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But he will inspect all the Joint-Stock Companies , permit and forbid , guide and control the credit . England has a gold currency , and he will have a gold currency for Trance ; sending away the silver displaced by the Substitution . He has taught the parsimonious " French to throw their savings upon . : the waters of commerce . And what are the results of this special Providence , self-elected , claiming to rule all France , its mercantile , local , and individual -affairs , from Paris ? The effecb has been , an hysterical fit of speculation from one end of France to the other . The Credit Mobilier is
mocked in every quarter , till all Trance is bubbles . Paris is converted to a capital of palaces , 6500 houses substituted for 1500 pulled down . Employment was given to the workmen ; but then the substitution , of palaces for hotels raised , the price of lodgings . Whole streets of magnificent palaces are to let at immense rents ; but they remain 'to let . ' The property has vastly increased in value—on paper ; but the positive income is
not proportionate ; The work of construction must come to an end , and then there will be an end of wages ; the workman must begin to hunger , and " Bread ! " has been heard as the cry in . one of those conspiracies which the French . Government is so frequently putting -down . But if the workmen begin to want bread , if the landlord of the building speculation begins to want tenants and rent , if the bubble compaaiies begin to burst , even the sound trade "that has been created
in France will begin to share the pressure ; and commerce , like the democracy , will find that no earthly Providence can . secure the daily bread of the workman , or manage the trade of an entire country . The reaction has begun .: the cry-of " Bread ! " has been heard , and while the Bank is raising its rate of discount to 6 per cent ., snares are tumbling .
" When the Koyal British Bank closed its doors , Alderman Kennedt , Mr . Esdaile , and several other very honest and substantial men found their property sacrificed and their name called in question . When the swindle of Josura Wiwixle Coie exploded , some of the most respectable and substantial houses in the City had somehow or other got mixed up in winking at strange practices . Mr . Malcolm La . in& , a merchant , came before the world with a romance of real life ; the
ever , a real extension of trade in Frauce , and there has been a still more vast expansion of trade in this country . Silver has been demanded in the far East , to supply the wants of the native Hindoos , whose condition is much better than , it was ; to supply capital for an increasing British trade in . India ; to pay for more tea which our comfortable people at home want front China ; to meet new trades in flax , hemp , and seeds , substituted for similar trades suppressed during the war with Russia . But it has been
reckoned that the sending of 2 , 5 OO , O 00 Z . of silver by the last three mails will have gone far to fill up that ¦ void . The demand for money in this country is occasioned partly by the want of' accommodation' for the over-traders in France and Grermany ; but the major part of our trade is perfectly sound . We have extended it in immense proportions over the whole globe ; we have to find more capital for shipping , for goods , for wages , in every quarter of the world , but the exchanges of commodities are substantial . The increase of
our wealth is shown in the increase of the revenue beyond the proportion of taxes ; in the increase of our exports ; and , in short , in the amount which we produce and consume at home . All . this is true ; the present pressure will be only temporary . Those who have means will only be called upon to make sacrifices ^ If , for example , they have no income this year , they will only have to draw so much out of their capital . In France , after the panic , they will wind up , and the whole community will be richer than it was before .
But what of tlie poor ? What of the industrious classes ? What if wages stop , or are diminished to one-half during the extreme pressure ? It is very easy to go without wine and pastry for six months , but it is not so easy to go without dinner for six days . The money pressure stabs into the very vitals of those who live from hand to mouth , upon money , and ready money too .
The " period of prosperity" is all very well for those who will have to repair their fortunes j but bow are some of these poor and helpless creatures to survive it at all ? The ^ Registrar-General will account for some of them ; and in the number of those who are lost , we shall see the penalty incurred by France , and by her accomplice , official England , for letting one bold man undertake the duties of an enrthly Providence .
connexions of Davidson and Gobdoit sustained painfnl family mortification's ; and hundreds of honest people were driven to pain and penury by the fraud , which , while it lasted , converted the perpetrators into temporary princes . John Sadleib was for a time a potentate of money ; srad when he lay with his face to the stars on Hampstead Heath , thousands who had honestly worked for their bread found ruin come upon them . "What is true of individuals iB true of States . If we have business transactions with those who
are bankrupt and fraudulent , we shall suffer from bankruptcy and fraud . If the system explodes in France , those who have business relations with France will suffer from the explosion . We shall Burvive , of course , and France will exist after the shock is over ; but the pnin and suffering will fall upon those classes who are the least able to defeat it .
