The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1850-04-16 00:00:00

IST, THE AGRICULTURISTS

Answer.—lt would operate in many important ways to
promote the interests of this class.
It would enable the landowner, the industrious farmer,
and the tradesman as well, to borrow money for improve-
ments, &c., at amoderate and unfluctuatingrate of interest ;
whereas under the present law, the banker is compelled
to refuse all accommodation for such purposes, even
whilst money is a drug on nis hands, by the dread of a
sudden contraction of the circulation, caused by the gold
upon which it is based, and by the amount of which in
the bank its quantity is regulated, being drawn out of the
country, or hoarded. From this dread it is, and from the
continual oscillation of the currency under the combined
action of the laws of 1819 and 1844, that we have at pre-
sent two distinct rates of interest ; and whilst the opulent
merchant and the speculator can readily procure money
at call, or for short periods, at from 2 to 21 per cent., a
mortgage, or a loan for a term, with good security, can
with difficulty be had for double that sum.

A cheap and abundant supply of paper money would
increase production, and enable the farmer to employ
more labour, thus diminishing his poor rates and the cost
of crime. The same stimulus being given by the same
means to the other producing classes, agricultural and
other commodities, with labour, would rise in price.
The fixed chargq upon the land, however, as mort-
gages, annuities, &c., would remain stationary, or nearly
so, the paper pound not being, like gold, susceptible of
fluctuation in value or purchasing power from the ebb
and flow of gold. Neither would such money go on pro-
gressively increasing in value, or purchasing power; as the
present money has done, from the fact that the stock of
gold in the world has not kept pace in increase with the
extension of the commerce and products of the country,
for the exchange and distribution of which it is wanted.
A currency independent of gold would, on the contrary,
be regulated strictly by the law of supply and demand;
and contract with the contraction of commercial dealings,
and expand with their expansion. The pound under our
present system, the bullionists themselves admit,
has doubled its purchasing power during the past thirty
years. In other words, a pound now pays for twice the
quantity of grain and labour that it did thirty years ago ;
and consequently a man who contracted a debt at that
time has now to give in liquidation of it twice as many
quarters of wheat, or twice as many days' labour.
A paper currency, by being thus capable of expansion
to meet any increased requirements of our internal trade,
would prevent the occurrence of those crises which, under
a gold standard, have periodically robbed industry of its
reward, and spread ruin and bankruptcy over the face of
the country, involving the agticulturists, who have been
guiltless of all offence, in the sufferings brought upon
themselves by schemers and speculators.
It would render an abundant harvest a national blessing,
instead of, as at present, a cause of agricultural suffering ;
whilst, in periods of deficiency of crops, the effect upon
the farmer and the great body of the people, would not
be aggravated tenfold by contractions of banking accom-
modation, and consequent suspension of trade and indus-
try. The harvests of 1822 and 1823 were abundant ones,
and wheat was in the former year 465. 2d., and in the
latter 38s. per quarter. yet, both farmers and people were
plunged in severe distress ; and a king's letter had to be
issued to provide food for the Irish ! We had no free
trade, and extensive importations of foreign corn in those
years; but we had the bullion act of 1819!
. .

It will diminish the national debt to the extent of the
amount converted into currency, upon which, whilst in
this state, no interest will be payable, thus placing a con-
siderable sum at the disposal of the Chancellor of the
Exchequer, to be applied either to reducing obnoxious
taxes, or as a fund for the gradual liquidation of the debt
itself.

It will, by giving a free scope to the enterprise and in-
dustry of the country, increase the consumption of taxed
commodities of all kinds, and thus create a largely in-
creased revenue.

Lastly, it will, to a great extent, protect the British
farmers from the ruinous effects of free trade in corn, as
at present conducted under a restricted currency ; for
whilst internal prices in a domestic currency would be
enhanced, the internal pressure of taxation, debts, and
contracts remaining stationary, foreign prices, measured
in standard gold or silver, with foreign rents, labour, and
taxation, still payable in the same gold and silver standard,
will share very little, if at all, in the benefits of such
enhancement ; the money which the foreigner will receive
as payments for his produce, being no longer convertible
into specie at a fixed value. Virtually, the operation of
a paper currency, such as proposed, would be to give to
the British farmer a protection to nearly the amount of
the difference between the enhanced domestic price thus
created, and that of its price as measured by an inflated
gold standard.

ALEXANDRE DUMAS AND MISS HELEN FAUCIT.—
Alexandre DUMB has engaged to write a series of novels
including the whole history of the Revolution—to appear
first in a newspaper and then in separate volumes. He
is, moreover, to compose a series of dramas for the Lon-
don stage, besides being about to undertake the mighty
task of reducing the whole of the theatres on the Boule-
vards of Paris under his own management. He is just
setting about writing a piece, wherein to introduce the
magnificent talent of Helen Faucit as an English orphan,
under the care and patronage of Anne of Austria. The
" Fille du Regent" was written expressly for Miss Faucit,
of whose exquisite pathos and matchless grace Alexandre
is an admirer. All these things are to be accomplished
in the space of two months from this tune !—Paris Cor.
;I:evotigent of Atlas.,