436 INFLUENCE OE DECENT GOLD DISCOYEBIES ON PBICES. 



Governor in a paper referred to in a despatch of January, 1852. In 

 this paper it is stated " that the wages of shearers rose from 12s. in 

 1850 to 20s. in 1851; of reapers from 10s. to 20s. and 25s. per 

 acre ; of common labourers, from 5s. to 15s. and 20s. per day ; of 

 coopers, from 5s. to 10s.; of shipwrights, from 6s. to 10s.;" and of 

 all others at the same rates. 



From December, 1850, to December, 1851, it is added that the 

 prices of provisions had risen as follows : Bread, 4 lb. loaf, from 5d. 

 to Is. 4d. and Is 8d.; butter from Is. 2d. to 2s. or 2s. 6d. Fresh 

 meat doubled in price, and vegetables were raised from 50 to 100 

 per cent. 



Mr. Sterling, from whose admirable work on the gold discoveries 

 I have copied the foregoing extracts, in commenting on them, in 

 1852, observes : — " The phenomena, in as far as they have yet de- 

 veloped themselves, have occurred exactly in the order that might 

 have been expected. First of all, we have had a rise in the money 

 prices of colonial labour, next in the prices of provisions and the 

 other direct products of that labour, and lastly and after a greater 

 interval, we may expect to witness an elevation of the money value 

 of commodities imported into the Colony, with a corresponding rise 

 of prices in England and the other countries whence those imported 

 commodities are derived." 



What Mr. Sterling confidently looked forward to in 1852 has 

 now actually taken place in England, the States, and Canada. 



From the figures furnished in Mr. Latrobe's despatches, it appears 

 that the money wages of labour rose more than 100 per cent., and 

 that the rise in the price of provisions was equally great. In other 

 words, the purchasing power, or the value of gold, as compared with 

 the things enumerated in that list, suddenly fell on the average 

 about 50 per cent. The cause and the measure of this fall in the 

 value of gold was the reduction of its cost of production in the 

 Colony. The average quantity of gold which a labourer could earn 

 at the diggings became in an incredibly short time the measure of 

 the value of a day's labour, and that quantity of gold would, there- 

 fore, only exchange for the produce of a day's labour applied in any 

 other way — an allowance, of course, being made for the severity and 

 uncertainty of the gold digger's toil. 



The average sum gained at the gold fields was estimated, at the 

 period referred to in Mr. Latrobe's despatches at £1 per day, and 

 consequently this sum appears to have been but little above the 

 average amount paid to a common day labourer. It is, indeed, 

 worthy of remark that the wages of common labourers ranged, at least 



