Читать книгу Ireland in the Days of Dean Swift (Irish Tracts, 1720 to 1734) - J. Bowles Daly - Страница 4

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There was a lack of copper coin in Ireland, which hampered the small transactions of the poor, and rendered the payment of weekly or daily wages a matter of difficulty. This want was reported to the English Cabinet; it was taken up, not as a grievance to be met with redress, but as a new opportunity for a job. A patent to make a copper coinage was granted to William Wood, a gentleman whose antecedents were not creditable. According to the habits of the day, the patent had to pass through various officials, each of whom had doubtless to be paid: a sort of black-mail on the transaction. The amount of the coinage had to be large to enable Wood to recoup himself and make his own profit. It was fixed at 108,000l., a sum vastly in excess of its need. The greatest share of the plunder was to fall to the king’s mistress. The Duchess of Kendal was to receive 10,000l. from Wood, to whom she farmed the patent. It was from the bottom to the top a scandalous job, and to add to its depravity, it was passed without consulting the responsible governors of the country. It was only when all efforts to defeat its passage were concluded, that Swift stepped in. The indignation of the country had risen to boiling-point; he gave it a voice. In describing the patent, Swift exaggerated its consequences. It is absurd to suppose that what he said of it was absolutely true, or that Swift thought it to be true. His object was to put a scandalous transaction in the grossest aspect possible. Swift adopted the ordinary recognized methods of political controversy. Apart from exaggeration, there was enough of injustice in the matter to justify any language which would tend to remove it.

LETTER I.

To the Tradesmen, Shopkeepers, Farmers, and Country-people in general, of the Kingdom of Ireland,

Concerning the brass halfpence coined by one William Wood, Hardwareman, with a design to have them pass in this kingdom!

Wherein is shewn the power of his Patent, the value of his Halfpence, and how far every person may be obliged to take the same in payments, and how to behave himself, in case such an attempt should be made by Wood, or any other person.

(VERY PROPER TO BE KEPT IN EVERY FAMILY.)

By M. B., Drapier, 1724.

Brethren, Friends, Countrymen, and Fellow-Subjects.

What I intend now to say to you, is, next to your duty to God, and the care of your salvation, of the greatest concern to yourselves and your children; your bread and clothing, and every common necessary of life, depend entirely upon it. Therefore I do most earnestly exhort you as men, as Christians, as parents, and as lovers of your country, to read this paper with the utmost attention, or get it read to you by others; which, that you may do at the less expense, I have ordered the printer to sell it at the lowest rate.

It is a great fault among you, that when a person writes with no other intention than to do you good, you will not be at the pains to read his advices. One copy of this paper may serve a dozen of you, which will be less than a farthing apiece. It is your folly, that you have no common or general interest in your view, not even the wisest among you; neither do you know, or inquire, or care, who are your friends, or who are your enemies.

About four years ago, a little book was written to advise all people to wear the manufactures of this our own dear country.[1] It had no other design, said nothing against the King or Parliament, or any persons whatever; yet the poor printer was prosecuted two years with the utmost violence, and even some weavers themselves (for whose sake it was written), being upon the JURY, found him guilty. This would be enough to discourage any man from endeavouring to do you good, when you will either neglect him, or fly in his face for his pains, and when he must expect only danger to himself, and to be fined and imprisoned, perhaps to his ruin.

However, I cannot but warn you once more of the manifest destruction before your eyes, if you do not behave yourself, as you ought.

I will therefore first tell you the plain story of the fact, and then I will lay before you how you ought to act, in common prudence according to the laws of your country.

