LETTERS FROM EUROPEf
BY
HON. WILLIAM D. KELLEY.
SIX LETTERS WRITTEN TO THE PHILADELPHIA TIMES
DURING THE SUMMER OF 1879.
WITH NOTE« BY THE AUTHOR.
PHILADELPHIA:
PORTER AND COATES.
rv
77?^ Cr erar Library
LETTERS FROM EUROPE.
BY
HON. WmLIAM D. KELLEY.
SIX LETTERS WRITTEN TO THE PHILADELPHIA TIMES
DURING THE SUMMER OF 1879.
WITH NOfES BY THE AUTHOR
PHILADELPHIA:
POETER AND COATES.
The following letters were written with no thought
or suspicion that they would ever appear in collective
form. They have been reprinted in compliance with
many requests from intelligent correspondents on both
sides of the Atlantic, and have been annotated because
the author was led by his correspondents to believe
that, by this pleasant labor, he might shed light on the
question of bi-metallism—a question of grave and world¬
wide importance.
A RETROSPECT.
On Board Steamer Zeeland,
Opp Lizard Point, June 17, 1879.
The Zeeland sailed on the 5th instant, and, if my memory
serves me, at the same hour at "which on the same day of June,
1852, I left Philadelphia for Liverpool on the City of Glasgow.
The interval marks just twenty-seven years—a long period in
the life of a man, but one which is as but a day in the life of a
people. It has, however, been prolific in national vicissitudes,
a glance at some of which may he a fitting prelude to the
occasional observations I hope to submit to the readers of The
Times.
The names of Victor Emanuel and Bismarck were, in 1852,
unknown to our countrymen. But to speak of the Kingdom
of Italy or the North German Empire is now to name them.
He would have been laughed at who had then ventured to pre¬
dict that in less than a quarter of a century Italy, united under
a liberal monarchy, would have fixed her gaze upon the future
and moved forward in production, trade, and popular intelli¬
gence with such notable strides as she has done. Victor
Emanuel's great achievement astonished the world, for never
had an appeal to the sentiment of nationality elicited such a
response or brought into unity so many discordant elements
and conflicting interests.
For Bismarck's success, others had prepared the way. Such
profound students and observers of social phenomena as our
venerable townsman, Henry 0. Carey, had noted the subtle
but controlling effect of progressive material development and
inter-state trade, and had regarded the German customs-union
or Zollverein as the precursor of Germany's political unity.
4
They believed that commercial, financial, and improving social
forces were more direct and persistent powers than sentiment,
and that the demand for general prosperity consequent upon
the progress made under the customs-union would extinguish
both local jealousies and loyalty to the hereditary rulers of
petty states, dukedoms, and principalities, and were therefore
prepared for the advent of Bismarck, Emperor William, and
the North German Empire.
The story of the Zollverein should be known to every Ameri¬
can, and especially to every Pennsylvanian. When the young
German enthusiast, Frederick List, came to our State, he ex¬
pected to make his home there. Germany then consisted of
Prussia and a number of minor States, whose hereditary jeal¬
ousies and conflicting interests seemed to defy all efibrts to
establish a national policy. The people were producers of raw
materials, and able-bodied men were of so little value that their
rulers had, till near the close of the last century, been ready
at all times to sell them by battalions to either side when other
nations engaged in war, as Donop's command of Hessians were
sold to England during our Revolutionary struggle. List wit¬
nessed the earlier efibrts to develop and utilize our anthracite
coal. He studied our political theories, and not only accepted
the doctrine of protection to home industry as an intellectual
conclusion, but changed his whole plan of life in deference to
this revelation in social science. In the theory of Mr. Clay
and his followers—free trade between the States of the Union,
with protective duties upon goods manufactured elsewhere—he
believed he had found a process by which his fatherland, hope¬
less as had seemed the efibrt, might be consolidated and raised
to its true position in the family of nations. Returning to
Germany, he dedicated himself to this work. What time and
efibrt it cost him to efiect such a union between Prussia and
two of the smallest dukedoms cannot be told, for, dying prema¬
turely and in want, he left no record of his labors except in
the papers which our late townsman, Stephen Colwell, collected,
caused to be translated, edited with copious notes, and pub¬
lished under the title of National Economy^ by Frederick List.
5
Though List died too early, he had lived long enough to be
assured that the results of his labor were so palpably beneficent
that example would accomplish what personal efibrts had failed
to do. The Zollverein was gradually extended, till it included
all Northern Germany, and enabled the people to not only
manufacture the materials they produced, but to attain com¬
mercial position for Germany by exporting their native manu¬
factures and importing materials for others. With the estab¬
lishment of each new industry the value of man increased, as
a consequence of the increased demand for human service.
Thus are home markets ever produced and social order and
progress promoted. The wild dream of the young enthusiast
has been fulfilled. The Zollverein prepared the way for Ger¬
man unity, as, I believe, the prevalence of the protective system,
by producing inter-state dependence, would have averted our
late fratricidal struggle.
The condition of France in 1852 was transitional. The
citizen King of 1830 had, in 1848, followed his hereditary
predecessor into exile, and the tri-color provisional government
established by Lamartine, Louis Blanc, and their fellow poets
and social reformers, had disappeared without having estab¬
lished a constitution which embraced adequate checks, balances
and restraints upon executive power. It had ordered a popular
election, and the ambitious adventurer, Louis Napoleon, having
received an overwhelming majority of votes, had been installed
as President, and now, under the title of the Prince President,
occupied the Elysee and exercised almost imperial power. Pre¬
paratory to the sanguinary days of June, which he had resolved
to provoke in order to discredit republicanism, he had impris¬
oned the National Guard in their own barracks ; he confided the
general control of popular education to the Church, and by an
order of three brief paragraphs, which read like an imperial re¬
script, he commanded and provided the means for the completion
of certain railroads which would connect Paris with the frontiers
of France. It was when the army received and the Church—
in the person of the Archbishop of Paris—blessed him, on his
return from, celebrating the completion of the road to Stras-
6
burg, that I first sa\y the man who was in a few months to re¬
establish the Empire on the ruing of the Republic, which, with
such solemnity and publicity, he had sworn to maintain. By
what abject servility he secured the support of the Church,
how he won the working people to his side by the magnificent
expenditures by which he improved Paris and completed the
railroads, .and how he satisfied the middle classes by his oft-
repeated assurance that the Empire meant peace, are matters
of history. But the day of retribution came ignobly and as the
termination of a war which he had, without cause or a reasonable
show of pretext, forced upon Germany. Fortunately for France
the usurper and his army were captured at Sedan under such
humiliating circumstances as to make the name of the Empire
and its founder odious to every French patriot. The keenness
with which this national disgrace is remembered must for many
years plead for the maintenance of a Republic, which, in view
of the number of feeble and envious descendants of legitimate
royalty who aspire to the throne, seems now to be the only
practicable form of government for France.
The year 1852 found England in the early and exhilarating
stage of a delirium, from which not a small number of her peo¬
ple are now reluctantly emerging, and which may prove fatal
unless alteratives of sufficient potency to effect a radical change
in the patient's condition can be speedily applied. Famine,
eviction, and deportation had settled the Irish question, by re¬
ducing the population of the "Green Isle" from about 7,500,000
to little more than 5,000,000. The golden treasures of California
and Australia had been discovered, and those distant countries
were reviving the trade of the world by offering boundless in¬
ducements to immigrants of every race and creating large de¬
mands for labor in every manufacturing centre. Appeased by
the chance to emigrate at the cost of others and by the demand
at home for labor at rising wages, Chartists and Repealers had
ceased to agitate for political reform, and emigrated or gone to
work in mine, factory or furnace. But Manchester, which then
dominated England, attributed to another cause this world-wide
and providential impulse to trade. Cobden and Bright had, she
7
believed, produced it. But for the gospel of free trade recently
proclaimed by them it could not have come. It was their dog¬
mas, and not the sudden and immense augmentation of the
world's supply of money, the primary tool of trade, which had
given an impetus to commerce more rapid and extended than
had ever occurred, except when the infusion of the precious
metals of Mexico ' and Peru into the contracted volume of
metallic money had roused Europe from the long torpor of the
dark ages.* The privilege of buying where one can buy at the
* " In the very front rank of this category we must place the discovery of
the gold mines of California and Australia, which promise, in their ulti¬
mate effects, not only to obviate many of the greatest evils under which
society has long labored, but to bring about a new balance of power in
every state, and relieve industry from the worst part of the load which has
hitherto oppressed it. . . .
" The two greatest events which have occurred in the history of mankind
have been directly brought about by a successive contraction and expansion
of the circulating medium of society. The fall of the Roman Empire, so
long ascribed In ignorance to slavery, heathenism, and moral corruption,
was in reality brought about by a decline in the silver and gold mines of
Spain and Greece. . . . And, as if Providence had intended to reveal in
the clearest manner the influence of this mighty agent on human affairs,
the resurrection of mankind from the ruin which these causes had pro¬
duced was owing to the directly opposite set of agencies being put in
operation. Columbus led the way in the career of renovation ; when he
spread his sails across the Atlantic he bore mankind and its fortunes in his
bark. . . . The annual supply of the precious metals for the use of the
globe was tripled ; before a century had expired the prices of every species
of produce were quadrupled. The weight of debt and taxes insensibly
wore off under the influence of that prodigious increase ; in the renovations
of industry the relations of society were changed ; the weight of feudalism
cast off; the rights of man established. Among the many concurring
causes which conspired to bring about this mighty consummation, the
most important, though hitherto the least observed, was the discovery of
Mexico and Peru."—Alison. History of Europe, from the Fall of Napoleon to
the Accession of Napoleon III., Vol. I., chap. i.
" The chief usefulness of the precious metals nowadays, and the sole use¬
fulness of gold and silver coins, lies in their purchasing-power, their value
as Money ; hence, a demonetization of silver would be proportionately
destructive to its present usefulness, and, we repeat, would be equivalent
to a willful annihilation of a vast portion of the world's stock of money.
In proportion as this demonetization was carried out, it would be a volun¬
tary throwing away of the vast blessings and benefits which mankind have
8
lowest figures in English currency was Manchester's infallible
remedy for all the ills to which nations are subject. What
booted it that every rood of English ground would maintain its
man ? Did not statistics prove that food could be bought more
cheaply than it could be produced on high-priced British acres,
and was it not therefore folly to waste labor in the farming of
land which was so valuable because it was so admirably adapted
to parks and game preserves ?
But more and better than all this, free trade, Manchester
confidently asserted, would banish war and all its horrors and
bind the nations in bonds of peace and amity by making them
all depend on the British Islands for wares and fabrics. That
it would work this wonder had, so all England believed, just
been proved by the success of the World's Fair of 1851. But
time tests all theories, and fate is sometimes cruelly cynical.
The intervening quarter of a century has not verified these
predictions, but has been unusually prolific im wars ; and while
other lands feed more than half the people of England, they
also supply them with many manufactured articles which idle
British laborers would gladly produce from neglected native
recently enjoyed from the new mines of America and Australia. The world
would be plunged back into the 'bard times' which previously prevailed,
or in truth into a far worse predicament. The fact that our own country
is under a single gold-standard would be powerless to ward off from us the
effects of a demonetization of silver, which stjll constitutes by far the larger
portion of the world's stock of the precious metals. Our stock of gold
would be drawn upon to supply the dearth of-money in other countries.
Not to speak of the inevitable collapse of our monetary system as regulated
by the absurd and pernicious Bank Act of 1844, the burden of our National
Debt would be vastly increased, and so would that of every other country.
These debts, which amount to an enormous sum, would thenceforth hang
like a mill-stone around the neck of the nations. Add tcr these results the
restriction upon trade and industry inseparable from a dearth of money,
and any statesman who at present favors the general, or any extended,
adoption of a single gold-standard may well shrink back from such a
change, and refuse to imperil the prosperity of his own country, and of the
civilized world at large, by producing an arbitrary and artificial dearth of
money, which is the most potent auxiliary, we might say the very life's
blood, of trade and industry, as these are, and must be, carried on under a
mature civilization."—R. H. Patterson, in Contemporary Review, April, 1879.
9
materials. Meanwhile the government is seeking " peace with
honor" through wars in Afghanistan and Zululand, and in¬
creasing numbers of the people are clamoring for the restora¬
tion of protective duties ; for the relief from financial distress
that would follow the enlargement of the basis of the world's
credit by the remonetization of silver; for relief from civic
burdens by the abolition of the Established Church ; the reduc¬
tion of the civil list, and, of public expenditures generally ;
while others insist upon the elevation of the mentally and
physically starving farm laborers of England into prosperous
yeomanry, and, as an essential preliminary thereto, demand the
abolition of entailments and the division of the great estates
which characterize the Britain of 1879.
Had Cobden and Bright been less confident and dogmatic,
and condescended to collate and consider facts, especially those
furnished by the experience of the United States,, they
might have discovered that their panacea was not of universal
application. In the light of experience it is now seen that they
generalized too largely, and that what England then needed
was the freest possible trade in food and every species of raw
material, and that this freedom should be coupled with the
largest possible home market for British manufactures that could
be created by protective duties, steady work, and high wages.
Prior to 1852 free trade had, with the exception of the brief
periods between 1824 to 1832 and 1842 to 1847, prevailed in
the United States, and our exports were consequently confined
to bulky raw materials. We shipped the cotton of the South
to Liverpool, to be spun and woven for our use; the grain
and provisions of the North went to the same port, to feed the
foreign laborers we there employed; the gold and silver of the
whole country went there also in exchange for commodities
which our unemployed people could have produced, to swell
* " This table demonstrates clearly that the increase in metallic money
from 1848 to 1870 of 40 per cent., was accompanied by an increase of 300
per cent, in commerce ; and in 1872 the increase in British exports ex¬
ceeded that of 1848 by 400 per cent. Whatever share inventions and free
trade may have had in this increase, it is evident that the copious supply
of metallic money afforded the medium for development in the greater
measure."—The Decline of Proeperity, by Erneet Seyd^ London, 1879, chap. 8.
