VAL 



hills, its lowest part being commonly the 

 bed of some torrent or river, which ori- 

 ginates in the higher grounds. A level 

 space of great breadth, separating two 

 mountain-ranges, is not, properly speak- 

 ing, a valley, but a plain. The same re- 

 mark aipplies to "circular valleys," as 

 that of Bohemia, 200 miles in diameter, 

 and that of Cashmere, 90 miles in dia- 

 meter, which are rather plains sur- 

 rounded by mountains. 



VALUE. Value is the only relation 

 ■with which Political Economy is con- 

 versant ; yet there is no subject as to the 

 meaning of which economists are less 

 agreed. Whately points out the incon- 

 sistencies of writers on this topic : — 



1. "The popular, and far the most 

 convenient, use of the word, is to signify 

 the capacity of being given and received 

 in exchange. So defined it expresses a 

 relation. The value of any one thing 

 must consist in the several quantities of 

 all other things which can be obtained in 

 exchange for it, and can never remain 

 fixed for an instant. Most writers admit 

 the propriety of this definition at the 

 outset, but they scarcely ever adhere 

 to it. 



2. "Adam Smith defines Value to 

 mean either the utility of a particular 

 object, or the power of purchasing other 

 goods which the possession of that object 

 conveys. The first he calls 'Value in 

 use,' the second ' Value in exchange.' 

 But he soon afterwards says, that equal 

 quantities of labour at all times and 

 places are of equal value to the labourer, 

 whatever may be the quantity of goods 

 he receives in return for them ; and that 

 labour never varies in its own value. It 

 is clear that he affixed, or thought he had 

 affixed, some other meaning to the word ; 

 as the first of these propositions is con- 

 tradictory, and the second false, which- 

 ever of his two definitions we adopt. 



3. "Mr. Ricardo appears to set out by 

 admitting Adam Smith's definition of 

 Value in exchange. But in the greater 

 part of his * Principles of Political Eco- 

 nomy,* he uses the word as synonymous 

 with Cost; and by this one ambiguity 

 has rendered his great work a long 

 enigma. 



4. " Mr. Malthus defines Value to be 

 the power of purchasing. In the very 

 next page he distinguishes absolute from 

 relative value, a distinction contradictory 

 to his definition of the term, as expres- 

 sive of a relation. 



5. " Mr. M'CuUoch distinguishes be- 



356 



VAL 



tween real and exchangeable, or relative, 

 value. And in his nomenclature, the ex- 

 changeable, or relative, value of a com 

 modity consists in its capacity of pur- 

 chasing ; — its real value in the quantity 

 of labour required for its production 01 

 appropriation. 



6. " All these differences appear to 

 arise from a confusion of cause and effect. 

 Having decided that commodities are 

 valuable in proportion to the labour they 

 have respectively cost, it was natural to 

 call that labour their Value." 



VALVE {valvcB, folding-doors). A close 

 lid affixed to a tube or an opening in 

 some vessel, by means of a hinge, and 

 which can be opened only in one direc- 

 tion. Hence, the more forcibly it is 

 pressed in the other direction, the closer 

 it shuts the aperture, so that it either 

 admits the entrance of a fluid and pre- 

 vents its return, or admits its escape and 

 prevents its re-entrance. 



1. The clack-valve, or ordinary pump- 

 valve, is of a circular form, and consists 

 of a flat piece of leather rather larger 

 than the aperture it is intended to close. 

 It should open at an angle of 30°, so as 

 to admit of a free passage, equal to its 

 aperture. The double-clack, or butterfly- 

 valve, consists of two semicircular valves, 

 commonly employed for pump-buckets, 

 and have the advantage of allowing less 

 water to escape into the well or cistern 

 while in the act of closing the orifice. 

 Clack-valves consist sometimes of four 

 sectors of circles, the angular points of 

 which meet vertically over the centre of 

 the orifice, the sides being disposed like 

 those of a quadrangular pyramid. 



2. The conical or spindle valve consists 

 of a flat circular plate of metal, having 

 its rim bevelled and ground so as to fit in 

 a conical seat or nozzle. Its form is that 

 of the frustum of a cone, the side of 

 which makes an angle of 45° with a dia- 

 meter of the base. It is usually employed 

 as the safety-valve of the boiler of a 

 steam-engine. The diameter of the valve- 

 box should be to the greater diameter of 

 the valve as 3 to 2 ; and the valve should 

 not rise less than one-fourth of its greater 

 diameter when quite open ; but both 

 these proportions must be increased if 

 the valve be out of the centre of the 

 box. 



3. The button-valve or puppet-clack re- 

 sembles the preceding valve, in being of 

 a circular form, with a conical side, and 

 having a vertical direction ; this is ef- 

 fected by means of a guide-rod, which is 



