Holmes County farmer. [volume] (Millersburg, Ohio) 1857-1926, 1865-11-02
A Canada Coat and n Cincinnati
COat--DincrcnCe In PriCes--
The Financial PrOblenls

a gentleman of this city, now on a visit
to Canada, writes TO a friend here: 81 can
have made here a coat of the finest English
broadcloth for $50 in specie, for the like of
which, in Cincinnati, | would have to pay
S75 in greenbacks | can get a pair Of
sewed calf-skin boots, double soled and extra
tine for So 80 in specie, for which, at home,
l would have to pay $l7 in greenbacks
The high tariff and inflated paper cur
rency make the difference. The enormous
protection given to Eastern manufacturers,
enabling them to pay dividends of from so
to 3OO per cent. per annum, on their capital,
is one cause of the high prices of all articles
of clothing. Then the inflated currency
being, in volume, about four times as large
as healthy business condition of the coun-
try really needs, is another cause of high
prices.
We are advised that boot-makers are de-
manding an advance of twenty-five per cent.
ON their wages. If allowed, a fine pair of
calf-skin boots will cost from twenty-five to
twenty-five dollars pair; which, however,
would not be more in proportion than the
advanced rate we have been paying, for u
year past, on u fine broadcloth coat.
How long this condition of things is to
last, no one, of course, can tell. The expe-
rience of the past is blank containing no
rules by which the present financial condi-
ton of this country can be estimated, or its
future predicted. The Secretary of the
Treasury advises gradual return to specie
payments by funding the greenbacks. If
that process should 90 on no faster than the
funding OF the compound lnterest-notes,
twenty-five to thirty years of an inflated
paper currency might be calculated upon,
unless some unexpected convulsion should
burst the bubble.
Those ecompound dintere t tnotes-that have
really been retired from circulation by the
bankers months ago-were to be called in
by the Secretary of the Treasury, and bonds
-fve-twenties, we believe-issued in their
place. Yet, the editor of the New York
Freen,aa's Journal says, in his last issue,
that on the 10th day of the present month,
he saw, in Wall street, ne,o compound Inter
est-bearing notes, issued and circulating,
bearing date that same 10th day of October,
1865 What does that mean? Are new
compound-interest- bearing notes issued as
fast as the old ones are retired by exchang-
ing them for bonds? And is that the way
it is proposed to reduce the volume of cur
rency, and make a gradual return to specie
payments--by issuing new greenbacks as
fast as the old ones are exchanged for bonds?
instead of diminishing-increasing at the
rate of from two aud half to three millions
week and prices of every thing-clothing
marketing, house rents, real estate-are
also going up. This advance in prices will
end some time, but when, is the question.
1t will end when the initiation of the currency
ceases to expand, aud spectators have had
their fingers well burned. The ablcst fnan-
cier, we apprehend, can come no nearer de-
fining the precise period when prices will
cease to advance than we have above. In
this emergency we have no advice to give,
except the old one, hard to be followed in
the midst of abundance, be frugal and eco
nomical, for the crash will come like thief
in the night, when no one is watching Fit
come not at all, frugality and economy, being
cardinal virtues, will always carry with them
their own inherent blessings. - CMcinnatI
Enquirer.