The weekly democratic statesman. [volume] (Austin, Tex.) 1871-1883, 1876-02-03

w ME tHe NUMBER Ol IdlluFes IN 1910 IS
so large, the average amount of liabilities is
less than those of any year, except two,
since 1864. This shows us that the tremen-
dous and widespread severity of the effects
of the reaction from the abnormal and spec
ulative activity of the war times, with their
Overtrading and initiation, is mitigating its
severity, and like a wave of impulsion
weakens as it widens. In 1878 it prostrated
the great business centers like hurricane,
and is now expending its last strength on
the smaller traders and business men of the
country.
When a general business panic occurs, as
in 1857 and 1878, the millionaire houses, the
great bankers, the large wholesale firms
with extended credits, the manufacturers
whose goods are found on the counters of
the mercantile world, suffer first and receive
the fullest force of the shock. Then the
panic-wave spreads wide over the country,
attacks in all localities the houses of smaller
capital, and finally, following its natural
sweep and effect, it exhAusts itself on the
outermost circle of smaller dealers, to be
followed speedily by wave of renewed
confidence and activity. So that the i'm
mense number of small failures last year is
really sign of encouragement and hope.
This is the general law of business reaction.
Nothing can -ceunteract it. Always when
as that of 1878 is doing. we find in year or
two afterwards a formidable number of
small failures, and then affairs begin to
mend. We have thus glanced briefly at
the immediate causes for hope in the near
future. The atmosphere in the business
world is yet heavy, stagnant and lowering,
but the quickening breeze which shall dispel
the fogs of despondency is at hand, and
promises wonderful revival of enterprise
and prosperity for the present year.
Another thought suggests itself here. in
the last fierce struggle between France and
Germany, the former was crushed and ap-
parently ruined = her capital taken, her
fairest provinces torn from her grasp, and
burdened with an immense debt avowedly
inflicted by the conquering power for the
purpose of rendering her permanently un-
able to avenge or retrieve her losses. The
statesmen of Europe said that France, as
political :orce, was almost blotted from the
map, and was no longer frst-class State.
But, as if to assert the divine law of COM
pensation, France has since been blessed
with bouutiful harVests, while Germany has
\ a1af ~, he E,,sn al
of France is the admiration of Europe,
while Berlin has been convulsed with re-
peated panics, and to-day France asserts
that the produce of her vineyards, in two
seasons, enabled her to pay off her immense
war indemnity of a thousand million dol
lars. Our section of the American nation
has had similar good fortune since the war
While the Northern States have suffered
severely from droughts, locusts, untimely
frosts, and scanty crops, the South, begin
ming the world anew, has been steadily
growing in prosperity, The crops have
been large, the seasons favorable, and the
farmers have marketed their produce to
fair advantage. This has helped our busi-
ness men to stand firm and the failures have
been few and light, less numerous than be-
fore the war, and not SO large. Our en-
tire section has been benefited by having
something to sell that the business world
wanted to buy. If now we add to these
undeniable and most encouraging facts, the
universal movement towards and demand
for retrenchment of expenses in every de-
partmene of pubirc Hffnirs, whether munich
pal, State or national, and the prevailing
caution, prudence and economy that every
citizen feels called upon to exercise, with
other similar causes now in active opera
tioB, and we reach the conclusion that
nothing but the improbable contingency of
a foreign war can so unsettle matters as to
hinder steady, healthy, and satisfactory
revival of trade during the next twelve
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