THE ‘DRAPIER’S LETTERS’

BY JONATHAN SWIFT

I

TO THE TRADESMEN, SHOP-KEEPERS, FARMERS, AND COMMON-PEOPLE IN GENERAL, OF THE KINGDOM OF IRELAND; CONCERNING THE BRASS HALF-PENCE COINED BY MR. WOOD.

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 entirely depend 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 expence, 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 a-piece.  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 enquire, 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:  it had no other design, said nothing against the king or Parliament, or any man, 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 loss of money, perhaps to his ruin.

However, I cannot but warn you once more of the manifest destruction before your eyes, if you do not behave yourselves 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, and according to the laws of your country.

The fact is thus, It having been many years since copper half-pence 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 hard-ware dealer, procured a patent under his Majesty’s Broad Seal to coin fourscore and ten thousand pounds 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 half-pence 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 above a penny in a shilling.  But Mr. Wood made his half-pence 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 fourscore and ten thousand pounds in good gold and silver, must be given for trash that will not be worth above 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 and another fourscore and ten thousand pounds, 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 a-piece, which amounts to three pounds, and receives the payment in Mr. 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 half-pence, 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 could tell a fair story.  And his majesty, and perhaps the great lord or lords who advised 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 hath 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 receiv’d 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 half-pence, to Cork and other seaport towns, and to get them off, offered an 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 hath condemned them, and desired the king that they might be stopped, all the kingdom do abominate them.

But Wood is still working under hand to force his half-pence upon us, and if he can by 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 ale-house 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 half-pence.  In this and the like cases the shop-keeper, 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 these half-pence, 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, because they are bound by their leases to pay their rents 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 where-ever it stops it is the same thing, and we are all undone.

The common weight of these half-pence is between four and five to an ounce; suppose five, then three shillings and fourpence will weigh a pound, and consequently twenty shillings will weigh six pounds butter weight.  Now there are many hundred farmers who pay two hundred pound a year rent.  Therefore when one of these farmers comes with his half year’s rent, which is one hundred pound, it will be at least six hundred pound 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 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 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 till I am just ready to starve, and then I will buy Mr. Wood’s money, as my father did the brass money in K. James’s time, who could buy ten pound 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 half-pence, if they once pass, will soon be counterfeit, 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 fourscore and ten thousand pounds 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 blood-suckers 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 payment, 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 cottiers.  The farmers must rob or beg, or leave their country.  The shop-keepers in this and every other town must break and starve:  for it is the landed man that maintains the merchant, and shop-keeper, 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 subjects 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 or 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 a-new 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 this much, I will now go on to tell you the judgments 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.

A famous law-book call’d the Mirrour of Justice, discoursing of the articles (or laws) ordained by our ancient kings, declares the law to be as follows:  It was ordained that no king of this realm should change, impair, or amend the money or make any other money than of gold or silver without the assent of all the counties, that is, as my Lord Coke says, without the assent of Parliament.

This book is very ancient, and of great authority for the time in which it was wrote, and with that character is often quoted by that great lawyer my Lord Coke.  By the laws of England, several metals are divided into lawful or true metal and unlawful or false metal; the former comprehends silver or gold, the latter all baser metals:  that the former is only to pass in payments appears by an Act of Parliament made the twentieth year of Edward the First, called the statute concerning the passing of pence, which I give you here as I got it translated into English; for some of our laws at that time were, as I am told, writ in Latin:  Whoever in buying or selling presumeth to refuse an half-penny or farthing of lawful money, bearing the stamp which it ought to have, let him be seized on as a contemner of the king’s majesty, and cast to prison.

By this statute, no person is to be reckoned a contemner of the king’s majesty, and for that crime to be committed to prison, but he who refuses to accept the king’s coin made of lawful metal, by which, as I observ’d before, silver and gold only are intended.

That this is the true construction of the Act, appears not only from the plain meaning of the words, but from my Lord Coke’s observation upon it.  By this Act (says he) it appears that no subject can be forc’d to take in buying or selling or other payments, any money made but of lawful metal; that is, of silver or gold.

The law of England gives the king all mines of gold and silver, but not the mines of other metals; the reason of which prerogative or power, as it is given by my Lord Coke, is, because money can be made of gold and silver, but not of other metals.

