456 ANNUAL REGISTER, 1810. 



price of gold above its mint price 

 was found to be owing to the bad 

 state of the currency ; and in both 

 instances, the reformation of the 

 currency effectually lowered the 

 market price of gold to the level 

 of the mint price. During the 

 whole of the years 1796 and 1707, 

 in which there was such a scarcity 

 of gold, occasioned by the great 

 demands of the country bankers 

 in order to increase their deposits, 

 the market price of gold never 

 rose above the mint price. 



Your committee have still fur- 

 er to remark upon this point, 

 ihat the evidence laid before them 

 has led them to entertain much 

 doubt of the alleged fact, that a 

 scarcity of gold bullion has been 

 recently experienced in this coun- 

 try. That guineas have disap- 

 peared from the circulation, there 

 can be no question ; but that does 

 not prove a scarcity of bullion, 

 any more than the high price 

 proves that scarcity. If gold is 

 rendered dear by any other cause 

 than scarcity, those who cannot 

 purchase it without paying the 

 high price, will be very apt to 

 conclude that it is scarce. A very 

 extensive home dealer who was 

 examined, and who spoke very 

 much of the scarcity of gold, ac- 

 knowledged that he found no dif- 

 ficulty in getting any quantity he 

 wanted, if he was willing to pay 

 the price for it. And it appears 

 to your committee, that, though 

 in the course of the last year there 

 have been large exportations of 

 gold to the continent, there have 

 been also very considerable im- 

 portations of it into this country 

 from South America, chiefly 

 through the West Indies. 



It is important also to observe, 

 that the rise ia the market price 



of silver in this country, which 

 has nearly corresponded to that 

 of the market price of gold, can- 

 not in any degree be ascribed to 

 a scarcity of silver. The impor- 

 tations of silver have of late years 

 been unusually large, while the 

 usual drain for India and China 

 has been stopped. 



Since the suspension ofcash pay- 

 ments in 1797, it is certain, that, 

 even if gold is still our measure of 

 value and standard of prices, it has 

 been exposed to a new cause of 

 variation, from the possible excess 

 of that paper which is not conver- 

 tible into gold at will ; and the 

 limit of this new variation is as in- 

 definite as the excess to which that 

 paper will be issued. It may in- 

 deed be doubted, whether, since 

 the new system of Bank of England 

 payments has been fully establish- 

 ed, gold has in truth continued to 

 be our measure of value; and whe- 

 ther we have any other standard of 

 prices thanthatcirculatingmedium, 

 issued primarily by the Bank of 

 England, and in a secondary man- 

 ner by the country banks, the va- 

 riations of which in relative value 

 may be as indefinite as the possible 

 excess of that circulating medium. 

 But whether our present measure 

 of value, and standard of prices, 

 be this paper currency thus variable 

 in its relative value, or continues 

 still to be gold, but gold rendered 

 more variable than it was before,in 

 consequence of being interchang- 

 able for a paper currency which is 

 not at will convertible into gold, it 

 is, in either case, most desirable 

 for the public that our circulating 

 medium should again be conform- 

 ed, as speedily as circumstances 

 will permit, to its real and legal 

 standard, gold bullion. 



If the gold coin of the country 



