supposed to be smuggled) amounts, according
to the best accounts, to about six millions
sterling a-year.
According to Mr Meggens[20], the annual
importation of the precious metals into Spain,
at an average of six years, viz. from 1748 to
1753, both inclusive, and into Portugal, at an
average of seven years, viz. from 1747 to
1753, both inclusive, amounted in silver to
1,101,107 pounds weight, and in gold to
49,940 pounds weight. The silver, at sixty-two
shillings the pound troy, amounts to
L.3,413,431 : 10s. sterling. The gold, at
forty-four guineas and a half the pound troy,
amounts to L.2,333,446 : 14s. sterling. Both
together amount to L.5,746,878 : 4s. sterling.
The account of what was imported under register,
he assures us, is exact. He gives us the
detail of the particular places from which the
gold and silver were brought, and of the particular
quantity of each metal, which, according
to the register, each of them afforded.
He makes an allowance, too, for the quantity
of each metal which, he supposes, may have
been smuggled. The great experience of this
judicious merchant renders his opinion of
considerable weight.
According to the eloquent, and sometimes
well-informed, author of the Philosophical
and Political History of the Establishment of
the Europeans in the two Indies, the annual
importation of registered gold and silver into
Spain, at an average of eleven years, viz. from
1754 to 1764, both inclusive, amounted to
13,984,1853⁄5 piastres of ten reals. On account
of what may have been smuggled, however,
the whole annual importation, he supposes,
may have amounted to seventeen millions of
piastres, which, at 4s. 6d. the piastre, is equal
to L.3,825,000 sterling. He gives the detail,
too, of the particular places from which
the gold and silver were brought, and of the
particular quantities of each metal, which according
to the register, each of them afforded.
He informs us, too, that if we were to judge
of the quantity of gold annually imported
from the Brazils to Lisbon, by the amount of
the tax paid to the king of Portugal, which it
seems, is one-fifth of the standard metal, we
might value it at eighteen millions of cruzadoes,
or forty-five millions of French livres,
equal to about twenty millions sterling. On
account of what may have been smuggled,
however, we may safely, he says, add to this
sum an eighth more, or L.250,000 sterling, so
that the whole will amount to L.2,250,000
sterling. According to this account, therefore,
the whole annual importation of the
precious metals into both Spain and Portugal,
amounts to about L.6,075,000 sterling.
Several other very well authenticated, though
manuscript accounts, I have been assured,
agree in making this whole annual importation
amount, at an average, to about six millions
sterling; sometimes a little more, sometimes
a little less.
The annual importation of the precious
metals into Cadiz and Lisbon, indeed, is not
equal to the whole annual produce of the
mines of America. Some part is sent annually
by the Acapulco ships to Manilla; some
part is employed in a contraband trade, which
the Spanish colonies carry on with those of
other European nations; and some part, no
doubt, remains in the country. The mines
of America, besides, are by no means the only
gold and silver mines in the world. They,
are, however, by far the most abundant. The
produce of all the other mines which are known
is insignificant, it is acknowledged, in comparison
with their's; and the far greater part of
their produce, it is likewise acknowledged, is
annually imported into Cadiz and Lisbon.
But the consumption of Birmingham alone,
at the rate of fifty thousand pounds a-year, is
equal to the hundred-and-twentieth part of
this annual importation, at the rate of six millions
a-year. The whole annual consumption
of gold and silver, therefore, in all the
different countries of the world where those
metals are used, may, perhaps, be nearly equal
to the whole annual produce. The remainder
may be no more than sufficient to supply
the increasing demand of all thriving countries.
It may even have fallen so far short
of this demand, as somewhat to raise the price
of those metals in the European market.
The quantity of brass and iron annually
brought from the mine to the market, is out
of all proportion greater than that of gold and
silver. We do not, however, upon this account,
imagine that those coarse metals are
likely to multiply beyond the demand, or to
become gradually cheaper and cheaper. Why
should we imagine that the precious metals
are likely to do so? The course metals, indeed,
though harder, are put to much harder
uses, and, as they are of less value, less care
is employed in their preservation. The precious
metals, however, are not necessarily immortal
any more than they, but are liable, too,
to be lost, wasted, and consumed, in a great
variety of ways.
The price of all metals, though liable to
slow and gradual variations, varies less from
year to year than that of almost any other
part of the rude produce of land: and the
price of the precious metals is even less liable
to sudden variations than that of the coarse
ones. The durableness of metals is the foundation
of this extraordinary steadiness of price.
The corn which was brought to market last
year will be all, or almost all, consumed, long
before the end of this year. But some part
of the iron which was brought from the mine