Reclass. 1-31-28 M. V.P. PREFACE. A rising wave of interest in Silver has within the last year been spreading over the country, deriving momentum from the apparent need that Congress make provision to fill the void in the money-stock of the country left by the retirement of the notes of National Banks. A new stage of discussion and of experimental legislation is thus to be entered, in which the status of the white monev-metal in other lands will remain entitled to peculiarly watchful and earnest consideration. The following pages are designed as a contribution to that end. It is not to be expected that they will render justice in detail to a subject so multifarious and so pervaded with subtleties and insoluble problems that a library could be filled with its literature. Their theme is the movement for the general restoration of Silver to legal equality with gold. While the reader is invited to consider topics that may appear to bear no close relation to each other, the effect as a whole will be, I trust, to present to him in perspective the changing status of the money-metals, and the changing forces of opinion relating to that great mistake, the general outlawry of silver, which only the chief nations by uniting can repair. iii 245426 |