Great Britain -- Description and travel; Great Britain -- Rural conditions
Mr. Canning's despatch, which I shall insert below, has, doubtless, had
a tendency (whether expected or not) to prop up the credit of these
sublime speculations. The propping up of the credit of them can,
however, do no sort of good. The keeping up the price of them for the
present may assist some of the actual speculators, but it can do nothing
for the speculation in the end, and this speculation, which was wholly
an effect of the Small-note Bill, will finally have a most ruinous
effect. How is it to be otherwise? Have we ever received any evidence,
or anything whereon to build a belief, that the interest on these bonds
will be paid? Never; and the man must be mad; mad with avarice or a love
of gambling, that could advance his money upon any such a thing as these
bonds. The fact is, however, that it was not _money_: it was paper: it
was borrowed, or created, for the purpose of being advanced. Observe,
too, that when the loans were made, money was at a lower value than it
is now; therefore, those who would have to pay the interest, would have
too much to pay if they were to fulfil their engagement. Mr. Canning's
State Paper clearly proves to me, that the main object of it is to make
the loans to South America finally be paid, because, if they be not
paid, not only is the amount of them lost to the bond-holders, but there
is an end, at once, to all that brilliant _commerce_ with which that
shining Minister appears to be so much enchanted. All the silver and
gold, all the Mexican and Peruvian dreams vanish in an instant, and
leave behind the wretched Cotton-Lords and wretched Jews and Jobbers to
go to the workhouse, or to Botany Bay. The whole of the loans are said
to amount to about twenty-one or twenty-two millions. It is supposed,
that twelve millions have actually been sent out in goods. These goods
have perhaps been paid for here, but they have been paid for out of
English money or by English promises. The money to pay with has come
from those who gave money for the South American bonds, and these
bond-holders are to be repaid, if repaid at all, _by the South
Americans_. If not paid at all, then England will have sent away twelve
millions worth of goods for nothing; and this would be the Scotch way of
obtaining enormous advantages for the country by laying out its
"_surplus capital_" in foreign loans. I shall conclude this subject by
inserting a letter which I find in the _Morning Chronicle_, of the 18th
instant. I perfectly agree with the writer. The Editor of the _Morning
Chronicle_ does not, as appears by the remark which he makes at the head
of it; but I shall insert the whole, his remark and all, and add a
remark or two of my own.--[See _Register_, vol. 56, p. 556.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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