Such, then, and so numerous, being the obstacles, some independent of the Bank, and some, as I have just shown, growing out of her very nature and constitution, which have hitherto prevented, and always will to a certain extent prevent, a uniform enforcement of the rule for regulating the currency by the foreign exchanges, I have now to offer, as the last illustration of the subject, a brief allusion to the state of the country, as regards mercantile and money matters, during the year 1841, being the second of those to which its stringent action has been applied.

A contracted currency affords the most conclusive proof that can be given of national distress: the smaller the amount of money in circulation, the less of it there is in the pockets of the people. The time is not too remote to be well remembered, when the issues of the Bank of England, distinct from those of the English country Banks, exceeded thirty millions. That my readers may judge accurately of the extent of our present poverty, I insert the total amounts of the circulation of all the Banks of issue in England, Wales, Scotland, and Ireland, published in the Gazette, pursuant to the Act 4 and 5 Vict. c. 50.

No peroration can be more appropriate upon a theme like this, than the emphatic description given by Mr. Jones Loyd himself of the condition to which the country must come when the rule is put in force. These are his words in 1840: "Against the actual exhaustion of its treasure by a drain through the foreign exchanges, the Bank almost under any circumstances has the power of protecting herself; but to do this she must produce upon the money-market a pressure ruinous from its suddenness and severity; she must save herself by the destruction of all around her." Precisely what is now being done: the Bank is saving herself and ruining all around her.

From the testimony of one eminent Banker I proceed to that of another. At the half-yearly meeting of the London and Birmingham Railway Company, held the 11th of last February, Mr. G. Carr Grlyn, the chairman, began his speech to the proprietors with this emphatic sentence: - "Allow me to congratulate you on a considerable increase in the amount of your receipts, in despite of what - speaking as I am in the presence of mercantile men - I will not hesitate to describe as one of the most disastrous years which has been known in our commercial experience"

There could not, I am sure, be a better authority upon such a subject than the most active partner of the firm of Messrs. Glyn & Co. I shall have occasion in the following chapter to particularize the losses which the Banking interest suffered itself, and inflicted upon the community, during this severe period. Let me here beg attention to a detail or two as to the injurious effects produced upon other descriptions of property. And first, as I have adverted to a railway, I will state the extent of the depreciation in railway property.

I find, by the Railway Magazine, that many new lines, or new portions of lines, have been opened in 1841; but that, "notwithstanding the greater length of opening, the vast extension of traffic, the greater number and proportion of dividends, such has been the state of the money market, that the shares, even of the best and most stable companies, taking the prices of the 18th of December in each year, have generally receded. The number of those which have increased in price has been twelve; remained at the same price, ten; decreased, twenty-eight. The sacrifice in the value of railway shares stands thus :-

"The net decrease in the value of railway shares this year (1841), on account of the depressed state of the money market, is above a million and a half sterling, although the traffic of the railways has increased by that amount during the present year. The bulk of railway shares have decreased ten per cent."

I take from the Times newspaper a case in the cotton trade.

"A gentleman at Liverpool was left by his father, four years since, the handsome fortune of 100,000/. He employs it, as his parent had done, in the wholesale cotton trade. He is naturally a large dealer, and holds a large stock. The late contraction in the currency works a rapid fall in cotton. He holds forty thousand bags; and before he can sell, a reduction of three pounds per bag takes place! He is stripped at once of his whole pro -perty, almost without a fault on his part. This is only one instance out of many. The depressions of 1819 and 1826, each arising from the same cause - a rapid contraction of the currency - produced thousands of such instances of cruel and lamentable spoliation."

There would be no end to the catalogue were I to proceed and enumerate other sufferings of this kind, upon which I can lay my hand in abundance.

But I am bound to refrain. Some painful examples I shall still have to add as I proceed with my sketch of the progress of Banking, particularly amongst the private and joint-stock establishments; to which, inviting the patience of my readers, I shall now address myself without further digression or delay.