The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1870-03-07


discipline in charge to burnish up. The loss
of the Oneida with nearly all on board-brave
fellows, who knew how to die-has brought
these thoughts back mournfully to our minds,
while no professional reproach can rest on
the memory of the dead, if the Navy Depart
ment sent them to distant and perilous seas,
as Captain Williams with his dying words said
it did, unprovided with the means of escape.
"What can do? / asked for more boats,
and they were not allowed me"
THE CLOSE OF GRANTS FIRST YEAR.
From the N: Y Tribune
The quotations of gold, which have been
steadily and rapidly going down during the
past fortnight fell on Friday till the premium
reached the vicinity of 113-Auctuating the
greater part of the day few fractions above
that point, but at one time striking fraction
below it. The quotations of Government
bonds indicated during the day that they we're
on the verge of par in gold, most of the va
rieties being worth bat little less than gold
while one variety was at gold premium over
its face value.
That the day of which we are able to chroni-
Gle these highly favorable financial facts was
also the day that marks the termination of the
first year of President Grants administration
of public affairs, is a circumstance which the
country will not lose sight of, and which the
feigned joy.
If the fall of the gold premium and the
advance of the national credit affected only
the Wall street spectators who have been
half-crazed thereby, the matter would not be
worth much attention. But its relation to all
our business interests and to all classes of our
people-to producers and consumers, to
farmers, merchants, mechanics, and laboring
men of every order--is of such nature as to
o1rn g fl,a1 Ia IL
last eight or nine years the business and labor
of the country have been kept in state of
anarchy by the wide and incalculable 1uotua-
tions in gold and currency. Not only have
values been deranged but our legitimate in
dustries have been thrown into a confusion
that to many of them was destruction. There
has been no possibility of remedying these
evils until our money system was put in order
until our currency represented fixed and
determinate value, corresponding to the
worlds standard. 1t is because we now see q
hope of speedily arriving at this desirable
point that we find cause of congratulation in
the movements which have lately taken place
in our money market.
We take it of course that these movements
are not in the nature of spasmodic huctua-
tions which may go the other way on any
given day. If they were, they would be of
advantage only to the spectators, and would
continue to work the damage which the
pubic interests have already suffered from
previous fluctuations. But no one who has
observed the course of things will believe
that there is any danger in this direction, or
that there is any more likelihood of gold re-
turning to $50 than there is of its returning
to 200. 1t has not gone down through specu-
lative combinations, but through the opera
ton of general causes that are not within the
control of the Gold Room.
The downward movement of on Friday was
accelerated by the circulation of an ex-
hibit of our commercial exchanges, by which
it appeared that the balance of trade against
us during the second half of the last year was
only about two millions of dollars. Though
we do not mean to accept the Interpretation of
this exhibit that was given by the bear ope-
rators in gold-though we do not admit that
they took all the elements of calculation
into account-yet its influence in Wall
| street indicates one of the great forces
! affecting the gold premium and the public
credit. We must keep our commercial
| exchanges on the safe side. If our imports
are double the value of our exports, we
must make up the difference by exporting
| gold or (Which is practically the same thing
bonds; and our heavy exports of coin durin G
| past years have been one of the forces ope-
| rating to the injury of our financial condi-
ton. The ''street" understands this very
well, as it has shown a hundred times over.
| And not to criticise here the exhibit used by
operators on Friday, it remains fact that
| our commercial exchanges are in better state
| at this time than they have been at any time
since the years before the war. In the single
item of cotton, we have an advantage in oul
exports greater than we ever had before; anG
it must tell more largely in our favor here
after than it does even at the present time.
The things, however, for which the admin
istration deserves the highest credit in con
nection with the improvement in our finan
cial condition are such as relate to the carry
ing out of Grants policy of honesty and re
trenchment. When, by his election, thu
country and the world received assurance tina
the financial honor of the Government woult
be maintained the policy of repudla
ton was spurned by the people, and Congress
gave its pledge to support the public credi
by paying the principal and interest of tn
debt in gold-the first great steps towar
financial redemption were taken. Whe
Grant announced his brief and simple polio
for remedying the confusion of our financis
state-when he began to carry out PRACTICAL
the programme he had announced Sit was ev
dent that we were about to take q long strid
towards the settlement of our trou
bles. But a years experience of thi
policy has gone far beyond public expectation
To say that the debt has been decrease
during the year of his administration hun
dred millions of dollars is to represent but
small part of what has actually been achieved
To say that during the first half of the currer
fiscal year the revenues were increased,
more faithful collection, at the rate of thirt
millions year over the previous year, dot
not indicate the actual result gained for IL
r public Treasury. To say that the expenses c
, the Government have been vastly reduce