A comparison of the foregoing regulations leads to the following general questions :

First, should there be more than one standard of value? This question has already been discussed in these pages; to the arguments already given in favour of a single standard it may be added that its advantages are now very generally admitted, and that there are indications of a desire to adopt gold only in most of those countries which still retain a double standard. The parties to the Latin Convention have recently limited the issue of the silver five-franc piece; and the measure was in fact necessitated by the very cause which we have adduced as the most cogent reason against such a system. At the date of the Convention gold was valued with respect to silver as 15 1/2 to 1, and the relative weights of the silver and gold five-franc pieces were established according to that ratio. But the recent demonetization of silver in Germany and Scandinavia, together with the use of a forced paper currency in Russia and Austria, the chief European countries which maintain a silver standard, have caused a very rapid depreciation of this metal. In 1872 the average price of 1 oz. of silver of the English standard was 60 5/16 pence, and the market relation of gold to silver was therefore that of 15.63 to 1; the average price in 1875 was only 56 7/8 pence, and gold stood to silver in the relation of 16.58 to 1; and in July, 1876, silver fell below 47 pence, gold being thus more than twenty times as valuable as silver! A considerable recovery has indeed followed this remarkable depreciation, but the statistics we have given are sufficient to show the necessity for the limitation of the five-franc piece in order to prevent the exportation of gold coin, and it seems probable that this measure is no distant precursor to the final adoption of gold as the sole standard of value in France and the countries associated with her.

* Eckfeldt and Dubois, p. 95.

Secondly, the question as to the metal best adapted for the purpose of a measure of value is now almost at rest. For many years after the discovery of the mines of America, silver was the standard of the commercial world; on the other hand, since the great discoveries of gold, in California and Australia, that metal has been almost universally adopted, and is now, in every continent but Asia, the medium of international exchange. This fact and the decided advantage that gold possesses on account of its greater value, sufficiently decide the point, and render any detailed examination of the respective merits of the two metals unnecessary.

Thirdly, should the coinage be performed free of charge to the importer? This question has perhaps been discussed more fully than any other in connection with the subject, and very opposite views have been expressed.

The majority of English writers are in favour of the charge; recently, however, the balance of opinion appears to be against it. The grounds on which it is supported are, first, that the value of a manufactured article is always greater than that of the raw material, and that it is therefore only fair that the importer should pay for the conversion of his bullion; and, secondly, that if no charge is levied, standard bullion being thereby rendered equal to its weight in coin, the fluctuations of the market-price offer opportunities to money-jobbers and others to make a profit at the expense of the country by melting down their coin into bullion for export when the market value is higher than the Mint price.

It is on the other hand advanced that a charge for coinage is equally unadvisable and unfair-unadvisable in that it increases the cost of production, drives away foreign gold, and encourages exportation, and unfair because it condemns the merchant to pay for a process in which every one is equally interested with himself, since the coin passes from hand to hand, and rapidly becomes common property. These reasons seem sufficiently to dispose of the first of the above objections to free coinage. With regard to the second, we venture to think that it has no foundation in a country where there is only one standard of value. When such an argument is brought forward with respect to England, it is, we believe, founded on the misunderstanding occasioned by the false use of the word 'price.' There can really be no such thing as a price for a metal where that metal is the only standard. Were silver a standard metal of the country, to say that the price of a pound troy of standard gold is £46 14s. 6d. would mean that it was worth 934 1/2 silver shillings, but, as it is, it amounts to nothing more than saying that the price of a thing is itself, or, for example, that the price of a ton of coals is a ton of coals of the same quality. It must be clearly understood that £46 14s. 6d. is properly only another name for one pound troy of standard gold. In the words of Locke, who, writing nearly two centuries ago, advocated silver as the standard of value, "an ounce of silver, whether in pence, groats, or crown pieces, stivers or ducatoons, or bullion, is, and always eternally will be, of equal value to any other ounce of silver under what stamp or denomination soever."* It is true that coin is never quite worth its nominal value, because the importer of bullion loses on the unexpressed fractions of the weight and assay, and it may therefore happen that a foreign country in great need of gold will offer a premium on bullion; but it is obvious that this premium will never exceed the amount of loss entailed by the melting down of sovereigns purchased at their nominal value, and therefore holds out no inducement to such a course. We shall presently have occasion to view the question of free coinage from another point.

* Letter to a Member of Parliament in 1691.

Fourthly, what regulations should exist as to the legal weight of worn coins, and who should bear the loss ? This question also has undergone much discussion. According to one theory, the loss should be borne by the Government, because it has occurred while the coins were performing the function of a circulating medium; this is the rule in the United States, Germany, Scandinavia, Russia, and Holland, and it is worth noticing that the loss to the United States in the year 1872-3 on the abrasion of gold coin was little more than 1/2 per cent.* In this country, Turkey, Portugal, Egypt, and Japan, the law throws the loss on the last holders, and the case is practically the same in France and the other countries belonging to the Latin Convention, though there is no law on the subject. The seeming unfairness of this system to some extent disappears when it is considered that it really affects the large bankers only, who look upon the loss as one belonging to their business. An interesting report by the late Mr. Graham, Master of the Mint, and Colonel Smith, formerly Master of the Calcutta Mint, entertains the question, "What would it cost, first to manufacture the gold currency, and afterwards to keep it in good condition for all time?" In the course of this inquiry it is mentioned that the original cost of the manufacture of each sovereign now issued is about 1/2d., an estimate almost identical with 2.1 per mille, which is the fixed charge for coining gold in France. The quantity of gold at present circulating in the United Kingdom is valued at £80,000,000, + composed of 68,000,000