PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS — SECTION F. 329 



would become greatly depreciated in its representative value : 

 in other words, it would take a great deal of the over-issued 

 currency to purchase a very small quantity of goods. As the 

 Pharaoh was the only person who was entitled to be supplied 

 with food without having worked for it, he had the right to 

 ■decree a fixed value upon each white stone. He caused a 

 certain number to be branded with the royal mark, which none 

 might imitate : this therefore became the pebble currency of 

 the land of Egypt. The Pharaoh gathered his tribute or labour- 

 tax of food by the emission of his marked pebbles, and thus 

 provisioned he maintained his court, his army, and his employes 

 in public works as other Governments have done, each in its 

 own particular way. The pebbles thus emitted became the 

 currency of the country, and enabled exchanges to be made 

 among his subjects. If, as was likely to happen, the Pharaoh 

 wanted further supplies he would make a new issue of marked 

 pebbles, " watered stock " — a process which would depreciate 

 the currency; or he would make an enforced levy upon his 

 subjects for some of the previously-issued pebbles, and thus 

 ■" corner " the money-market, by which means the price of the 

 food that he wanted to purchase w^ould be rendered more 

 favourable to the buyer. Judging from the financial tactics of 

 later ages, if Pharaoh had surplus stores that he wanted to sell, 

 he would emit his newly -branded pebbles freely, so that he 

 might sell at a profit. This latter course might be State 

 jobbery ; but the Kings of Egypt, like the bank associations, 

 had not the terror of the ballot-box before their eyes : that 

 may follow later on, as far as the banks are concerned. Pass- 

 ing along to the time of David, King of Israel, we read that 

 by his victories he amassed so much gold and silver in 

 Jerusalem— afterwards added to by the glamour of his son's 

 wisdom — that it is said, " Silver was not anything accounted of 

 in the days of Solomon;" plainly showing the absurdity of 

 gold, or gold and silver — bimetallism — being reckoned as a 

 " standard of value." 



From what has been said, I hope it has been made plain 

 that an honest Pharaoh could, by regulating the issue of his 

 ear-marked white-stone currency, produce greater stability in 

 finance than could be contrived by any uncertain influx of silver 

 or gold. Food may be cheap for either one of two reasons : 

 Because there is more of it than can be consumed (in which 

 case no one ought to go short of it) ; or money may be so 

 scarce that there is not enough in circulation to enable many 

 would-be consumers to purchase as much as they require for 

 their sustenance. In both instances the growers of wheat 

 equally suffer, but it is in the latter case that nobody benefits : 

 the cause of the whole misfortune rests with those who 

 have permitted a deficient money-circulation to exist. These 



