postmaster of the district in which the debtor, resides. The account is given to the postman to collect on his rounds, and if the money is paid, the postmaster deducts, if the sum is 10of. or above (the maximum allowed is 500f.), 25 centimes for himself, 25 centimes for the pos man, and then sends the balance on to the creditor by a post office order, charging, of course, the cost of the order, which is one per cent. of the amount. If the sum collected is less than toof., the fee for the postmaster and letter carrier is fixed at 5 centimes per 20f. each; in no case can they receive more than 25 centimes each. The charge for the envelope is invariable at 25 centimes. To take two examples: For a sum of 6of collected, the charges would be, envelope, 25c.; postmaster and postman each, 15c.; money order, 6oc.; total, 1f. 15c., for a sum of 500f., envelope, 25c; the two fees of 25c. each; money order at I per cent., 5f.; total, 5f. 75c. If the account is not paid on presentation the postmaster will return it by post without charge. The post office will not undertake to make protest in case of non-payment, although this appears to be done in Belgium; nor will it accept part payments on account. The system will be first applied only to the chief towns of departments, but will be gradually extended to all the localities having a postmaster. An article of the bill also authorizes the post offices to receive subscriptions to newspapers, charging three per cent. for the service." Not only is this in itself a most important step, but it presents additional evidence that as systems of civilization advance to higher planes the functions of government become greater and more varied, the State of necessity taking cognizance of affairs which it had previously regarded as not within its province. In Great Britain the reigning school of doctrinaires has, within the past half century, preached the dogma of laissez faire with such success that the State, while interfering in the domestic trade and intercourse of the people to so great an extent that it has recently been decided that a country clergyman could not daily sell a small quantity of milk to one of his neighbors without taking out a license as a dealer, has almost entirely abdicated all right to interfere with the trade between foreigners and its own sorely-taxed subjects. While this dogma the economic soundness. of which has been put forward with much confidence, has reigned supreme over foreign trade, Great Britain has, nevertheless, in common with other Powers, moved forward to the performance of new and higher functions demanded by an advancing civilization-such as the institution of the postal-money-order system, the postal saving banks, the absorption of the telegraphs, the interference in sanitary affairs, the prevention of the importation of diseased cattle, the destruction, at the public expense, of domestic ones which are diseased, or which are of diseased herds, and, finally, the recent erection of Epping Forest into an immense public park. The absorption of the railroads by the State has also been advocated with much ability, and will, doubtless, in time be consummated. Unless, too, her agricultural system, and with it her landed aristocracy, is to be overthrown, she must interfere to protect her agriculture against the effects of the stupidity and the wickedness of our rulers, who, while subordinating our societary life to an arbitrarily fixed and wholly inadequate volume of money, even then persistently and barbarously keep nearly one-third of that money uselessly locked up in the Treasury of the United States, where they now have $261,716,000. The magnitude of these figures will be appreciated when it is understood that the whole national banking system of the land, with its loans of $811,000,000 and deposits of $904,975,000, nów rests on but $162,000,000 of gold, silver and paper money. Thus do these rulers break up the organization of society, destroy the once happy balance of our industries, and drive millions of impoverished people to the West,* to make new farms and raise cheap produce with which to overwhelm the farmers of the Eastern States, and of those countries of Europe which have been idiotic enough to leave their farming interest unprotected and open to every foreign influence, be it bad or good. Free foreign trade in food in Great Britain, which has resulted in seeing wheat lower in London in 1878 than in any year since 1780, has simply discouraged the domestic production of the cereals, and made the nation more and more dependent upon foreign supplies. The importation of large quantities of American meat, which is now threatened, will drive the British farmer out of the last ditch wherein he has taken refuge, and where capitulation is merely a matter of time and of circumstances over which he has no control. Professor Adolph Wagner, the eminent German political economist, has, in an essay, recently pointed out that the social economy of Germany is continually taking upon itself a more and more communistic * Secretary Sherman, in his speech of this afternoon, actually treats this movement as a beneficent one, which "finally equalized the demand and supply of labor." + Now, I will tell honorable gentlemen opposite, and it will not add to their comfort, that the growth in the Western States is such that land in the Eastern States is decreasing in value. If these Western States have had so much * * * * effect on land near them, what will be the effect on land in this country ?-Speech of John Bright, House of Commons, July, 1879. The wheat acreage in Great Britain is reported to be 500,000 less this year than last. A large part of the reduction, both there and in France, is attributed to the competition of American wheat, which is so low as to take away all profit from the cultivation in either country.