From The Spectator 28 Nov. brought against it in 1847, of having stimu- prudent. Its error lies in the conduct of its THE BANK OF ENGLAND'S BANKING. This is a charge which requires to be supported by facts. Before adducing those facts however, the reader must distinctly bear in mind, that in the issue of bank-notes under the Act of 1844 the Bank of England has no more power or discretion than he has. It was assumed by Sir Robert Peel that fourteen millions was an amount below which the paper circulation would never fall. The value of notes to that amount rests on a vacuum, secured, or supposed to be secured, by that amount of public securities. For every note issued beyond fourteen millions, an equivalent must be deposited in the form of bullion or sovereigns. The suspension of the Act simply means that the Bank may disregard this provision, and issue notes ad libitum, without any other base than its own prestige and the national credit. These topics, we say, cannot be too well ventilated. It will be mischievous if the exposition of economical principles, or the examination of particular forms of money derangement, should succeed in diverting public attention from the examination of the conduct of the Bank of England as a bank of deposit and discount, but a bank endowed But while it is a mere machine in the "Isby the State with peculiar privileges and very sue Department" til the Act is suspended, profitable advantages. For it seems proba- it is absolute in the common banking departble that the Bank, whether unconsciously or ment, that is, as absolute as any other joint consciously, has abused the powers granted stock or private bank. If the Directors will to it for public purposes, and has repeated, not restrain themselves by the established though in a more subtile form, and possibly laws of banking, there are no means of rein a less degree, the course which aggra- straining them. We believe that they have vated the panics of 1825, 1837, and 1847. not complied with the established laws of banking; that they have gone on increasing their amount of discounts without any apparent care as to their means of honoring the checks of their depositors, to an extent which no other solvent bank would have dared to venture upon, but which the Bank of England risked with the knowledge that Government would never let them stop as bankers. Their intentions may have been as good as those which are said to pave a certain place; On the present occasion, at least up to the 12th of November, no charge could be brought against the Bank that in pursuit of shareholders' profits it risked the convertibility of the note and then " put on the screw to save itself from being unable to pay in gold. The Act of 1844, by separating its functions as a bank of deposit from a bank of issue, prevented that danger. Neither is the Bank obnoxious to the charge they may never have thought of the profit to the Bank in twice as many weeks suffered be derived from seven, eight, ten per cent three successive reductions of its available rates but they have contributed as much as assets to meet the demands of its banking in them lay, not only to the suspension of the customers to nearly the same amount as the Act, but to the encouragement of the unex- money (£1,462,153,) remaining in its coffers pressed conviction that Government will the night before the suspension. It will be never let the Bank stop, which animates the seen, that in the week-ending the 3d October money dealers who supply the speculators, the available assets were diminished by more whose conduct has chiefly rendered the sus- than £1,400,000—being a reduction of nearly pension a necessity. the same amount as the Bank had in its possession when it "received the assistance" of Government. The week before the suspension took place, the decrease was £1,372,485 The main facts that prove the mismanagement of the Bank lie in a nutshell. The day before the issue of the letter of suspension, the banking liabilities to the Government and individuals, and the means of meeting those liabilities in available assets-that is, money -stood as under. within £90,000 of the sum they finally closed with. In the very week of the suspending letter, their available assets were reduced by £1,243,882-leaving them with Liabilities in the week ending the 11th November 1857. only £1,462,153. Another week of a simi Public Deposits Seven day and other Bills Other Deposits Total Liabilities to the cus tomers of the Bank £5,314,659 853,075 Liabilities beyond available Means the night before the Suspension lar reduction would have brought the Bank within £120,000 of stoppage, even if we sup£19,103,078 pose that no distrust had been caused by the publication of such an account. And all these reductions took place notwithstanding, it had sold stock to increase its means. 