for which credit had been given in the transfer
books. What is thus paid for the keeping
of the deposit may be considered as a sort of
warehouse rent; and why this warehouse rent
should be so much dearer for gold than for silver,
several different reasons have been assigned.
The fineness of gold, it has been said, is more
difficult to be ascertained than that of silver.
Frauds are more easily practised, and occasion
a greater loss in the most precious metal. Silver,
besides, being the standard metal, the
state, it has been said, wishes to encourage
more the making of deposits of silver than
those of gold.
Deposits of bullion are most commonly
made when the price is somewhat lower than
ordinary, and they are taken out again when
it happens to rise. In Holland the market
price of bullion is generally above the mint
price, for the same reason that it was so in
England before the late reformation of the
gold coin. The difference is said to be commonly
from about six to sixteen stivers upon
the mark, or eight ounces of silver, of eleven
parts of fine and one part alloy. The bank
price, or the credit which the bank gives for
the deposits of such silver (when made in foreign
coin, of which the fineness is well known
and ascertained, such as Mexico dollars), is
twenty-two guilders the mark; the mint price
is about twenty-three guilders, and the market
price is from twenty-three guilders six, to
twenty-three guilders sixteen stivers, or from
two to three per cent. above the mint price.[37]
The proportions between the bank price, the
mint price, and the market price of gold bullion,
are nearly the same. A person can generally
sell his receipt for the difference between
the mint price of bullion and the market
price. A receipt for bullion is almost always
worth something, and it very seldom happens,
therefore, that anybody suffers his receipts to
expire, or allows his bullion to fall to the bank
at the price at which it had been received, either
by not taking it out before the end of
the six months, or by neglecting to pay one
fourth or one half per cent. in order to obtain
a new receipt for another six months. This,
however, though it happens seldom, is said to
happen sometimes, and more frequently with
regard to gold than with regard to silver, on
account of the higher warehouse rent which
is paid for the keeping of the more precious
metal.
The person who, by making a deposit of
bullion, obtains both a bank credit and a receipt,
pays his bills of exchange as they become
due, with his bank credit; and either
sells or keeps his receipt, according as he
judges that the price of bullion is likely to
rise or to fall. The receipt and the bank credit
seldom keep long together, and there is no
occasion that they should. The person who
has a receipt, and who wants to take out bullion,
finds always plenty of bank credits, or
bank money, to buy at the ordinary price,
and the person who has bank money, and
wants to take out bullion, finds receipts always
in equal abundance.
The owners of bank credits, and the holders
of receipts, constitute two different sorts
of creditors against the bank. The holder of
a receipt cannot draw out the bullion for
which it is granted, without re-assigning to
the bank a sum of bank money equal to the
price at which the bullion had been received.
If he has no bank money of his own, he must
purchase it of those who have it. The owner
of bank money cannot draw out bullion, without
producing to the bank receipts for the
quantity which he wants. If he has none of
his own, he must buy them of those who have
them. The holder of a receipt, when he purchases
bank money, purchases the power of
taking out a quantity of bullion, of which the
mint price is five per cent. above the bank
price. The agio of five per cent. therefore,
which he commonly pays for it, is paid, not
for an imaginary, but for a real value. The
owner of bank money, when he purchases a
receipt, purchases the power of taking out a
quantity of bullion, of which the market price
is commonly from two to three per cent.
above the mint price. The price which he
pays for it, therefore, is paid likewise for a
real value. The price of the receipt, and the
price of the bank money, compound or make
up between them the full value or price of
the bullion.
Upon deposits of the coin current in the
country, the bank grant receipts likewise, as
well as bank credits; but those receipts are
frequently of no value and will bring no
price in the market. Upon ducatoons, for
example, which in the currency pass for three
guilders three stivers each, the bank gives a
credit of three guilders only, or five per
cent. below their current value. It grants
a receipt likewise, entitling the bearer to
take out a number of ducatoons deposited