The Monticellonian., 1895-04-12

huctnated with more or less vlo- lence since the earliest record of it. existence. l. has been affected wholly by causes which may be grouped under the heads of sup. ply ani demand. There nave been temporary disturbances, such as affect all merchandise, which have either raised. or loweGed the ruling value of the cheaper metal relatively to the dearer-specula- tion, governmental action, or oth- CT human actions which supended the workings of natural laws for a time. But in the main the market has been influenced by over or un- der production. by improved methods of mining, new mechanl- cal discoveries, increased trans portation facilities, reduced freight rates, and so on-the usual things which figure m the progress of the worlds commerce.
 Within historic times the value of silver relatively to gold has greatly changed. In antiquity, local conditions governing entire ly, there were as many values to silver as there were countries. Commerce gradually cqualized these differences.
 The encyclopedias tell us that
 in ancient Arabia silver was worth twice as much as gold.
 According to the relative pro- duction of the two metals, coun- tries appreciated or depreciated siIver. In Asia, q gold-producing country, silver was higher in es- timation than in Europe, of which silver was the peculiar production. This estimation in Asia prevailed until within a recent period. As late as the seventeenth century gold and silver were valued equal y in Japan.
 The earliest recorded ratio Is found inscribed at Karnak, the tribute lists of Thutmosis, 1900 B. c. giving 1883 to l. The Britain mica tells us that the same ratio IS shown by cuneiform inscriptions on ancient Persian coirs and that Xenophon reported it's existence in 490 B. c. with the approach of the Christian era silver appreciat- ed with relation to gold. In lS9 B. c. both Greeks and Romans had ratio of 10 to 1. Upon Caesars return to Rome there was temporary relative superabund- ance of gold and the ratio fell to 7l2 to 1. A century later the ratio of l2 l.2 to l was fixed 1t so remained for nearly two cen turies.
 At the end of the fifteenth cen tury the ratio established by Spain was 10 9.4 to l. Half century later, the plunder of America be- ing principally in gold, the wealth of the Potosi silver mines not be- ing as yet known, Spain, which country then monopolized the supplies of precious metals, raised the legal value Of gold to Is l-2 to 1. Another century made Portu- gal the arbiter, as into its cotfers flowed stream of gold from Bra gil, Japan and the East Indies. In 1888 for the first. time appeared the now celebrated figures Is to l. Then came another exchange. The placers of Brazil were ex- hausted, the Orient had been fully plundered, Portugal had lost it's importance. Spain again controll- ed the ratio, and in l755, her col onial produce being chiefly silver, she raised the relative value of the white metal to 15 l-2 to l for Europe, allowing it to remain at the Portuguese ratio for her American colonies. France had since 1726 ratio of her own, IA l-2 to l. In 17S5 she adopted the Spanish relation-15 2 to l.
 Since then, with brief breaks, these two ratios have existed. With the suspension of free coin age of silver in the United States the Is to ratio has become sim ply a tradition.
 The value of silver in the mark ct has suffered depreciation in the last quarter at sl.29S per
 l.. S- ..- l.... 4La II l