208 Proceedings of the American academy. 



equal to the silver in use in 1700, we should have had the starting point 

 for the curve of the silver rate at the date when the emissions were in 

 excess of the trading wants of the Province. The circumstances of the 

 Province necessarily controlled and limited its trading capacity. A 

 greater amount than was needed could not have been kept in circulation. 

 Hence the maintenance at par of an adequate substitute for the silver 

 could only have been attained by the displacement of that metal. If the 

 currency had remained at par up to the point suggested, there would 

 have been no necessity for considering the relations of the increase of 

 the currency to the decrease of the silver. Each emission of bills would 

 have required the displacement of a corresponding amount of coin in 

 order that it should circulate. As a matter of fact, however, the rise of 

 silver began almost as soon as the Province adopted a form of bills of its 

 own. Up to 1702, use was made of the Old Colony bills, to meet by 

 emissions the extraordinary wants of the Province. The adoption at 

 that date of a form of l)ill specially adapted to the use of the government 

 was a practical announcement that the policy of emitting public bills was 

 to be continued, and was followed so promptly by a rise in silver that 

 the quotation in 1704 shows an advance of a shilling. The displacement 

 of silver was apparently slower in taking effect, so that it would appear 

 that the bills increased slightly the purchasing capacity of the circulation 

 for a few years. 



The graphic delineation of the disappearance of the silver is based 

 upon the statement of one of the pamphleteers of the day as to the 

 amount of silver required for the trade of New P^ngland,* and the 

 assertions of Dr. Douglass that there were 219,000 oz. still remaining in 

 circulation in 1713 which had entirely disappeared in 1718. f Since the 

 disappearance of the silver was practically simultaneous throughout New 

 England, the only effect of adjusting this representation to the proportion 

 in use in Massachusetts alone would be to reduce slightly the area in- 

 cluded between the two curves. The main features would be the same. 



With regard to the time of the disappearance of silver, it is not im- 

 probable that the £100,000 loan at the end of 1 71 G, following so closely on 

 the £50,000 loan of 1714, caused the coin to be hoarded in 1717. Then 

 came the process of adjustment, through which the silver rate reduced to 

 its just proportion a paper medium having a nominal valuation in excess of 

 the trading needs of the Province. When distrust and lack of confidence 



* The Second Part of South Sea Stock, p. 22. 

 I A Discourse, etc., p. 29. 



