BOOK rent coin of any nation; and the order, to receive I. no gold at the public offices but by weight, is

likely to preferve it fo, as long as that order is enforced. The filver coin ftill continues in the fame worn and degraded ftate as before the reformation of the gold coin. In the market, however, one-and-twenty fhillings of this degraded filver coin are still confidered as worth a guinea of this excellent gold coin.

THE reformation of the gold coin has evidently raised the value of the filver coin which can be exchanged for it.

IN the English mint a pound weight of gold is. coined into forty-four guineas and a half, which, at one-and-twenty fhillings the guinea, is equal to forty-fix pounds fourteen fhillings and fixpence. An ounce of fuch gold coin, therefore, is worth 37. 175. 10 d. in filver. In England no duty or feignorage is paid upon the coinage, and he who carries a pound weight or an ounce weight of ftandard gold bullion to the mint, gets back a pound weight or an ounce weight of gold in coin, without any deduction. Three pounds feventeen fhillings and ten-pence halfpenny an ounce, therefore, is faid to be the mint price of gold in England, or the quantity of gold coin which the mint gives in return for standard gold bullion.

BEFORE the reformation of the gold coin, the price of ftandard gold bullion in the market had for many years been upwards of 37. 18 s. fometimes 3. 195. and very frequently 4 7. an ounce; that fum, it is probable, in the worn and de

graded

V.

graded gold coin, feldom containing more than CHA P. an ounce of standard gold. Since the reformation of the gold coin, the market price of ftandard gold bullion feldom exceeds 37. 17 s. 7 d. an ounce. Before the reformation of the gold coin, the market price was always more or lefs above the mint price. Since that reformation, the market price has been conftantly below the mint price. But that market price is the fame whether it is paid in gold or in filver coin. The late reformation of the gold coin, therefore, has raised not only the value of the gold coin, but likewife that of the filver coin in proportion to gold bullion, and probably too in proportion to all other commodities; though the price of the greater part of other commodities being influenced by fo many other caufes, the rife in the value either of gold or filver coin in proportion to them, may not be fo diftinct and fenfible.

IN the English mint a pound weight of ftandard filver bullion is coined into fixty-two fhillings, containing, in the fame manner, a pound weight of standard filver. Five fhillings and two-pence an ounce, therefore, is faid to be the mint price of filver in England, or the quantity of filver coin which the mint gives in return for ftandard filver bullion. Before the reformation of the gold coin, the market price of standard filver bullion was, upon different occafions, five fhillings and four-pence, five fhillings and fivepence, five fhillings and fix-pence, five fhillings and feven-pence, and very often five fhillings and eight pence an ounce. Five fhillings and seven

8

pence,

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1.

pence, however, feems to have been the most
common price.
Since the reformation of the
gold coin, the market price of standard filver
bullion has fallen occafionally to five fhillings
and three-pence, five fhillings and four-pence,
and five fhillings and five-pence an ounce, which
laft price it has fcarce ever exceeded. Though
the market price of filver bullion has fallen con-
fiderably fince the reformation of the gold coin,
it has not fallen fo low as the mint price.

In the proportion between the different metals.
in the English coin, as copper is rated very
much above its real value, fo filver is rated fome-
what below it. In the market of Europe, in the
French coin and in the Dutch coin, an ounce of
fine gold exchanges for about fourteen ounces of
fine filver. In the English coin, it exchanges for
about fifteen ounces, that is, for more filver than
it is worth according to the common eftimation
of Europe. But as the price of copper in bars
is not, even in England, raised by the high price
of copper in English coin, fo the price of filver
in bullion is not funk by the low rate of filver in
English coin. Silver in bullion still preserves its
proper proportion to gold; for the fame reason
that copper
in bars preferves its proper propor-

tion to filver.

UPON the reformation of the filver coin in the reign of William III. the price of filver bullion ftill continued to be fomewhat above the mint price. Mr. Locke imputed this high price to the permiffion of exporting filver bullion, and to the prohibition of exporting filver coin. This permiffion

9

V.

permiffion of exporting, he faid, rendered the CHA P. demand for filver bullion greater than the demand for filver coin. But the number of people who want filver coin for the common ufes of buying and felling at home, is furely much greater than that of those who want filver bullion either for the use of exportation or for any other ufe. There fubfifts at prefent a like permiffion of exporting gold bullion, and a like prohibition of exporting gold coin; and yet the price of gold bullion has fallen below the mint price. But in the English coin filver was then, in the fame manner as now, under-rated in proportion to gold; and the gold coin (which at that time too was not fupposed to require any reformation) regulated then, as well as now, the real value of the whole coin. As the reformation of the filver coin did not then reduce the price of filver bullion to the mint price, it is not very probable that a like reformation will do fo now.

WERE the filver coin brought back as near to its ftandard weight as the gold, a guinea, it is probable, would, according to the prefent proportion, exchange for more filver in coin than it would purchase in bullion. The filver contaiming its full ftandard weight, there would in this case be a profit in melting it down, in order, first, to fell the bullion for gold coin, and afterwards to exchange this gold coin for filver coin to be melted down in the fame manner. Some alteration in the present proportion seems to be the only method of preventing this inconveniency.

VOL. I.

F

THA

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THE inconveniency perhaps would be lefs if filver was rated in the coin as much above its proper proportion to gold as it is at present rated below it; provided it was at the fame time enacted that filver fhould not be a legal tender for more than the change of a guinea; in the fame manner as copper is not a legal tender for more than the change of a fhilling. No creditor could in this cafe be cheated in confequence of the high valuation of filver in coin; as no creditor can at present be cheated in confequence of the high valuation of copper. The bankers only would fuffer by this regulation. When a run comes upon them they fometimes endeavour to gain time by paying in fixpences, and they would be precluded by this regulation from this difcreditable method of evading immediate payment. They would be obliged in confequence to keep at all times in their coffers a greater quantity of cash than at prefent; and though this might no doubt be a confiderable inconveniency to them, it would at the fame time be a confiderable fecurity to their creditors.

THREE pounds feventeen fhillings and tenpence halfpenny (the mint price of gold) certainly does not contain, even in our prefent excellent gold coin, more than an ounce of ftandard gold, and it may be thought, therefore, fhould not purchase more standard bullion. But gold in coin is more convenient than gold in bullion, and though, in England, the coinage is free, yet the gold which is carried in bullion to the mint, can feldom be returned in coin to the

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