Pursuant to this opinion half-pence and farthings were anciently made of silver, which is more evident from the Act of Parliament of Henry the IVth. cha, by which it is enacted as follows:  Item, for the great scarcity that is at present within the realm of England of half-pence and farthings of silver, it is ordained and established that the third part of all the money of silver plate which shall be brought to the bullion, shall be made in half-pence and farthings.  This shows that by the words half-penny and farthing of lawful money in that statute concerning the passing of pence, is meant a small coin in half-pence and farthings of silver.

This is further manifest from the statute of the ninth year of Edward the IIId. cha, which enacts, That no sterling half-penny or farthing be molten for to make vessel, or any other thing by the goldsmiths, nor others, upon forfeiture of the money so molten (or melted).

By another Act in this king’s reign black money was not to be current in England, and by an Act made in the eleventh year of his reign, cha, galley half-pence were not to pass:  what kind of coin these were I do not know, but I presume they were made of base metal, and that these Acts were no new laws, but further declarations of the old laws relating to the coin.

Thus the law stands in relation to coin, nor is there any example to the contrary, except one in Davis’s Reports, who tells us, that in the time of Tyrone’s rebellion Queen Elizabeth ordered money of mixt metal to be coined in the Tower of London, and sent over hither for payment of the army, obliging all people to receive it, and commanding that all silver money should be taken only as bullion, that is, for as much as it weighed.  Davis tells us several particulars in this matter too long here to trouble you with, and that the Privy Council of this kingdom obliged a merchant in England to receive this mixt money for goods transmitted hither.

But this proceeding is rejected by all the best lawyers as contrary to law, the Privy Council here having no such power.  And, besides, it is to be considered that the Queen was then under great difficulties by a rebellion in this kingdom, assisted from Spain, and whatever is done in great exigences and dangerous times should never be an example to proceed by in seasons of peace and quietness.

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 oblig’d to take all money in payments which is coin’d by the king and is of the English standard or weight, provided it be of gold or silver.

Secondly, You are not oblig’d to take any money which is not of gold or silver, not only the half-pence or farthings of England, or of any other country; and it is only for convenience, or ease, that you are content to take them, because the custom of coining silver half-pence and farthings hath long been left off, I will suppose on account of their being subject to be lost.

Thirdly, Much less are we oblig’d to take those vile half-pence of that 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 half-pence; our gracious prince hath no so 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 poor sort of tradesmen:  perhaps you may think you will not be so great losers as the rich if these half-pence 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 half-pence to a shop for tobacco or brandy, or any other thing you want, the shop-keeper 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 half-pence?  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 further, that if Mr. Wood’s project should take it will ruin even our beggars:  for when I give a beggar an half-penny, it will quench his thirst, or go a good way to fill his belly; but the twelfth part of a half-penny will do him no more service than if I should give him three pins out of my sleeve.

In short those half-pence 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 hands upon them.  I have heard scholars talk of a man who told a 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 his own brazen bull to make the experiment; this very much resembles the project of Mr. Wood; and the like of this may possibly 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 inform’d by persons who have made it their business to be exact in their observations on the true value of these half-pence, that any person may expect to get a quart of twopenny ale for thirty-six of them.

I desire all persons may keep this paper carefully by them to refresh their memories whenever they shall have further notice of Mr. Wood’s half-pence or any other the like imposture.

II.

A LETTER TO MR. HARDING THE PRINTER, UPON OCCASION OF A PARAGRAPH IN HIS NEWS-PAPER OF AUGUST 1, 1724, RELATING TO MR. WOOD’S HALF-PENCE.

In your news-letter of the first instant there is a paragraph dated from London, July 25th, relating to Wood’s half-pence; whereby it is plain, what I foretold in my letter to the shop-keepers, etc., that this vile fellow would never be at rest, and that the danger of our ruin approaches nearer, and therefore the kingdom requires new and fresh warning; however I take that paragraph to be, in a great measure, an imposition upon the public, at least I hope so, because I am informed that Wood is generally his own news-writer.  I cannot but observe from that paragraph that this public enemy of ours, not satisfied to ruin us with his trash, takes every occasion to treat this kingdom with the utmost contempt.  He represents several of our merchants and traders upon examination before a committee of a council, agreeing that there was the utmost necessity of copper-money here, before his patent, so that several gentlemen have been forced to tally with their workmen, and give them bits of cards sealed and subscribed with their names.  What then?  If a physician prescribe to a patient a dram of physic, shall a rascal apothecary cram him with a pound, and mix it up with poison?  And is not a landlord’s hand and seal to his own labourers a better security for five or ten shillings, than Wood’s brass seven times below the real value, can be to the kingdom, for an hundred and four thousand pounds?

