There has been a decrease in the consumption of alcohol, less intemperance, and a striking diminution in crime and pauperism. With an increase of over fifty per cent. in the population there is less crime.
While the necessaries of life have not increased in cost, wages are from twenty-five to fifty per cent. higher, and the working classes no longer live in damp cellars or in dark courts and alleys, but have at their disposal cheerful, sanitary, and convenient homes.
CHAPTER IV. BUSINESS LIFE.
On my return home from Australia and South America I entered my father's office. It was noted for hard work and late hours. The principals seldom left for home before seven and eight in the evening, and on Friday nights, when we wrote our cotton circular, and despatched our American mail, it was usually eleven o'clock before we were able to get away, and many of the juniors had to work all night. In those days everything was done by correspondence, and mail letters often ran to a great length, frequently ten and twelve pages; and unfortunately the principals wasted much of their time in the middle of the day. The morning's work always commenced with reading the letters aloud by the head clerk, and afterwards the principals gave instructions as to replies to be sent, and laid out the work for the day.
In those times the business of a merchant's office was much more laborious, and the risks they ran were greater and longer than they are to-day, when we have the assistance of telegraphic communication with all the world. We often refer to the good old days, but they were days of much anxiety and hard work, and I doubt if the profits were as large; the risks were certainly much greater, and added to this there was a constant recurrence of panics. We had a money panic almost every ten years, 1847, 1857, 1866, of the severity of which we to-day can form very little idea. It was not merely that the bank rate advanced to eight, nine, and even ten per cent., but it was impossible to get money at any price. Bank bills were not discountable, and all kinds of produce became unsaleable. In addition to these great panics we had frequent small panics of a very alarming character. I well remember the panics of 1857 and 1866; the intense anxiety and the impossibility of converting either bills or produce into cash.
The main cause of all these troubles was that the banks kept too small reserves, and the provisions of the Bank Charter Act of Sir Robert Peel were too rigid. The object of the Act was to secure the convertibility of the bank note into gold, and it would no doubt have worked well had sufficient reserves been kept, but practically the only reserve of gold was in the Bank of England, and this was frequently allowed to fall as low as five or six million in notes. All other institutions, both banks and discount houses, depended upon this reserve, and employed their entire resources, relying upon discounting with the Bank of England in an emergency. This emergency arose about every ten years. The Bank of England was unable to meet the demand—a panic took place, and the bank had to apply to the Government to suspend the Bank Act, and allow it to issue bank notes in excess of the amount allowed by the Act. All this took time, the suspense was terrible, and many banks and honest traders were cruelly ruined. Immediately the Act was suspended the panic disappeared as if by magic, and traders began to breathe freely again.
Happily far larger reserves are now held by all banks, and banking business is also conducted on more prudent lines, and trade generally is worked on a sounder basis; payment by bills is now the exception; margins and frequent settlements on our produce exchanges prevent undue speculation, and the system of arbitration now universal has put a stop to the constant litigation which was a frequent cause of contention and trouble and loss of valuable time.
I was admitted a partner in my father's firm on the 1st January, 1862. The previous year had been a very successful one. My brother Arthur had visited America, and believing that war between the North and South was inevitable, had bought cotton very heavily, upon which the firm realised handsome profits. But it was at the expense of my father's health; the anxiety was too much for him, and this, coupled with my mother's death on the 1st August, 1861, so prostrated him, that he was ordered to take a sea voyage, and it was arranged that I should accompany him.