10
the colossal fortunes of British manufacturers. A conse¬
quence of this absurd system of keeping our workshops and
making our domestic exchanges in a foreign country was,
that in the absence of promising industrial enterprises in which
to expend our .energies, sentimental politics were the prevailing
pursuit of the people, and a growing tendency to national dis¬
integration was disclosed with each new cause of excitement.
This tendency culminated in 1861, and brought into armed con¬
flict compatriots who were involved in war because, instead of
trading directly with each other over roads owned in common,
they had made a foreign port their place of exchange. The
disbursements demanded by the war compelled Congress to im¬
pose duties on imports, which, for the first time in our history,
were fully protective. Have .the palpable consequences of this
action confirmed or confounded the bold generalizations of the
free-trade philosophers ? Let us see. " Free trade," said Man¬
chester, " will extend our trade, because nations can only buy
from those who in turn purchase their productions. Foreign
trade is the exchange of commodities." Not only our recent
experience, but that of Britain herself, derides this and all
kindred dogmas with the bitter irony of fate.* Every Eastern-
bound craft the Zeeland has passed has been, as she is, freighted
to its utmost capacity, while those bound for the West have all,
as their light draft of water showed, been without cargo. It is
protective America and not free-trade England whose foreign
exports increase. Our exports were never so large, valuable,
or varied as they have been in 1878-79, while those of England
for 1879 will not exceed, if they equal, in value those of 1866.
May we not, in view of such facts, safely conclude that a grow-
ng and prosperous inter-state trade, created and fostered by
protective duties, is, by harmonizing once discordant elements,
* " Many of our ' professors' of commercial economy know nothing what¬
ever of the plain motives which guide trade and exchanges. All that they
can do is to preach to the British public that the rules of ' supply and de¬
mand ' must conquer from the ' British manufacturing' point of view.
Foreign nations mutt take British goods,, they fancy 1 The fact that our
own importing power has so quickly declined within the last year is bitter
sarcasm oh so great an error."—Emut Sej/d, The Decline of Prosperiti/,
chap. 11.
11
doing for the United States what the Zollverein did for Ger¬
many ?
I was led to this train of thought by remembering that the
City of Glasgow and her companion steamer were soon- with¬
drawn. Philadelphia could not, experience had decided, main¬
tain a line of foreign-going steamers. She was off the routes
of the cotton and grain trades, and was consequently unable
to offer cargo for the outward passage. The Delaware was
not lighted sufficiently to enable even steamers to traverse
it at night. The ice accumulated at the Horseshoe in such
masses as to interrupt winter navigation, and the upper bars
were a menace to steamers of even less than two thousand
tons. But now the American and Red Star lines of steamers,
some of which carry over three thousand tons, come and go
with as much regularity as those of any of the New York lines,
and occasional vessels of larger tonnage come to our wharves
for cargo. Domestic commerce is ever the progenitor of foreign
trade, and the necessities of our growing coasting trade have
compelled the improvement of th^e river. The city ice boats,
arriving and departing steamers, and the sturdy and swift tugs
that tow sailing craft to and from the capes, keep the ice afloat
in the coldest weather. Our railroads offer ample cargoes of
grain, provisions, oil, tobacco, and cattle, and the workshops
of the city furnish part of almost every foreign cargo. It is a
curious fact that for about sixty years the merchants of Phila¬
delphia had seemed to despair of maintaining direct trans¬
atlantic trade, and had not, during that long period, asked
Congress to provide for the improvement of the Delaware or
Schuylkill, and it will probably surprise intelligent readers of
The Times to hear that more work has been done in this direc¬
tion in the last fifteen years than had previously been done, or
than Philadelphians had asked for, from the foundation of the
government. It needs—and I speak from experience—but
persistent appeals to Congress to secure the removal of every
bar and to locate a lighthouse on every point on which it is
needed. The Delaware will then be a more important river
than the Clyde, and the expanding foreign trade of Philadel¬
phia will soon exceed that of Glasgow.
BELGIUM MD HOLIMD.
Austbrdau.
Among the readers of The Times are doubtless convales¬
cents to whose complete restoration moderate exercise in the
open air and the diversion afforded by changing scenes and
conditions are essential, and to whom European travel is pre¬
scribed. To all such persons I am justified in commending
Antwerp as the port for which to sail. On arriving in Eng¬
land a Pennsylvanian feels that he has come to another and
older State of the Union. The language he hears is his own ;
the signs he reads would not be out of place on the streets of
Philadelphia, and the prevailing style of architecture is equally
familiar. But Antwerp is in the heart of Europe. It is itself
a curiosity worthy of study. The sights it presents are all
strange. American ears are unused to the prevailing language,
which is not French, G-erman or Dutch, but Flamand. The
immediate approach to the city is strikingly beautiful. At
Flushing, four hours distant, we enter the Scheldt, on either
side of which we see in panoramic procession glimpses and
sometimes quaint and charming views of Dutch villages.
Nearer the city the river becomes the boundary between Hol¬
land and Belgium ; the dykes seem to be lower, and we can
view more closely the passing scenes with all their Flemish
minuteness of detail. The view of Antwerp, with its grand old
cathedral, and the new quarter of the city as we have them
from the outer harbor is, I think, finer than that of any city
I ever entered from the sea, though not so picturesque as
that of San Francisco when approached after the street lamps
have been lighted and the whole hiUside on which the city
stands seems to have been illuminated for a joyous occasion.
Here one need not travel far for novelties. The costumes of the
(12)
13
Paysannes are not only novel but picturesque or grotesque, as
it may happen, and the pursuits in which many of them are em¬
ployed surprise a Philadelphian. While the steamer was haul¬
ing into her berth, and before officers had come to examine the
trunks, I had noticed one of these women over whose shoulders
hung from a wooden yoke large tin vessels of water, from which
she refreshed thirsty laborers at the rate of a centime, or one-
fifth of a cent, per glass, and every one of them that stood or
walked upon the quay and did not çarry or attend a child,
how deep soever she might be in gossip or dispute, plied her
knitting needles as rapidly as did her less voluble neighbors.
And before we reached the hotel we saw that the women of the
humbler classes all knit as they walk, and that old women, whose
wooden shoes and rude occupation offered strange contrast to
their immaculate lace caps with side pendants falling to their
shoulders, were employed indifferently with men in sweeping
the streets. In England the little donkey and his cart attract
attention, but we have all seen their counterparts at home,
while it is a strange sight to see dogs of even less than medium
size commonly used as substitutes for donkey or horse. But
here the slender girl who as porter pulls a hand-cart, the
matron who serves milk from door to door or vends vegetables,
and the burly fellow who pushes a load heavy enough for a
horse, all avail themselves of the assistance of a dog or dogs.
Every change of scene in the old part of the city illustrates the
moral of Burns' Twa Bogs, for nowhere is the aristocratic dog
more petted and fondled or his plebeian kinsman more hardly
worked than in Antwerp.
Here we are not only, as I have said, in the heart of Europe,
but at a point from which every city in the kingdoms of which
our countryman. Motley, was the ablest historian, may be
reached by journeys involving less than three hours on the
rail. Each one of these cities has its own historic monuments,
and is rich in old and rare specimens of architecture, painting
and sculpture, and each one, if it be only in the costume of the
country people, also retains some early characteristic of the
province of which it was once the noted and well-defended
14
capital. The contrasts between the cities of Belgium and
those of Holland—for, dating from Amsterdam, I write of
—are very positive," and both present attractive novelties
to the fresh traveller. Antwerp is the busy entrepot for world¬
wide commercial exchanges. Brussels, less than two hours
distant, is a quiet and beautiful little capital, the residence of
the king, his ministers, and those of foreign countries. Here,
too, is the Parliament House, and now,, while the Chambers
are in session, the boulevards and parks swarm with equipages
every afternoon from 4 to 6 o'clock. The French language
prevails, and an air of refinement and elegance characterizes
this Petit Paris. From Brussels a ride of less than two hours
carries one to Ghent, a grand old town, which centuries ago
was famed for its manufacture of cotton goods and the turbu¬
lence and prowess of its spinners. These have, however, dis¬
appeared, and Ghent is now the centre of a large linen trade,
the factories supplying which are in neighboring towns. Its
oldest architectural monument, now a ruin, but suflSciently pre¬
served to attest its antiquity, dates from the sixth century.
On the foundations of a temple of Mars erected by the Romans
were subsequently built a church and monastery, which, except
the crypt of the formei, have now also disappeared. A further
ride of two hours carries one to Bruges, a capital once famed
for its commerce and the wealth and courage of its people, and
of whose old belfry Longfellow sang while yet but " a promising
American poet." But it is essentially a city of the past, and.
forgetting its historic renown, puts forth no sign of energy or en¬
terprise, and is therefore, to an American, all the more curious.
The cities of Holland are, I think, more interesting than Bruges
and Ghent, or than Brussels and Antwerp, each of which has its
old city and beautiful modern extension. In a country reclaimed
from the sea, they are built on piles, and all are below, some of
them, it is said, quite three hundred feet below the level of the
sea. Nothing can be more quaint or picturesque than views
one gets while riding through the narrow and winding streets
of the older parts' of Rotterdam and Amsterdam, or on those
that bound the broader canals, which are shaded by rows of
15
elms, and upon which front the residences of many of the
richest bankers and merchants of the world. That Pennsyl¬
vania and New York derived their earliest domestic architec¬
ture largely from these cities is very apparent, and I wish our
city fathers would incur another obligation to them by adopt¬
ing their admirable system of street paving. I have never
been in Venice, but what I see in Amsterdam, whose canals
divide it into ninety islands, frequently recalls descriptions I
have read of that city. From my window I look upon the river
Amstel, which is at this point about three hundred feet wide,
and is the outlet for the longest of the canals. This is the newest
quarter of the city, and the residences which line the banks of
the river are evidently those of people in easy circumstances.
In front of many of them are moored handsome sailing yachts
or tiny steamers, and at the mouth of the canal is the house of
the boat clubs. Last evening's sky was cloudless, and as I
watched the boats glide noiselessly over the moonlit water it was
difficult to believe that I was in Holland and not in Venice.
I have not referred to Hague, the capital of Holland,
because, like Brussels, it is not commercial and is in all respects
unlike the seaports. It is less pretentious than Brusssls, but
is, in my judgment, as beautiful and richer in precious works
of art. Its collections—though not large enough to weary
one—embrace works of high repute of many of the old masters.
The ball room in the Palace in the Woods, so called because it
is embowered in the woods which constitute a large portion of
the park, is a marvel of beauty. Its walls and ceilings were
decorated by seven of the most distinguished artists of the
school of Rubens, whose joint work was completed in 1749.
From the centre of the city a ride of less than thirty minutes
in a street car through a beautiful suburb carries one to Schev¬
eningen, one of the most charming seaside bathing places I
have ever seen. To the overwrought student or man of busi¬
ness whose summer vacation is restricted to about six weeks
the route I have indicated offers special attractions, as a few
hours will take him from Amsterdam to Paris, and going
thence to London he need not retrace any of his steps.
16
Our train passed through Delft while they were burying the
late Prince of Orange, and near enough to enable passengers
to distinguish persons in the crowd that gathered about the
church, and we entered Hague near the close of a day of
formal mourning. The streets swarmed with thrifty-looking
citizens and soldiers in full dress, who, having escorted the
funeral cortege to the station, had been dismissed for the day.
I had come to regard the Prince as a mere reprobate, whose
early death none would mourn. But whenever the people
spoke of him it was in terms of sympathy and regret ; and
when I saw his portrait at the age of eighteen, as it hung in
the room of his mother, " the old Queen," in the Palace in the
Woods, I could account for a measure of this kindly feeling,
for it is the likeness of a beautiful youth, the features and ex¬
pression of which betoken a more than usual mingling of force
and gentleness. The Prince's story, as I gathered it from the
people, was this : When about twenty-seven years old he loved
and wooed a German countess of ancient and honorable pedi¬
gree and large estates, whose amiability and accomplishments
are said to have commended his choice. But, as the sequel
proved, he loved not wisely. He was Prince of Orange and
heir apparent to the throne, and the King, protesting against
any other than a royal connection, forbade the marriage. The
young man hoped his father might relent, and as occasion
offered urged his plea, when one day, so the story runs, the
King, while in a tempest of rage, met him on the palace stairs,
and by a blow sent him reeling to the floor of the landing.
This indignity was too great to be endured. It had been in¬
flicted in the presence of others, and was soon whispered abroad.
Transferring his household and duties to his chancellor, the
Prince left for Paris, whence he returned less than two years
ago, and then only to attend the funeral of his mother, from
which he went direct to France. Thenceforth, whatever re¬
straints he might previously have imposed upon himself, his
career was one of wild dissipation. To the vices attributed to
his father the King, he added gambling, and is said to have
squandered more than a million of florins a year. He died in
IT
his forty-fourth year. Meanwhile the King, who is in his
sixty-third year, married a German princess of twenty. The
wedding was a notable occasion, but one in which the then heir
to the throne did not participate.
After this bit of personal gossip let me return to Belgium.
Pennsylvania is about to erect an additional penitentiary, and
I beg leave to request those to whom the work may be en¬
trusted to learn something from that government which was
the first in Europe to accept our example and adopt the cellular
or separate system, and which, while adhering scrupulously to
our system, has materially improved its means of administra¬
tion. Thanks to the courtesy of our justly popular minister,
Hon. W. C. Goodloe, of Kentucky, I was, while at Brussels,
honored by the Minister of Justice with an invitation to make
a thorough inspection of the prisons of the kingdom. This
my time did not permit, but I found pleasure and instruction
in devoting a morning to the Maison de Force at Ghent. The
construction of this prison was begun in 1772 and completed
in 1825. Since then, however, a wing embracing one hundred
and fifty-eight cells, with amply lighted and ventilated work¬
rooms adapted to the Auburn or silent system, has been
added for the use of prisoners " en perpetuite," or, as we say,
for life. As the pardoning power is not part of the political
machine in Belgium, as it so often is in our country, such
prisoners are never returned to society to endanger it by their
evil tendencies, and, though each has his separate cell at night
and on Sunday, all are permitted to work in silence in each
other's presence. But in all other cases the " separation of
the convicts by day and night, at work, at meals, at church,
in the school or at exercise in the prison court," is absolute.
