which is restricted to the natural and normal ebb and flow of the precious metals, due to the action of bimetallic law. The operation of debasing a coinage—of lowering it, that is, so far and so arbitrarily as to remove it at once from the action of natural law of prices ruling around—means an arrestation of natural economic processes and laws, and the events which follow thereupon stand apart from such laws and ought to be treated as so separate. In reality, debasements always favoured the action of this malignant bimetallic law, and the fact might possibly lead one to attribute to the normal action of a natural law what is in three-fourths of it due to arbitrary action of government.
It would be, therefore, unfair to treat of debasements in a history of bimetallism.
Given, however, the above standpoint, and mental reservation of deduction and innuendo, it is permissible to treat of this debasement as showing how or in what way a debasement does actually facilitate the malignant action of bimetallic law.6 Further, the present Page 123 instance of debasement is the only one on record in English currency history, and the testimonies regarding it are of extreme interest.
For the purpose of external or foreign trade, a debasement of currency is fatuous and pernicious. The coins are estimated at their content of pure metal, and the international exchange is so rated. The consequence is an