The fact is this: It having been many years since COPPER HALFPENCE OR FARTHINGS were last coined in this kingdom, they have been for some time very scarce, and many counterfeits passed about under the name of raps, several applications were made to England that we might have liberty to coin new ones, as in former times we did; but they did not succeed. At last, one Mr. Wood, a mean ordinary man, a hardware dealer, procured a patent under his Majesty’s broad seal to coin 108,000l.[2] in copper for this kingdom; which patent, however, did not oblige any one here to take them, unless they pleased. Now you must know, that the halfpence and farthings in England pass for very little more than they are worth; and if you should beat them to pieces, and sell them to the brazier, you would not lose much above a penny in a shilling. But Mr. Wood made his halfpence of such base metal, and so much smaller than the English ones, that the brazier would not give you above a penny of good money for a shilling of his; so that this sum of 108,000l. in good gold and silver, must be given for trash, that will not be worth eight or nine thousand pounds real value. But this is not the worst; for Mr. Wood, when he pleases, may, by stealth, send over another 108,000l., and buy all our goods for eleven parts in twelve under the value. For example, if a hatter sells a dozen of hats for five shillings apiece, which amounts to three pounds, and receives the payment in Wood’s coin, he really receives only the value of five shillings.

Perhaps you will wonder how such an ordinary fellow as this Mr. Wood could have so much interest as to get his Majesty’s broad seal for so great a sum of bad money to be sent to this poor country; and that all the nobility and gentry here could not obtain the same favour, and let us make our own halfpence, as we used to do. Now I will make that matter very plain: We are at a great distance from the King’s court, and have nobody there to solicit for us, although a great number of lords and ’squires, whose estates are here, and are our countrymen, spend all their lives and fortunes there; but this same Mr. Wood was able to attend constantly for his own interest; he is an Englishman, and had great friends; and, it seems, knew very well where to give money to those that would speak to others, that could speak to the King, and would tell a fair story. And his Majesty, and perhaps the great lord or lords who advise him, might think it was for our country’s good; and so, as the lawyers express it, “The King was deceived in his grant,” which often happens in all reigns. And I am sure if his Majesty knew that such a patent, if it should take effect according to the desire of Mr. Wood, would utterly ruin this kingdom, which has given such great proofs of its loyalty, he would immediately recall it, and perhaps show his displeasure to somebody or other; but a word to the wise is enough. Most of you must have heard with what anger our honourable House of Commons received an account of this Wood’s patent. There were several fine speeches made upon it, and plain proofs that it was all a wicked cheat from the bottom to the top; and several smart votes were printed, which that same Wood had the assurance to answer likewise in print; and in so confident a way, as if he were a better man than our whole Parliament put together.

This Wood, as soon as his patent was passed, or soon after, sends over a great many barrels of those halfpence to Cork, and other seaport towns; and to get them off, offered a hundred pounds in his coin, for seventy or eighty in silver; but the collectors of the King’s customs very honestly refused to take them, and so did almost everybody else. And since the Parliament has condemned them, and desired the King that they might be stopped, all the kingdom do abominate them.

But Wood is still working underhand to force his halfpence upon us; and if he can, by the help of his friends in England, prevail so far as to get an order, that the commissioners and collectors of the King’s money shall receive them, and that the army is to be paid with them, then he thinks his work shall be done. And this is the difficulty you will be under in such a case: for the common soldier, when he goes to the market, or alehouse, will offer this money; and if it be refused, perhaps he will swagger and hector, and threaten to beat the butcher or ale-wife, or take the goods by force, and throw them the bad halfpence. In this and the like cases, the shopkeeper or victualler, or any other tradesman, has no more to do, than to demand ten times the price of his goods, if it is to be paid in Wood’s money; for example, twenty pence of that money for a quart of ale and so in all things else, and not part with his goods till he gets the money.

For, suppose you go to an ale-house with that base money, and the landlord gives you a quart for four of those halfpence, what must the victualler do? his brewer will not be paid in that coin; or, if the brewer should be such a fool, the farmers will not take it from them for their bere,[3] because they are bound, by their leases, to pay their rent in good and lawful money of England; which this is not, nor of Ireland neither; and the ’squire, their landlord, will never be so bewitched to take such trash for his land; so that it must certainly stop somewhere or other; and wherever it stops, it is the same thing, and we are all undone.

