Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 10.djvu/292

284 within my knowledge or conjecture. The first point is, that we shall be always sure of receiving good copper, equal in bulk and fineness to the best English halfpence.

The second point is, to know what allowance he makes to himself, either out of the weight or mixture of his copper, or both, for the charge of coinage. As to the weight, the matter is easy by his own scheme; for, as I have said before, he proposes forty-eight to weigh a pound, which he gives you for two shillings, and receives it by the pound at twentypence: so that, supposing pure copper to be fourteenpence a pound, he makes you pay 30 per cent for the labour of coining, as I have already observed, beside 16 per cent when he sells it. But if to this he adds any alloy, to debase the metal, although it be not above 10 per cent; then Mr. Culla's promissory notes will, to the intrinsick value of the metal, be above 47 per cent discount.

For, subtracting 10 per cent off sixty pounds worth of copper, it will (to avoid fractions) be about five and a half per cent in the whole 100l., which, added to

That we are under great distress for change; and that Mr. Culla's copper notes, on supposition of the metal being pure, are less liable to objection than the project of Wood, may be granted: but such a discount, where we are not sure even of our twentypence a pound, appears hitherto a dead weight on his scheme. Since