The produce loan.
--The following letter in reply to questions for information, and explanation, will be interesting to many readers:Confederate States of America,
Treasury Department.
Richmond July 11, 1861.
Sir:
--Your letter of the 6th instant makes an inquiry which I find repeated from several other quarters, to which I think it best to make a public reply.
The inquiry is, whether, in case no sales can be made before the day named, in the Cotton subscriptions, without a sacrifice of the property, the sales are still to be insisted on. I answer, certainly not — The day named is upon the presumption that the blockade will be broken, and that sales of produce can be then made.
I propose to submit another plan to provide for the contingency of a continuance of the blockade, which will allow an indefinite retention of the crop.
But it constitutes no part of either plan to force the produce on the market at a sacrifice. Sir:
