The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1848-02-29 00:00:00

A CURE FOR CURRENCY DERANGEMENTS.

(Prom a Pamphlet by W. Pickering, Esq)
If I am correct, the amount which the Government
owes to the Bank of England is eleven millions. To this
amount the Batik is now entitled to issue notes. This
amounts, in fact, as does the national debt, to a mort-
gage on ail property, as each one has to bear his part.
feu'; I would recommend that these eleven millions shall
he converted into a Four per Cent. Stock. and be called
Gold Stock, because the interest of it as stock shall be
r6able alone in gold sovereigns of full weight. With
above eleven millions, and nineteen other millions
add thereto, the Four per Cent. Gold Stock should be
ttlaltamounte thirty millions of pounds. This should be
',n bY the Ban of England and by other bankers,
t:Yina and paying k for the same,, who should be at liberty
issue notes of various amounts, as bank notes, similar
L'u the notes of the Bank of England and other banks of
7,81 r. Each note should have an additional stem n affixed
•;1111 g 3 face or back, by the Government office created to
o 'lnez% the loan accounts of the Four per Cent. Gold
eeteeka.
t„ The gold stock note should be made a legal tender, but
oe holders of it, on presentation, 'to have power to de-
mand that the issuers pay it in gold ; and in default, and
Znil)(riesentation of a protest to the effect that at least one
the hr:(11 pounds of it had not been paid on demand, then
wdeaprodssit4 any amount of one hundred pounds or uP-
-e entitled, by virtue of the said protest, to
office
notes to the amount so protested in the loan-
• e, and receive a scrip certificate 'of having such an
of the loan standing to his credit in the books,
fall,ri.ng interest-at tour picent. per annum.— The de-
,tng issuer of any such stock notes should be disqua-
.,eu from again becoming a contractor for any part of
the loan.
The thirty millions of gold stock, or rather so much of
.
as the requirements of commerce might keep in circu-
lation, would be by its contracting owners issuable as
bank stock notes ; by this means, all which may be cir-
culating or contracted for by banks with the Government
office will not receive interest, when out by contract;
Whereby the nation will reap the whole benefit of the
!noterest at four per cent., the contracting holders obtain-
1g their interest from the notes they will issue as cash,
egal tender.
op this arrangement, bankers 'would obtain the notes
so ):f;'s they obtain gold, by giving value for them ; and
witilg as they can circulate them with advantage, they
uo so I
• n the event of their not being required as
Bert ,;Yt
,") use, any contractor or holder should be at li-
PaY in his notes. and demand for them an equi-
dayei;'munt his tock, bearing interest to him, from the
Tbo-„Piald in notes and became a stockholder.
ne "'en, in time of need, there are thirty millions of
Antiable notes—a sum amply sufficient for any con-
reable expansion ; while in dull dead times, the con-
o etc." or owners of it might reduce their notes to such
:11nahr0awieunt as they can profitably use, by converting them
lia stock bearing
timinterest at four p Gent. Thus, by
')Pansion at one e, or contraction ater another, it would,
"id like, always find its own level !
.then I would have the usury laws re-enacted, with an
ePtion as regards this stock that is, the loan-office
.uould have power, in case of need, to exact on such
4t°ol( such a rate of discount as the directors of the Bank
tiv Angland and the officers of the loan-office may, by a
,°,..tioe in the Gazette, announce to be the legal, and
olch should continue to be the legal, rate of discount,
until altered by a subsequent notice in the Gazette.
• At all times w hen aboe five per cent. wa legal, the
vilt°)e excess of interestv above five per cent.s should be
F•
t. over by the bankers to the credit of the Consolidated
iallll°. as also the interest arising on the amount of stock
need. By this means, although above five per cent.
the T nationarg, in case of bent when it was charged
I would reap the whole efit.
stn aware that this plan would interfere with the pre-
sent arrangement by which the Bank of England manages
the_, issues and national monetary affairs ; but any matters
°I mere details, which the change required, might be
equitably adjusted with them. Thus, then, I repeat it,
discounts could not fall below four per cent., and rarely
" ver would they rise above five. A self-acting, self-
adjusting standard would be maintained ; gold would be
maintained; and vet expansion and contraction both
Fliectually provided for • which, as it appears to me, is
Just what the country requires.
ORIGIN OP THE STORY OF BLUE BEARD.—In the
current number of Bentley's Miscellany there is an inter-
esting article, under this title, by W. C. Taylor, LL.D.
It is (says Dr. Taylor) a very common, but a very erro-
neous opinion that the legend of Blue Reard was devised
by the Roman Catholics, as a satire on Henry VIII- I -awl
that its object was to strengthen the indignation with
which his cruelty to his wives was viewed throughout
%rope. There is nothing in the legend which can afford
the
slightest support to such a theory ; the manners which
'°!l story portrays, describe a state of society long ante-
ler to the age of the Tudors ; they belong to a time when
r,areurder of wives needed not to shelter itself under the
title of law ; the hero is not a king feeling something of
4.6 control which nascent public opinion imposes upon
he is a castellan of the darkest period of the
bid ages, when the only check on the tyranny of the
cca °f the castles was the chance of their being called to
too-rtnt by some adventurous knight errant, who under-
„,r redress grievances by the point of his lance, and
ttetv-gge of his sword. The most telling incident in the
-ast,l4 the look out of sister Anne from the tower of the
taatr.; evidently fixes the date in the age of knight er-
"a; Blue Beard is clearly one of those terrible bur-
as seel4/10tn Victor Hugo has so vividly delineated, or,
,ms to be probable, he is
drlr, laet,'‘,ll,ight of the shire and represents them all."
12-1 'loCenere are few countries in western Europe which
13ea'111 the equivocal honour of having produced a
n•
eetiCru, and we may regard the tale as a kind of
e"latin,ta,ted essence of several legends and traditions
Leebl Outrages perpetrated by feudal lords during the
%rig: "age of monarchy, when to use the expressive
itlolo-814,! of the sacred historian, it be said of
'ler° country in western Europe, at this
.
1ee01,,,,"as no king in Israel ; every man did that which
11‘41Cfright in his own eyes." In the recent develop-
s°d (11- Provincial literature in France. several strange
NT• .iiteresting local legends have been brought to light,
of', throw some gleams of explanation on the tales
th"aVe become current in European tradition. Several
and
~se relate to a supposed prototype of Blue Beard,
t° will will not be uninteresting to glance at the real his-
state (3f some of these personages as illustrative of the
of society in that age of chivalry, the disappearance
tiwolch is so deeply lamented by certain writers of sen-
ACe.ntal romances. After giving an outline of three of
13tegends alluded to, Dr. Taylor observes—" We think
,it.lrace of these three legends may be found in Per-
t, "asi°.lo s story of Blue Beard, and that instead of his
• eg based his fiction on a single tradition, he endea-
ul to make it a kind of resume of the many legends
Of rannical husbands with which e popular literature
r Mace abounds,"