-N. Y. Mercantile Journal, July 26, 1879. character, and that this is to be explained by the high development of civilization, and is also in the just and natural order of things. He instances the State institutions for intercourse—the post, the telegraph, the railways and the highways and the municipal institutions for health, cleanliness, light, etc. The State too is gradually extending its ownership over the forests-a step the importance of which, in saving the country from floods and drouths, and the soil on the mountains and hills from destruction, as in Italy, Spain, and the East, cannot well be overestimated. It is further proposed that it should absorb the business of insurance, and now, too, under the lead of Prince Bismarck, Germany once more assumes the high duty of protecting against foreign competition her producers, upon whose broad shoulders alone the State is and must be carried, and upon whom all internal taxation finally falls. The phenomena indicated by Professor Wagner, and illustrated by the new French postal law, have their root and origin in the one great controlling principle of man's nature-the necessity under which he always stands for association with his fellow men. It is this necessity which has, more than any other fact, fixed the fate and controlled the destiny of the human race. This it is which makes one set of men rich and another set poor-individual wealth consisting merely in the possession of the power to command the services of a large body of men, while on the other hand the sufferings of poverty come from the necessity for a dependence upon other men's services, without the power to command them. In a word, in this world no man is sufficient unto himself. As civilization consists in the high development of the power of association, material and intellectual, and through this of great command over the gratuitous services of nature, so, too, ever restless and never satisfied, it demands the still further growth of this power, and in these new fields the interposition of the government-the associated force of the whole people, the great co-ordinator of their actions—becomes more and more necessary, because of the inadequate means of all other bodies. Day by day and step by step we unconsciously give in our adhesion to these new manifestations of governmental control; and, in time, from the postal money order, coast survey, lighthouse system, improvement of rivers and harbors, and national board of health, we shall emerge into a national government system of telegraphs, savings banks, fire, marine, and life insurance, and thence to a money issued solely by the government for its own benefit and loaned to the people, as in old colonial times in Pennsylvania, and as to-day with the county school funds in the State of New York, until finally that government wholly ceases to pay interest, but collects it on loans, instead of collecting taxes. Then will the whole body of the people become the lenders of money, and the few the payers of interest, instead, as it is now, where the whole are the payers of interest and the few its recipients. That this will be the ultimate solution of what is called the money question in this, as well as in all enlightened countries, there can be no doubt, inasmuch as it is not only "in the just, but the natural order of things." Then, and then only, will the power of association among men no longer be subordinated to the instrument of that association-money-but the instrument, at all times and in all places, be kept subordinate to man, and to this, the paramount necessity of his being. If these views seem visionary, it may only be necessary to look back upon the history of our post-office-a department of the government, by means of which our people associate among themselves, from Maine to Texas, from Oregon to Florida-and see what progress it has made within the thirty-two years since it first adopted postage stamps, and when it would neither permit a bound book nor a parcel of merchandise to pass without paying letter postage, and when it knew nothing about the registration of mail matter, the issue of money orders, postal cards, cheap ocean postage, or the delivery of letters, papers, etc., by carriers. The true government which is to be evolved out of the civilization of this age is one which will be of the people, by the people and for the people; and in order that it may be such, it must in every manner and way respond to and harmonize with man's demand for association with his fellow-men. It must no longer be, like our present government, one which feels that it has nothing to do but to take care of itself—to collect taxes and distribute the results thereof among its partisans, and pile up useless hoards of money in the Treasury, and give the people as nearly nothing as possible in return for the enormous annual cost at which they keep it up. It must be, in fact and in truth, thier government, and its life must be one of entire subordination to their prosperity, happiness, and civilization. Henry Carey Baird. Philadelphia, July 28, 1879. APPENDIX NO. 3 LETTER ON THE EXPLOITATIONS OF THE SALTS CONTAINED IN THE LAKE OF TEXCOCO. ADDRESSED TO A. K. OWEN, C. E., ESQ., BY WILLIAM HAY. Mexico, 5th December, 1879. A. K. OWEN, C. E., Esq., DEAR SIR: According to the conversation we had the day before yesterday, I have the honor to propose to you the project of exploitation of the soda salts of the lake of Texcoco, pointing out the results of the observations which I have been able to make during the long period of twenty-six years, in which I have applied myself to this business. I have not to detain your attention in making a description of the five lakes which exist in our valley, as you know them perfectly well-and you are neither ignorant of the circumstance that the lakes of Zumpango, Xaltocan, San Cristobal and Texcoco contain more or less soda and common salt, and that those of Chalco and Xochimilco contain sweet water. It has always been believed that the lakes, and most particularly the Texcoco one, contain, in their bottom springs, of salt water; but this is not the fact. I have explored this lake in all directions, and at the time when it had dried completely. I have been able to convince myself that there exist no springs of salt water. The salts have another origin in my opinion. The greatest part of the mountains which surround the valley are composed of volcanic rocks. These, by the influence of the sun-rays, during the dry seasons, produce on their surface salt and soda, which are (62) |