clearly perceived and explained it presented it as an ideal standard. Some of them even regarded it as a perfect standard of value infinitely preferable to one of silver or gold. They had observed certain exhibitions of the mental habit we have indicated, but had not marked the causes which so effectually confuse and destroy their supposed standard.

On the other hand, this notion of an ideal standard has been met and refuted without perceiving that approximation to a standard which the mental employment of the money of account really makes. The fact of an ideal standard was denied by those who failed to reach the full conception of a money of account. The controversy in reference to an IDEAL STANDARD OF ABSTRACT CURRENCY, as some have called it, is one of curious and instructive interest, and shows strikingly how close both parties to a discussion may approach the truth without touching it.

Believing, as we do, that the views we have presented of the functions of a money of account are highly important in practical respects, and very necessary to a clear conception of the whole doctrine of money, and many of its special difficulties, we have thus brought it to special notice. It is not needful, however, that our explanation be conceded to be correct for the practical object now before us. It will answer our purpose, to stop short of the functions we assign to the money of account, and take the doctrine of standard as held by Ricardo* and McCulloch. The latter, in the article "Money," in the Encyclopedia Britannica, has produced one of the most intelligible and practical treatises on money to be found. He clearly distinguishes between the standard of the coinage and the standard of the currency; he denies that coins are a sign or measure of value. They are, he says, the things signified; they are not a measure, but an equivalent. There is an obscurity in this term standard of currency; for if currency means the same thing as the coins, then the standard of currency is the same thing as the standard of coinage, which is merely the proportion of pure metal to the alloy in the coins. What they mean, however, by the standard of currency, is the quantity of coin which is the equivalent of the unit or denominations of the money of account, and they allege that when in England you speak of £3 17s. 10d., you mean an ounce of gold; and when you speak of a pound you mean a sovereign and applying their doctrine here, that when a dollar, or any number of dollars, are spoken of, it is intended the quantity of silver in one dollar, or in the number of dollars mentioned. They insist that all prices are fixed, and all sales made with express reference to the quantity of gold or silver, which is the equivalent of the terms used. And we admit this is strictly true until a long use of the terms and habitual familiarity with the equivalents impress them firmly upon the mind, when they can be employed readily without any mental reference to the coins, and that the coins or equivalents upon which this money of account is thus founded may be wholly withdrawn, as may be shown to have been the case in innumerable instances.

Ricardo, "Proposals for an Economical and Secure Currency."

Art. II-THE FISHERIES OF THE UNITED STATES.

CHAPTER X.

FUTURE PROSPECTS-WHOLESOMENESS OF FISH AS AN ARTICLE OF FOOD-ITS GREATER USE RECOMMENDED TO THE LABORING CLASSES-TO THE FARMERS, ETC.,-CHANCES OF OPENING A LARGE MARKET AT THE WEST-IN CALIFORNIA-PROSPECTS IN WEST INDIES-CUBA, AND CUBAN FREEDOM SOUTH AMERICAN STATES, BRAZIL, GUIANA, GRENADA, ETC.-WESTERN SOUTH AMERICA-EAST INDIES-CHANCES OF A GOOD MARKET IN CHINA.

Ir that suitable care which we recommend as necessary to afford us the chance of a fair rivalry, is hereafter exercised, we shall certainly be able, with the growth of our own nation, and the enlargement of our foreign Commerce, to find a market for our fish, and that perhaps, without incommoding at all, our friends of the East.

Nor

Fish is one of the wholesomest and best articles of food, adapted to use at all times, and especially suited to hot climates. It is in such places, infinitely preferable to flesh, being less fat, and generating, therefore, less animal heat or caloric. We believe that in torrid regions, or in the warm season of temperate climates, where prepared fish is an extensive article of food, epidemics are less frequent and severe, than where either meat or fruits are substituted. We know that there are opinions entertained, based on the assertions of eminent physicians, that fish is unwholesome in warm weather, and they go so far as to attribute to fish several severe epidemics, and other diseases. Some learned son of Esculapius has attributed to fish the generation, or at least the propagation of that dreadful plague, the Asiatic cholera. This is not the first time that learning has gone completely astray, and that science has lost itself in the labyrinths of its own ignorance. is it anything new for the innocent to bear the punishment, while the real criminal escapes entirely "unwhipped of justice." We suppose the prohibition refers rather to fresh than to preserved fish, but in either case we join issue. These savans, we are invincibly persuaded, would subserve the public health much better, in cholera seasons, by reversing their regimen-prescribing fish, and interdicting roast beef and brandy. Fish, and especially fresh fish, may not be at all times entirely wholesome, as is the case, perhaps, with almost any article of food; with all, at least, formed of animal matter. There are, very likely, at times diseases among the inhabitants of the water, as well as among land animals. But fish have only natural diseases, when they have any, that is, such as originate in purely natural disturbances, never being superinduced or perpetuated by vicious habits of living. They have no corrupted physical condition, whose taint lures disease from every side, as carrion gathers the flocks of prey. When nature is disturbed in one of her departments, the perturbation is soon extended, in some form, to all,; and when the ocean is therefore invaded by disease, if it be not the fact, as is most likely, that the primal cause was in violation of her laws upon the earth, the latter will certainly participate the infection. Especially, if it be true, as the theory has it, that these diseases of the oceanic population are due to electrical or magnetic affections, then is it certain that a principle so pervading the entire globe, and so subtle in its se sibilities, will sympathize throughout its system in the agitation that se ms to affect it in one part. If fish are sick of magnetic influences, how sh ll the electric currents of the earth and the air, in such perfect communi