In the important matters of light and ventilation this prison
is much superior to either of ours, and is a positive reproach
to that part of the County Prison of Philadelphia which is
devoted to convicts.
The political condition of Belgium is interesting. Though
the passing traveller is not likely to observe the fact, the kingdom
is profoundly agitated. Indeed, it is said by those who have
2
18
the means of knowing, that popular feeling is more intensely
excited and more sharply divided than it has been since the
revolution of 1830. The law of 1842, regulating the public
schools, has just been repealed, after a protracted debate, which
was in each chamber as free, though not so violent, as that now
proceeding on the same subject in France. The changes pro¬
vided by the new law are very far-reaching, and the bill passed
by the meagre majorities of six in the Chamber and but two in
the Senate. So deep is the feeling engendered by this measure
that many partisans of either side refuse to trade with those
of the other side or to mingle with them at cafés or elsewhere,
and I was more than once assured that a Catholic clergyman
who should be known to visit any member of the ministry un-
oflScially would lose caste with his brethren and superiors. Nor
is this intensity of feeling surprising. Belgium is as essentially
Catholic as Italy. The King and his family belong to the
church, and under the law of 1842, the schools, though sup¬
ported by the State, were governed by the church. No book
could be introduced into any of them till it had received the
approval of the archbishop. The clergy constituted the super¬
visory committees, and could enter the schools and interrupt
the exercises at any time and proceed to administer religious
instruction. The new law not only qualifies but repeals these
privileges. It secularizes the schools and puts them in charge
of the State, whose agents are to select books and appoint
teachers. Under its provisions a clergyman cannot visit the
schools ofiicially or address the pupils in any of them within
thirty minutes of the opening or closing of a session, and may
then address the children of such parents only as have filed
consent thereto. But what is protested against with most
popular vehemence is that provision of this loi criminelley as it
is called by its opponents, which provides that none other than
a head of a family can serve as a school committee man of any
degree, which is an ingenious exclusion of the clergy, though
it is not absolutely invidious, as they are not the only men in
Belgium who do not marry.
Other grave questions also threaten to demand early solu-
19
tion. The depreciation ©f values produced by the demonetiza¬
tion of silver is felt in Belgium as it is in Germany, India, the
United States and elsewhere.* The new quarters of Antwerp
and Brussels, with their boulevards and parks, have been
created since 1852. From that year till 1873 real estate in
both cities appreciated steadily. An eager occupant or pur¬
chaser was ready for each new edifice before it was completed.
Prices and rents increased, yet the people were prosperous
and paid increased charges out of current profits. But 1873
brought a reaction which continues and intensifies. Building
is almost entirely suspended, great numbers of buildings are
tenantless, rents continue to fall, and, as a consequence, there
* " The quantities of gold and silver procurable will prove no more than
sufiScient to meet the exigencies of an enormously increased population
and an augmenting commerce and industry. Providence seems to have
originally adjusted the relative values of the precious metals, and the fact
th.at these relations have remained the same for ages will survive all
theories."—Sir Roderick Mureheson.
" But, upon the whole, it seems to be most advisable, as has been ob¬
served, not to attach the unit exclusively to either of the metals ; be.cause
this cannot be done effectually without destroying the oflSce and character
of one of them as money and reducing it to the situation of a mere.merchan-
dise, which, accordingly, at different times, has been proposed from dif¬
ferent and respectable quarters ; but it would probably be a greater evil
than occasional variations of the unit, from the fluctuations in the relative
value in the metals, especially if care be taken to regulate the proportion
between them with an eye to their average commercial value."
"To annul the use of either of the metals as money is to abridge the
quantity of circulating medium, and is liable to all the objections which
arise from a comparison of the benefits of a full with the evils of a scanty
circulation."—Alexander Hamilton.
" Suffocation, strangulation, are words hardly too strong to express the
agony of the industrial body when embraced in the fatal coils of a con¬
tracting money supply I At a time when the production of the two his¬
torical money metals, jointly, is diminishing, this most unfortunate occasion
is taken to throw one of them out of use as money of full value, to remit it
to the uses of token-money, and to banish what of the accumulated stock
of three thousand years' production cannot thus be employed, to be hoarded
in the East as treasure, or devoted to personal ornament. Against so great
a wrong to civilization and to the hopes of mankind, the representatives of
the United States here present raise their earnest protest and warning."—
Gen. Francia A. Walker, Report of the International Monetary Conference, p. 78.
20
is an earnest demand for a large reduction of taxes. Nor is
this confined to the cities. The cheap cattle and wheat of
America are ruining the tenant farmers of Belgium, who der
mand a reduction of rent, in response to which demand land¬
lords turn to the government and ask for such a reduction of
taxes as will enable them to comply with this palpably reason¬
able request. For the present these are but financial ques¬
tions, but behind them grave political problems are looming
up, and the cheap land and improved agricultural implements
of the United States are as threatening and troublesome to
European farmers and statesmen as cheap Chinese labor is to
the working classes and politicians of the Pacific coast.
GERMANY.
PRINCE BISMARCK AND THE SILVER QUESTION.
Berlik.
I have been in Berlin more than a week, and though my
overcoat and umbrella have been required each day, my visit
could not have been more opportune. The Reichstag is not
only in session, hut is engaged upon a tariff bill, which pro¬
poses to reverse the trade policy of the empire, as all its provi¬
sions recognize the principle of protection. My devotion to
the protective system, though it has secured me through twenty
successive years the support of a constituency of whose con¬
tinued confidence any statesman in the world might well be
proud, has also won for me, not only at home but here in the
capital of Germany, where it appears to be accepted as a title
of honor conferred by my countrymen in evidence of their
appreciation of services, the sobriquet of Old Pig Iron. Nor
is my advocacy of bi-metallism, involving as it does the restora¬
tion of the dollar of "the Daddies" to its original position in our
monetary system, regarded as a heresy by the German govern¬
ment,, the president of the Reichs-Bank, through which the
government sales of silver have been" made, nor by a pronounced
majority of the members of the Reichstag, though it still con¬
strains most of the gentlemen who control our metropolitan
press to classify me with pretenders to financial knowledge,
inflationists, swindlers, and repudiators.
Few of our countrymen have—indeed, I think I am justified
in saying that not one of them has—an adequate appreciation of
the influence which Henry C. Carey, the late Stephen Colwell,
and their disciples, are exercising in Germany, Austria and Italy.
At the risk of the charge of egotism I propose to sustain this
assertion by references to my personal experience.
(21)
22
My Berlin letters of introduction were to Professors Rou¬
leaux and Dühring, Drs. Stoepel and Grothe, and Baron
Kardorf. The American friends of Professor Rouleaux, who
feared that his repoçt on the Centennial Exhibition, with its
severe strictures upon German mechanical methods and pro¬
ductions as compared with those of the United States, would
injure him with his countrymen and government, will be glad
to learn that he has been sent as Chief Combissioner to the
exhibitions at Sydney and Melbourne. Nor could I pay my
homage to Dühring, whom I have been taught by Mr. Carey
to regard as foremost among the intellectual giants of his
generation. His story, as I have heard it from his former
co-laborers, is sadder than that of Milton in his blindness.
For he lacks Milton's sublime faith, and sightless and sick he
has, as he believes, for opinion sake, but, as his friends admit,
by reason of his irascibility, been deprived of his license to
lecture at the universities and has sought obscurity in Munich.
As Dühring's name is familiar to but few Americans, it may
not be improper for me to introduce it to the readers of The
Times. Remarkable for his physical and intellectual powers,
his learning, and the vast fund of information he had gathered
from all sources, he had, though not called to a professor's
chair, been licensed to lecture to volunteer classes at any of
Ihe universities. While much employed in this way, and de¬
riving most of his income from his lectures, he wrote and pub¬
lished works on many subjects, including an elaborate exposi¬
tion and commendation of Mr. Carey's Social Sciencé. But
the strongest men can overtask their powers, for Nature will
permit no man to labor incessantly with impunity ; Dühring's
nervous system yielded, and he soon became totally blind. His
two sons, the eldest of whom has not yet attained his majority,
were but children, yet thenceforth they must be eyes and right
hand for their stricken father. For more than ten years they
have served him as amanuenses, and have educated themselves
by conducting his immense correspondence and reading aloud
the books of whomsoever their father regarded as a master in
any department of thought or knowledge. His last great work
23
"was a voluminous one on " The History and Philosophy of Me¬
chanical Science," which, it is to be hoped, will soon be rendered
into English. That it is a masterpiece, is proven by the fact
that it was written in competition with all the world for a prize
offered by the government for the best essay on the subject,
and even his competitors approve the judgment that awarded
the pr ize to Diihring. His last book was an elaborate and de¬
fiant defence of social democracy, to the publication of which
it is said he ascribes the withdrawal by the government of his
license to lecture^ from which he derived most of his income.
I hope to see him in Munich, but am told that, embittered
toward all men, he causes himself to be denied, and thus
refuses personal conference even with his old friends. Poor,
blind giant, look to posterity and take courage. The time
is within your memory when Frederick List was driven to
suicide by neglect and destitution, and in your concealment
you must have heard that your countrymen are busying them¬
selves with the question to whom they shall confide the prepa¬
ration of the monument with which they propose to commemo¬
rate his services and their gratitude.*
* The following letters, explanatory of Judge Kelley's foreign letter in
The Times in regard to Dr. Diihring, are published as a matter of justice
to all parties :
To the Editob of The Times :
Coincidently with my return to Philadelphia, Mr. Carey received the
enclosed letter from our common friend, Mr. Ernest Koch, for which I be¬
speak a prominent place in The Times. The regret I felt at my failure to
find Dr. Diihring is greatly enhanced by the consciousness that I was in
the same city with him for about ten days. I shall, however, feel compen¬
sated for my loss, and in some measure for any pain I may have given one
whom I regard as intellectually an heroic giant, if the publication of this
correspondence shall attract the attention of any of my countrymen to his
writings, especially to his " History of Political Economy " and his prize
essay on " The Progress and Philosophy of Mechanical Science."
In justice to myself I think it proper to say that I presented myself, with
Mr. Carey's letter of introduction in hand, at the address through which he
has communicated with Dr. Diihring for years, whence, as I now learn, he
had removed to another quarter of the city, and fearing that I might not
have made myself understood, or thoroughly comprehended the assurance
that he no longer resided there, I returned with a companion, who was alike
24
With my other letters I was more fortunate, and was cordi¬
ally greeted by Doctors Stoepel and Grothe, both of whom are
editors and advocates of protection and bi-metalism. Each of
fluent in German and English, and again left with the assurance that he
did not reside there, and that the person interrogated could give me no clue
to his whereabouts. It is also due to Dr. Diihring and those with whom I
conferred, to say that any information I received about him in Berlin came
from gentlemen to whom I expressed the regret I felt at my inability to
meet him, each one of whom confirmed or increased the estimate I had
formed of his heroic labors and their grand results.
Yours very truly.
West Philadelphia, September 29, 1879. William D. Kelley.
To the Editor op The Times :
In your issue of the 4th of August Hon. William D. Kelley, whilst re¬
porting the impressions he had received during his recent stay at Berlin,
has inadvertently reproduced some statements concerning Dr. Diihring
which the latter desires to have corrected. Considering the profound
esteem which both Henry C. Carey and Mr. Kelley entertain for Mr. Duh-
ring, it will no doubt be a matter of the highest regret to Mr. Kelley that
he has been prevented, through some mishap, from seeing Dr. Diihring, to
meet whom had been one of the objects of his visit to Berlin. Dr. Diihring
writes as follows :
" Dear Sir :—Mr. Kelley communicates that he had a letter of introduc¬
tion to me, but had learned from people who professed to be my friends
that I had retired to Munich into the obscurity of private life. I reside
now, as ever, at Berlin, nor was I absent on any journey. Mr. Kelley has
evidently been mystified, in order that he might not have an opportunity
of seeing me and hearing from me what I have to say about those who pre¬
tend to be my friends and about German politico-economical affairs. As
to my obscurity, it finds ample illustration in the various writings, new, or
in new editions, which are every year published by me, and through the
much frequented public lectures which even during the present year I have
delivered at Berlin.
" Mr. Kelley has been quite as seriously misinformed and misused by
those pretending friends of mine with regard to the cause of my expulsion
from the university as he has with regard to my residence and my activity.
He states that I believed myself to have been removed on account of my
opinions, while my friends admitted that it had happened on account of
my irascibility. In this there are three discrepancies : In the first instance
I have never believed that the government caused my removal because of
my line of thought. The real cause was to be found in the too great influ¬
ence which I exercised at the university, and in the jealousy of my com¬
peting savants. The pretext was taken from a scientific critical passage
in my Prize Essay, which Mr. Kelley mentions, on ' Mechanics,' and from
25
•them hastened to congratulate me on the already assured tri¬
umph of the protective principle in Germany and on the hope¬
ful signs of the speedy triumph of the friends of the remoneti-
zation of silver. In this connection each of them mentioned
the fact that Herr Von Dechend, president of the Reichs-Bank,
by whom the sales of silver had been conducted, had recently
reported that the sales already made had caused a loss to the gov¬
ernment of nearly 100,000,000 marks ($25,000,000), and that
he shrunk from contemplating the loss a continuance of such
sales would involve. It was, each also added. Von Dechend's
statement that had induced Bismarck to prohibit further sales.
Though each of them edits two weekly journals devoted to
specific branches of industry, Drs. Grothe and Stoepel have
published many controversial pamphlets, to which the latter
has added translations of the abridged edition of Mr. Carey's
a general non-personal critique on the 'Abuses of University Tactics.'
Secondly, I have never associated ■with Berlin professors, consequently no
opportunity could have been afforded of coming in contact with them
pleasantly or disagreeably, and of showing any irascibility. In my univer¬
sity lectures I never mentioned these gentlemen, being endowed with a
keener sense of propriety than customarily prevails at the university.
Thirdly, it is only on the part of my most empoisoned enemies that I am
charged, and that chiefly in the remotest parts of the world, with univer-
sitarian irascibility. Had Mr. Kelley not been kept away from me against
bis will, he would have learned who are my friends and who my enemies.
He could then have satisfied himself that his statement that my nervous
system is deranged is quite as benevolent an invention as the tale of my
obscure corner existence at Munich.