1,462,153 £17,640,925 In other words, the withdrawal of less than a million and a half of money from the banking department would have compelled the Bank to decline paying the checks of its customers—that is, to stop and have involved a panic and wholesale destruction, compared with which 1825 would have been as nothing. Nor can it be said that this reduction of assets, though a theoretical possibility was in practice improbable; or that the Bank was driven into a sudden error through the news of the American crises. The subjoined table* will show, that on three separate occasions, Table showing the amount of Assets in the available to meet the demands of their Custom- Notes. The same table shows that this was not an "accidental" proceeding, but a course regularly persisted in. During the seven weeks commencing the 19th September and ending the 11th November, this reduction of the company's available means extended to nearly. five millions and a quarter, spite of additions. made by the sale of securities. This drain of course varied week by week, but with one 'exception it was continuous. The money. thus reduced was applied to increasing the discounts, which rose between the 26th September and the 11th November from £19,719,700 to £26,113,453; being an increase in round numbers of £6,400,000. These proceedings of the Bank are not exceptional. The same risk of stoppage as bankers was run in 1847, though not to so great a degree. Two days before the then letter of suspension was issued, the liabilities and means of the Bank stood thus. Liabilities in the week ending the 23d October 1847. Weekly decrease. £ £4,766,394 Other Deposits 8,530.509 October 8 Seven ay and other Bills 947,013 1,418,551 Total Liabilities to the custo mers of the Bank £14,293,916 595,584 Available Means of meeting these Liabilities. 3.485,840 592.680 4,078,520 1,994,516 There are people who think the Bank | A Government department-Board-Comcould escape stoppage at the very last mo- mission, or what name you will-seems the ment by an unscrupulous use of its powers only resource: but there is the obvious oband resources. Lord Overstone inclines to jection that the Board would be influenced this opinion. He did not speak positively by the Government, as Government in its before the Committee of the house of com- turn would be influenced by " pressure from mons, but he conceived that the Bank, by the without." If, however, the Bank is subject sale of securities, by discontinuing all dis- to influences of an equally potent but of a counts, and by letting the bills already dis- less patent and therefore a more mischievous counted "run to maturity," might save itself. kind, and pursues a line of conduct that comThe authority of Lord Overstone is perhaps pels the Government to tamper with the curthe highest that exists on currency, more es- rency law, there does not seem much differpecially as regards any act of practical bank- ence between them. A Government Board ing; but we cannot help doubting the sound- would have this advantage, that the responness of this notion. If the Bank were to sibility would be distinctly limited and fixed. deluge the Stock Exchange with public se- At present it is divided so that nobody is recurities, to suspend instanter all discounts, sponsible. However, all we, now say isand ruthlessly enforce payment,-everybody knowing its position,-a panic might arise among depositors, which all the money to be raised by these methods could not meet; or if it did, the panic and convulsion would be almost as ruinous as stoppage itself. inquire. From The Spectator 28 Nov. THE NEW TRADE IN NEGROES. THE French Government, it is understood, is rather in a "fix "; it has received representations from this country which show that The first conclusion from all this is, that it has connived at a real infraction of the Peel's Act has secured (up to this time) the Slave-trade Treaties. The plan of M. Régis convertibility of the note, which, considering may be technically legal; it may not violate the financial strain of the last four years, and the letter of the treaties; but there is no the deviation of the Bank on the only point doubt that it violates the spirit, and that in where it could deviate, might without that sanctioning the measure the French Governact have been in jeopardy. The second con- ment has placed itself in direct antagonism clusion is, that the proceedings of the Bank, to the Government of England. Perhaps and their reasons for them, should be very there may be another reason why the Impesearchingly examined during the inquiry rial Government is not altogether satisfied which it is assumed will take place as regards with its position: nobody understands the the suspension of the Act. If found culpa- African emigration as conducted by the Marble, a further inquiry should be entered into seilles contractor to be a very complete sucas to the propriety of removing the manage- cess. France has