November was the critical period of the year 1857. The Times of November 12, 1857, contained these announcements:

1.Bank charter suspended.
2.Interest in London,10 per cent.
3.Interest in Hamburg,10 per cent.
4.Interest in Paris,8-1/2 per cent.
5.Interest in New York,25 per cent.
6.Suspension of cash payments generally
by all banks in the United States.
7.Two banks stopped in Glasgow,
and one in Liverpool, and a great bill
panic in London.
8.Commercial credit and transactions
almost suspended in the country.
9.Bullion in the bank,£7,170,000.
10.Reserve notes in the bank,£975,000.
11.Bank liabilities,£40,875,000.

'One gentleman, during the heat of the excitement at Glasgow, went into the Union Bank and presented a check for £500. The teller asked him if he wished gold. 'Gold!' replied he, 'no; give me notes, and let the fools who are frightened get the gold,' Another gentleman rushed into the same bank in a great state of excitement, with a check for £1,400. On being asked if he wished gold he replied, 'Yes.' 'Well,' said the teller, 'there is £1,000 in that bag and £400 in this one.' The gentleman was so flurried by the readiness with which the demand was granted that he lifted up the bag with the £400 only, and walked off, leaving the £1,000 on the counter. The teller, on discovering the bag, laid it aside for the time. Late in the day the gentleman returned to the bank in great distress, stating he had lost the bag with the £1,000, and could not tell whether he dropped it in the crowd or left it behind him on leaving the bank. 'Oh, you left it on the counter,' said the teller, quietly, 'and if you call to-morrow you will get your £1,000.' (Vide ' History Bank of England,' p. 429.)

The facts and statistics from the year 1844 to 1860 relating to the bank are superadded to the English work by the American editor. Of the important phases of this period the editor gives a slight sketch in the following paragraphs. The prominent financial movements in England, France, and the United States are given in the subsequent pages of the volume.

'The sixteen years which followed the last charter of the bank have been pregnant with important events of a financial character; the most important, perhaps, during the whole history of the institution. The bank has twice, during this short period, been on the brink of suspension, and was relieved only by the interference of Government. The second instance occurred after new gold, to the extent of one hundred millions sterling, or more, had been poured into Western Europe from California and Australia. The Bank of France had, during the same period, suspended specie payment. Two financial revulsions have occurred in the United States, when, with few exceptions, the banks of the whole country suspended specie payments. The production of gold and silver throughout the world, which, up to 1844, was annually about ten or twelve millions sterling, had recently advanced from twenty-five to thirty millions sterling per annum, thus stimulating industry and production largely throughout Europe and America. Sir Robert Peel, the author of the new charter of the bank, has left the world's stage, after witnessing the failure of the charter to fully accomplish the end promised; Europe and America, Asia and Europe, have been knit together by a wire cord, and capital is now subscribed to

'Put a girdle round about the earth,'

whereby London may speak to San Francisco (the prospective commercial centre of the world) in less than 'forty minutes.' During the same short space of sixteen years the suspended States of this Union (five at least) have resumed payment of their obligations; two violent wars, with sundry revolutions, have occurred in Europe; the ancient city of the Cortez has been conquered by the 'hordes of the North,' and magnanimously given up by the captors to the possession of their weaker enemy, and millions were paid to the latter for portions of their territory; the northwest passage of the American continent has been discovered; steam has accomplished wonders between Europe and America, and between Europe and their distant colonies of Asia, Africa, and Australia; Ireland has been on the verge of starvation,[6] when 600,000 of her people died from hunger alone and its effects, and her population was reduced two millions by emigration and privation; England's minister has been expelled from the capital of the United States; speculation has been rife in Europe and America, and its inevitable effects, revulsion and bankruptcy, have followed in its train; the railway and the telegraph have brought remote regions together; China, with her four hundred millions of people, has been conquered by the united forces of the English and the French.

'The Bank of England, instead of pursuing one even course, with a view to permanent commercial interests, has unfortunately, and, we fear, from selfish and individual views, fostered speculation by reducing her rate of discount to 2 per cent., and soon after, but too late, discovered the error, and forced her borrowers to pay from 6 to 10 per cent.

'We propose to give the leading events of each year, from 1844 to 1861, referring the reader to authorities where more copious information can be gained by those who wish to study the invariable connection between commerce and money.