cable to gold, in all
probability, for a long period of time.

The fact is, that the increase of commodities has been, in many
instances, far greater than the increase of population. In 1740, the
total quantity of iron made in Great Britain was 17,350 tons; in the
following hundred years, this quantity increased considerably more
than a hundredfold, being estimated at the later period at above
2,000,000 tons. In 1801, the Cornish tin-mines produced 2328 tons of
metal; it took only thirty years to double their annual amount. The
same is more than true of the copper-mines of Cornwall, which produced
in 1801, 5267 tons; and after thirty years, 11,224 tons. In 1828, the
quantity of sheep's wool imported from Australia was 1,574,186 lbs.;
in 1850, it was 39,018,228 lbs. In 1801, the coals shipped from
Newcastle were 1,331,870 tons; in fifty years more than
double--namely, 2,977,385 tons. These are only a few examples gleaned
from many of a similar description, and to them we will only add the
fact, of a kind totally new in the world's annals, that a sum
approaching to a moiety of the national debt is now invested in
railways in England alone--namely, upwards of L.350,000,000.

By a late police report, it appears that 60,000 houses have been added
to the metropolis of England in the last ten years. These would alone
form a large city, requiring much gold and silver for money and
luxury; and in this question of gold, the requisitions of luxury must
not be forgotten; they form an important item, and are commensurate
with the necessity for coin.

'When,' said Adam Smith, 'the wealth of any country increases, when
the annual produce of its labour becomes gradually greater and
greater, a quantity of coin becomes necessary, in order to circulate a
greater quantity of commodities; and the people as they can afford it,
as they have more commodities to give for it, will naturally purchase
a greater and greater quantity of plate. The quantity of their coin
will increase from necessity, the quantity of their plate from vanity
and ostentation, or from the same reason that the quantity of fine
statues, pictures, and of every other luxury and curiosity, is likely
to increase among them. But as statuaries and painters are not likely
to be worse rewarded in times of wealth and prosperity than in times
of poverty and depression, so gold and silver are not likely to be
worse paid for.'

It may, indeed, be predicted with tolerable certaint