"It is not right to pay laboring men in a depreciated currency; it is a still greater wrong that there is a discount on silver. It is the steadiest measure of values that mankind has ever found; it is the only metal that three-fifths of the human race can measure their daily transactions in; its full adoption by our Government, as a measure of values and basis of money, would mean prosperity; its rejection during the past five years and the denying to it its old sovereignty, have wrought incalculable loss. "Here on the Comstock it sleeps in the same matrix with gold, the proportion in bullion being about forty-four per cent. gold to fifty-six per cent. silver. The Nation cannot make a better adjustment than to keep that proportion good in her securities. Five years ago silver commanded a premium over gold. Since then two dollars in gold to one in silver have been taken from the earth, but silver is at a discount, because through unwise if not dishonest legislation, its sovereignty as a measure of values, its recognition as money was taken away. The whole burden was put upon gold, and the result is that the purchasing power of gold has been enhanced, and silver is, or seems to be, at a discount. Those who have accomplished this wrong affect to scorn the proposition that legislation could restore to silver its old value, ignoring the fact that the present apparent depreciation is due entirely to unfriendly legislation, and conveniently forgetting that with silver, everything else is at a discount when measured by gold. That is, gold is inflated by the discriminations which have been made in its favor. The chief use of silver in the world is for a measure of values, as the chief use of wheat is for material out of which to make bread. Were men forbidden to make any more bread from wheaten flour and compelled to use corn meal as a substitute, would the present prices of wheat and corn remain respectively the same?