THE SCIENCE OF WEALTH: A MANUAL OF POLITICAL ECONOMY. EMBRACING THE LAWS OF TRADE, CURRENCY, BY AMASA WALKER, LL.D., LECTURER ON PUBLIC ECONOMY IN AMHERST COLLEGE. FIFTH EDITION REVISED. UNIVER CALH BOSTON: LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY. 1869. Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1866, by AMASA WALKER, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. CAMBRIDGE: STEREOTYPED AND PRINTED BY JOHN WILSON AND SON. IN preparing the present edition of the Science of Wealth for the press, the author has endeavored to correct all errors, typographical and otherwise, that have been discovered, and has inserted, at page 237, an original section on "The Development of the National Banking System." When the first edition of this work was published, in 1866, the National Banks had but just commenced their career; and the system was an untried experiment. Since that time, it has been greatly enlarged: its full circulation of three hundred millions has been issued; and its operations extended throughout all the States of the Union. It seemed desirable, therefore, to present such facts and statistics as would exhibit its character and effects, both as affording a profitable investment, and as affecting the general interests of the country. This has been necessarily done with great brevity, owing to the limited space at command. No period in our country's history has been so instructive upon all questions appertaining to economic science as the present decade. Four years of war upon the largest scale, and nearly four years more of peace; the suspension of the laws of value by the legal-tender act of Congress; the high premium on gold occasioned by the redundancy of the cur |