soon expire, and when dead they are of a delicate white color. The trout, pike, and muscalonge devour them without mercy. Some of these voracious kinds have been caught with the remains of six white fish in them. The Detroit River white fish are more juicy and better flavored than those caught in the upper lakes, probably from the fact that they feed on more delicate food, but those found in Lake Superior surpass all others in size. They were once so numerous that eight thousand were taken at a single haul. At present a haul of one or two thousand is thought a very good one. In all the rivers they are growing scarce, very gradually but surely; the ratio of decrease cannot be arrived at with any degree of precision. A few years ago they were mostly taken with gill nets, and when they fell off in one place a corresponding increase would be found in another. Now they are taken with trap nets along the shore. The trap nets are a decided advantage over gill nets; they allow the fish to be kept alive, and they are taken out at leisure; they are therefore of better quality. PICKEREL. This variety is also held in high esteem-they are good either fresh, or salted and dried, and for packing rank next in value to white, although held nominally at the same price as trout when packed. They generally run up the rivers and lakes in the spring to spawn, where they are caught in considerable numbers; average weight, 2 lbs.; large, 20 lbs.; common length, 15 inches. LAKE OF MACKINAC TROUT.-This species are as varacious as pike; they are chiefly caught on Lake Huron with gill nets and hooks. Saginaw Bay appears to be a favorite resort with them. Some winters large quantities are caught in the bay through the ice, with a decoy fish and spear. They spawn in the fall, generally in the bays and inlets; average weight, 5 lbs.; large, 75 lbs. SISCOWIT. These are mostly found in Lake Superior, and are preferred by some to any other kind. They are of the trout family, and for fat are unequaled; they are mostly taken in gill nets. They spawn in the fall, and are very superior for packing; they are also of some value for their oil; common weight, 4 lbs.; length, 16 inches. LARGE HERRING.-These are very good fish, found only in the straits and large lakes. They spawn in the fall. But few are caught; average weight, 13 lbs.; common length, 10 inches. In addition to the above the muskelonge-a large and delicious variety -black and white bass, rock bass, perch, sturgeon, and at least twenty other kinds, abound in our waters, a minute description of which we are compelled to forego. The number of men employed, and the consequent expense, varies according to the method employed. With seines, the occupation is very laborious, and requires a much stronger force than pound nets; one set of hands can manage a number of the latter. Some of the fisheries on Detroit and St. Clair rivers use seines altogether, to draw which horse power is brought into requisition in some cases. A double set of men are employed, working alternately day and night, and the exposure is a most disagreeable feature of the business, particularly in bad weather. The great bulk of the aggregate catch continues to be taken with seines or gill nets, but pound (or trap) nets are on the increase. They have been in use below Lake Huron more or less for the past four or five years, but it is only about two years since their introduction in the upper lakes. With these nets 100 barrels of white fish have been taken at a single haul; of course their general use must produce a material diminution in the supply. As regards capital invested, there is in particular instances a wide difference. Geo. Clark, Esq., nine miles below Detroit, has $12,000 invested in his grounds, owing mostly to the cost of removing obstructions; but this is an exception. The barrels for packing constitute no inconsiderable item of this vast and immense trade; their manufacture is a regular branch in Port Huron, but most of them are made by the fishermen when not engaged in their regular vocation-they are made at all the villages and fishing stations on Lake Huron, pine being generally easy of access; the barrels are worth 63 cents each; half-barrels, 50 cents. Over two-thirds of the packages used are halves, but our estimated totals of the catch represent wholes. Formerly the nets used also to be made almost entirely by the fishermen, who usually procured the twine from Detroit; latterly, many of them have been brought from Boston already made. Salt is another large item. For packing and repacking, about one-fourth of a barrel is used to each barrel of fish. For the amount packed, therefore, in the fisheries we have described, about 20,000 barrels are used. AGGREGATE VALUES. Proceeds of Michigan fisheries. $620,000 | Aggregate bbls. salted, say.... 80,000 Total proceeds.. 