Men who are learned in money matters explain the nature of the crisis in the City , and show ua that a time of prosperity will return after the pressure . Their explanation la true . The immense influx of gold from the new gold countries has altered the relations ot the preoioua metala in Europe ; has partly suggested and partly compelled the adoption ot a gold circuWtioi in France , as it Jil lprobably do m Belgium and Germany ; tW . £ ? i T the t 6 X aTl Previously set them by the Levant . There has been , how-
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radical , and searching nature , is imperatively demanded ,- and must , sooner or later , come to pass . We are now in tlie still waters of the recess , and tlie House of Commons no longer rings with the indignant interpellations of honourable members engaged in the patriotic task of denouncing the corrupt manner in which patronage is used ; but , because we hear nothing about tlie matter in this particular
quarter , we are not , therefore , to conclude that the evil has ceased to exist , or that it is not ten times more active for the fact that the principal mouthpiece of this self-governed nation is gagged . We , casting about in our quiet way , and keeping our ears open to what is going on in the world , have picked up one or two little facts a proposoi the matter , and without further preface shall proceed to serve them , up for the delecta tion of our readers- .
It is not the late appointments in the Church that we are about to refer to . It is just possible that the brother of Lord Clarendon and the brother and brother-inlaw of the ChanceijXOh . or the Exchequer were the very fittest persons in . the Church for the lucrative offices to which they have lately been appointed , and ,-at any rate , we have no positive charge of unfitness to "bring against them . Let them pass ; the game at which we axe pointing is of quite a different nature .
Here is our first story . Be it known that there is at the present moment a Board of Inspectors appointed to exercise certain functions , not Very onerous in . their nature , and consequently ( for there is a sort of consistency in these matters ) uncommonly well paid for . It should be admitted , however , that up to within a very short period , the gentlemen , composing that Board exercised their duties with perfect propriety , and received their salaries with praiseworthy punctuality , until , the other day , they were
startled out of their dignified composure by learning that two new colleagues had been appointed : seven men , in fact , to do what five had done fill too easily . The previous members of the Board did not know liow to take this . Was it a reflection upon the manner in which they had performed their duties ? That could not be ; for one of the gentlemen appointed was utterly ignorant ot everything connected with his future duties .
Inquiry brought light . One of the gentlemen on whose behalf the appointments had been made was professionally employed aa electioneering agent by a member having great interest with the Government , who , doubtless , thought this the best way of discharging that document so troublesome to all rising politicians , his electioneering bill ; the other was a naturalized foreigner , whose only qualification was that he was "blessed with a
ANECDOTES OE PATRONAGE . It may be fairly objected to popular cries that they are apt to degenerate into mere cant phrases , or else to become converted into stalking-horses behind wliich political adventurers conceal their interested purposes . The old lady who held " Refobm" to be a removal of the tax upon sugar , may be a fair sample of the intelligence with which certain classes echo a party cry ; but it must be admitted , nevertheless , that the thing was wanted none the less because some of its supporters understood it imperfectly , or nob at all . Just so with this cry about Patronage , jobbery in
high places , the rottenness of our system , nepotism , and the thousand other forms which corruption assumes to work out its own selfish ends ; the cry may be a little vague , the notions of the objectors somewhat loose as to the beat method of bringing about a new order of things , Mr . La . ya . kd may make a blunder or two in details , and the Reform Association may bluster much and effect little ; but a p lain man , at all acquainted with the composition , of public affairs in the present day , and having no special reason to think otherwise than as his unbiassed judgment points , can entertain no reasonable cloubt that lieform , aud that of the most complete
pretty wife who had made herself agreeable to a certain noble lord dear to Cupid . So much for the top of the tree ; let us take a peep at what is going on at the roots . Not many weeks ago , a young gentleman , y ' on of a respectable City merchant , startled his family by announcing that he did not intorni to follow any longer the profession to which he had been , bred , and in answer to an inquiry as to his intentions , replied that he " should
like to have a government appointment , with four or five hundred a year . " Further question elicited that a fair lady ( whose character may best be indicated by stating that she lived as a spinster sole , without any visible means , in the neighbourhood of St . John ' s Wood ) had offered , to procure him Buch a place , on " being presented with fifteen hundred pounds . It was also established beyond the shadow of a doubt that the lady promised no more than she could perform , or than
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948 THE LEAD 1 E . _ [ No , 341 , Satukpay ,
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Oct. 4, 1856, page 948, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2161/page/12/
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