But who are these merchants and traders of Ireland that make this report of the utmost necessity we are under of copper money?  They are only a few betrayers of their country, confederates with Wood, from whom they are to purchase a great quantity of his coin, perhaps at half value, and vend it among us to the ruin of the public and their own private advantage.  Are not these excellent witnesses, upon whose integrity the fate of a kingdom must depend, who are evidences in their own cause, and sharers in this work of iniquity?

If we could have deserved the liberty of coining for ourselves, as we formerly did (and why we have not is everybody’s wonder as well as mine), ten thousand pounds might have been coined here in Dublin of only one fifth below the intrinsic value, and this sum, with the stock of half-pence we then had, would have been sufficient:  but Wood by his emissaries, enemies to God and this kingdom, hath taken care to buy up as many of our old half-pence as he could, and from thence the present want of change arises; to remove which, by Mr. Wood’s remedy, would be, to cure a scratch on the finger by cutting off the arm.  But supposing there were not one farthing of change in the whole nation, I will maintain that five and twenty thousand pounds would be a sum fully sufficient to answer all our occasions.  I am no inconsiderable shop-keeper in this town, I have discoursed with several of my own and other trades, with many gentlemen both of city and country, and also with great numbers of farmers, cottagers, and labourers, who all agree that two shillings in change for every family would be more than necessary in all dealings.  Now by the largest computation (even before that grievous discouragement of agriculture, which hath so much lessened our numbers) the souls in this kingdom are computed to be one million and a half, which, allowing but six to a family, makes two hundred and fifty thousand families, and consequently two shillings to each family will amount only to five and twenty thousand pounds, whereas this honest liberal hard-ware-man Wood, would impose upon us above four times that sum.

Your paragraph relates further, that Sir Isaac Newton reported an assay taken at the Tower, of Wood’s metal, by which it appears that Wood had in all respects performed his contract.  His contract!  With whom?  Was it with the Parliament or people of Ireland?  Are not they to be the purchasers?  But they detest, abhor, and reject it, as corrupt, fraudulent, mingled with dirt and trash.  Upon which he grows angry, goes to law, and will impose his goods upon us by force.

But your news-letter says that an assay was made of the coin.  How impudent and insupportable is this?  Wood takes care to coin a dozen or two half-pence of good metal, sends them to the Tower and they are approved, and these must answer all that he hath already coined or shall coin for the future.  It is true, indeed, that a gentleman often sends to my shop for a pattern of stuff, I cut it fairly off, and if he likes it he comes or sends and compares the pattern with the whole piece, and probably we come to a bargain.  But if I were to buy an hundred sheep, and the grazier should bring me one single weather fat and well fleeced by way of pattern, and expect the same price round for the whole hundred, without suffering me to see them before he was paid, or giving me good security to restore my money for those that were lean or shorn or scabby, I would be none of his customer.  I have heard of a man who had a mind to sell his house, and therefore carried a piece of brick in his pocket, which he showed as a pattern to encourage purchasers:  and this is directly the case in point with Mr. Wood’s assay.

The next part of the paragraph contains Mr. Wood’s voluntary proposals for preventing any future objections or apprehensions.

His first proposal is, that whereas he hath already coined seventeen thousand pounds, and has copper prepared to make it up forty thousand pounds, he will be content to coin no more, unless the exigences of trade require it, though his patent empowers him to coin a far greater quantity.

To which if I were to answer it should be thus:  Let Mr. Wood and his crew of founders and tinkers coin on till there is not an old kettle left in the kingdom; let them coin old leather, tobacco-pipe clay, or the dirt in the streets, and call their trumpery by what name they please from a guinea to a farthing, we are not under any concern to know how he and his tribe or accomplices think fit to employ themselves.  But I hope and trust that we are all to a man fully determined to have nothing to do with him or his ware.

The king has given him a patent to coin half-pence, but hath not obliged us to take them, and I have already shown in my Letter to the Shop-keepers, etc., that the law hath not left it in the power of the prerogative to compel the subject to take any money, beside gold and silver of the right sterling and standard.