" I have never, followed the fashion of being nervously affected or of
breaking down. I am hale and hearty and more vigorous than ever, and
more active than is desirable to those pretending friends, my enemies.
Through the medium of Mr. Kelley they have, although against his will,
made me appear as good as dead. I am sorry I cannot serve them in this
way as yet. I am still living at Berlin, much to the disappointment of
those who never, even through their offers of professorship abroad, could
prevail on me to abandon the breach in the centre in order to be buried in
insignificant situations of no influence whatever. I remain, dear si», yours
truly, Düheing.
"Grossbeeren Str., 51, Berlin, Prussia, Sept. 1, 1879."
Trusting that you will readily give space to this letter in your columns,
I am yours truly, Ernest Koch.
26
"Social Science," his "Unity of Law," and of E. Peshine
Smith's "Political Economy," and Dr. Grothe proposes to
translate Professor Robert E. Thompson's recent capital hand¬
book of " Political Economy." I cannot express the gratitude
I owe these earnest and learned men for their many courtesies.
Baron Kardorf, a Silesian, represents his native district
in the Reichstag, and for eight years, during which the cause
seemed hopeless, has made himself heard in that body and
before the people as a protectionist. He is tall and slender,
nervously active and graceful in action. His long, light hair
is brushed back from his forehead. His voice, though incisive,
is pleasant, and his speech, whether in German or English, is
fluent. He leads the Conservative, as Herr Windhorst does
the Ultramontane, section of the Protectionist party in the
Chamber, and both are members of the Tariff Committee. Like
our Committee of Ways and Means, when a tariff or tax bill is
under consideration the committee on the tariff meets daily,
and I therefore contented myself with leaving my card and
letter at Kardorf's hotel at an hour when he must be absent.
On Sunday, his only day of leisure, he returned my call, and
passed two hours in talking instructively about German affairs
and inquiring about men and things in the United States, with
which he showed surprising familiarity. He seemed to find
pleasure in recalling parts of some of my tariff speeches, saying
he had quoted them in debate, and when informed that Bis¬
marck had intimated to our minister, Hon. Andrew D. White,
that it would be agreeable to him to meet me that day, he said,
with much animation : " He will talk with you on the silver
question, for only last week, in debate in his hearing, I quoted
from your speech on the. costliness of financial mismanagement
your remark, ' that if the nations persisted in the attempt to
demonetize silver, the administrations of Beaconsfield, Bis¬
marck and Hayes would be scored in history as among the
most disastrous their countries had ever known.' " Two of his
remarks were of such general import that I must report them.
One was as follows: "As the German people come to under¬
stand it, they prefer the social science of Philadelphia to the
2T
political economy of Manchester, by -which so many schoolmen
have been misled," and the other that "the extremely exag¬
gerated statement made by Dr. Linderman while Director of
the American Mint, of the amount of silver he had seen when
inspecting the mines of Nevada, had done much to mislead
German opinion on the money question." But the hour of my
other engagement approached, and, for the present, we parted.
As the clock struck two Mr. White's carriage entered
the courtyard of «Prince Bismarck's oflScial residence, which,
fronting on Wilhelm Strasse, surrounds three sides of a quad¬
rangle. As we entered his room, Bismarck advanced and put me
at ease by the cordiality of his greeting. His personal appear¬
ance was a surprise to me. Portraits, busts, and statutes had
made me familiar with his face and head, but had not told me
that his height is more than six feet three and that his frame
is broader than was that of General Scott, to whom in all
physical respects, except in the contour of his face and head,
he bears a closer resemblance than any man I have ever seen.
Having turned his back upon the broad table, on which, from
the papers spread upon it, it was evident he had been at work,
he remarked that he was not so vigorous as formerly and could
work but five hours a day at his desk, though he ought to work
sixteen, and proceeded, with the easiest familiarity, to tell us
how his habit of working far into the morning, and the pre¬
occupation of his thoughts by practical questions, had made it
impossible for him to sleep in the quiet hours of the night.
" The silence that follows midnight is terrible," said he. " It
wakens all the evil spirits of my mind ; they lead me into phan¬
tasies, and to escape them I get up and walk or read or write.
On many such occasions I have anticipated debates and sup¬
posed what would be said in opposition and what I should say
in reply, and fearing that I might not remember my thoughts
and words, which seemed so effective, have risen and carefully
written them out. But I have never once found them of use.
They were always too fine to be available among practical men,
and the paper and pen which are always beside my bed have,
on these occasions, been useless and wasted. When the noises
of the day begin, I fall asleep and sleep till eleven o'clock.
28
sometimes till twelve and even one o'clock. At my home in
the country I should not, I think, sleep any, but that the great
burden trains, with three engines and more than one hundred
wagons, pass each other on a railroad about three hundred
feet from my house, and during this time, soothed by the
noise, I go to sleep."
To these remarks Mr. White made appropriate rejoinders,
and in a few minutes Bismarck, addressing me directly, said :
" You are doubtless interested in our action on the tariff. We
can," he proceeded to say, "produce what we need as well as
our neighbors, but cannot do it so cheaply as they, especially
as Hungary and Russia can raise cattle and grain almost with¬
out cost, and to relieve our farmers of part of the land tax,
which is oppressive, it is proper that we should make those who
compete with them for our market pay something for the privi¬
lege." He then gave a most interesting account of how vast
tracts in those countries are cultivated by people who neither
own nor rent the land, and who, therefore, need not, as he .said,
pay taxes or earn interest on capital. On parts of these free
lands their herds of cattle range, and at the proper season
hundreds of horses and plows are brought there, and land out¬
side the cattle ranges is prepared for seed. This service is paid
with cattle, and when the grain is ripe the same horses come to
cut and thresh it, their owners receiving a percentage of the
crop. " To raise and gather 200 kilos of wheat in that way,"
continued he, " does not cost as much as the German farmer is
taxed on the quantity of land that would yield the same amount
of grain ; and the experience of a few years has taught us that
the people of the empire need such duties as protected them
from unequal competition, under the Zollverein."
Nothing in the interview surprised me so much as the free¬
dom with which Bismarck spoke of men still in positions of in¬
fluence. His contempt is intense for the arrogant pretenders
who regard the doctrines of the British school of free trade as
absolute and indisputable propositions. He characterized them
as doctrinaires and closet men, and said ; " Doctors, clergy¬
men and lawyers, but few of whom know anything of the de¬
tails of public affairs, are generally on that side, and they are
29
led by those who know nothing on the question but what they
have learned from the books of men who have plausibly for¬
mulated impracticable nonsense.* I have," said he, " had much
annoyance from blockheads who ask impossible answers to ir¬
relevant questions, and, as the French proverb says, ' Go about
seeking for noon at two o'clock.' " Fearing that we might be
trespassing we proposed to leave, when saying, " But you will
look at the garden," he arose, took his cane and cap, and,
snapping his fingers to the large black dog that had lain quietly
at his side, moved toward the door ; but, as if upon sudden im¬
pulse, he turned and said, " But I must introduce you to these
friends of mine," pointing to the two sides of the room, on which
hung a few portraits. Most of them were engraved, and but
one of them indicated that the subject was other than a private
citizen, although they included his wife and daughter, the Earl
of Beaconsfield, " My dear friend Moltke," and several other
notabilities.
In view of the grave international significance of the conver¬
sation which followed, I must omit what he said about them,
with his account of the garden, with its arcade of trees, illus¬
trating the growth of Berlin, and his response to my remark
upon his striking personal resemblance to General Scott. In
the garden Bismarck, recurring to the subject of customs duties,
said that each government should regard the welfare of its own
people. You have done this by your tariff, and your national
progress is unparalleled. You can compete in manufactures with
England in many markets, and by means of your ingenious
machinery and cheap transportation can send food even into
Germany." Here I found my opportunity, and said : " That
is true. But many of us believe that hy your demonetization
of silver you have arrested our progress, and, by restricting
our trade, have driven bankrupt traders and unemployed
* For eminent English authority in support of Bismarck's contempt for
the prevailing school of political economists, see the lecture delivered in
the Section of Economic Science and Statistics of the British Association
for the Advancement of Science, by the Professor of the Section, John K.
Ingram, which was republished in the Penn Monthly of November. Also
the recent volume, by Cliffe Leslie, entitled Esâays in Political and Moral
Philosophy.
80
artisans into agricultural pursuits, and by thus rediicing prices
have increased the competition with which you have to con¬
tend." The frankness of the response to this challenge seemed
as much of a surprise to our minister, who is evidently on the
easiest possible terms with Bismarck, as it was to me. "Yes,"
said he, " in that matter we have gone too fast and too far.
We have not been wise. As each State had its own monetary
system, the Empire found many coinages within its limits, and
must unify them. It also found itself in a condition to use
gold, and it seemed wise to do so. One man cannot under¬
stand every specialty, and men must select those which they
would master. I had not made finance a study, and had to
choose an agent to conduct these changes. Herr Delbrück
had great reputation as a financier abroad and at home, and to
him the matter was confided. But great as was his reputation,
results have shown that, as the country people say, he carried
only water in his kettle (which proverb signifies that workmen
whose poverty is such that they cannot obtain meat or broth
carry a kettle of water in order to conceal their poverty). I
therefore had to call other counsellors and make a special study
of the subject. It is clear that we did not need to abolish silver
money—we should have supplemented it by a gold coinage.
The sale of silver has reduced the price of that metal, has cost
the Empire an immense sum, and cannot be continued without
ruinous loss, as Von Dechend, President of the Reichs-Bank,
has shown, and I have therefore prohibited further sales."*
* " "We have witbdra-wn from circulation 629 millions of marks in coined
silver and sold 439 millions. About one-third of this amount was sold in
the first four years, and the remainder in 18Ï7 and 1878. The loss on these
sales amounts to 14^ per cent., or 89,487,073 marks. If the loss by abra¬
sion of the coins, amounting to 24,479,000 marks, be deducted, there still
remains a loss on sales of 64,911,980 marks. The average price of the
silver sold was 54«. 8d. Within the last seven months, from October 14
of last year to the 19th of May last, silver has again been sold, but the
average price realized was but 50d., and at one time the price was as low
as 48^^. We therefore lost 21 per cent, on our silver sales, and could not
help it. On the silver sold this year wo have suffered a further loss of
7,000,000, and the aggregate loss on our silver sales amounts to 96,000,000
marks, and if the loss by abrasion is deducted, still 72,000,000."—Report of
Herr Von Dechend to the Reichstag, June 17, 1879.
31
At this point I suggested that our government was ahout to
invite Germany, France, England and other nations to meet in
joint convention for the purpose of determining the relative
value of gold and silver and providing for the general recog¬
nition of silver as a money metal. With an expression of min¬
gled surprise and gratification he quickly asked : " Is the
measure definitely determined ?" I replied aflirmatively, say¬
ing that I had my information from President Hayes and our
Minister of Foreign Affairs,^ Mr. Evarts, and that Congress
had appropriatfed 120,000 marks with which to defray the ex¬
penses of our commissioners. Turning to Minister White with
an earnestness of manner which caused me to think he would
he pleased if the remark should be transmitted to Washington,
he said : " That proposition will not need protracted considera¬
tion. Its acceptance will he immediate." The publication of
these facts may impair the mysterious value of future formal
diplomacy, hut is justified by the freedom of the interview,
which imposed no restraint upon my pen.
Moving toward the door by which we had entered the garden,
my steps were arrested by the question from Bismarck, " What
will you probably do if the governments you address do not
respond favorably ?" Premising that I could give but my per¬
sonal views on that question, I said that I was confident that
our people would in less than two years imperatively demand
the full and unqualified remonetization of silver, which measure
I ardently supported. "But," said he, "can you do that?
Will not all debtors then pay in the least valuable metal?"
"I will," said I, "let American and German history answer
your questions," and proceeded to explain that, from the in¬
auguration of our government by Washington until 1873, gold
and silver had, as provided by the Constitution, both been legal
tender ; that the first Congress, upon Hamilton's recommenda¬
tion, had fixed the relation at 15 to 1, and for a time both gold
and silver coins had circulated freely; that, after France es¬
tablished for Europe the relation of 15J to 1, which she did in
1803, our gold coins were all exported, and our trade had been
conducted and our debts paid exclusively with silver down to
1834 ; that in that year Congress so far reduced the weight of
32
the gold dollar as to fix the relation at 16 to 1, which made it
profitable to export silver when not only our dollars, but all
other silver coins, were exported, even to the dime, worth but
40 pfennigs ; that this had compelled us to revise our sub¬
sidiary coinage and reduce the weight of every coin for the
fractional part of a dollar, and that none of these changes had
brought upon the nation the charge of dishonesty or invoked
the suggestion that American debtors were defrauding their cred¬
itors by paying them with constitutional dollars of either metal.
After a brief pause I added : " But the recent monetary
history of Germany fully illustrates the point in question. Be¬
fore the establishment of the Empire, German law authorized
the coinage of 20-gulden pieces of gold and made them legal
tender, in common with silver, but no German paid his debts
in gold. In the then state of trade you found it impossible to
keep gold pieces in circulation and ceased to coin them, though
you did not repeal the law which made them legal tender."
" All that," responded Bismarck, " is true and pertinent ; but
what efiect upon your trade will it have if you alone make the
experiment?" Speaking for myself, I said: "I hope that
England and other manufacturing and commercial nations will
reject our proposal. It is a mistake to suppose that we alone
should in that event use silver as the standard of payment.
We should have most of the people of the world with us.
China, Japan, British India, Mexico and Central and South
America all use silver, and in a few years we should monopolize
their trade.* They could not sell their raw materials to or pur¬
chase their manufactured goods from people who used a
much more costly standard of payment. We should have
nine-tenths of the people of the world as our customers, as the
gold-using nations include but about one-tenth, and I prefer
that my country should be at the head of the many non-man¬
ufacturing countries rather than at the tail of the small group
* " The fact that the British Empire is the largest holder of silver is ex¬
ceeded by a much more important consideration. England has also the
greatest interests in silver, because more than three-fourths of the whole of her
outward commerce is conducted on the silver basis, one-fourth only resting on
gold."—Ernest Seyd, Decline of Prosperity, chap. tí.
