rrent
monometallist position that the nations are now as one in trade and the
interchange of the precious metals, and therefore even the partial
equilibrium of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries could not be
maintained. Let us, then, bring the figures down to the present, and it
will be found, I think, that the farther down we come the weaker does the
monometallist contention appear.

The improved, more extended, and more intimate intercourse of the nations
brought about by the introduction of steam, electricity, and other
agencies tends to minimize the fluctuations of the two metals, and
indicates that the divergences of the metals in mediaeval times was due
rather to the want of speedy, easy, and certain intercourse and
communication of the nations than to an innate commercial tendency of the
two metals to diverge. Had the same intimate and speedy commercial
relation existed between the nations of the world in those times as now
exists, the equalizing tendencies of trade would evidently have prevented
not only the ratio of divergence to which the metals attained at different
periods, but would have prevented a difference of ratio existing between
the different nations at the same period of time.

From 1761 to 1800, inclusive, the relative production of gold decreased
steadily, until it was but 23.4 per cent. of the total value, to 76.6 per
cent. of silver. In other words, there were for many of the later years
over 50 ounces of silver produced to 1 of gold, and yet the ratio stood
long at 15.68 to 1. This is almost exactly the ratio fixed by Hamilton and
Jefferson, fixed because of its long-continued maintenance in European
markets. During these forty years the production of silver in proportion
to gold was never for even one year as low as the highest proportion of
any year since 1873, and yet the money value only varied from 14.42 to
15.72, or a fraction over 8 per cent. In the face of such figures as
these, the change in relative production since 1873 seems too trifling to
be taken into account, especially since in that year and some time after
the value production of gold at 16 to 1 was much the greater, nor was it
till 1883 that the world's silver product exceeded that of gold.

In 1800-10 the annual production of gold was $12,069,000 and of silver
almost exactly $39,000,000, or some 50 ounces to 1; yet the highest ratio
was 16.08, and the lowest 15.26. This relative production changed very
slowly, and in