Quasqueton guardian. (Quasqueton, Buchanan County, Iowa) 1856-1858, 1857-02-21


j We have lately given from our Wash
ington documents the state of our national
debt. Ii has been reduced 25 per cent
during the year, bringing it down to
$4,000, 600, with a surplus in gold, in
the treasury of 1900, 900, after de-
Quoting all expenses. Moreover. the
president is of opinion that The debt can
be entirely exiting uished (for the second
time, having been previously paid off in
l3I5-6) in the early part of 1858, and
he recommends Congress to take steps
to reduce the revenue down to level
with the expenditures, in order to obviate
the aba RAISING consequences to COM
merce of an excessice accumulation OF
specie in the vaults of the treasury Was
there ever great nation In similar con-
dition? No government in Europe, great
or small, (unless the very smallest,) can
compare. Great Britain is, in this respect,
like Atlas bending under the weight of
the world the young Republic, mean
while, goes forth erect and buoyant, like
young Hercules, to clear the wilds OF
the world for the march of modern en-
/ terprise and civilization We have lately
met somewhere with an illustration, from
an English pen, of the British national
debt-the facts are almost stunning" +"
lis weigia in gold amounts to 14,088, 475
pounds; and in silver to 1865, 6G9
pounds. TO transport this debt across
the seas, in gold, would require fleet OF
25 ships of $50 tons burden each 10
carry the debt by lanl it would require
12, $50 one-horse carts, each cart being
loaded with half Ton of gold. These
would extend in one unbroken line, 35J
miles. Ii conveyed by soldiers, and
every soldier were TO carry SO lbs. weight
in his knapsack, it would require an army
of 20l, ,769 men. Eight hundred mil
liens Of sovereigns piled on one another,
or formed in one close column, would ex-
tend 7I2 miles. If this column were
commenced at the Lands End and con
tiuued northward, it would reach ten
miles beyond John O'Groat's House.
The same number of sovereigns laid flat,
in a straight line, and touching each
other, would exAsnd sli4as Il 44a ie imelsS og
Eight hundred millions OF one pound
Bank Of England NOES, sewei together,
would cover a turnpike road a. feet wide
and ,052 miles long, or from Lands End
to John o. Groat's AMI nearly half way
back again Ii the notes were sewed
together, end to end, they would 90 -four
times round the world, and strteea times
round the moon. The whole population
of the world is estimated at thousand
millions of souls. An equal distribution
of the national debt would give sixteea
1 shillings to every man, woman and child,
or twenty dollars TO every family on the
face of the earth. Were Britain 10 con-
quer all Europe, and levy general poll
TAX, to liquidate her present debs, she must
have from every man, woman and child,
IS It's. 7ad; or, from every family
throughout Europe, f29. What a con
trast between this state of things and oul
virtually debtless young nation, with its
public domain equal to all Europe-ex-
cept Russia-and its boundless resources
OF every KIND
i 1t would perhaps be hardly possible
J to over-rate the direct and indirect I'M
/, portance of California to our national
development. Instead of the gradual
progress of our population westward, as
heretofore, at an average OF about thirteen
miles per year, Ga sublime national march
though II now seems slow, the Califor,
MIA impulse has broken down all gradu.
alton of the movement, and the whole
continent is traversed and laid open fol
the peaceful invasion OF immigration and
settlement. Before many years we may
even hope that the railroad whistle viii
be heard over all the intermediate distance
between the TWO oceans. California now
yields TO us every year, more gold than
was ever Obtained by Old spain from hei
early discoveries in America and ye
the downfall of Spain has been attributed
to her sudden riches. During the las
! three years, the California mines have
yielded US $40, ,o00,o 900 of gold
Messrs. Marie d kanz admit that We
have fully got beyond dependence upor
foreign capital; our own resources plact
US, in this respect, on an improyable basis
There are SO many that believe otherwise
4 and who acc the part of alarmists AT every
European crisis, that our progress during
the three years since the inception of th'
Crlmean war, stopped the current of Eu
ropean capi.al toward this country. de