33
of gold-using nations, with whose cheaper labor we should have
to compete even in our own market. That trade between coun¬
tries who respectively use gold or silver as the standard of pay¬
ment will he impossible is proven by the fact that even now,
when the work of demonetization has but commenced, neither
England nor Holland can safely trade with their own Indian
dependencies. This the failure of great trading companies in
each country during the past year has shown."*
"Your country," said Bismarck, "has great geographical
advantages. Tour occupation of the Pacific coast makes the
hordes of Asia your neighbors and opens their trade to your
enterprise, and the South American States are open to you on
both oceans. But in this matter you must not act alone.
Others must co-operate with you. I have told you that no
more of our silver will be sold, and you may also know that
the people want the coins for business, and that they will go
into circulation again. It is already ordered."
A few minutes were then passed in general conversation,
when, after pleasant parting salutations, the organizer and
ruler of the German Empire returned to his desk.
* " These conclusions by no means exhaust the category of untoward re¬
sults. The picture could be greatly heightened in coloring, but they are
enough for our purpose, accounting as they do for the greatly diminished
demand there now is for our textile fabrics, railway materials, machinery,
and other things, from vast and populous regions of the globe, whose
money is now useless to us, and unsuitable for the discharge of our trade
accounts. Merchants are at their wits' end. They are shut up to refuse
credits in silver-using countries. They are baffled in all their exchange
calculations. They are driven to restrict their operations. The malign
and adverse influence acts and reacts. The distress intensifies. Man¬
chester warehouses are filled to repletion with unsalable stocks. Iron rails
go down to a point lower than ever known. Many good opportunities for
developing the resources of other countries, and of investing English
capital, pass unheeded and unavailed of. Men inquire what will the silver
dollar or the rupee be worth six months or six years hence in the London
market; and the deduction from late monetary legislation prompts the reply
that there is no bottom to the fall. India may be ruined—our investments
may be worthless; and the inevitable conclusion is that we must minimize
our risks, restrict our operations, draw in our capital from silver-using eoun-
tries, and let things take their chance."—Contemporary Review, April, 1879.
3
THROUGH AUSTRIA TO GERMANY AGAIN.
ouk naturalization treaties.
Munich.
After a delightful excursion through part of Austria I am
again in Germany, Munich is the capital of South, as Berlin
is of North Germany, and its monuments are Bavarian, as
those of Berlin are Prussian. Notable among them is the
bronze statute of Bavaria, the harmonious proportions of which
are so colossal that six men may stand together in its head
and enjoy a view of the city and suburbs, while to encircle its
middle finger requires a cord longer than did the waist of a
lady who stood by as I scanned a plaster cast of it in the bronze
foundry.
Coming abroad, as I did, in pursuit of health, I have not
underestimated the value of sleep to a convalescent, or the
danger of violent or protracted physical effort, and, avoiding
night travel, have rested long enough at Dresden, Prague,
Vienna, Linz and Salzburg, to take a leisurely, though neces¬
sarily superficial, view of each of these cities. I have thus
seen all the country through which I have travelled, and been
able to observe the extent of the holdings of lands and the
methods, age and sex of agricultural laborers.
I forget the date at which Livingston came as our Minister
to France. It was, however, before the adoption of the Con¬
stitution, or as the representative of Washington's administra¬
tion. But the precise date is not important, as I refer to him
as an illustration of a general truth which social reformers
should ever bear in mind. Before arriving in Paris he had
been painfully impressed by the fact that most of the agricul¬
tural laborers were bowed and exhibited other signs of prema¬
ture old age. He observed, also, that their chief implements
35
were hoes, with handles hut three feet long, and sickles which
required them to stoop even lower while reaping than they had
done while cultivating their crop.
He was a philanthropist, and in the hope of remedying a
national evil, he not only brought to the attention of many
Frenchmen of influence the fact that American farmers used
implements which enabled them to stand erect, hut went so
far as to import a large number of long-handled hoes for
gratuitous distribution. Their use would, he hoped, demon¬
strate their vital superiority and cause their general adoption.
In this he was mistaken. They were soon discarded, and
Livingston's papers thenceforth abounded in dissertations on
the difficulty of inducing a people to change their practical
methods. Here, too, he was in error. In the choice of tools,
the people whose condition he sought to improve were not free
agents, but were—as the masses of mankind always are—sub¬
ject to social and physical conditions. Had Livingston first
asked why the use of longer hoe handles had not occurred to
the French paysans, his labors in their behalf would probably
have taken a more practical turn. He has, however, many
successors among American travellers, who vex one's ears with
the question. Why do these people not use our labor-saving
agricultural machinery ? though they see unmistakable proofs
—such as the diversity in kind and age of the crop—that the
holdings of lands in the rural parts of Belgium, France and
Switzerland are not, on the average, so large as building lots
in the Twenty-second, Twenty-fourth and Twenty-seventh
Wards of Philadelphia. Those who own or rent these patches
of land live in villages and labor in workshop or in factory.
Old men and women—generally more of the latter—attend to
the crops, which, even when of grain, are carefully weeded.
The ground may be prepared by the spade, the old-fashioned,
short-handled hoe is still frequently used in breaking it up, but
much of the work is done with trowels. It is evident that
Burns had not the cultivators of these petty farms in mind,
when he described the farmer walking in glory behind the
plow.
86
The. prevailing appearance of premature old age which
aroused Livingston's sympathies is attributable to this inevi¬
table method of manual farming, and to the habit which the
women have of carrying strapped on their backs huge baskets,
often heavily loaded.
But it is not alone the small holdings of land which impose
this character of work upon women, for in Germany and
Austria, where the holdings are generally larger and much of
the farming is carried on upon a considerable scale, women
seem to do most of the work, and often the heaviest part of it.
They pitch the hay upon the wagon, while the man—if there
be one of the party—receives and stores it. I have seen many
of them plowing, and others with scythe or sickle, holding
their line with men in the harvest field. To sweep the streets
of great cities, to trundle overburdened wheelbarrows or hand¬
carts through streets crowded with swift-going droschkies, to
split, saw and pile firewood, to serve as unskilled laborers in
glass and iron works, foundries and machine-shops, to carry
stone, bricks, sand and mortar to masons and bricklayers work¬
ing on the upper stories of the highest buildings, will not seem
to the average American woman strictly feminine occupations.
Yet, so long as the flower of masculine youth and the vigor of
European manhood are to be dedicated, as they now are, to
barrack and camp, such must continue to be the occupations of
the mothers of many future American citizens.
In Germany the plow has generally supplemented the spade
and the scythe the sickle, but not until I had reached Central
Austria did I see a cradle ; and even there its use appeared
exceptional. Here all our agricultural machinery might he
brought into use. The land is level as the prairies of Illinois,
and the extent of the wheat fields reminded me of the great
ones of Minnesota. Yet here I saw but one piece of machinery.
That was turning hay which had been subjected to a protracted
rain.
Berlin, Dresden, Vienna and Munich are beautiful cities.
My stay in no one of them was long enough, however, to
justify me in attempting to describe it, or, indeed, to indicate
37
the leading points of attraction, since each of them is rich in
historic monuments and matters of interêst to lovers of archi¬
tecture, painting, sculpture and music. There are two facts
concerning each of them, however^ that I must record, since
they seem to me to illustrate a law whose force and inflexibility
finaaciers and statesmen should comprehend. They are among
the oldest of modern cities. The period of most rapid and
costly growth of each has been since 1850, and the progress of
each was checked by a rapid decline in the value of real estate
between 1878 and 1875, and is still restricted.*
* " How much more serious would be the dilemma were silver demonetized
in our Indian Empire. Were it to become necessary to send gold instead
of silver to India, the scarcity of gold and the further destruction of the
value of silver would not merely break down our own monetary system,
but would seriously disturb monetary affairs generally, besides checking
the great and most valuable trade between India and the countries of the
West. If such would be the effects of demonetizing silver in India, how
much vaster would be the calamity produced by likewise and simultane¬
ously pursuing the present process of demonetizing silver in Europe and
America? Fortunately, we can hardly believe that governments wilbper¬
severe in, or that nations will tolerate, so suicidal a policy. Mankind will
not allow themselves to be strangled in deference to any theories or doc¬
trines, however well established they may be held to be. A single gold
standard, no doubt, suits our own country—especially when gold is so
abundant as it still is ; but to preach up this form of ' mono-metallism' for
universal adoption in civilized countries, and to pour contempt upon the
' double standard,' is one of the most perilous freaks of ' science falsely so
called.'' It would cut our own throat, to begin with, by making gold too
scarce for the maintenance of our own monetary system. For the world at
large, our own country included, such a change would produce the widest
and most oppressive calamity that human intelligence or folly ever created.
It is now acknowledged on all hands that our recent commercial prosperity,
and the general well being of mankind, have been greatly owing to the
large supply of the precious metals from California and Australian mines.
To proceed in the work of demonetizing silver would not only undo these
benefits, but would create disasters far exceeding in magnitude the past
blessings. It would destroy about one-half of the entire stock of the
world's money. It would not merely paralyze commerce and rob industry
of its due reward, but it would intensify the worst evils of old established
society. It would make the rich vastly richer, and the poor still poorer.
We often hear from certain quarters, of ' bloated capitalists' accumulating
fortunes at the expense of the laboring classes ; but even if capitalists were
the sole and unchecked legislators of the world, they could not devise any
38
Prague is not accounted a great city, and many American
tourists pass by it as*they would by a wayside station ; yet no
continental city has impressed me more. Its situation is most
picturesque, and, having been from the dawn of the fourteenth
century the theatre of memorable events, it abounds in historic
monuments. It has the tower from which Tycho Brahe and
bis imperial patron, Rudolph II., watched the course of the
stars in the closing year of the sixteenth century. Here, too,
Huss and Jerome were born, and by their devotion to liberty
of conscience and their pious labors earned the martyrdom
which overtook both in 1415, when their ashes were thrown
into the Rhine. The new city—lining the banks of the Moldau
with its gardens and recent buildings—though beautiful, is
commonplace. What interested me was the old buildings,
which one sees as he ascends the well-paved slopes which lead
to the Hradschin. Here stands the Cathedral, begun in 1844,
finished in 1385, and now being restored, having been damaged
not only by the fire of 1541, which reduced the height of its
tower from five hundred and twenty to three hundred and
twenty-three feet, but by the artillery brought to bear upon it
during the Seven and the Thirty Years' wars. The imperial
palace, close at hand, is said to contain more than seven hun¬
dred rooms, of which the recently refurnished Spanish and
German saloons are the most elegant. But the most curious
is, in my judgment, the vaulted chamber, in which were held
the tournaments, the great hall of Ladislau—approached from
within by successive fiights of stairs, and from without by as¬
cending avenues paved with brick. Not having recognized the
fact that tournaments were in-door sports and might have been
conducted in an attic, I concluded that this was an exceptional
instance, but on visiting the Bavarian Mint, at Munich, I
found in it a tourney hall, no larger than the one at Prague.
law so purely and exorbitantly for their own interests as one for the de¬
monetization of silver—for the destruction of one-half of the world's cur¬
rency, and the consequent doubling or quadrupling of the value of their
own capital. Such a course would promote the ' social revolution' far be¬
yond all the preaching of French Communists or Russian Nihilists."
Blackwood^ s Magazine for August, pages 233 and 234.
89
The building had önce been a palace, and this hall, surrounded
by low but heavy and imposing columns, and arched stalls
for guests, had been one of its central points of attraction.
But, to return from a digression, a few steps bring one from
Ladislau's Hall to the old council chamber, from a small
balcony of which one obtains a fine view of the city, the
Moldau and the venerable bridges which span it, in themselves
quaint and instructive historical monuments as well as noble
highways. Rarely have such momentous associations clustered
about so contracted a space as this little balcony, to which,
tempted by the charming view it offers, so many pleasure-seek¬
ing tourists climb. It was from this balcony that Count Thurn
caused the imperial counsellors, Martinitz and Slawata, to be
hurled. Their full-length portraits hang upon the wall of the
gloomy chamber but a few feet from the place of their execu¬
tion, and an obelisk bearing their names marks the spot upon
which they fell. This outrage was the proximate cause, if not
really the first act, of the Thirty Years' War, which, after the
then average life of a generation, was terminated in 1620 on
the White Hill. Though it had ravaged Europe, this long war
was terminated by a desperate struggle on a field less than a
mile from and in sight of the little balcony from which Martinitz
and Slawata were thrown.
The religious monuments of Prague are specially interesting.
The Cathedral to which I have alluded is in itself a collection
of such monuments, some of which are very instructive as to the
spirit of several periods during the last five centuries and a
half. Almost under its shadow, but nearer the river, is the
old church of the Hussites, which was erected by German
merchants before the expiration of the century in which Huss
and Jerome had been burned. And at but a small distance
from this church, upon the river bank, is the Jews' Quarter,
or Josephstadt, with its synagogues. The oldest of these,
erected in the thirteenth century, is an architectural curiosity.
Though quite small, it bears traces of both Byzantine and
Gothic schools, and is perhaps the only synagogue in the con¬
struction of which the Gothic cross was ever adopted. The
40
worshippers in this venerable temple seem to have lived har¬
moniously with their Christian compatriots. The flag presented
to them by Ferdinand III., in 1648, in recognition of the
bravery displayed by the Jews during the siege of the city,
still hangs in the midst of the synagogue. For an admirable
description of the overcrowded Jewish cemetery I refer the
readers of The Times to Bayard Taylor's "Views Afoot,"
contenting myself with the remark that, although it is a century
since an interment was permitted within its limits, it has not
yet been sold for building lots, as so many American ceme¬
teries have been.
But, to turn to a more practical matter, the naturalization
treaties between Germany and the United States are attract¬
ing much attention in diplomatic and consular circles. The
subject was several times brought to my notice while at
Berlin, as it has been in this city, and always with ex¬
pressions of surprise that Americans should demand their
revision, or consent to it if it can be avoided. These trea¬
ties are regarded as the crowning work of Mr. Bancroft's
diplomatic career, and are referred to as such by the resident
ministers who were at Berlin when they were negotiated.