Wood further proposes, (if I understand him right, for his expressions are dubious) that he will not coin above forty thousand pounds unless the exigences of trade require it:  First, I observe that this sum of forty thousand pounds is almost double to what I proved to be sufficient for the whole kingdom, although we had not one of our old half-pence left.  Again I ask, who is to be judge when the exigences of trade require it?  Without doubt he means himself, for as to us of this poor kingdom, who must be utterly ruined if his project should succeed, we were never once consulted till the matter was over, and he will judge of our exigences by his own; neither will these be ever at an end till he and his accomplices will think they have enough:  and it now appears that he will not be content with all our gold and silver, but intends to buy up our goods and manufactures with the same coin.

I shall not enter into examination of the prices for which he now proposes to sell his half-pence or what he calls his copper, by the pound; I have said enough of it in my former letter, and it hath likewise been considered by others.  It is certain that, by his own first computation, we were to pay three shillings for what was intrinsically worth but one, although it had been of the true weight and standard for which he pretended to have contracted; but there is so great a difference both in weight and badness in several of his coins that some of them have been nine in ten below the intrinsic value, and most of them six or seven.

His last proposal being of a peculiar strain and nature, deserves to be very particularly consider’d, both on account of the matter and the style.  It is as follows.

Lastly, in consideration of the direful apprehensions which prevail in Ireland, that Mr. Wood will by such coinage drain them of their gold and silver, he proposes to take their manufactures in exchange, and that no person be obliged to receive more than five-pence half-penny at one payment.

First, observe this little impudent hard-ware-man turning into ridicule the direful apprehensions of a whole kingdom, priding himself as the cause of them, and daring to prescribe what no king of England ever attempted, how far a whole nation shall be obliged to take his brass coin.  And he has reason to insult; for sure there was never an example in history of a great kingdom kept in awe for above a year in daily dread of utter destruction, not by a powerful invader at the head of twenty thousand men, not by a plague or a famine, not by a tyrannical prince (for we never had one more gracious) or a corrupt administration, but by one single, diminutive, insignificant, mechanic.

But to go on.  To remove our direful apprehensions that he will drain us of our gold and silver by his coinage, this little arbitrary mock-monarch most graciously offers to take our manufactures in exchange.  Are our Irish understandings indeed so low in his opinion?  Is not this the very misery we complain of?  That his cursed project will put us under the necessity of selling our goods for what is equal to nothing.  How would such a proposal sound from France or Spain, or any other country we deal with, if they should offer to deal with us only upon this condition, that we should take their money at ten times higher than the intrinsic value?  Does Mr. Wood think, for instance, that we will sell him a stone of wool for a parcel of his counters not worth sixpence, when we can send it to England and receive as many shillings in gold and silver?  Surely there was never heard such a compound of impudence, villainy and folly.

His proposals conclude with perfect high-treason.  He promises, that no person shall be obliged to receive more than five-pence half-penny of his coin in one payment:  by which it is plain that he pretends to oblige every subject in this kingdom to take so much in every payment, if it be offered; whereas his patent obliges no man, nor can the prerogative by law claim such a power, as I have often observed; so that here Mr. Wood takes upon him the entire legislature, and an absolute dominion over the properties of the whole nation.

Good God!  Who are this wretch’s advisers?  Who are his supporters, abettors, encouragers, or sharers?  Mr. Wood will oblige me to take five-pence half-penny of his brass in every payment.  And I will shoot Mr. Wood and his deputies through the head, like highway-men or house-breakers, if they dare to force one farthing of their coin upon me in the payment of an hundred pounds.  It is no loss of honour to submit to the lion; but who, with the figure of a man can think with patience of being devoured alive by a rat?  He has laid a tax upon the people of Ireland of seventeen shillings at least in the pound; a tax, I say, not only upon lands, but interest-money, goods, manufactures, the hire of handicraftsmen, labourers and servants.  Shop-keepers, look to yourselves.  Wood will oblige and force you to take five-pence half-penny of his trash in every payment, and many of you receive twenty, thirty, forty, payments in one day, or else you can hardly find bread:  and pray consider how much that will amount to in a year; twenty times five-pence half-penny is nine shillings and two-pence, which is above an hundred and sixty pounds a year, whereof you will be losers of at least one hundred and forty pounds by taking your payments in his money.  If any of you be content to deal with Mr. Wood on such conditions they may.  But for my own particular, let his money perish with him.  If the famous Mr. Hampden rather chose to go to prison than pay a few shillings to King Charles I. without authority of Parliament, I will rather choose to be hanged than have all my substance taxed at seventeen shillings in the pound, at the arbitrary will and pleasure of the venerable Mr. Wood.

