Before silver was demonetized, we were under the burden of an enormous national debt, but every dollar of this was payable in silver. The stimulated demand for gold, and, consequently, its increase in value, was not the only gain to England. She now buys our cheap silver bullion, exchanges it at its coinage value for products in the silver-using countries of Asia, Africa and South America, and nets a profit of over one hundred per cent. by the transaction. We then buy from her at gold prices and pay with gold or products at prices which, by forcing us into competition with the world, England fixes herself. 7. =The Resumption of Specie Payment.= (January 14, 1875.) This law provided for the retirement of the fractional currency ($45,000,000) and the legal-tender treasury notes, their places to be supplied by national bank notes, which are not a legal tender between man and man. The name “specie payment” is simply a blind; it does not mean anything; to get rid of the much despised greenback was the real object of the act. The moneyed aristocracy had long ago confessed their inability to “control” the “greenback as it is called.” Had the provisions of this law been carried out, it would have added to our annual interest charge about twenty millions of dollars. 8. =The Sherman Purchasing Clause.= (July 14, 1890.) This act was a miserable makeshift or substitute for a free coinage bill. It provided for the purchase of not less than 2,000,000 nor more than 4,500,000 ounces of silver bullion per month, 2,000,000 ounces of which was to be coined each month into silver dollars until July 1, 1891. Instead of redeeming the treasury notes issued in the purchase of silver with their equivalent in silver, upon the demand of the holder, the Secretary of the Treasury was required to redeem these notes in gold or silver coin at his discretion. The legal-tender power of the silver dollar was modified so as to read: “Except otherwise expressly stipulated in the contract.” In 1893 President Cleveland called Congress together in extraordinary session to consider the financial condition of the country. November 1, 1893, the Sherman law was repealed, leaving us on a single gold basis. [Illustration] V. FINANCIAL AUTHORITIES. “Above all things good policy is to be used, that the treasures and money of the state be not gathered into a few hands; for, otherwise, a state may have great stock and yet starve. And money is like muck, not good unless spread. This is done by suppressing, or at least keeping a strait hand upon the devouring trade of usury, engrossing, great pasturages and the like.”—BACON.