discovery of the precious metals within her own territories, it is only because she would possess a larger fund to exchange for more useful and necessary products of labour.  The value of silver would not fall, assuming the supply and demand to be equalised, but gold would fall in relation to silver, and the existing proportion (about 15 to 1) could no longer be maintained.  Then prices would rise of all articles now estimated in our currency—­i.e. an ounce of gold would exchange for less than at present.  And, assuming the price of silver to keep up as heretofore, about 5s. an ounce, our sovereign would be valued less in other countries, and all exchange operations would be sensibly affected.  The only countervailing influence in the reduction of gold to, say, only double the price of silver, would be an increased consumption in articles of taste and manufacture, which, however, can only be speculative and uncertain.  It is said by accounts from California that five hundred miles lie open to the avarice of gold-hunters, and that some adventurers have collected from 1,200 to 1,800 dollars a-day; the probable average of each man’s earnings being from 8 to 10 dollars a-day, or, let us say, L2.  The same authority avers there is room and verge enough for the profitable working, to that extent, of a hundred thousand persons.  And it is likely enough before long that such a number may be tempted to seek their easily acquired fortune in the golden sands of El Sacramento and elsewhere.  Now two pounds a-day for each man would amount to L200,000, which, multiplied by 300 working days, will give L60,000,000 a-year!  That is, L600,000,000 in ten years!  A fearful amount of gold dust, and far more than enough to disturb the equanimity of ten thousand political economists.  The gold utensils found among the simple-minded and philosophic Peruvians (who wondered at the eager desire of Christians for what they scarcely valued), will be esteemed trifles with our golden palaces, and halls paved with gold, when California shall have poured this vast treasure into Europe.  Assuming in round numbers each 2,000 lbs., or troy ton, to be equivalent to L100,000 sterling, the above amount in one year would represent six hundred tons, and in ten years six thousand tons of gold!  The imagination of all-plodding industrious England is incapable of grasping so great an idea!  Can there be any doubt, then, of a revolution in the value of the precious metals?

PROHIBITION FROM THE GOVERNMENT.—­It would seem that the government have at length taken measures to preserve the gold districts from the bands of foreign adventurers who are daily pouring in from every quarter.  Towards the end of January we learn that General Smith had been sent out by the United States government, with orders to enforce the laws against all persons, not citizens of the States, who should be found trespassing on the public lands.  Official notice to this effect was issued to the American consul at Panama and other