The paragraph concludes thus. N.B. (that is to say nota bene, or mark well) No evidence appeared from Ireland or elsewhere, to prove the mischiefs complained of, or any abuses whatsoever committed in the execution of the said grant.

The impudence of this remark exceeds all that went before.  First, the House of Commons in Ireland, which represents the whole people of the kingdom; and secondly the Privy Council, addressed his majesty against these half-pence.  What could be done more to express the universal sense and opinion of the nation?  If his copper were diamonds, and the kingdom were entirely against it, would not that be sufficient to reject it?  Must a committee of the House of Commons, and our whole Privy Council go over to argue pro and con with Mr. Wood?  To what end did the king give his patent for coining of half-pence in Ireland?  Was it not, because it was represented to his sacred majesty, that such a coinage would be of advantage to the good of this kingdom, and of all his subjects here?  It is to the patentee’s peril if his representation be false, and the execution of his patent be fraudulent and corrupt.  Is he so wicked and foolish to think that his patent was given him to ruin a million and a half of people, that he might be a gainer of three or fourscore thousand pounds to himself?  Before he was at the charge of passing a patent, much more of raking up so much filthy dross, and stamping it with his majesty’s image and superscription, should he not first in common sense, in common equity, and common manners, have consulted the principal party concerned; that is to say, the people of the kingdom, the House of Lords or Commons, or the Privy Council?  If any foreigner should ask us, whose image and superscription there is on Wood’s coin, we should be ashamed to tell him, it was Caesar’s.  In that great want of copper half-pence, which he alleges we were, our city set up our Caesar’s statue in excellent copper, at an expence that is equal in value to thirty thousand pounds of his coin; and we will not receive his image in worse metal.

I observe many of our people putting a melancholy case on this subject.  It is true say they, we are all undone if Wood’s half-pence must pass; but what shall we do, if his majesty puts out a proclamation commanding us to take them?  This has been often dinned in my ears.  But I desire my countrymen to be assured that there is nothing in it.  The king never issues out a proclamation but to enjoin what the law permits him.  He will not issue out a proclamation against law, or if such a thing should happen by a mistake, we are no more obliged to obey it than to run our heads into the fire.  Besides, his majesty will never command us by a proclamation, what he does not offer to command us in the patent itself.  There he leaves it to our discretion, so that our destruction must be entirely owing to ourselves.  Therefore let no man be afraid of a proclamation, which will never be granted; and if it should, yet upon this occasion, will be of no force.  The king’s revenues here are near four hundred thousand pounds a year, can you think his ministers will advise him to take them in Wood’s brass, which will reduce the value to fifty thousand pounds?  England gets a million sterl. by this nation, which, if this project goes on, will be almost reduc’d to nothing:  and do you think those who live in England upon Irish estates will be content to take an eighth or a tenth part, by being paid in Wood’s dross?

If Wood and his confederates were not convinced of our stupidity, they never would have attempted so audacious an enterprise.  He now sees a spirit hath been raised against him, and he only watches till it begins to flag, he goes about watching when to devour us.  He hopes we shall be weary of contending with him, and at last out of ignorance, or fear, or of being perfectly tired with opposition, we shall be forced to yield.  And therefore I confess it is my chief endeavour to keep up your spirits and resentments.  If I tell you there is a precipice under you, and that if you go forwards you will certainly break your necks ­if I point to it before your eyes, must I be at the trouble of repeating it every morning?  Are our people’s hearts waxed gross?  Are their ears dull of hearing, and have they closed their eyes?  I fear there are some few vipers among us, who, for ten or twenty pounds’ gain, would sell their souls and their country, though at last it would end in their own ruin as well as ours.  Be not like the deaf adder, who refuses to hear the voice of the charmer, charm he never so wisely.

