The anti-monopolist. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1874-1878, 1874-08-27

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and never had a visitor during the who'll,
period Of his sojourn. At Knebworth
which is the hereditary seat of the Lyt
tons, his mothers family, the noveiist
did not, in his later life, reside much
A friend of mlne.the late Lady Murray
lived at Andelbury, only few mile.
distant. and while on visit there hat
frequent opportunities of hearing O
her famous neighbor. He was extreme
~ popular and beloved by the lower or
ders in all that part of the country, ane
ms hospitality was apparently without
limit. People came from all parts Of
the world: especially from America, tt
see him. The house at Knebworth wa.
often full, but I don't think the host
always knew who his guests were,-
A Rebels Recollection of rnrI.<;ou
in the Southern Currency.
George Cary Eggleston in the septembe,
- Atlantic ]
1t seems a remarkable fact that dur.
fing the late congressional travail with
the currency question, mo one of the
people In or out Of congress, who were
concerned lest there should not be
enough money in the country to smoye
the crops" ever took upon himself the
pleasing task Of rehearsing the late con.
federacy's financial story, for the pur.
pose of showing by example how sim.
pie and easy thing it is to create
wealth out Of nothing by magic revolu-
tons Of the printing press, and to make
rich, by act of congress, everybody not
too lazy to gather free dollars into a
pile. The story has all the favor of
the Princess Scheherezade's romancee.
! with the additional merit Of being his.
torically true.
For once whole people was rich.
Money was ''easy" enough to satisfy
ever bod y, and everybody had it in
unstinted measure. Money was SO
easily got, and its value was SO utterly
uncertain, that we were never able to
determine what was fair price for any
thing. We fell into the habit of pay
ing whatever was asked, knowing that
tomorrow we should have to pay more.
Speculation became the easiest and
surest thing imaginable. The specula-
tor saw no risks ofloss. Every article of
merchandise rose in value every day,
and to buy anything this week and sell
it next was to make an enormous profit
quite as matter Of course. So uncer-
tain were prices, or rather so constant
ly did they tend upward, that when
cargo Of cadet gray cloth was brought
into Charleston once, an officer in my
battery, attending the sale, was able to
secure enough Of the cloth to make two
suits Of clothes, without any ex-
pense whatever, merely speculat-
ing upon an immediate advance.
He became the purchaser, at auction,
of case of the goods, and had no diff
Guilty, as soon as the sale was over, in
finding a merchant who was glad to
take his bargain off his hands, giving
him the cloth he wanted as premium.
The officer could not possibly have
paid for the case Of goods, but there
was nothing surer than that he could
sell again at an advance the moment
the auctioneer's hammer fell on the last
lot of cloths.
were so high that nobody could see
them, and that they got mixed for
want Of supervision" He held, how
ever, that the difference between the
old and the new order Of things was
trifling one. "Before the war" he said.
A facetious friend used to say prices
81 went to market with the money in
my pocket, and brought back my pur-
chases in basket; now ] take the
money in q basket, and bring the things
home in my pocket.
l am sometimes asked at what time
prices attained their highest point In
the confederacy. and find that mem
DRY fails to answer to the question sat-
isfactorily. They were about as high
as they could be in the fall Of 1868, and
I should be disposed to fix upon that as
the time when the climax was reached,
but for my consciousness that the law
of constant appreciation was fixed one
throughout the war. The financial
condition got steadily worse to the end.
! believe the highest price, relatively,
l ever saw paid, was for a pair Of
boots. A cavalry officer entering lit
tie country store, found there pair Of
boots which fitted him. He inquired
the price. 1.-TWO hundred dollars
said the merchant. A five hundred
dollar bill was offered, but the mer-
chant, having no smaller bills, could not
change it. "Never mind" said the
cavalier, "I'll take the boots anyhow.
Keep the change; l never let little
matter of three hundred dollars stand
in the way Of trade
That was on the day before Lees
surrendered, but it would nothave been
an impossible occurrence at any time
during the preceding year. The money
was Of SO little value that we parted
with it gladly whenever it would pur-
chase anything 1t al desirable. II
cheerfully paid five dollars for little
salt, at Petersburg, in August, 1854, and
being thirsty, drank my last two dollars
In half pint Of cider.
The governments course in levying .
tax in kind, as the only possible way Of
making the taxation amount to any
thing, led speedily to the adoption Of
similar plan, as far as possible, by the
people. A physician would order from
his planter friend ten or twenty yisits'