ELLET, Charles, Jnr.

A Popular Exposition of the Incorrectness of the Tariffs of Toll in use on the Public Improvements of the United States.

Philadelphia, C. Sherman & Co., 1839. 8vo, pp. 33, [1] blank; with an engraved plate; scattered light foxing throughout, but still a good copy, recently rebound in quarter calf. First edition. Ellet (1810–1862) was a brilliant and troublesome civil engineer who introduced European innovations to American practice. He is best known for designing (but not building) the suspension bridge beneath Niagara Falls (1847–55) and the Wheeling and Belmont bridge (1848–9) over the Ohio with a span of 1010 feet, the longest span in the world at the time. He died as a result of a wound received in the Civil War, during the Union capture of Memphis, as a colonel of engineers in the War Department. Ellet is also noteworthy as an early proponent of mathematical economics.‘The object of this pamphlet is to point out, in a brief and popular view, the consequences of some of the errors which are committed in the charges assessed on the public works of this country’ (preface), a subject previously discussed by Ellet in his first work, An Essay on the Laws of Trade (1839). The Popular Exposition is intended for readers interested in the content of the Essay, but for whom its method may prove difficult. ‘This pamphlet is intended to subserve that purpose; and to show that the principles on which all the tariffs in the country are based, are unsound, and lead, in their application, to oppressive injustice to a portion of the community, and to great loss of trade and revenue to the improvements’ (ibid.).Both the Essay and The Laws of Trade applied to the determination of the most advantageous fare for passengers of railroads (1840) are singled out by Theocharis, and part of the first work is printed in Baumol and Goldfield, who write of Ellet’s work: ‘Despite the reservations …, it must be conceded that as compared with many earlier writings it is characterised by a degree of sophistication, in particular, in avoiding the use of undefined and undefinable variables …’ (Precursors in Mathematical Economics: an anthology, London, LSE, 1968).Kress C.4858; not in Goldsmiths’.

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• nº de pedido: H544

• librero: Bernard Quaritch Ltd. (GREAT BRITAIN)