Though my letter be directed to you, Mr. Harding, yet I intend it for all my countrymen.  I have no interest in this affair but what is common to the public; I can live better than many others, I have some gold and silver by me, and a shop well furnished, and shall be able to make a shift when many of my betters are starving.  But I am grieved to see the coldness and indifference of many people with whom I discourse.  Some are afraid of a proclamation, others shrug up their shoulders, and cry, what would you have us to do?  Some give out, there is no danger at all.  Others are comforted that it will be a common calamity and they shall fare no worse than their neighbours.  Will a man, who hears midnight-robbers at his door, get out of bed, and raise his family for a common defence, and shall a whole kingdom lie in a lethargy, while Mr. Wood comes at the head of his confederates to rob them of all they have, to ruin us and our posterity for ever?  If an high-way-man meets you on the road, you give him your money to save your life; but, God be thanked, Mr. Wood cannot touch a hair of your heads.  You have all the laws of God and man on your side.  When he or his accomplices offer you his dross, it is but saying No, and you are safe.  If a madman should come to my shop with a handful of dirt raked out of the kennel, and offer it in payment for ten yards of stuff, I would pity or laugh at him, or, if his behaviour deserved it, kick him out of my doors.  And if Mr. Wood comes to demand any gold or silver, or commodities for which I have paid my gold and silver, in exchange for his trash, can he deserve or expect better treatment?

When the evil day is come (if it must come) let us mark and observe those who presume to offer these half-pence in payment.  Let their names and trades, and places of abode be made public, that every one may be aware of them, as betrayers of their country, and confederates with Mr. Wood.  Let them be watched at markets and fairs, and let the first honest discoverer give the word about, that Wood’s half-pence have been offered, and caution the poor innocent people not to receive them.

Perhaps I have been too tedious; but there would never be an end, if I attempt to say all that this melancholy subject will bear.  I will conclude with humbly offering one proposal, which if it were put in practice, would blow up this destructive project at once.  Let some skilful judicious pen draw up an advertisement to the following purpose: 

Whereas one William Wood, hard-ware-man, now or lately sojourning in the city of London, hath, by many misrepresentations, procured a patent for coining an hundred and forty thousand pounds in copper half-pence for this kingdom, which is a sum five times greater than our occasions require:  And whereas it is notorious that the said Wood hath coined his half-pence of such base metal and false weight, that they are, at least, six parts in seven below the real value:  And whereas we have reason to apprehend that the said Wood may, at any time hereafter, clandestinely coin as many more half-pence as he pleases:  And whereas the said patent neither doth nor can oblige his majesty’s subjects to receive the said half-pence in any payment, but leaves it to their voluntary choice, because, by law the subject cannot be obliged to take any money except gold or silver:  And whereas, contrary to the letter and meaning of the said patent, the said Wood hath declared that every person shall be obliged to take five-pence half-penny of his coin in every payment:  And whereas the House of Commons and Privy Council have severally addressed his most sacred majesty representing the ill consequences which the said coinage may have upon this kingdom:  And lastly, whereas it is universally agreed, that the whole nation to a man (except Mr. Wood and his confederates) are in the utmost apprehensions of the ruinous consequences that must follow from the said coinage.  Therefore we, whose names are underwritten, being persons of considerable estates in this kingdom, and residers therein, do unanimously resolve and declare that we will never receive one farthing or half-penny of the said Wood’s coining, and that we will direct all our tenants to refuse the said coin from any person whatsoever; of which, that they may not be ignorant, we have sent them a copy of this advertisement, to be read to them by our stewards, receivers, etc.

I could wish, that a paper of this nature might be drawn up, and signed by two or three hundred principal gentlemen of this kingdom, and printed copies thereof sent to their several tenants; I am deceived, if anything could sooner defeat this execrable design of Wood and his accomplices.  This would immediately give the alarm, and set the kingdom on their guard.  This would give courage to the meanest tenant and cottager. How long, O Lord, righteous and true, etc.

I must tell you in particular, Mr. Harding, that you are much to blame.  Several hundred persons have enquired at your house for my Letter to the Shop-keepers, etc., and you had none to sell them.  Pray keep yourself provided with that letter and with this; you have got very well by the former, but I did not then write for your sake, any more than I do now.  Pray advertise both in every news-paper, and let it not be your fault or mine if our countrymen will not take warning.  I desire you likewise to sell them as cheap as you can. ­I am your Servant, M.B.

Au, 1724.