The New York herald., 1874-12-16
BY All Msansg

it is proposed by the Associated Banks of
Philadelphia to make complete collection Of
specimens of the coins and paper money of
the United States, to be elucidated by statistics
Of banking and finance, and banks and bank
ers all over the United States are desired to
contribute to this collection,
The idea is an excellent one, and we hope it
will be successfully carried out. collection
Of coins tolerably complete could be loaned
to the Exhibition by more than one citizen,
and except as matter of curiosity to the
average country visitor, and Of envy to less
fortunate collectors, would have little i'm
portance to us now. But complete, or even
tolerably complete, collection of the shin
plasters which have cursed the people, robbed
industry Of its just returns embarrassed trade
and caused financial distress and stagnation,
from the days of the coarse brown Continental
rag to the present day of greasy greenbacks,
would be most important and instructive
study.
What story such collection would tell of
futile attempts to create wealth, not by labor
but by legislation; Of promises to pay which
the poor were persuaded to take, and which
wilted in their pockets; of magnificent financial
theories based on ignorance and supported
by knavery; OF bubbles warranted not 10
burst, which nevertheless always did burst
at the very moment Of greatest infa-
ton What q record such gathering would
make of wrecked financial schemes, each of
which was expressly adopted to make the poor
richer, and all Of which in reality only made
them poorer ! And under what instructive
labels the mass Of failed and dishonored paper
would be displayed! The collection would-if
the curator or managers were not averse to
sound English-come under the general head
of shinplasters; and in one case would be dis
played samples Of the Wild Cat of Indiana;
in another the visitor would admire the Red
Dog Of Michigan; here would be specimens
of Texas scrip, of which the more you had the
worse OF you were; there the issues Of real
estate banks, founded on mortgages, and
which the last credulous holders took in ex-
change for eggs or butter, weight for weight,
and found themselves swindled at that. On
one side would he shown the Confederate
notes, payable six months after the conclusion
of peace between the Confederate and the
United States governments, and which can
not therefore be called 'past due;" and on
the other our own dear-too dear-greenback,
which, according to the limited under
standing Of Mr.. Kelley and General
Butler, is never due; while somewhere
midway between would be seen specimens of
Nick Biddle's magnificent United States Bank
issues, which were to have made the last gen.
GRAFTON all men and women OF independent
property, and left great number Of them
without enough to pay their decent funeral
expenses.
To the poor the show would have but a
mourniul interest but it would greatly at
tract the papermakers and the engravers
'What you want to do is to get the bills nicely
engraved, printed on good, crisp paper, and
send them off as far as you can from the
bank" This used to be the instruction
given to the bank president by the directors
in the West. But the engravers, printers and
papermakers had always to be paid in cash,
and the shrewd rogues took care that cash
meant money, not the stuff they were manu.
featuring. They did not, like the ancestors
Of King Kalakaua, worship the idol they
created.
A small part Of the collection will consist of
bills of American banks which have never
failed to redeem their promises to pay. 1t
will be very small alas but very honorable
gathering.
And then the literature of the subject-the
great mass Of laws to regulate to limit, to ex-
pand, to contract, to improve-everythin
but to abolish unredeemed promises to pay
the tons Of plans for the resumption of specie
payments, each more complicated and ia.
genious than the other; tons of finan-
cial theories; the shelves full of State
laws, intended to make bank bills as good as
money, not to speak of speeches, public
documents, messages and great mass of
other literature, all Of which, like its subject,
has gone to protest.
To help to make this dreary spectacle more
impressive upon visitors we trust the Asso-
ciated Banks Of Philadelphia will cause to
be placed conspicuousy over the whole col
lection the busts or portraits of Pennsyl-
vania's two most eminent statesmen, Ben
jamin Franklin, Of Massachusetts, and Albert
Gallatin, of Swit2erland--both sound finan-
ciers. Hamlet saw his fathers ghost, with "a
countenance more in sorrow than in anger"
II Franklin and Gallatin could really look
down it would be, we imagine, with amaze
ment and indignation at the project which
some Of their successors are trying to get Con-
gress to adopt
The COLD TERM.-As will be seen from our
dispatches, the mercury fell to thirty degrees