A careful study of the systems of banking currency and coinage adopted by the principal nations of Europe convinces me that our system, when cured of a few defects developed by time, founded upon the bimetallic coinage of gold and silver maintained at par with each other, with free national banks established in every city and town of importance in the United States, issuing their notes secured beyond doubt by United States bonds or some equivalent security, redeemable on demand in United States notes, and the issue of an amount of United States notes and treasury notes equal to the amount now outstanding, with provision for a ratable increase with the increase of population, always redeemable in coin and supported by an ample reserve of coin in the treasury, not to be invaded by deficiencies of revenue, and separated by the sub-treasury system from all connection with the receipts and expenditures of the government — such a system would make our money current in commercial circles in every land and clime, better than the best that now exists in Europe, better than that of Great Britain, which now holds the purse-string of the world.

It is not given to man to foresee with certainty the future; but if we may judge the future by the past, the growth and progress of our country will continue, the diversity and extent of our industries will expand, the vast plains of our broad territory will be teeming with population. The rapid growth of our cities, unexampled in the history of mankind, will continue. A century spans the life of this Republic; what will the next century do? I have seen great changes in my life, but those who come after us will see greater changes still. I may on some proper occasion hereafter give the reasons for my faith in our present financial system. All I ask now is that you will not disturb it with your deficiencies, you will not

rob it of its safeguards, you will not return to the days of wildcat money, you will not lessen the savings of prudent labor or the accumulations of the rich. Time makes all things even. Let us give to the executive authorities ample means to meet the appropriations you have made, but let us strengthen rather than weaken our monetary system, which lies at the foundation of our prosperity and progress.

MEAGHER

THO

HOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER, an Irish soldier and revolutionist, was the son of a retired merchant and was born in Waterford, Ireland, August 3, 1823. After obtaining an education at the Jesuit College of Clongowes Wood and Stonyhurst College, Lancashire, he went to Dublin in 1844 with the intention of studying law, but speedily relinquished it for politics. He espoused the cause of Ireland with the greatest enthusiasm, and in a fiery speech on July 28 of that year deprecated the idea that the use of arms was immoral and declared the sword to be a sacred weapon. For this he was styled by Thackeray "Meagher of the Sword." On the 5th of March, 1848, he made a vehement speech before a meeting of the Irish confederation, asserting that Irishmen were justified in saying to the government, "If you do not give us a parliament in which to state our grievances, we shall state them by arms and force." He was arrested for sedition a few days later and tried at Dublin without a verdict being obtained. Undismayed by this warning, Meagher travelled about Ireland in the following July attempting to organize a revolution, but was again arrested. In October he was brought to trial at Clonmel and after six 'days' deliberation was adjudged guilty of high treason and sentenced to be hanged, drawn, and quartered. His sentence being commuted to penal servitude for life, he was banished to Tasmania, where considerable liberty appears to have been allowed him. In 1852 he escaped to the United States, where for two years he came frequently before the public as a lecturer, his fiery eloquence and his handsome features together making a great impression upon his hearers. He took up the study of law again and was admitted to the New York bar in 1855, but at the opening of the civil war promptly gave up his professional duties, and, organizing a company of zouave volunteers, served at their head in the Federal army. In 1862 he was appointed brigadier-general and distinguished himself by bravery at Antietam and other battle-fields. In 1866 he was appointed governor of Montana pro tempore, and while occupying this position was drowned in the Missouri River, near Fort Benton, Montana, July 1, 1867, by accidentally falling from the deck of a steamboat. Meagher was an exc tremely impulsive, recklessly courageous character, whose oratory was of the most fiery description. His writings include "Speeches on the Legislative Independence of Ireland" (1853); "Recollections of Ireland and the Irish; " "Last Days of the Sixty-Ninth in Virginia" (1861).

"SWORD SPEECH"

DELIVERED IN CONCILIATION HALL, DUBLIN, JULY 20, 1846

M

Y LORD MAYOR,-I will commence as Mr. Mitchel concluded, by an allusion to the Whigs.

I fully concur with my friend, that the most comprehensive measures which the Whig minister may propose will fail to lift this country up to that position which she has the right to occupy and the power to maintain. A Whig minister, I admit, may improve the province — he will not restore the nation. Franchises, tenant-compensation bills, liberal appointments, may ameliorate—they will not exalt. They may meet the necessities — they will not call forth the abilities of the country. The errors of the past may be repaired the hopes of the future will not be fulfilled. With a vote in one pocket, a lease in the other, and full "justice" before him at the petty sessions in the shape of a restored magistrate "the humblest peasant may be told that he is free; but, my lord, he will not have the character of a freeman his spirit to dare, his energy to act. From the stateliest mansion, down to the poorest cottage in the land, the inactivity, the meanness, the debasement, which provincialism engenders, will be perceptible.

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These are not the crude sentiments of youth, though the mere commercial politician, who has deduced his ideas of self-government from the table of imports and exports, may satirize them as such. Age has uttered them, my lord, and the experience of eighty years has preached them to the people. A few weeks since, and there stood in the court of queen's bench an old and venerable man, to teach the coun

try the lessons he had learned, in this youth, beneath the por tico of the Irish Senate House, and which, during a long life, he had treasured in his heart as the costliest legacy a true citizen could bequeath the land that gave him birth.

What said this aged orator?

"National independence does not necessarily lead to national virtue and happiness; but reason and experience demonstrate that public spirit and general happiness are looked for in vain under the withering influence of provincial subjection. The very consciousness of being dependent on another power, for advancement in the scale of national being, weighs down the spirit of a people, manacles the efforts of genius, depresses the energies of virtue, blunts the sense of common glory and common good, and produces an insulated selfishness of character, the surest mark of debasement in the individual, and mortality in the State."

My lord, it was once said by an eminent citizen of Rome, the elder Pliny, that "we owe our youth and manhood to our country, but our declining age to ourselves." This may have been the maxim of the Roman - it is not the maxim of the Irish patriot. One might have thought that the anxieties, the labors, the vicissitudes of a long career, had dimmed the fire which burned in the heart of the illustrious old man whose words I have cited; but now, almost from the shadow of death, he comes forth with the vigor of youth and the authority of age, to serve the country in the defence of which he once bore arms by an example, my lord, that must shame the coward, rouse the sluggard, and stimulate the bold.

These sentiments have sunk deep into the public mind. They are recited as the national creed. Whilst these sentiments inspire the people, I have no fear for the national cause I do not dread the venal influence of the Whigs. Inspired by such sentiments, the people of this country will.