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111.: grenfell to ricardo1 - David Ricardo, The Works and Correspondence of David Ricardo, Vol. 6 Letters 1810-1815 [1810]

Edition used:

The Works and Correspondence of David Ricardo, ed. Piero Sraffa with the Collaboration of M.H. Dobb (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2005). Vol. 6 Letters 1810-1815.

Part of: The Works and Correspondence of David Ricardo, 11 vols (Sraffa ed.)

About Liberty Fund:

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111.

grenfell to ricardo1

My dear Sir

I dictated a Letter to you on Friday2 in great haste whilst I was preparing to leave Town and arranging my Papers for that purpose. I had not time to read over what was written; you will therefore have the goodness to excuse any inaccuracy resulting from a hasty dictation—

I now send you herewith four Parliamentary Papers, containing much useful information and detail on the subject of the Bank of England—the Principles which apply to the Deposits of Public Money there, the Charter &c &c3 —As these are Parliamentary Papers my Privilege enables me to Frank them to you, whatever their Weight may be; and when you have perused them, you will have the goodness to return them to me in the same manner, leaving both Ends of the Cover open and writing “Parliamentary proceedings” on the address.—I could wish to have these Papers returned to me by the middle of September, if possible: they are valuable to me, as I have no Duplicates of them.

I am My dear Sir Very sincerely yours

Pascoe Grenfell.

Be so good as to acknowledge the Receipt of these Papers. David Ricardo Esqr

P:S: I also send herewith under 3 Covers some observations of my own which I drew up for the purpose of explaining to some Friends of mine in Parliament, the Case of the Bank with reference to the Stamp Duties. These Papers will explain themselves. When I stated in the House the Facts which you will find in No 1:, Mr. Sam Thornton the Bank Director, (whose Memory does not appear to be a very correct one) boldly asserted that when the composition for Stamps was made with Mr. Pitt in 1799, it was understood, distinctly, that the Bank were not to pay an equivalent for the Stamp Duties on their circulation, and that in fact they enjoyed a Bonus on that occasion.1 I had no means at the moment of contradicting Mr. Thornton and indeed was impressed with a Notion, that he would not have advanced such a fact but upon some foundation. Upon reference however to Parliamentary Documents, and other Materials, a few days afterwards, I discovered that so far from any Bonus having been given to the Bank by Mr. Pitt in 1799, the £20,000 then fixed as the Composition for the Stamp Duty on Notes above 40 Shillings greatly exceeded what the Duties would actually have amounted to, on the circulation of Notes of that description at that Period; and to prove this I drew up the observations in Paper No 2: I also took the first opportunity of correcting Mr. Thorntons mis-statement from my Place in the House, and in Mr. Thorntons presence: and he gave a very lame explanation of the mistake he had made in his former statement2

Be so good also to return these Papers to me—Excuse my using an Amanuensis—Writing is a painful Operation to me—

:P G:

[1 ]MS in R.P.—Dictated; only the signature, the line that follows it, and the last two lines of the postscript are in Grenfell’s hand.

[2 ]Letter 113 of Friday 25 August, below, p. 260.

[3 ]A great number of accounts relating to the Bank of England, including accounts of public balances in the hands of the Bank, were moved for by Grenfell and ordered to be printed by the House of Commons in May and June 1815. (See Parliamentary Papers, 1814–15, vol. x.)

[1 ]Debate on the Stamp Duties Bill, 27 June 1815. (Hansard, XXXI, 1012–13.)

[2 ]In the same debate, 29 June 1815. (Hansard, XXXI, 1057–8, 1060.)