only,
thanks to a beneficent Providence, the danger of a
failing harvest, we may be called on to encounter to-
morrow. We see no great encouragement, yet, for
renewed confidence in American good faith, honesty,
or stability. We have great fears that the experience
of the past will be lost on the present generations
when certain European Powers are calling for
loans on terms so much more advantageous (osten-
sibly at least) for investments than the reduced
interest of our own public securities at present
offers. And the effects of the Zollverein confederacy
against British trade, and of the tariffs of Belgium,
America, France, Portugal, and other States are not
yet so far developed, that any man shall undertake to
predict their ultimate effect on the balance of trade.
But are there no superadded or instant causes of panic,
and disorganisation to be apprehended ? The Minis-
ter purposes next spring to apply his "gold equiva-
lent" screw to the monetary affairs of Scotland. By
the very last gazetted account of the Bank of Eng-
I land's assets, liabilities, &c., the far-famed sixteen mil-
lions of gold, has dwindled down to twelve millions and
forty thousand pounds. Coincidently with all this, we
see these announcements of new railway companies,
calling for a capital of forty millions ! Say that from
lines abandoned, and schemes reduced, their actual
demand shall be for only half the amount—what is to
become of the accommodation required for general
commerce, domestic trade, and the dealings of society,
with the enormous additional demand for wages,
which these projects suppose, and the efflux of gold
contingent on dealings founded on the seventy millions
of imports, and one hundred and fifty millions of ex-
ports, which represented their value for last year ?
If this trade is to be demolished, if those demands
cannot be responded to, if commercial enterprise is
to be discouraged and abandoned, and gambling spe-
culations in home schemes and foreign loans are to
be necessarily encouraged, in order to accommodate
the march of events to the scheme of the Premier;
what will presently become the value of the securities
held by the Bank of England from that Government
which such a Premier administers ? And what will
be the means possessed by the Bank to meet "in gold"
its own liabilities, when those securities shall have
sustained this serious deterioration ? And what must
be the fate of the empire if both the Government
securities be discredited ; the evolution of private
capital crippled ; the stock of bullion drained to a
fraction ; and no sounder and more expansive system
of curreny organized to supply and represent it ?

Madrid journals of the 18th and 19th have been
received, but they possess little interest. The new
Constitution appears to be regarded by the citizens
with great apathy. A Committee had been appointed
by the Congress to report upon the new Bill, and six
out of seven were believed to be favourable to the
measure. At the sitting of the 19th, 103 Members
were present, and of these, 71 declared for reform,
only 32 against it. " Thus," says the Clamor Publico,
" will be consummated the attempt upon our rights,
and Spain will be deprived of her liberties if Heaven
does not take pity upon her." The Clamor Publico
should remember that [leaven helps only those who
themselves.

MADRID BOURSE, OCT. 19.—Three per Cents., for
cash, 251, ; Ditto, for cash, 261 ; Five per Cents., no
quotation ; Floating Debt, 631,1 for account ; Coupons,
26 for cash.

The Paris Papers are chiefly occupied with discus-
ions on the new Spanish Constitution, on which a
great many words seem thrown away. The Minis-
terial journals are very shy on the subject. The
Globe gives the whole of the preamble of the Bill, but
without comment; and the Journal des Debuts, to
keep up appearances, seems dissatisfied with some
parts of it. " The text of the report," says that
journal, " presented to the Queen of SPAIN by her
Ministers, in which are detailed the motives which
decided them to remodel the Constitution of 1837, h
a lengthy document, and by no means redeems its
fault of wordiness by that of clearness. 'We must
confess that it has by no means induced us to change
our opinion on the main subject, and that we are not
more persuaded to-day than yesterday of the neces-
sity of any change in the fundamental law of Spain.
'We cannot yet see what the royal power can gain
in strength or security by effacing the principle of
the sovereignty of the nation from the preamble
of the Consitution. It is a sort of bravado ad-
dressed to the spirit of the times—one of the least in-
conveniences of which is its being utterly useless."
CHRISTINA'S journal regards the new Constitution as
an event of ordinary occurrence. " The project of
reform," says the Presse, " has been received at
Madrid with a calm—we should say with an indiffe-
rence—which contrasts singularly with the almost
unanimous disapprobation which it has excited in
Paris. The language of the press is not more ani-
mated in general than if an ordinary question was
discussed. All the moderate journals, without excep.
tion, approve of the plan in its fundamental points,
and their criticisms only refer to questions of detail
altogether secondary. As to the Opposition journals
they cry out perjury and treason. But as we re-
member that these same journals clapped their hands
at the revolution of Granja, and at its legislative con-
sequences, it is impossible for us to attribute a great
importance to their protests."

The Quotidienne ias the following brief notice :
" It will be seen that the Constitution-makers in
Spain have proposed to themselves the Charter of
1830, particularly the posterior laws which modified
it. What they have dared in addition would be
gladly attempted at Paris. The jury, for instance,
is far from offering a sufficient guarantee to our
clever fellows ; they would also be very glad to ar-
range, according to their iittle interests, the organisa-
tion of the municipalities."

The National cannot write with any composure,
and vents its rage in such brief sentences and inter-
rogatories as the following, addressed to the Journal
des Debals :

" Your protege) (Spain) is at'present in full fortune.
The Minister of Foreign Affairs for Spain, who is de-
sirous of putting an end to all pelitical discussions, is one
of your intimate friends ; you have proclaimed Narvapz
a hero ! All this band of shameless counter-revolutionists
and unbridled pilferers have been declared your adopted
children. You have not concealed your sentiments.
You have declared them in such a manner as to be heard
by the whole of Europe. At present they are at work,
and not sparingly. No more national sovereignty—no
more elective senate—no more obligatory convocation of
the Cortes—no more Budgets voted annually—no more
jury—no more National Guards—the monarchy freed
from all control—organic laws made by simple decrees—
and even more, perhaps. 'Who can describe all the
audacity that there is in this overturning of all constitu-
tional regime ? You must give some explanation. Is
this what you wanted ? Does M. Guizot sympathise
with this Government, sold to the Pope and Don Carlos?
Is it the policy of your Government which triumphs ?
Are these your secret maxims which are applied 2"
The Paris papers contain no news. The Toulonnais
states that the 9th Regiment of Light Cavalry, ingar-
rison at Mascara, is so completely decimated with
disease, that there scarcely remain as
many men able

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