cation with those of the water, escape the unhealthy influence? But suppose the land does actually escape diseases that invade the water, it must be as true on the other hand, that the water is exempt from others which afflict the land and the creatures thereof. And on which side is the balance likely to preponderate? On one hand, we have a perfectly natural system of living; on the other an artificial, and in consequence, a corrupt system, both with regard to man, and the animals whom he has forced to be particeps criminis in his violence to the laws of nature. The balance of the case is plainly this-fish may have natural diseases to which land animals are equally subject, to say the least, while the latter (i. e., those we use mostly for food) have in addition, a class of diseases that do not visit the former, and which are the result of domestication.

It is a fact worth mentioning here, that in New England the atmosphere is found to be peculiarly wholesome in the vicinity of the large yards where the business of drying fish is carried on. In Newburyport, where the writer has resided-within his remembrance, a severe summer sickness that visited the rest of the town, generally passed by that portion, quite as thickly settled, where were located several large fish-yards, the health of that quarter remaining good the whole season; and eminent physicians there attributed the escape to the very evident cause-a sanitory influence exerted upon the atmosphere by the emanations from these yards. A great part of this influence may have belonged to the salt rather than to the fish, but still the latter were not without their odor, distinguishable in spite of the salt, to a considerable distance; and if the exhalation of all the fishy juices into an atmosphere breathed by so many on every side, was consistent with a state of isolated good health just within that atmosphere, it does not seem to prove that the components of the fishy matter are remarkably unwholesome. It may be added, that the people within the district in question, although not entirely ichthyophagous, made a larger part of their food of fish, both fresh and prepared, than the people of other parts of the town.

But to return to the question we had in view in starting-the prospect of our markets for the future. As we have said, if our fish are properly prepared, we shall find people to eat them. Who these people are to be is to be now our inquiry.

In the first place, let us look at home. More fish must be eaten in our own country. We are growing fast, and with the rapid multiplication of mouths, additional substance will be needed to fill them. More fish should be called for, by the new mouths, as well as more beef, corn, and potatoes. But apart from the prospect of increased numbers, the market at home is not as large, with the present population and present circumstances, as it should be. The class to which we will first allude are the laborers in our cities and towns. These people are great consumers of meat, principally beef, and generally fancy that such substantial food is necessary to sustain men at their hard labor. But the idea is fallacious. Continual use of stimulating food is injurious to the system, and especially in the summer season, when meat is, in any state, not particularly wholesome, and when animals are known to be peculiarly liable to humor and disease. It is not to be wondered at that where flesh is a considerable article of food, at this season, those malignant diseases, called summer complaints should be especially prevalent. Light food is required in warm weather, and if men do not in that season force themselves to the use of stimulating viands, they will easily adapt themselves to light substances. But it is certain their health will be

better at all seasons by varying their diet, substituting partially a weaker food for the uniformly strong to which they are now so devoted. And by usage, nature will be just as well satisfied in this way as the other. A great number of laboring men, of course, will deny the correctness of our argument, but there is a class, and a large class, too, who cannot fail to acknowledge its validity. We refer to the adopted citizens, natives of Ireland, England, France, Germany, &c., men who are now among the most inveterate beef-eaters of the country, but who, in the old countries, were necessitated to a much weaker diet; and who can remember that when meat was a rarity to them, they were just as well able as now, provided they had a sufficiency of other food, to sustain hard labor. There are other reasons to recommend the course we propose; that is a vicious taste which continually craves one kind of food. Taste is only properly cultivated by the use of a variety of kinds, and the pleasure arising from a taste thus exercised is much greater than that resulting from one perpetual stimulus. The change is again recommended by economy. Meat is already a dear article of food, and with the present rate of increase in population, and a continuance of the present beef-consuming rage, the cost must be more and more enhanced; the certain tendency of this circumstance is a continual depression of the working population, of which they must be as sensible as any. The remedy, of course, is in that substitution, partial or entire, which must eventually happen of sheer necessity, if choice is delayed, of some other food. We hope, with the spread of intelligence, so rapidly increasing, to see our mechanics, artisans, and laborers generally, correcting the abuses in their modes of living which they have so long been subject to, and advice on which they have so long disregarded. In the case of their food, we would recommend to them all the use of fish in lieu of at least half of their meat. Good qualities of dried or pickled fish, properly prepared, with the accompaniments of the ordinary dinner vegetables, will not, we venture to say, be long liable to the charge of unsavoriness, or deficiency of nutritive power. For breakfast, too, a broiled fish is at any time better adapted than a beef-steak, however tender, and however pressing the invitations it conveys through the olfactories; and for tea, a stripped dried pollock is in all respects preferable to the daintiest bits of smoked beef.

