ast half a million. I dare say your Pa is worth as much as that?"

"I have not the least idea he is worth a fourth of it, though I do not
pretend to know. To me half a million of dollars seems a great deal of
money, and I know my father considers himself poor--poor, at least, for
one of his station. But what were you about to say of political
economy? I am curious to hear how THAT can have any thing to do with
your handkerchief."

"Why, my dear, in this manner. You know a distribution of labor is the
source of all civilization--that trade is an exchange of
equivalents--that custom-houses fetter these equivalents--that nothing
which is fettered is free--"

"My dear Eudosia, what IS your tongue running on?"

"You will not deny, Clara, that any thing which is fettered is not
free? And that freedom is the greatest blessing of this happy country;
and that trade ought to be as free as any thing else?"

All this was gibberish to Clara Caverly, who understood the phrases,
notwithstanding, quite as well as the friend who was using them.
Political economy is especially a science of terms; and free trade, as
a branch of it is called, is just the portion of it which is indebted
to them the most. But Clara had not patience to hear any more of the
unintelligible jargon which has got possession of the world to-day,
much as Mr. Pitt's celebrated sinking-fund scheme for paying off the
national debt of Great Britain did, half a century since, and under
very much the same influences; and she desired her friend to come at
once to the point, as connected with the pocket-handkerchief.

{Mr. Pitt's celebrated sinking-fund = Sir William Pitt "the younger"
(1759-1806), when he became Prime Minister in 1784, sought to raise
taxes in order to pay off the British national debt}

"Well, then," resumed Eudosia, "it is connected in this way. The
luxuries of the rich give employment to the poor, and cause money to
circulate. Now this handkerchief of mine, no doubt, has given
employment to some poor French girl for four or five months, and, of
course, food and raiment. She has earned, no doubt, fifty of the
hundred dollars I have paid. Then the custom-house--ah, Clara, if it
were not for that vile custom-house, I might have had the handkerchief
for at least five-and-twenty dollars lower----!"

"In which case you would have prized it five-and-twenty times less,"
answered Clara, smiling archly.

"THAT is true; yes, free trade, after all, does N