The common weight of these halfpence is between four and five to an ounce—suppose five, then three shillings and four pence will weigh a pound, and consequently twenty shillings will weigh six pounds butter weight. Now there are many hundred farmers, who pay two hundred pounds a year rent; therefore, when one of these farmers comes with his half-year’s rent, which is one hundred pounds, it will be at least six hundred pounds’ weight, which is three horses’ load.

If a ’squire has a mind to come to town to buy clothes and wine, and spices for himself and family, or perhaps to pass the winter here, he must bring with him five or six horses well loaden with sacks, as the farmers bring their corn; and when his lady comes in her coach to our shops, it must be followed by a car loaded with Mr. Wood’s money. And I hope we shall have the grace to take it for no more than it is worth.

They say ’Squire Conolly[4] has sixteen thousand pounds a-year; now, if he sends for his rent to town, as it is likely he does, he must have two hundred and fifty horses to bring up his half-year’s rent, and two or three great cellars in his house for stowage. But what the bankers will do I cannot tell; for I am assured, that some great bankers keep by them forty thousand pounds in ready cash, to answer all payments; which sum, in Mr. Wood’s money, would require twelve hundred horses to carry it.

For my own part, I am already resolved what to do; I have a pretty good shop of Irish stuffs and silks; and instead of taking Mr. Wood’s bad copper, I intend to truck with my neighbours, the butchers, and bakers, and brewers, and the rest, goods for goods; and the little gold and silver I have, I will keep by me, like my heart’s blood, till better times, or until I am just ready to starve; and then I will buy Mr. Wood’s money, as my father did the brass money in King James’s time,[5] who could buy ten pounds of it with a guinea; and I hope to get as much for a pistole, and so purchase bread from those who will be such fools as to sell it me. These halfpence, if they once pass, will soon be counterfeited, because it may be cheaply done, the stuff is so base. The Dutch, likewise, will probably do the same thing, and send them over to us to pay for our goods; and Mr. Wood will never be at rest, but coin on: so that in some years we shall have at least five times 108,000l. of this lumber. Now the current money of this kingdom is not reckoned to be above four hundred thousand pounds in all; and while there is a silver sixpence left, these bloodsuckers will never be quiet. When once the kingdom is reduced to such a condition, I will tell you what must be the end: the gentlemen of estates will all turn off their tenants for want of payments, because, as I told you before, the tenants are obliged by their leases to pay sterling, which is lawful current money of England; then they will turn their own farmers, as too many of them do already, run all into sheep, where they can, keeping only such other cattle as are necessary; then they will be their own merchants, and send their wool, and butter, and hides, and linen beyond sea, for ready money, and wine, and spices, and silks. They will keep only a few miserable cottagers; the farmers must rob, or beg, or leave their country; the shopkeepers in this, and every other town, must break and starve; for it is the landed man that maintains the merchant, and shopkeeper, and handicraftsman.

But when the ’squire turns farmer and merchant himself, all the good money he gets from abroad he will hoard up to send for England, and keep some poor tailor or weaver and the like in his own house, who will be glad to get bread at any rate.

I should never have done, if I were to tell you all the miseries that we shall undergo, if we be so foolish and wicked as to take this cursed coin. It would be very hard if all Ireland should be put into one scale, and this sorry fellow, Wood, into the other; that Mr. Wood should weigh down this whole kingdom, by which England gets above a million of good money every year clear into their pockets; and that is more than the English do by all the world besides.