We don't know why the advice we offer to the laborers is not quite as good for those who are called, we suppose usually in a facetious way," the upper class." The charge of over-eating is habitually made against them, and though to a considerable extent true, implies not gluttony in the abstract, but only over-indulgence as compared to their physical activity. Now it is certain that a plethora upon substances of a light nature is much less injurious to the digestive organs, and to the joint-systems generally, than a plethora from heavy substances. Fish would commit less injury than roastbeef. To be sure, the rich have already their particular, few favorites in the finny trive, but they might enjoy, at least more often, real luxury in a dish of common broiled cod-fish and potatoes, a broiled mackerel, a fried bass, or a smoked herring.

More fish might advantageously be eaten by our farmers. Beside diver sifying their food, it would extend the sale of their own productions.

While the market contiguous to the sea might thus be so widely enlarged, there is another home field to which attention is especially due, and which may be made to yield rich results. We allude to the great West. The already great, and soon to become vast population of the Ohio and Mis

sissippi valleys are deeply concerned in every means by which their trade with the East can be extended. The country does not yet afford a sufficient market for the bountiful products of their luxuriant soil, and they look in vain for purchases abroad to take up their overplus. If they will take the fish of the East, the East, in return, will be enabled to buy more of their produce. Pork, for instance, is an article of universal consumption, an plentifully and cheaply raised in the West. Among the different animal meats consumed, pork, raised in the manner of the Western article, is certainly much wholesomer than the mass of meats, of whatever kind, raised in the Atlantic States. Let the Atlantic population, then, eat more Western pork, and further diminish their consumption of unwholesome dark-meats, and we have thus a good market opened for our fish, where there is now but an indifferent one-if there can be said to be any at all-one which may be indefinitely extended too, and in return, shall have bettered and cheapened our own living. In that great region a market may be created for our fish which will enable us to disregard all rivalry without.

We hope to see a good market growing up in California. For all the population of that magnificent State, and for the miners especially, nothing can be better calculated as food, than fish. Beef and pork are poor food for a climate like that, and we have no doubt, that the opinion of eminent physicians in that State is correct, that a great part of the early mortality among the miners and others, and particularly that form of disease so fatal, commencing with a scurvy, or with an overpowering lassitude, was the result of excessive use of these articles. Fish and vegetables are the food best adapted to that climate. The Pacific, of course, is plentifully supplied with the former, but in the present state of that region, the catching and cure of them, to any extent, will, likely, be neglected for a considerable time yet; and, in the mean time, the market is open to our Eastern people. Only a few have yet been sent, and most of those not properly prepared: but it is to be hoped attention will at once be turned to the subject.

But we are not yet necessitated to abandon our external markets. If the reform suggested in regard to preparation is made, we can keep up the export heretofore made to the several hot countries, and can also teach others in those climates, with whom we do now, or may hereafter have intercourse, to eat and to call for American fish-for all the balance, perhaps, that we and our provincial neighbors, jointly, can spare. There are not too many fish in the sea for the use of the people of the land, nor too many engaged in taking them. Errors in the business, and political evils, are all that now limit the market, and produce injurious competition. Were Cuba relieved of the nightmare of Spanish tyranny, and mistress of her own abused energies, she would become three-fold the customer she has ever been. It is not our part to urge or desire our government to violate its treaty obligations, or disregard the comity of nations; and we do not forget also, the reason there is for apprehension in any anticipation of the independence of Cuba, and the probable effort that would follow to annex it to the United States, regarding the peace of our own union. But, as an individual, we are not disposed, from either consideration, to wish that Cuba may remain as she is. We do not feel called upon, on the grounds of a mere uncertain prudence-in the dread of after consequences, of which we can have no certain knowledge, and the direction of which rests wholly with Providence-to stifle noble impulses to sympathize with a great wrong, when we are no more certain, that the timid prudence which suggests such a course, may not be over