Page:The Economic Journal Volume 1.djvu/179

 Rh they would not at once be converted from rumour into facts, or feel sure that he would at once receive coin for his bullion. Such a holder might then well have been willing to abate his pretensions, and take a shade less for his Silver than its shipment to Paris would produce in normal times; and this the holder of a bill of lading for Silver, who could only sell for forward delivery, would be certain to do.

Is it possible, then, that this trifling fall from the par price of 60¼d. should have caused France to close its Mint to Silyer? I add a table of prices from 1827 to 1850 (see Appendix p. 161) by which it will be seen that during that period of twenty-four years there was a fall—

In the year 1848 the price of Silver, possibly owing to political disturbances, had fallen to 1¾d. below the par price; but neither then nor at any other period when the fall was almost as great did we hear of any project for closing the Mint to Silver.

There was a very sufficient cause for the limitation of the coinage of Silver. The French War Indemnity had been fixed at £200,000,000 sterling to be paid to Germany, and as Germany had determined to demonetise Silver it was to be expected that the greater part of the Silver which the Indemnity would enable her to set free, would come to the Paris Mint for coinage. France had already coined in 1873 five-franc pieces to the amount cf about six millions sterling, an amount only exceeded in 1834 and 1849, and greater by about five millions than the average of the previous ten years. There may well, therefore, have been hesitation to coin the undefined, but unquestionably large amount of Silver which the action of Germany would almost certainly have thrown upon the Paris Mint.

It is clear, then, that the real cause of the suspension of Silver coinage in 1873-5 was not the insignificant fall of the price