But your great comfort is, that as his Majesty’s patent does not oblige you to take this money, so the laws have not given the crown a power of forcing the subject to take what money the King pleases; for then, by the same reason, we might be bound to take pebble-stones, or cockle-shells, or stamped leather, for current coin, if ever we should happen to live under an ill prince; who might likewise, by the same power, make a guinea pass for ten pounds, a shilling for twenty shillings, and so on; by which he would, in a short time, get all the silver and gold of the kingdom into his own hands, and leave us nothing but brass or leather, or what he pleased. Neither is anything reckoned more cruel and oppressive in the French government than their common practice of calling in all their money, after they have sunk it very low, and then coining it anew at a much higher value; which, however, is not the thousandth part so wicked as this abominable project of Mr. Wood. For the French give their subjects silver for silver, and gold for gold; but this fellow will not so much as give us good brass or copper for our gold and silver, nor even a twelfth part of their worth. Having said thus much, I will now go on to tell you the judgment of some great lawyers in this matter, whom I fee’d on purpose for your sakes, and got their opinions under their hands, that I might be sure I went upon good grounds.... I will now, my dear friends, to save you the trouble, set before you, in short, what the law obliges you to do, and what it does not oblige you to.

First, you are obliged to take all money in payments which is coined by the King, and is of the English standard or weight, provided it be of gold or silver.

Secondly, you are not obliged to take any money which is not of gold or silver; not only the halfpence or farthings of England, but of any other country. And it is merely for convenience or ease, that you are content to take them; because the custom of coining silver halfpence and farthings has long been left off; I suppose on account of their being subject to be lost.

Thirdly, much less are you obliged to take those vile halfpence of the same Wood, by which you must lose almost eleven pence in every shilling. Therefore, my friends, stand to it one and all; refuse this filthy trash. It is no treason to rebel against Mr. Wood. His Majesty in his patent, obliges nobody to take these halfpence, our gracious prince has no such ill-advisers about him; or, if he had, yet you see the laws have not left it in the King’s power to force us to take any coin but what is lawful, of right standard, gold and silver. Therefore you have nothing to fear.

And let me in the next place apply myself particularly to you who are the poorer sort of tradesmen. Perhaps you may think you will not be so great losers as the rich, if these halfpence should pass; because you seldom see any silver, and your customers come to your shops or stalls with nothing but brass, which you likewise find hard to be got. But you may take my word, whenever this money gains footing among you, you will be utterly undone. If you carry these halfpence to a shop for tobacco or brandy, or any other thing that you want, the shopkeeper will advance his goods accordingly, or else he must break, and leave the key under the door. “Do you think I will sell you a yard of tenpenny stuff for twenty of Mr. Wood’s halfpence? No, not under two hundred at least; neither will I be at the trouble of counting, but weigh them in a lump.” I will tell you one thing farther, that if Mr. Wood’s project should take, it would ruin even our beggars; for when I give a beggar a halfpenny, it will quench his thirst, or go a good way to fill his belly; but the twelfth part of a halfpenny will do him no more service than if I should give him three pins out of my sleeve.

In short, these halfpence are like “the accursed thing, which,” as the Scripture tells us, “the children of Israel were forbidden to touch.” They will run about like the plague, and destroy every one who lays his hand upon them. I have heard scholars talk of a man who told the King, that he had invented a way to torment people, by putting them into a bull of brass with fire under it; but the prince put the projector first into it, to make the experiment. This very much resembles the project of Mr. Wood; and the like of this may probably be Mr. Wood’s fate; that the brass he contrived to torment this kingdom with, may prove his own torment, and his destruction at last.

N.B. The author of this paper is informed by persons, who have made it their business to be exact in their observations on the true value of these halfpence, that any person may expect to get a quart of twopenny ale for thirty-six of them.

I desire that all families may keep this paper carefully by them, to refresh their memories whenever they shall have farther notice of Mr. Wood’s halfpence, or any other the like imposture.

SECOND LETTER.

Walpole recommended his Majesty to compromise the grave issue which had risen. An order was issued restricting the importation of Wood’s copper coin to the sum of 40,000l. instead of 108,000l., to be current only amongst those who should be willing to accept them. But the dispute had risen too high to admit of accommodation. The real grievance of this measure lay rather in its principle than its immediate effects. The merits and details of the question are now laid aside. Even Wood is almost forgotten in the vehemence of rage, that a nation should be exposed to the menaces or mercies of such an adventurer.

LETTER II.