in this principally played ment of the issues from the Bank of Eng- the jackal for Spanish, Portuguese, and land, and leaving it to stand before the world Yankee speculators-that semi-piratical tribe like any other joint-stock bank, with perhaps who have always been carrying on a smugsome curtailment of its power and privileges gling of Africans in breach or evasion of in other directions. Theoretically, this should treaty law. Thus the Imperial Government have been done in 1844 to render the mea- has placed itself in a position of antagonism sure complete, but practical and inherent dif- to that of England without getting any very ficulties intervened. The real differences be- great profit by the deviation; and we can tween a bank of national issue and a simple well understand the feelings with which the bank of deposit and discount were not popu- astute and practical Napoleon would contemlarly understood; many of those who under-plate the tangible results of the scheme that stood them after a fashion had prejudices as to the hocos-pocus power of the Bank on money and the money-market, which the people at large partook of in a superstitious degree. These notions are to a great extent dissipated: the main inherent difficulty remains the difficulty of finding a substitute. he has sanctioned. It is altogether very dis- the aforesaid Spaniards, Portuguese, and novo. But could we do so? Would the is not English to buy our laborers, but it is African: "the African will be bought and sold; it is the fashion of his country," the betters, with whom the slave-hunt is like the revenue of his prince, the amusement of his fox-hunt with us. At any rate, do not let us, for a resultless experiment, go on "sacrificing English pith, toil, and money, to quashee," nor in the attempt "reduce other Tropical colonies to the condition of our own." In the view which we have thus compressed, Expertus completely adopts the Expertus. This is a new phase of the conphilosophy of Régis, and the Times adopts troversy. ; It is scarcely changed in its character by the argument of "Olim Africanus," who instructs Expertus and the Times that all Africans are not idle. The besetting difficulty of England in her Tropical possessions, he says, has been to find laborers who can endure a vertical sun and who are also willing to work. Now there are African races that meet these two requirements. The Krooman is of this stamp. In most American whaling-vessels the harpooner is a Krooman he rises even above the White races to posts of trust and energy and discoverers in Africa have found that there are other Black tribes that partake the characteristics of the Krooman. Napoleon might assist in getting these African recruits through friendly understanding with Senegal. Perhaps so; and French difficulty. If M. Régis has been the idea is a new outlet from the Anglopermitted to destroy the slave-trade treaties, Napoleon may assist in a new plan of filling the British West Indies, and America generally, with industrious Africans. We do not succeed in suppressing the traffic, which continues as fervid as ever, in Cuba, the Carolinas, and Louisiana. What we do succeed in is in rendering the Transit from Africa to America painful in the extreme for the Negroes. By our West Indian failures we have shown how little suited to Long years since, it was shown in this working for wages is the freed Negro; who, journal as well as in the Colonial Gazette, cultivating his little squatting, sneers at the lish West Indies was the true means of illusthat an industrious recruitment of the Engindustry of the race which has emancipated trating the capacity of the African race for him. Some one in twenty of the Negro industry at wages: subsequent years have population may be found to be civil and in- been consumed in the endeavor to stop the dustrious,-highly so; but "almost without slave-trade by forcible means, with the only exception, they are old freed slaves-men practical effect of using the squadron as who were formed in regular habits under means of protecting the African smugglinggood masters." This plan of keeping up at- trade, that profitable traffic. Perhaps if the tempts to suppress the slave-trade in spite twenty years or so had been employed in of constant failure, and of suddenly emanci- filling the British West Indies with free Afripating the Negro from compulsion without cans, however obtained, the vaunted superisubjecting him to the compulsion of unlim- ority of free labor, even in the Black race, ited competition, has proved abortive. If might have been exhibited. For the mothe Negro is to be made to work at wages, ment, however, we are less anxious to press it must be by filling the place with abundance this very ancient argument, than to point of labor, as in Barbados. A short cut to out the entire change in the style of the dissuch a process would be, to buy the