In the United States there was no charge for seigniorage on gold and silver to 1853, when one half of one per cent was charged as interest on the delay if coin was immediately delivered on the deposit of bullion; in 1873 it was reduced to one fifth of one per cent; and in 1875, by a provision of the Resumption Act, it was wholly abolished (the depositor, however, paying for the copper alloy). For the trade-dollars, as was consistent with their being only coined ingots and not legal money, a seigniorage was charged equal simply to the expense of coinage, which was one and a quarter per cent at Philadelphia, and one and a half per cent at San Francisco on the tale value. § 2. —Which is determined by the cost of production. The value of money, then, conforms permanently, and in a state of freedom almost immediately, to the value of the metal of which it is made; with the addition, or not, of the expenses of coinage, according as those expenses are borne by the individual or by the state. To the majority of civilized countries gold and silver are foreign products: and the circumstances which govern the values of foreign products present some questions which we are not yet ready to examine. For the present, therefore, we must suppose the country which is the subject of our inquiries to be supplied with gold and silver by its own mines [as in the case of the United States], reserving for future consideration how far our conclusions require modification to adapt them to the more usual case.