- market, and the estimates amounted to about £4,000. As all taxes
in that island are raised by a direct assessment on property, the rich protested against the expenditure, though they desired the proposed accommodation. Here, then, was a dilemma, since they who willed the end would not will the means, and without the means the structure could not be erected. Had such an emergency arisen with us, our Chancellor of the Exchequer would unhesitatingly have thrown all the burden on the working-classes, by taxing the commodities they daily consumed; but the rulers of Guernsey have notions of honour and justice which do not permit them to relieve the rich at the expense of the poor, and they are too well instructed in the principles of commerce to crush trade by customs and excise; these contrivances, as iniquitous as they are bungling, would be disdained by the legislatures of the Channel Islands. How, then, did they proceed in building the meat-market? They issued paper notes, guaranteed by the States of Guernsey, this national paper not bearing interest; and the better to show the nature of this currency, the words "Meat-market Notes" were inscribed upon them, and they were numbered so that no more could be put into circulation than represented the sum agreed to be expended on the undertaking. On the first instalment being due to the contractor, he was paid in these notes, which he again paid away to his workmen and others, who passed them to the shopkeepers; the landlords took them for rent, and the treasurer of the States and the constables received them in discharge of dues and taxes. At length the building was completed, when butchers took the stalls at an annual rent, and as that rent was received the meat-market notes were destroyed. In due course of time this rent wholly extinguished the notes; and the market remains, to this day, a permanent source of national revenue, applicable to other national improvements; and, strange as it may sound, no individual has been taxed one farthing for its construction! Here, then, is a practical illustration of the uses of a symbolic currency, and of the mode in which it may be made to work. Not an ounce of gold was employed; not a shilling of interest was paid. The States of Guernsey were their own guarantees for their own paper; they created the substance with the symbol, realising the allegory of Aladdin's lamp.
As bullion, the precious metals are mere commodities, and therefore possess no more intrinsic value than any other commodity, under the laws of supply and demand; as coin, they are still bits of bullion, and it is the act of ourselves, or of the legislature who represents us, that gives them the character and the power of a legal tender. And yet we have the folly to kneel down to this graven image, and measure individual happiness and national greatness by its presence or its departure. Foreign trade, however valuable, must ever be subsidiary to the home trade. This doctrine none will contest; being admitted, then it follows that the chief care of the government should be to provide a currency suited to the home trade, and leave to merchants the care of adjusting the foreign exchanges, which never, for any long period, can be adverse or
