"In order to make my plan as clear as possible, I shall run the risk of seeming elementary by running through, step by step, a typical transaction under it: Let us fancy that the reader, bearing a nugget of gold in his left hand and another of silver in his right, and desiring to convert them into money, repairs to the Philadelphia mint. He applies there to the proper clerk, who, for simplicity's sake, we will suppose performs all the operations. The clerk weighs and assays the two pieces of metal, and finds the gold one to contain 25,800 grains of standard gold, worth precisely $1,000, which are counted out in bills. A similar operation reveals that the lump of silver weighs 35,500 grains, but the clerk is observed to consult a table before saying: 'The market equivalent of a gold dollar is to-day 710 grains; consequently your 35,500 grains are worth $50;' and he then proceeds to count out the money in bills precisely like those given in payment for the gold. Upon examining these at his leisure, the reader discovers imprinted thereon a contract running as follows: 'This note entitles the bearer on demand to [the denomination of the bill] dollars in gold or to the market equivalent thereof in silver.'" This paragraph needs only to be critically examined in order to show forth the material of which it is builded. Mr. Lepper takes his two nuggets, the one of gold and the other of silver. He goes to the mint. The gold nugget weighs 25,800 grains; the silver nugget weighs 35,500 grains. Mr. Lepper adroitly slips in the clause that the gold nugget is "_worth precisely a thousand dollars!_" In what units is the gold nugget worth a thousand dollars? Why, in gold units. He says that the 35,500 grains of silver are found to be worth $50. In what units is that amount of silver worth $50? Why, in gold units! That is, beginning with the gold standard, and ignoring the silver standard, Mr. Lepper reaches bimetallism! That is good. He assumes, to begin with, the thing he is trying to prove! He assumes it in his major premise, implies it in his minor premise, and reaches it in his conclusion. I say that is very good. Twenty-five thousand eight hundred grains of gold are "worth precisely $1,000," in gold dollars at the rate of 25.8 grains to the dollar. Well, I should say so. The same would be true of tin, of leather, or tree-molasses. Only assume that something is a standard, and then measure that something by itself and you will get there. Mr. Lepper gets there. Then again he assumes that the market equivalent of the gold dollar at the date referred to, is 710 grains of silver; therefore, 35,500 grains of silver are worth just $50 in gold. Forsooth, it requires a philosopher to tell us that; though a country schoolboy might make it out just as well. It is only a problem in the rule of three. We assume that silver is worth so much in gold; therefore, so much silver will be worth so much in gold! That is, gold is the standard; but we are