The Aberdeen weekly. [volume] (Aberdeen, Miss.) 1878-1933, 1907-11-15
How Long is the Crisis to Last.

Everybody Is asking how long the
+ present crisis is to last In the
very nature Of the case no definite
answer to the question is possible.
+ Masses Of men, impelled by vague
/ fears, go to lengths which are after
ward seen to have been in the last
degree absurd. Nevertheless, there
/ is a solid basis to hope that the
prevailing frenzy may be compare
lively shortlived In the first place,
/ the soundness of the currency is be-
yond cavil, as is shown by the fact
! that paper issued by the govern
ment and the national banks dis
+ appears on the grand scale. 1t was
not 50 in 1898, nor in 1878, nor in
+ 1857. In each of those disastrous
years the circulating medium was
tainted in the popular esteem, from
I one cause or another. Then, again,
the farmers are prosperous, as rule,
and general trade, though shorn Of
/ its phenomenal proportions, is still
near to the maximum. Confidence
/ has been severely shaken by recent
developments concerning the meth
/ DDS Of certain New York institutions,
and it is plain that there must be a
more or less readjustment of enter
prise to the supply of capital, even
after this storm shall have blown
over. We may therefore feel fairly
sure that the foundations are sound,
even if the superstructure be shat
tered by the cyclone.
We think that there can be no
mistake in assuming that the pinch
has its origin in the disposition to
hoard currency. The motive Of
+ this boarding does not matter now
/ it is the fact with which we have to
deal All estimates of the sum thus
withdrawn from commerce must be
purely conjectural; but taking the
country's population and wealth as
a rough basis, it would seem not
extravagant to guess that something
like $500, 900, 900 has been consign-
ed to strong boxes, or secreted by
other devices which modern civiiza-
ton affords Now the loss of these
two hundred millions, at a cOnJunc-
ture 80 critical Is like the loss Of an
army s reserve at the turn of a
battle and our case is pretty much
what Wellington 5 would have been
at Waterloo if Butcher had not come
up. For want of these two hundred
millions, merchants and manufac-
turers have to stop or 60 slow; the
staple crops have to be kept on the
farm or sold over the bargain coun-
tiers; thousand of artisans are
brought face to face with idleness;
gilt-edge securities have literally to
bc flung at the heads of the few
buyers who are fortunate enough
to have actual money in hand Nor
are these the only fruits OF the mad
pessimism that has succeeded to the
equally mad optimism of the recent
past. In our efforts to replace the
boarded millions we are draining
the great European banks of their
gold reserves and the rise of rates of
discount to prohibitive levels shows
that the process can not 60 much
farther without precipit&ting an up
heaval on the transatlantic bourses. /
Experience proves that conditions
so revolutionary work their own
cure, within a very brief delay 4
good deal has already been done in
this direction, through purchases Of
stocks in odd lots. The transfer
books of the chief railway systems
suggest that the control no longer
rests where it rested a few months
ago \ thousand shares of Penn
sylvania are divided between fifty
or & hundred investors, and then
locked up to await inevitable reac-
ton The quotations Of issues like
the New York City t lbs is irresis-
tibly tempting to people of moder-
ate means who want to hold some
thing good as gold, but who do not
care To shrink their income mean
while Not infrequently, boarded
currency Is sold for a premium in
certified cheques. and the proceeds /.
of the transaction are placed in in /
terest- bearing papers of indisputa-
BILE worth. But such methods are
mere palliatives at best; they can
not cure the enervating malady from I
which we suffer We must conse-
quently rest in this gertrude that,
at the psychological moment. the /
tide viii cease to ebb from the banks I
to the strong boxes and flow from
the strong boxes to the banks. It
always has been, it always will be,
50; for human nature never changes.
In finance, as in physics and morals,
the recoil is equal to the shock.
May the hour of the saving change
quickly come. 1t is monstrous that
a nation, rich in every resource,
should let the life-bloo from its
own veins and totter towards the
gates of the poorhouse. The ills
we have might be borne with some
if they came from war,
pestilenee or famine; but the suicide
who yields to pure hypochondria
lacks the dignity (which may invest
the man who resolves to take up
arms against a sea of troubles
and, by opposing, end them. -
New Orleans Times Democrat.
A Good Liniment.
When you need a good reliable lini-