644 



APPENDIX. 



problem of the probable result of the use of a silver standard, as conditions in 

 India are abnormal. An index table constructed upon silver prices in China 

 would have much greater promise of value, but I have no knowledge of the 

 methods employed by Mr. Wetmore. I assume his competence from the fact 

 that his table is included in a public document whose compilers must have 

 been familiar with the facts. 



The two tables with the diagrams prepared from them are as follows and 

 are given for what they are worth: — 



RELATIVE SILVER PRICES IN INDIA. 

 Table of Index Nionbers, prepared from his oivtt calcidations, by F.J. Atkinson, 

 Journal Royal Statistical Society, 1897. 



Prices of 1871 = 100. 



occ Diagram XV. (page 645). 



According to the foregoing table, silver prices of commodities in India 

 fluctuated violently and were 28 per cent higher in 1895 than in 1871. 



RELATIVE SILVER PRICES IN CHINA. 

 Table of Index Numbers compiled by W. S. Wetmore from calculations based on 

 the records of the hnperial Customs of China. 

 Prices of 1873=100. 



See Diagram XVI. (page 645). 



According to Mr. Wetmore's table, silver prices in China were quite stable, 

 and were twelve per cent lower in 1892 than in 1873. 



I am not able to throw much light upon the question as to which of these 

 two tables, if either, indicates the normal course of silver with respect to com- 

 modities, but taking into consideration the fact that local conditions affecting 

 prices were more nearly normal in China than in India, and the general 

 coincidence pf Mr. Wetmore's table with the course of silver and commodities 

 in England, as shown in Diagram V., I am compelled to believe that Mr. 

 Wetmore's table comes nearer to showing the probable result of the general use 

 of the silver standard than Mr. Atkinson's. But one swallow does not make a 

 summerj and it must not be so imagined in either case. 



