Page:Craik History of British Commerce Vol 1.djvu/89

Rh ," observes Mr. Macpherson, "if the weigh contained then, as now, 182 pounds of wool, near three-fourths of a [Saxon] penny (equivalent to nearly twopence in modern money) for a pound; a price which, as far as we are enabled to compare it with the prices of other articles, may be thought high."

Of the prices of articles, however, in the Anglo-Saxon times, with the exception of some articles of agricultural produce, we scarcely know anything. Money being then comparatively scarce, the prices of most commodities were of course much lower than they now are—that is to say, they might be purchased for a much smaller amount of money. But there is no uniform proportion between the prices of that period and those of the present day, some things being nominally dearer than they now are, as well as many others nominally cheaper. Books, for instance, were still scarcer than money; and accordingly their prices were then vastly higher than at present. It follows, that no correct estimate can be formed of the proportion generally between the value of money in those times and its value at present; for the calculation that might be true of some articles would not hold in regard to others.