Africans cussion. The leading organ in the English and free them. By that means, we should press has abandoned the old Anti-Slavery get plenty of the race, and could establish ground, and has taken up the new Freed Afthem in complete freedom, always excepting rican ground. The very change in the form the compulsion of unlimited competition. It of the discussion constitutes an event. rose." 66 ARTESIAN WELLS IN THE DESERT of the "well of bliss." The third was the OF SAHARA. finest stream of all, yielding thirty gallons THERE are two well-known facts from a-minute, but of a slightly lower temperature. which it might have been inferred à priori Its situation was not far from that of the that Artesian wells were eminently practica- second, at a place called Tamelhat. Here ble in the Great Desert of Africa. The first the Marabouts, in the presence of the whole fact is, that the desert is bounded on its population, thanked the soldiers, and gave longest sides by high ranges of mountains them a banquet, and afterwards escorted the Atlas on the north, and the Abyssinian, them homewards in solemn procession. The Gebel Kumri, and Guinea Mountains on the fourth was at Sidi-Nached, an oasis that had south the second, that there do actually been almost destroyed by the drought; and exist in many parts of the desert numerous yielding as it does more than ten gallons springs and fountains, which cannot be sus- a-minute, the emotions with which it was posed to have their origin anywhere but in welcomed by the inhabitants may be at least the mountains aforesaid, and which in their faintly conceived. The first rush of the water turn give rise to those spots covered with being announced by the shouts of the soldiers, luxurions vegetation known as oases. From the inhabitants flocked in immense numbers these two facts, it is easy to pass to the in- to the spot, and bathed themselves and their ference, that, if fissures or channels were children in what was to them a river of life. artificially made in the earth's crust, in the The aged Emir, with bended knees and more sterile parts of the desert, water would streaming eyes, in the presence of all the also issue forth through them; and that, by people, gave thanks to God, and implored repeating the process, the fertility of the soil his blessing on those to whom they were inmight be so prodigiously increased, that the debted for a boon so inestimably great. The desert should rejoice and blossom as the fifth was bored at Oum Thiour, and yielded about twenty-six gallons a-minute. ImmeDoubtless, somewhat similar reasonings diately on its completion, the neighboring were pursued by the French colonists in tribes took a first step towards the abandonAlgeria, who, as we learn from the" Moniteur ment of their nomadic life, by planting seveAlgerian," have recently been making some ral hundred date-palm-trees, at which spot a highly-interesting experiments in that neigh-village will soon spring up. The effect which borhood. Altogether, five wells have been the multiplication of these wells will eventubored, and others are in progress. The first ally produce upon the civilization of Africa was in the province of Constantine at Oued- can scarcely be estimated. Anything that Rir, near Samerna, and was executed by a tends to withdraw nomadic tribes from their detachment of the Foreign Legion, conducted unsettled mode of existence, and induces by the engineer, M. Jus. The operation them to engage in agricultural and mechani⚫ lasted about a month; at the termination of ical pursuits, has assuredly an elevating inwhich period, a splendid jet of water, yielding fluence. And nothing was wanted in the rather more than a gallon per minute, rushed neighborhood of the Sahara, to render such forth to bless the thirsty soil. Its tempera- pursuits possible, but water. In every part ture was 210 Réaumur (about 790 Fahren- of that sterile tract, wherever a spring of heit); and the Marabouts, at a solemn conse- water breaks through the soil, there vegetacration of the fountain, gave it the name of tion flourishes: and wherever vegetation the "well of peace." The superstitious na- flourishes, and water can be found for man tives very naturally regarded the work as and beast, there the desert tribes begin to miraculous; and when the intelligence of the settle, and cultivate a home. A sense of affair spread towards the south, multitudes mutual interdependence soon follows, conflocked to witness it. A second well was cessions are exchanged, and peaceable disAnd there is no bored at Temaken, and yielded upwards of positions are cherished. race of men so inhuman, as not to appreciate eight gallons per minute, of the same temthe advantages which such a mode of life perature as the former. This was also cerc-possesses over that of the wandering, fightmoniously consecrated, and received the name ing, precariously-fed nomad.-Titan. |