or manufactures for two shillings and fourpence worth of
copper, although the copper were melted down, and that we could get five
shillings in gold or silver for the said goods, yet to take the said two
shillings and fourpence in copper would be greatly for our advantage."

And Lastly, He makes us a very fair offer, as empowered by Wood, that
"if we will take off two hundred thousand pounds in his halfpence for
our goods, and likewise pay him three _per cent_. interest for thirty
years, for an hundred and twenty thousand pounds (at which he computes
the coinage above the intrinsic value of the copper) for the loan of his
coin, he, will after that time give us good money for what halfpence
will be then left."

Let me place this offer in as clear a light as I can to shew the
unsupportable villainy and impudence of that incorrigible wretch. First
(says he) "I will send two hundred thousand pounds of my coin into your
country, the copper I compute to be in real value eighty thousand
pounds, and I charge you with an hundred and twenty thousand pounds for
the coinage; so that you see I lend you an hundred and twenty thousand
pounds for thirty years, for which you shall pay me three _per cent_.
That is to say three thousand six hundred pounds _per ann_. which in
thirty years will amount to an hundred and eight thousand pounds. And
when these thirty years are expired, return me my copper and I will give
you good money for it."

This is the proposal made to us by Wood in that pamphlet written by one
of his commissioners; and the author is supposed to be the same infamous
Coleby one of his under-swearers at the committee of council, who was
tried for robbing the treasury here, where he was an under-clerk.[23]

[Footnote 23: See note on p. 61. [T.S.]]

By this proposal he will first receive two hundred thousand pounds, in
goods or sterling for as much copper as he values at eighty thousand
pounds, but in reality not worth thirty thousand pounds. Secondly, He
will receive for interest an hundred and eight thousand pounds. And when
our children came thirty years hence to return his halfpence upon his
executors (for before that time he will be probably gone to his own
place) those executors will very reasonably reject them as raps and
counterfeits, which probably they will be, and millions of them of his
own coinage.

Methinks I am fond of such a dealer as this who mends every day upon our
hands, like a Dutch reckoning, where i