900,000 Cost of packages.. 252,000 Cost of salt $70,000 22,000 White fish are taken both spring and fall, chiefly the latter; spring is the season for pickerel; trout are taken at all seasons. The following is a list of the ports from whence fish were received during the year, and the amount from each. To the receipts reported at the Custom-house we have added those by the steamer Columbia, which, as she does not go beyond the district, is not required to report: The reported shipments from Detroit for 1859 are as follows: Considerable quantities are loaded for Cleveland at Thunder Bay, and at other points, which are not entered at our Custom-house. Formerly, many from Lake Huron and Mackinac, particularly the latter, were taken to Chicago, but that market now derives its supplies from grounds nearer home. The trade of Lake Superior has received a rapid development in the last few years. In the spring of 1845 the fleet on Lake Superior consisted of eleven schooners. In 1845 the propeller Independence, the first steamer that ever floated on Lake Superior, was taken across the portage, and the next year the Julia Palmer followed her, she being the first side-wheel steamer. In the spring of 1855, the Sault Canal was completed, since which date the trade with that important region has rapidly grown into commanding importance. It will be seen by the table below that the importations of machinery, provisions, supplies, and merchandise for the past year amount to $5,298,640, while the exports of copper, iron, fur, and fish amount to $3,071,069. The following are the names of the steam craft now regularly employed in this trade :Steamers Illinois, Lady Elgin, and North Star; propellers Marquette, Mineral Rock, Montgomery, Northern Light, and Iron City. The Detroit shipping office has published the names of ninety-six sail vessels that have been engaged in the iron trade the past year. Rapid as this trade has increased, it is destined, no doubt, to yet undergo a still greater transformation. The latent resources of the upper peninsula are of a character and magnitude that defy all estimates of their future greatness. S. P. Mead, Esq., Superintendent of the Canal, has furnished a monthly statement of its commerce for the past year, the figures of which for the year foot up as follows: Quantity. DOWN FREIGHT. Copper. tons & lbs. 6,245 105 $2,445,290 Hides..... ....No. 993 Iron blooms.... 4,951 954 150,197 Fish..... Quantity. Value. 3,972 212 31,800 ..bbls. 3,985 31,434 $3,071,069 The aggregate amount of tolls collected in May, July, August, and September was $10,374 18, a large increase over the corresponding months last year. Including the probable amount for the months not reported, and we have at the lowest not less probably than $16,000 as the tolls for 1859. Number of passengers-May, 2,493; June, 1,764; 706 108,975 15 20,000 103 10,300 ..lbs. 6,261 222,402 125,220 4,450 24 96 $5,298,640 July, 2,116; August, 2,617; September, 1,538; October, 1,015. The leading shipments from Detroit to Lake Superior were as follows:Flour........bbls. 11,415 | Apples...... bbls. 2,059 | Candles......boxes 2,872 Corn........bush. 3.400 Cattle & horses. No. 667 Castings.. 11,962 Ale, beer, &c. . bbls. 3,340 Machinery .. pieces 8,602 Feed.... .tons 260 Machinery... boxes .bbls. 1,752 | Hay 421 Brick........bbls. Dressed hogs...No. 81 Lime... ..bbls. 2,121 Tram T rail 792 Gen'l merchandise. 557 841 90 446 2,400 36 15 2,745 From the sketch here given of the natural wealth of Michigan, it is evident that the completion of its means of communication, opening up access to regions which have hitherto proved so attractive to capital, must give a new impulse to the employment of that capital which is so rapidly accumulating at the East. A large population will inevitably gather around the head of that magnificent peninsula, commanding not only these vast resources pointed out, but the point of communication between the Atlantic and the Pacific. Art. III.-MONEY, THE CREDIT SYSTEM, AND PAYMENTS.* GOLD and silver, although the universally preferred material for money and coinage, are yet so expensive a medium of exchange that all civilized people, without giving up this preference, have constantly endeavored to effect their exchanges, as far as practicable, in some more economical way. In this the success has been so great that now more than three-fourths of all the large transactions of both foreign and domestic trade are effected without aid or agency of the precious metals, which are, nevertheless, by the laws of legal tender and by universal assent, the final resort in all cases of difference. But money is not the real object of trade or industry. It is neither food nor raiment; it is neither house nor lodging. The