Alluding to this subject, one who had been there during
Bayard Taylor's brief service declared his belief that Mr.
Taylor's illness was aggravated by anxiety concerning several
cases that were pending under the treaties, and by the severe
animadversion of American papers on the very judicious advice
he had given to some of our naturalized citizens who were
about to bring themselves under the debatable provisions of
the treaties.
Another gentleman, referring to the subject, said : " There
is probably no diplomatic position in Europe so laborious or so
harassing as that at Berlin, and on this account,—there is a
perpetual struggle to secure the rights or to investigate the
supposed rights of naturalized American citizens who have re¬
turned to their native country. Much criticism was passed in
certain quarters against Mr. Bayard Taylor for advice given
by him to returning naturalized American citizens. Never
41
was criticism more unjust. The fact is, that among the causes
of Mr. Taylor's premature death were his anxiety and labor on
these very cases. Early and late he toiled over them, and the
result was that the great majority of the persons concerned
were released from German service."
I am free to confess that I had not appreciated the import¬
ance of these treaties and of the service Mr. Bancroft had
rendered his countrymen of German birth in negotiating them,
and I feel that I cannot better appropriate a portion of my
space in The Times than by stating some of their cardinal
stipulations and the questions that have arisen under them.
The treaties were negotiated in 1868 with the German States
as they then existed. Bavaria appended to herS a protocol by
which she voluntarily agreed to adopt that construction most
favorable to the rights of American citizens should doubtful
questions arise.
. With the Prussian treaty the cage is different, since its
provisions are subject to the strict laws of diplomatic construc¬
tion. The general terms of the treaties are these : That any
native citizen of Germany who leaves the country before being
able to serve in the army, who, after a five years' residence in
the United States,, becomes a naturalized citizen, and who then
returns to Germany, shall be regarded as an American citizen.
As such he shall be free for the space of two years from all
claims of the government to military service. If, however,
such person remain longer than that time, the government may
presume that he has resumed his German citizenship, and may
call upon him to perform his military duty. It will be readily
seen that that word "may" may well give rise to delicate ques¬
tions if many naturalized citizens return and stay over the
stipulated time. Events have shown that it is impossible for
the German government to overlook violations of this stipula¬
tion, or to grant the appeal of our minister in every case of
which he is obliged to take cognizance.
It is conceded that in a vast majority of cases returned
naturalized citizens have no trouble, and the fact is pointed
out that while more than ten thousand such citizens are now
42
residing in Germany, the number seized each year for un¬
fulfilled military service averages less than thirty, and that
very few of those arrested are permanently held.
It is also sáid, and, according to the statements of represent¬
atives of other governments residing here, with unqualified
truth, that where there is good faith in the action of the re¬
turned American, every possible concession is made, and no
disposition is shown to apply the law strictly. On behalf of
the German government it is urged that many young men
leave the country just in time to escape the call to serve in the
army. They learn the English.language, acquire American
ideas of trade, become naturalized and embark for Germany
often within the month in which , they acquire American citi¬
zenship. Such cases the government is compelled to scrutinize
closely. The neighbors of such young men—often their former
associates—justly complain that while they themselves are dis¬
charging their duties to.the empire, these men, who grew up
with them and until a few years ago lived beside them are now
free, under the pretence of an American citizenship which they
do not exercise or intend to exercise. It is this class of cases
which has given rise to most of the diflSculties under the treaty.
The German government contends that these men have not
become naturalized American citizens in spirit and intent, but
have assumed a pretended citizenship, by which they hope to
evade their duties both to Germany and the United States.
It freely admits that mistakes have been made by its subordi¬
nate officials, who* have, in some cases, claimed military service
from naturalized citizens before the expiration of the two
years allowed by the treaties, but it asserts that in every
such case instant concessions have been made on proof of the
facts. To those who insist that the United States ought to
maintain at all costs the right of expatriation, it replies that
we have this right in all honâ fide cases.; that the apparent
exceptions are where fraud upon both governments is attempted
as above described.
I have alluded to this subject because the ten years have ex¬
pired in which, by their terms, the treaties should not be sub-
43
ject to revision, and either party can now. terminate hy
giving one year's notice. The attitude of the German govern¬
ment on the question is. this : while it does not propose to
demand the termination of the treaties, it has no objections to
offer should the United States make the demand. It is, how¬
ever, not believed in diplomatic circles, that as favorable terms
would he granted by any future treaty as those we now enjoy.
The general belief appears to be thatj should our government
act in the premises, we would simply resume the position we
occupied prior to 1868, when young naturalized Americans re¬
turning to Germany were promptly arrested and harassed in
many ways, if not absolutely held for military service. They
then had no treaty rights, and their chance of escape depended
upon the good will of the Minister of Foreign Affairs. It ap¬
pears to me that to state this case is to argue it. Those who
demand for personal or party ends a termination of these
treaties, and propose that our- government should propound
and enforce the doctrine of the unlimited right of expatriation,
and that other, doctrine, incompatible therewith, that he who
is once a citizen is always a citizen, would do well to ask
themselves whether we are masters of the situation. To en¬
force these doctrines would require an army of not less than
one million of men, whose battle-fields would be on German
soil, and would involve an expenditure of mopey and life such
as practical people would not incur for the sake of enabling a
few unpatriotic men to escape duties, due to the government
whose protection they demand.
HENRI CERNÜSCHI.
Paris.
The mo^t beautiful of the parks of Paris is Pare Monceau,
upon the Boulevard des Courcelles and the Avenue de la Reine
Hortense, in the northwestern part of the city. It may be
entered also from Avenue Velasquez. This is probably the
shortest avenue in Paris, since but seven residences and no
other buildings front upon it. They are all elegant, and of
recent construction. It is of number seven—between which
and the park no buildings can ever be constructed—that I am
about to write. Its frontage is something over sixty feet. Its
style cannot be said to be plain, though it is free from any at¬
tempt at rococo. Coachmen stop their carriages in front of it
to bring to the notice of strangers the likenesses of Aristotle
and Leonardo, which, in brilliant mosaic, are set in panels
above the windows of what we term the second story, but what
is known here as the first. They are costly and exquisite
works of art. Approaching the porte cochere, by which alone
—as with most Parisian mansions—entrance may be had from
the front, a foreigner—observing the Japanese lion on either
side—might well conclude that this was the residence of the
Japanese Embassy, or of some notable citizen of Japan. But
no Frenchman familiar with the recent history of his country
would entertain this conclusion, for in diamond-shaped panels,
in the iron t^ork of the gates, is wrought on the one hand
Février and on the other Septembre, the former of which marks
the last month of monarchy and the latter the month in which
the Empire vanished. He would conclude that he had ap¬
proached the residence of a pronounced Republican, and in
this he would not be mistaken, for it is the elegant and hospit¬
able home of Henri Cernuschi.
(44)
45
We are at the threshold of what is at once one of the most
pfrfectly-appointed homes of Paris and a museum of which the
equal is not to be found in either hemisphere. Indeed, familiar
acquaintance with the interior begets a doubt as to whether the
architect who planned the edifice studied more the comfort of
its master and his guests or the means of displaying with
greatest perfection his immense and unique collection of works
of Oriental art.
To the right of the porte cochere is a small room occupied
by the concierge, and opposite is the entrance to the main body
of the building. In passing one observes that the sides of the
carriage-way are paneled, and that between the panels are many
brackets, each of which is surmounted by a Chinese or Japanese
vase or urn ; and if, impelled by curiosity, a visitor venture
beyond the door, he will find each panel covered by tapestry,
either bits of gobelin or rare specimens of Oriental art.
On entering the building one knows not which to admire
first or most, the broad stairway and the ingeniously-wrought
iron-work by which the rail is supported, or the bronze figures,
the like of which he has never seen, and which meet his view
from points that an artist would select for their display. None
are crowded, yet, loot which way one may, one sees those that
are unlike all the rest. The stairs bring us to a landing which
constitutes a hall about thirty feet square, in which several
massive specimens of Mr. Cernuschi's collection are admirably
displayed, and from which I entered with him the room he calls
his atelier. Here again, standing upon Persian and Turkish
rugs, some of which are from the early part of the sixteenth
century, one is surrounded—except for the shelves which con¬
tain his library of the writings or speeches of American states¬
men and statisticians—^by Oriental screens or work in glass,
porcelain and bronze. Adjoining this room is a hall sixty feet
long, forty feet wide and thirty feet high, lighted from the roof
and by a large window that overlooks Pare Monceau.
In this apartment, in the home of a private gentleman, one
may study the progress of Chinese art during four thousand
years, and of that of Japan for nearly as long a period. Be-
46
yond the hall is the breakfast room, where on one morning I
met Professor J. L. Morris, of Cornell University, and on
another Mr. George Walker, who, if rumor has not misled me,
is here as the representative of our government in connection
with the question of the remonetization of silver. Here, again,
let thé guest he -placed as he may at the circular table, his at¬
tention will be attracted by Chinese or Japanese productions,
of which he would gladly learn the date and history. One side
of the room is almost covered by vessels of glazed and colored
pottery, some of which, at least in combinations of color, are
of exquisite beauty. It must not be supposed that this collec¬
tion is simply the aggregation of a great number of unmeaning
specimens of Chinese and Japanese work. It is far more than
this. Mr. Cernuschi devoted several months in each country
to the selection of such works as would best illustrate its pro¬
gress in art and its religion.
To afford space for the display of the multitudinous objects'
of which the collection consists a balcony has been built around
three sides of the hall, and the staircases leading to it are con¬
cealed by a partition. This arrangement gives shelving room
for hundreds of the smaller objects, some of which are no larger
than pieces of jewelry ; while in the centre, seated upon a lofty
marble pedestal, is a colossal bronze figure of Buddha, brought
from its temple in Japan.
But readers of The Times who do not remember the names
of the leading actors in the Roman revolution of 1848, or have-
not been officially interested in the controversy waging between
mono-metallism and bi-metallism, will probably ask. Who is
Henri Cernuschi ? He is a private gentleman, whose suscepti¬
bilities will probably be wounded by the freedom with which I
write of his afiairs. Public ofiice and honors have often sought
him, but he has but once—in Rome—consented to surrender
his individuality by accepting a position that required the
adaptation of personal conduct to the necessities of a party or
government. He is by birth an Italian, and having been
educated for the bar in the best schools of Italy, the outbreak
of the Revolution of 1848 found him as leader of the junior bar,
47
in the possession of a lucrative practice in the city of Milan.
An intense Republican, he was already in correspondence
with the chief promoters of Liberalism in Italy. On the break¬
ing out of the Roman revolution he hastened to Rome and was
at once recognized as triumvir with Mazzini and Garibaldi.
This style of office was not recognized, but serves better than
any other to express their relations to each other and to the
revolutionary movement. Though not a Roman citizen, Cer-
nuschi was elected to the Chamber of Deputies, and was im¬
mediately recognized as the trusted counsellor of those to whom
the destinies of the young republic had been confided. He led
the opposition to the admission of the French army, and when
others were disposed to accept its pledges of friendship and pro¬
tection, he denounced the proposition and warned the Chamber
against the French army as the treacherous instrument of re¬
action throughout Europe. He could inspire and control the
Chamber, but could not create an army or provide arms and
munitions with which to repulse that of France, which gradu¬
ally occupied positions from which it could submit to Mazzini
the alternative of capitulation or the bombardment of the city.
Further resistance was vain, yet Cernuschi would not consent
to capitulation, and proposed the transfer of the government
to Civita Vecchia. He would evacuate the city he could not
defend, but would not acknowledge the extinction of the Re¬
public, and he and his colleagues having left Rome, the French
army entered the city without resistance.
From Civita Vecchia Mr. Cernuschi was offered safety and
passage to England on a British war vessel, among the officers
of which he found a former friend. He, however, preferred to
share the fate of his colleagues, and on going ashore was cast
into prison. It was more than six months before formal accu¬
sation was made against him. He was, however, finally tried
by a military court on three charges, each of which involved
many specifications, and, managing his own case, was acquitted.
But acquittal did not bring release. He was remanded to
prison, and after another interval of more than six months was
brought before another military court on two of the charges on
48
which he had been tried, and was again acquitted. After
weeks of further confinement, during which his re-trial was
considered, he was given a passport and ordered to leave Italy.
He came to Paris. The practice of his profession was not open
to him. His estate had been forfeited, and he must accept such
employment as he could find.
We next find him occupying a position in the service of one
of the great financial institutions of France, of whose chiefs he
soon became a trusted counsellor. "Whatever he touched,"
said one of his earliest French friends to me, " turned to gold."
In a few years he was able to invite certain capitalists to unite
with him in establishing a bank, of which he became the mana¬
ger. One feature of this institution was that, to prevent specu¬
lation in the stock, it should be transferable only with the
unanimous consent of the shareholders. Good fortune still
attended him, and, weary of business, the affairs of the bank
were closed and Mr. Cernuschi retired with a princely fortune
and the resolution, to which he has religiously adhered, to
never embark any portion of his means in a business operation.
His surplus income is invested in government securities or ex¬
pended in the gratification of his refined tastes, the propagation
of his political or financial opinions, and the dispensation of a
hospitality the chief charm of which is in the fine presence,
happy manner and brilliant and instructive conversation of the
host, whose pleasure seems to be found in eliciting information
from his guests.
But it must not be inferred that the current of Mr. Cer-
nuschi's life through all these years was undisturbed by dra¬
matic and painful incidents. It was impossible that one whose
Bepublicanism was so intense and who was so true to his con¬
victions could avoid collision with the governments under
which, as an exile, he has lived in France. When the usurper,
Louis Napoleon, determined to justify, by the pretence of a
popular vote, his overthrow of the Republic, which as president
he had sworn to maintain, he ordered a plebiscite and pro¬
claimed to the world his purpose to insure a fair and unbiased
election. With characteristic treachery he not only confided
49
the conduct of the election to his creatures, a prefect and curé
in each district, but distributed to the people tickets for affirm¬
ative votes only. The Republicans of Paris entered the un¬
equal contest and hoped to effect a competent distribution of
negative tickets and thus produce an adverse result. Gambetta
was chairman of the executive committee. A poor man him¬
self, and representing all classes save the wealthy and powerful,
how was he to procure and distribute thé needed negative bal¬
lots ? Among his constituents was one rich man, Henri Cer-
nuschi, who, perceiving the emergency, promptly sent him one
hundred thousand francs.
