Part 10 (2/2)

My views respecting the Bank are entirely prospective. The last return of bank notes in circulation was, I think, larger than any that preceded it. I have not the paper in London, but I think the circulation of bank notes then amounted (1815) to 28,000,000 or more[117].

It is dangerous to listen to reports respecting briskness or slackness of trade. It is I believe certain that the revenue has been uncommonly productive the last quarter, which is no indication of diminished trade.

As you allow that the loss of the sellers is the gain of the buyers, you appear to me to attribute effects much too great to the fall of raw produce which has lately taken place. It does not follow that, because prices are low, production will be discouraged. If money were to fall very much in value whilst a country was making great advances in prosperity, would not production be encouraged, notwithstanding a fall of prices?

That profits may rise on the land, if population increases faster than capital, I am not disposed to deny; but this will be a partial rise of profits on a particular trade, for a limited time, and is very different from a general rise of profits on trade in general. This admission does not affect my principle.

Ever truly yours, DAVID RICARDO.

I ought to apologise for writing to you twice in one day.

XL.

GATCOMB PARK, _24th Dec., 1815_.

MY DEAR SIR,

I write to remind you that the time is come at which you once gave me hope almost to certainty that I should have the pleasure of seeing you here; and even when I last saw you you promised, if you could make it convenient, to come and pa.s.s a part of your vacation with me. The weather is beautiful, and my desire to see you as ardent as ever. Come then and inhale the pure atmosphere of our hills, and be under no fear that your visit will r.e.t.a.r.d any object to which your attention may now be devoted, for you shall be free to write, study, or read, as many hours in the day as you please, unmolested by any one's intrusion.

My lost MS.[118] is recovered. Mr. Mill recommends its publication, but advises me to write an introduction, and to divide it into sections. I had almost resolved to throw it aside, but I have been again at work upon it, and, though I cannot put it in any shape to please me, it is I think rather better than when you saw it; and the probability at present is that I shall venture to publish it.

I attended the Bank Court the other day. I had no intention whatever of speaking; but some very bad reasoning on the other side and a total deviation from the question called me up, and I spoke for five or ten minutes with considerable inward agitation, but without committing any glaring blunder. My speaking is like my writing too much compressed. I am too apt to crowd a great deal of difficult matter into so short a s.p.a.ce as to be incomprehensible to the generality of readers. The Chronicle, I see, has reported what he thought or heard I said, but he has imputed to me what I neither felt nor uttered. Allusions were made to the Bullion question, and it was said that it had been prophesied that, if the Bank directors were corrupt, they might with the power they had of issuing paper occasion the greatest public distress; no such distress, however, had been experienced. I observed in reply that the goodness of the system was not proved by the distress not having occurred,--that the speaker had been only paying a compliment to the integrity of the directors, in which no one in the court was more ready to join than myself,--but, if the directors had been corrupt, I still thought that they had been armed with the power of doing mischief.

Though I was ready to declare my confidence in the integrity of the directors, there were many parts of their system of which I could not approve, etc. etc. This is very different from the report in the Chronicle; but I understand that the reporters were most carefully excluded from the court.

I hope the business at the college has been settled to your satisfaction, and that the result of the late unpleasant disturbance[119] will give you some security against its recurrence in future.

I conclude that you have quite finished writing the alterations and amendments which you projected for the new edition of your book[120].

When I last saw you I think you had made considerable progress, and therefore it is probable that you may be already in the press. What point will next engage your attention? For I hope, as M. Say says, that you will 'travaillez toujours' [_sic_]....

Ever yours, DAVID RICARDO.

[Fragment. Within this year, or earlier. See Letter XL]

[I began] by a.s.suring you that I was not going to weary you with a repet.i.tion of my hundred times told tale, and I am ashamed to see that I have filled four sides with nothing else. There are some other points on which I shall make some remarks when I have the pleasure of seeing you.

If you should come to town, will you do me the favour to call at the Stock Exchange, unless my house should not be much out of your way. I recommend your calling there because I am just about deserting Brook Street for some time. Mrs. Ricardo and all the family are going to Ramsgate to-morrow morning, and she will not consent to let me remain at home by myself, so that when I am in London I shall be chiefly with my brother at Bow; now and then I shall pa.s.s a night at home. My business is so uncertain that I cannot at all foresee what portion of the next two or three months I shall be able to spend at the sea side. It is probable that I shall be so much in town that I shall be found by you at the Stock Exchange....

Yours most truly, DAVID RICARDO.

XLI.

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