commodities exchanged in commercial life are those which minister to these wants, and money is only an agent in the exchange of such commodities, in the same sense as ships, warehouses, railroads, merchants' bills of exchange, books of account, and many other things. The main object is the exchange of the commodities of industry. In effecting this the use of money, or any other of the usual agencies, is wholly a question of expediency, economy, or convenience. Money is not to be regarded as holding the office of a necessary medium of exchange or measure of value, as being the main representative of value, or as being the main purchasing power; it is rather a preferred commodity, which all are willing to receive for what they sell or deliver. Coinage makes the facility of employing gold and silver, as a preferred commodity, very complete, as it furnishes these metals, weighed in convenient denominations, with the cer The object of this article is to present some of the ing work: "The Ways and Means of Payment: A full Various Modes of Adjustment." By Stephen Colwell. cott & Co., 1859. 2d edition, 1860. leading topics and positions of the follow Analysis of the Credit System, with its 8vo., pp. 644. Philadelphia: T. B. Lippin tificate of the mint as to quality and quantity. But governments have taken another important step in adding to the usefulness of the precious metals as money. They have made gold, or silver, or both, at a fixed price, a legal tender in all payments. By this law every debtor may acquit himself of his debt by payment in one or both of these metals at the rate named in the law, and every creditor has a right to exact payment in one of these metals at the rate fixed. The law of legal tender is one of the most firmly established enactments of modern times. The necessity of such a regulation is scarcely ever called in question. There is one feature of it, however, which is undoubtedly of questionable policy in large transactions. That gold or silver should by law be the proper medium of payment between those who cannot agree upon any other, is clearly right as well as expedient, but that they should always be taken at the same rate in large payments, when it is well known they fluctuate in price, is not merely anomalous-it is fruitful of injurious tendencies and actual injustice. If this be a difficulty hard to surmount, it requires, at least, more careful consideration than it has hitherto received. In the consideration of money, as a means of payment, gold and silver only are treated as money. In popular estimation and language, other things are so considered and called, but, in strictness, they are only substitutes for money or devices to dispense with money. The law which enforces the acceptance of coins at a specific rate, constituting them a legal tender at that price, makes them the standard of payment; it does not make them money, for they would pass as such without force of law. Gold and silver, when employed as money, are used as the small change of trade, as reserves for banks, and to pay balances of trade, both foreign and domestic. As thus employed, the extent of their agency is easily seen and appreciated. The actual utility and efficiency of money is limited to its actual employment. As more than nine-tenths of all the payments of trade are effected without the intervention of gold or silver, it becomes proper to ascertain the way in which this large proportion of payments is effected. It is very true that the commercial paper which represents this indebtedness is made payable in gold or silver, though in practice not so paid. The effect of the law of legal tender, which makes these commercial securities payable in gold or silver, is merely cautionary, and enables creditors to demand such payment if not satisfied with that which is offered. How, then, are the payments chiefly made in the commercial world? The reply of this work to this inquiry is, that the large proportion of nine-tenths of the whole payments of trade is effected by the various devices of the Credit System. The credit system does not merely imply that time is given in which to pay debts; it implies that payments are not only deferred to a future day, but that they are finally effected without the aid of money, of gold, or silver. The devices by which this is accomplished are numerous and largely treated in this volume. The commodities of trade circulate in the regular channels according to the course of business, proceeding by the usual steps to their final destination and consumption; but the payments involved in this mighty mass of transactions are deferred and reserved for adjustment by a class of en devoted to this business. It is through the agency of banks, bankrs, and dealers in exchange and commercial paper that these payments |