This act involved a degree of courage and liberality for
which the usurper and the adventurers by whom he had sur¬
rounded himself were unprepared. Such individuality was, in
their judgment, incompatible with "order and society." It
could not go unrebuked. It did not, for having received a
letter of expulsion, Mr. Cernuschi, before the next day's sun
rose, was on his way to Switzerland. His response to the
letter of expulsion was characteristic. It was not, however, in
the form of a protest or appeal to the usurper, but was ad¬
dressed to Gambetta, and enclosed a check for an additional
one hundred thousand francs, with the simple expression of a
hope that the proceeds could be effectively applied to the dis¬
tribution of negative ballots. The expenditure was in vain,
for the government which would not provide negative ballots
suppressed those that Gambetta issued. When the authority
of the Empire became absolute Mr. Cemuschi was permitted
to return to Paris, but, as will appear, this incident was not
forgotten. Though he had refused to accept citizenship under
the Empire, he remained in Paris during the siege and the
Commune, and was an active member of the committee for the
relief of the poor, to the funds of which he is said to have been
a generous contributor. He also purchased a controlling influ¬
ence in the Siècle and assumed the editorship of its political
columns, in which he daily advocated Republicanism as contra¬
distinguished from Communism. His labors at this time were
herculean. They were shared by Mr. Chaudey, of whom he
4
50
speaks only as "my dear friend and constant colaborer."
They were inseparable, and were often admonished of the
danger they incurred by their condemnation of the excesses of
the Commune. At length Mr. Chau.dey was arrested and cast
into prison. Cernuschi, hoping to effect the release of his
friend, visited him daily. When he called on the morning of
the day on which the French army was entering the city, he
found that his friend'had just been shot by the baffled leaders
of the Commune. While he was endeavoring to get possession
of the body of Mr. Chaudey a detachment of soldiers, who were
still under the command of Imperialist generals, entered the
prison. To others the army came as a deliverer, but not so
was it for Cernuschi, for before he had accomplished his object
the jailer received an order for his detention.
Nobody could suspect him of Communism. Indeed, all
Paris knew that while devoting himself to works of charity
and the promotion of Republicanism he had been bravely out¬
spoken in opposition to the theories and conduct of the Com¬
munists ; but it was remembered by the general in command
that he had endeavored to defeat the scheme for giving an ap¬
parent vote of the people for the Empire. For this, though
years of acquiescence had intervened, his life was to pay the
forfeit. The hour of his death was fixed. He was in the
presence of his executioners—the firing squad. But lo, the
fatal order was informal in this, that it was printed and not
written. He demanded the production of a written order, and
to put him to death, pending such a demand, might involve
grave consequences to him who gave the word of command.
Time was gained. Days elapsed and no written order came.
The higher official who might issue it shrank from wanton
murder. The general in command of the prison was, however,
less scrupulous, and again Mr. Cernuschi found himself in the
presence of his executioners and the moment of his death near
at hand, when mutual recognition occurred between him and
a functionary whose position justified him in demanding a brief
respite for the condemned. This was done. The intended victim
was again remanded to his cell, where, until the next afternoon.
61
he had time to consider the strange fortune by which his friend
and colaborar, Cbaudey, had been put to death by the Com¬
mune while he was to be murdered by tbe expiring Empire.
That day, however, terminated his imprisonment and released
him from impending death. It is worthy of remembrance that
these incidents in the life of an unambitious, cultivated and
benevolent gentleman do not characterize the French govern¬
ment of "a former century, but that of the early years of the
current decade. In view of them may we not all hope for the
consolidation of the Republic, which at least promises personal
security ? On the fourth day after its proclamation Mr. Cer-.
nuschi took the oath which made him a French citizen—a thing
be had been unable to do while that oath required him to swear
fidelity to king or emperor. Rejecting all overtures from con¬
stituencies and offers of administrative position from the chiefs
of the new government, he determined to seek recreation in
wide foreign travel. After spending some time in our country,
he sailed from San Francisco to Japan, whence, after having
devoted months to collecting the objects to which I have re¬
ferred, he proceeded to China, and devoted nearly five months
to the same purpose. It was after his return to Paris, and
with special reference to his unequalled museum, that his res¬
idence was erected.
But what Henri Cernuschi regards as his life-work remains
for brief reference. He had, as I have said, counselled the
chiefs of one of the great financial establishments of France,
and subsequently organized and successfully managed a great
bank. He had while thus engaged made the subjects of money
and finance a special study, and had in 1865 published a volume
entitled the "Mechanism of Exchange," which attracted con¬
tinental notice and induced the Société des Economistes to
tender him a fellowship. He was then, as now, an unqualified
bullionist, yet he is the author of the phrase " hi-metallism,"
and for the last six years has devoted his means and energy to
the work of promoting the universal monetization of silver on
the basis of 15^ weights of that metal to 1 of gold. His studies
had prepared him to believe that the attempt by Germany and
the United States to demonetize silver, though it could not be
52
ultimately successful, would derange the commercial relations
of the world, and work incalculable evil to states and men who
were in debt and to the producing classes generally, and he at
once took up this subject in the Siècle. In 1875 he published
a volume entitled "Bi-Metallic Money," and in the next year,
under the title of "Bi-Metalhsm," another containing his sev¬
eral replies to Chevalier.
The promotion of this beneficent work is, as I have said, the
life-business of Mr. Cernuschi. To advance it he labors in¬
cessantly and expends his means with unstinted generosity. It
was in the hope of furthering this cause, by presenting his
views to the Senatorial Commission on the silver question, that
he passed the winter of 1876-7 in Washington, where I had
the privilege of being personally recognized by him as an effi¬
cient co-laborer. His many controversial pamphlets on the
subject are distributed gratuitously, and only put on sale in
order that all who will may obtain them. His collection of
books on the subject, in several languages, is large, the volumes
are well thumbed and the pages of many of them carefully an¬
notated. Not only has h.e the American library to which I
have referred, but, desiring to follow the course of the money
question in America, he is a subscriber—the only one east of
the Atlantic—to the Congressional Record. As I had frequent
opportunity of observing, he receives many miscellaneous papers
from our country, and is in the regular receipt of the financial
journals published at all the money centres of the world. He
and his secretary are busy men, for each day's mails bring him,
from all parts of the world, letters of inquiry and suggestion or
of thanks and approval Will success crown his unselfish
labors in this beneficent cause ? That it will, and at an early
day, there is, I believe, no room to doubt.
Indeed* it may be said that success has crowned them, for the
return to bi-metallism is practically determined. The Diplo¬
matic Commission will be convoked in obedience to the de¬
mands of suffering nations, and the commissioners when they
meet will find little to do but determine a relation between gold
* What follows of the text of this letter was accidentally omitted in its
original publication.
53
and silver, and sign treaties binding their respective govern¬
ments to adhere to it as the basis for unlimited coinage. It is
a mistake to suppose that Prince Bismarck acted capriciously or
arbitrarily in prohibiting further sales of silver and ordering
the coin which had been hoarded by the government to be
returned to circulation. As I was assured during my first
visit to Germany, and reassured with ample illustration by
Ernest Koch, of Gelsenkirchen, and Otto Zimmerman, editor
of the Allgemeiner Anzeiger, of Cologne, after my return to
the empire, the Prince acted in response to fervent appeals
from the producing classes, irrespective of party or sect.*
Nor can the British government long refuse to name com¬
missioners and endow them with plenary power in the premises.
The demand for relief from the sufiering consequent upon the
attempted demonetization of silver comes from India with un¬
divided voice, and is becoming more general, throughout the
British Islands, as each week passes. He who would know the
strength of the arguments by which this appeal is enforced,
should consult the columns of that valuable epitome of Anglo-
Indian opinion, The Bombay Gazette Summary, compiled for
the use of British merchants and bankers interested in the
Indian trade ; should read the Letters of Samuel Smith, a
distinguished merchant of Liverpool, on the silver question ;
should consider the vigorous statements embodied in the
memorial presented by the Liverpool Chamber of Commerce
to the government; should read the two articles, one by
Stephen Williamson, of Liverpool, and the other by R. H. Pat¬
terson, of Edinburgh, in the Contemporary Review for April ;
he should read the article in Blackwood for August ; and the
exhaustive volume just published in London by Ernest Seyd,
F.S.S., entitled " The Decline of Prosperity : Its Insidious
Cause and Obvious Remedy," for the privilege of examining a
copy of which, received in advance of general publication, I am
* While these sheets have been going through the press I have received
from Gustav Godeffroy, the eminent merchant and banker of Hamburg, a
paper entitled " The Gold and Silver Question," in which he vindicates,
with much ability and a fine array of statistics, the recent action of Prince
Bismarck, and the necessity of international bi-metallism.
54
indebted to Mr. Cernuschi.* Having done this the inquirer
will be prepared to believe that the Anglo-Indian appeal thus
enforced at home must soon be regarded as irresistible.
It is therefore now in order to inquire what relation between
the metals will be established, and what change of our coinage
it will involve. This, too, is predetermined. The relation must
be 15J of silver to 1 of gold. To adopt another would be to
require the recoinage of all the gold money or of all the silver
* " A remarkable pamphlet has just been issued, which derives additional
interest and importance from its authorship. It is by Henry H. Gibbs, of
London, who was formerly Governor of the Bank of England, and was one
of the commissioners from Great Britain to the Paris International Confer¬
ence on the silver question. In company with his colleagues there, he
stubbornly resisted every proposal looking to international action on the
question, and it is well known that the complete and not very courteous
rejection of American suggestions was mainly due to the uncompromising
attitude of the British representatives. Yet this same Mr. Gibbs now writes,
at the close of his pamphlet:
" ' I have expressed in it conclusions which differ very widely from the
spirit of the report of the proceedings of the Paris Conference presented to
the government by my colleagues and myself. I fully concurred in that
report ; but the more I have, sinpe then, thought over the subject of the
Conference, the more I have been led to distrust some part of our reason¬
ing, and to doubt in part the wisdom of the conclusion to which we came.
In no case was it to be expected that tlie Conference would have simply
affirmed the original resolutions of the Commissioners of the United States.
Indeed, the evil from which we suffer had not at that time pressed so
strongly upon the minds of Englishmen as it has since done, and public
opinion was less prepared than I think it now is to look with favor on any
change which might promise to alleviate it. . . . t have tried,to show that
it (remonetization of silver) is practicable; and that though universal
mono-metallism would be better if it was possible, no such possibility ex¬
ists ; that though England has flourished long, trusting in her gold mono¬
metallism, there was a cause which enabled her to do so, a cause which no
longer exists ; and that, even granted that there would be inconvenience
in surrendering our single standard, there may be a greater inconvenience
Still in remaining as we are.'
" The question will at once be asked with great interest. What new argu¬
ments or new facts have brought about so remarkable a change in the
opinion of one of the British Commissioners? The pamphlet gives full
reply, and it is exceedingly creditable to the candor and good sense of Mr.
Gibbs that he not only sees the enormous evils to which the policy of Eng¬
land has subjected her in her commerce with India, but frankly and earn¬
estly urges the facts upon the attention of his countrymen."—New York
■Tribune, October 10th.
55
money of the -world except that of the United States. This is
the relation established by the British Parliament between the
gold money of England and the silver money of India. It is the
existing relation between the two metals in Germany, France,
Italy, Belgium, Switzerland, Greece, Spain, Roumania, and
most of the South American States. In Holland, 15 Î A pre¬
vails ; in Austria, 15,^; in Japan, 15/^. These departures
from 15y®^ are hardly appreciable, and tTiese countries may
be reckoned on to sustain this relation. But what relation do
we maintain ? Our coinage is based on 16 to 1. What nations
agree with us in maintaining this relation ? Not one ; we stand
alone in the world ; and it cannot be presumed that all other
nations will abandon their traditions and recoin their money in
deference to our wishes. Being thus in a hopeless minority,
we shall have to adopt the universally accepted ratio, and the
result will surprise those of our leading statesmen and able
financial teachers who have denounced the " Dollar of the Dad¬
dies" as dishonest, and insisted on maintaining our national
honor by enlarging the silver dollar to the diameter of a cofiee
cup or saucer. The relation of 15J to 1 cannot be brought
about in that way unless proportionate weight be also added to
the gold dollar ; and tax-payers will hardly consent to increase
the weight of the unit of payment, of a nation as largely in¬
debted as we are, whether of gold or silver.
The process by which it will be accomplished is very simple.
The end can be obtained by either of two methods : By restor¬
ing to the gold dollar one-half of the metal of which it was
" clipped " by the Act of 1834, or by reducing the weight of the
silver dollar from 412^ to 399/^ grains. The first plan would
require the recoinage of our gold coins and the addition of three
cents to the value of every dollar ; the second would simply re¬
quire new dies for the silver dollar, and would reduce its intrinsic
value three cents. These are the alternatives that are before us.
We have invited the Convention, and must abide by its issue.
Our countrymen are justly celebrated for their ingenuity, and he
will entitle himself to eternal fame who will suggest any other
method than those I have just indicated, by which we can es¬
tablish bi-metallism on a basis that other nations can accept..
ENGLAND.
London, Septeoiber 6.
"Look !" said the oninibus-driver beside ■whom I was snugly
seated, as be pointed with the stock of bis whip to Rotten Row,
" there is nobody there now—not a soul. Six weeks ago they
were crowding each other, and there was not room for all the
splendid turnouts that wanted to get in." In reply to my
responsive question whether there was any day on which a
stranger might hope to see any of them there, he said, "No;
London is hempty now. The season's over, and all the swells
and nobby people have gone to the country or over to the con¬
tinent." Parliament had adjourned, and the world of fashion had
undoubtedly left London, but the comparatively small number
of people which that world embraces are not missed by strangers.
I have been here a week, and have neither presented a letter
-of introduction nor left a card for any of my old friends. I
preferred to see the great human hive, the world's financial
and commercial centre, as I could while loitering in its crowded
highways, from the open front of a hansom, the top of a 'bus,
the deck of a Thames steamer, or the window of a, car while
following.a locomotive to some of the suburban stations to
which trains go every few minutes. Social engagements would
have interfered with my plan. Had I arrived while Parlia¬
ment was in session, the case would have been different, and I
should have made an effort to see some of the distinguished
men whose appearance must be a matter of interest to every
intelligent American.
My friend of the whip indulged in a violent figure of speech
when he said London was empty. Its business quarters are
rarely more crowded than now. Rarnest-looking men swarm
and jostle each other on their thoroughfares, and a casual
(56)
57
observer mîgbt readily conclude that each man was conscious
that he was making successful strides in pursuit of fortune.
Unhappily this is not the case. It would be more nearly
true to say that each one is contemplating past or prospective
losses ; for let the Englishman look where he may, he encoun¬
ters the frown of fortune.
While on the continent I read in one of the London dailies a
comparative annual abstract of the business of the savings
banks of Ireland, the result of which seems, as I am at present
advised, to epitomize the condition of the people of the British
Islands, whose accumulated capital probably never shrunk as
rapidly as it is now shrinking. The abstract referred to shows
that through twelve successive years following 1863 there was
at the close of the official year a steady annual increase of
deposits in the savings banks of Ireland. In 1876, though the
increase was one million pounds, it marked a decline in the
ratio of augmentation which was regarded as exceptional.
Events have, however, proved that it was not exceptional, but
the first of a series of disastrous years. The story of the inter¬
vening years is thus told by the Registrar of Irish savings
banks in his midsummer report, which has just appeared:
" It will be seen from this table that the uninterrupted prog¬
ress of deposits and cash balances from <£12,967,000 in De¬
cember, 1868, to .£32,815,000 in 1876 has since shown a
change for the worse. First the increase of ,£1,956,000 in
1875 was followed by an increase of only ¿61,000,000 in 1876.
This was changed into a decrease of ,£69,000 in 1877, followed
by the decrease of ¿61,001,000 in 1878, and now a decrease of
¿61,554,000 in 1879. So there have been decreases for three
years in succession. Taking the actual decreases in the last
three years, they amount in the aggregate to ¿62,624,000.
The falling off in bank deposits in 1860 was ¿6433,000 ; 1861, of
¿6604,000; in 1862, of ¿6616,000, and in 1863," of ¿61,422,000,
very closely resembled the present crisis ; the aggregate of with¬
drawals in three years was ¿62,642,000, only ¿618,000 more
than in three years now, and in four years was ¿63,075,000,
whilst in the third year of the present crisis we have reached
58
a falling ofiF of ¿£2,624,000. The present crisis has been
more acute in the second and third years, as the ¿61,001,000
falling off in 1878 is greater than the ¿6616,000 in 1862, and
the ¿61,554,000 in 1879 than the ¿61,422,000 in 1863."
Are the poor Irish people "withdrawing their deposits for
investments in land or trade ? I wish it were so ; but it is not,
as is proven by ample testimony obtained from many author¬
itative sources. The owners of British railroads have recently
received the reports of their earnings and expenditures for the
last six months, and every report I have been able to see,
except that of the London and Southwestern—and they have
been many—shows a decrease of receipts from both passenger
and freight traffic.
Sanguine gentlemen attempt in their reports, in a few in¬
stances, to account for much of this loss by the bad weather,
which has undoubtedly diminished pleasure travel; but the
accounting officials of most of the roads frankly ascribe the
loss of income to the depressed condition of agriculture and
trade. It is evident, however, that the, people of Ireland have
not been special sufferers. The following extract from the letter
of a Dublin correspondent of a leading London daily furnishes
fibres which may be accepted as representing, at least approx¬
imately, the condition of affairs throughout the British Islands :
" The speech of Mr. Colvill, chairman of the Great Southern
and Western Railway of Ireland, on Saturday, afforded the
most striking evidence of the agricultural depression which has
this year existed, his shareholders being informed that the de¬
cline of revenue (causing a 4 per cent, dividend) in six months
was ¿628,448; the falling off in first-class passengers, 10,850;
in second-class, 6059 ; and in third-class, 32,401. Passenger
traffic fell ¿611,471 ; goods, ¿610,898. The number of cattle
carried was 91,479 less; the artificial manures less by 3274
tons ; butter by 358 tons. There had been no alteration in
rates, and these decreases were entirely accounted for by the
state of general business. It appears from the Registrar Gen¬
eral's report that there are 20,000 less milch cows in Ireland
than last year ; and, although the total number of cattle has
69
increased, the increase is in young beasts, the most valuable
having been exported. In sheep there has been a decrease of
numbers in the country of 77,245, and of pigs, 197,409. The
cattle exports from Dublin have fallen ofiF 31 per cent."
This is the fifth consecutive year of bad harvests, and the
failure is almost total. No crop will give the British farmer a
remunerative return. Nearly incessant rain has ruined them
all, including hay, potatoes, and hops, and the accepted esti¬
mate of loss to farmers and landlords is ¿£60,000,000, or
$300,000,000. Formerly increase of price would have parti¬
ally compensated the farmer for deficiency of crop, but now it
does not. Last year, in the face of four successive short crops,
the price of wheat in London was, I am informed, lower than
it had been in ninety-eight years. Despair has overtaken the
British farmer, and those who assume to advise him can formu¬
late no encouraging theory that does not involve the abandon¬
ment of the whole system of husbandry hitherto pursued and
the conversion of the land into vegetable and fruit gardens.
Let it not be supposed that there is exaggeration in this
statement. It is but a few days since an editorial in the Tele¬
graph said that land owners must be content to hold land as
diamonds are held, as a non-productive investment. Hoping
to suggest a means of averting the total loss of income from
British farming land, Mr. Thomas C. Scott, of Knaphill, Sur¬
rey, addressed a note to the editor of the Times. It is so
accurately descriptive of the condition of the British mind on
the matters to which it relates that I enclose it at length :
" It was hoped a month ago that the bad weather had done
its worst, but its. continuance is still further militating against
the farmers' prospects. To bring up the corn crops now to an
average yield or earliness would require something like a mag¬
ical influence, such as we are not accustomed to in this country.
This is the more to be regretted, as the great farming class
never was so much in need of good and early ready-money
crops. The light hay. crop, which has been mowed in a good
many places, is being spoilt on the ground ; the corn crops are
being checked in their growth by the prevailing low temper-
60
ature, and more or less weakened in their roots by the sat¬
urating rains; and the important potato crop throughout the
three kingdoms is daily being rendered more sensitive to ruin¬
ous blight by excessive moisture. There may probably be an
average of green crops, but the returns from these are so de¬
ferred that they are of very little account to needy farmers.
Tinder these unfortunate circumstances there appears no pres¬
ent prospect of this year's corn or root crops compensating
farmers for the deficient ones of the previous four years. It
would be hoping against the evidence of one's senses to look
for such a result. Those who are fortunate enough to have
other resources will, therefore, in innumerable cases, in all
probability, have to draw upon" them to meet their liabilities ;
but what is to become of the numerous class who are now short
of capital ? Unfortunately, the farming class of this country
is less qualified or inclined to change its occupation than any
other in the community. Should the above anticipations be
realized, it will be a double misfortune to agriculture, as it will
still further reduce the farming capital of the country at a time
when its increase has become indispensable. It thus appears
more than probable that the present farming class, in England
especially, will before long have to be largely recruited from
other classes in the country. Many townspeople possessing
acquired means prefer a country to a town life, and could
easily be induced to hire farms under certain conditions and
to ignore farming profits to a certain extent for a country res¬
idence and occupation ; and it is to this class, therefore, that
landlords must to some extent look to help them out of their
present and increasingly embarrassed positions."
A wiser suggestion was offered on the occasion of the annual
dinner of the Devon Agricultural Association in May last, by
my old friend Mr. J. H. Puleston, the senior member of Par¬
liament from Devonport. I may say in passing that I have
several times heard Mr. Puleston referred to as the American
member, and rejoice in knowing that the zeal with which he
promoted the spread of Republican sentiment in Pennsylvania
between 1854 and 1860, and his labors in behalf of the Union
61
cause at Washington throughout the whole period of the war,
seem rather to have aided than prevented his political advance¬
ment. His knowledge of the extent and resources of our
country enabled him to make a rapid statement of our growing
annual and our possible future production of grain and pro¬
visions which must have astounded most of his auditors. He
proposed no remedy broad enough to meet the whole case.
Drawing attention to the fact that, though the use of fruit and
vegetables is beyond the means of a majority of the people of the
British islands and unknown to them, the annual importation of
these articles cost from $35,000,000 to $40,000,000, he ex¬
pressed the hope that the land might soon be used more as a
garden than as a farm, unless it were for the breeding of fine
horses, sheep and cattle. This suggestion, which is less
chimerical than that of Mr. Scott, has been elaborated in other
quarters, and seems to have simultaneously forced itself upon
many minds.
If it be true that misery loves company, farmers and land¬
holders may find some grains of comfort in the fact that all
classes are suffering with them. Even great capitalists, while
making frequent losses, cannot find safe employment for their
funds at one per cent, per annum.* A correspondent of the
* " After full deliberation and discussion, the following conclusions were
unanimously arriyed at :
" 1st. That the recent shrinkage in the value of the world's silver money,
measured in gold, is very large, and there is every reason to fear that, with
the prospect before us, the depreciation will continue to increase.
" 2d. That there has besides been much diminution in the value of in¬
vestments of English capital in the public funds, railways, &c., of silver-
using countries.
" 3d. That we are now compelled to look upon the silver of the world as
in large measure cut off from its previous sphere of usefulness as one of
the two agents for the liquidation of international indebtedness.
"4th. That the serious diminution of the world's money, caused by the
disuse of silver, may, in the future, lead to frequent panics, through the
inadequate supply of gold for the world's wants.
" 5th. That the uncertainty regarding the course of exchange in the
future, largely prevents the further investment of English capital in the
public funds of silver-using countries, or in railways, industrial enter¬
prises, and commercial credits.
62
Timei^ in its issue of the 30th ult., tells the story of some sev¬
enty cotton-mills in Oldham " constructed on the latest prin¬
ciples, with the best-arranged machinery, and managed with
the strictest regard to economy, which are declaring no div¬
idends, and which are quoted in the share list at a decline, in
many instances, of from 50 to 80 per cent, on the amount of
paid-up capital." He tells, too, a like story of the coal and
iron mining companies, in which Lancashire, from which he
dates, has invested heavily. Of building societies and owners
of improved property he tells even a sadder story, and closes
his gloomy picture by saying :
" Machine shops and paper works also come under the cat¬
egory of unprofitable undertakings, and those which have been
thrown on the market during the past month have only real¬
ized from 6 to 9 per cent, of their cost ; and these works were
built within the past twenty years at a cost of from ¿£120,000
to ¿£150,000 each. All the foregoing point to a most calam¬
itous state of affairs, and are only a few of the most salient
indications of the general depression which exists among us ;
nevertheless, they are quite sufficient to show that some rad¬
ical change is necessary to draw us out of the deep slough of
despond into which we have fallen. India, which consumes
about one-third of our cotton productions, is getting poorer
and poorer every year. The United States, which used to
take a considerable amount of our calico, is now independent
of us, and actually competing with us in many of our mar¬
kets—aye, and even in our own Manchester market ; the con-
" 6th. That the friction and harassment now attending business with
silver-using countries, as India, China, Java, Austria, Chili, Mexico, and
others, naturally lead merchants to curtail their operation in the export of
our manufactured goods, and to restrict the employment of English capital
in such business.
" 7th. That this is a most serious question for India, which many believe
to be BO impoverished as not to be able to bear increased taxation.
" 8th. That the depreciation of silver seriously aflfects the power of silver-
using states to purchase English manufactures, and leads to increased taxa¬
tion, thus further curtailing the trade which has hitherto been carried on
in English commodities."—T'A« ßejport of the Special Committee on the State of
Trade to the Incorporated Chamber of Commerce of Liverpool, March 21, 1879.
63
tinent of Europe is leaving us gradually but surely, as it is
yearly supplying more and more of its requirements from its
own spindles and looms."
The truth is, the depression is complete and almost hope¬
less. I have before me a paper by Richard Seyd, F.S.S.,
brother to Ernest Seyd, entitled " Statistics of Failures in the
United Kingdom during the .years 1877, 1878, and the first
half of 1879." The list embraces financial institutions, man¬
ufacturers, wholesale and retail dealers, professional men,
builders, publicans, etc., and presents the following totals : In
1877 the failures numbered 11,022; in 1878, 15,059; and in
the first six months of this year 8990.
What shall be inferred from this combination of disastrous
conditions, and the infinite number of facts with which they
might be supplemented and confirmed ? May they justify us
in speaking of "effete monarchy and aristocracy," and proph¬
esying the bankruptcy of England? I think not. My im¬
pression is that the throne of England was never more firmly
seated in the affection of the people, and that, apart from other
favoring considerations, the influences which are sometimes
supposed to control legislatures in the election of United States
senators have done much to confirm the faith of the people in
an hereditary peerage. Nor is the bankruptcy of the British
Islands impending. England is the world's creditor. Every
nation is in debt to her, and there is no field for the invest¬
ment of her accumulated capital, as is shown by the fact that,
though money may be borrowed in London at less than one per
cent, per annum, the bank now holds more gold than it ever
held before. Her losses will be immense but not ruinous,
as are those which debtor nations are suffering from the same
world wide cause—the attempt to demonetize silver. As cred¬
itor she loses by tjie failure of individuals, corporations, and
states, the world over; but while ruin overtakes them, what
happens to her is but a reduction of surplus capital so slight
relatively, as to leave her the means with which to buy in,
at her own- price, the assets of her debtors, and to hold them
until the repeal (pursuant to universal treaty stipulations) of
64
unwholesome laws shall restore the value they possessed before
the volume of the world's metallic money was arbitrarily
reduced. Bonaparte said, "Though the empire were ada¬
mant, political economists would reduce it to powder." Brit¬
ish subjects in all climes are suffering from the baneful influ¬
ence of these doctrinaires ; but the spirit of compromise that
controls the government in all- great crises will preserve the
empire, and London will continue to be the monetary centre
and the creditor of the world.