The Press.
London, England, 1856-12-06 00:00:00

ttropplitait.

THE RATE OF INTEREST UPON MONEY in ancient
and modern times was the subject discussed at the
last meeting of the Institute of Actuaries. Mr. W.
B. Hodge read the paper. He began by stating that
the practice of lending money on interest appears to
be coeval with the use of money. What was the
rate of interest amongst the Jews does not appear
very clearly from the Old Testament, but from a
passage in Nehemiah (c. v., 11? it is conjectured by
commentators that it was 1 per cent. per month ;
and as an additional month was intercalated every
second or third year, this interest was equivalent to
at least 13 per oent. paid yearly. In Rome, accord.
ing to Niebuhr, the rate was 8 I.3rd per cent. for the
old year of ten months, that is, 10 per cent. per
annum ; but though this restriction was in force at
Rome, in the conquered provinces enormous interest
was exacted. After the expulsion of the Jews the
history of interest in England is obscure, till in the
third year of Henry VII. (1488) a statute was
passed forbidding interest to be taken ; and from a
passage in the act it would seem that 20 per cent.
had been the usual rate charged. In the thirteenth
year of Elizabeth (1571), the act of Edward
VI. was repealed, and interest at the rate of 10
per cent. legalised. This act, which was to continue
in force fur five years, was several times renewed,
and subsequently, in the thirty-ninth of the same
reign (1597), made perpetual. At this epoch the
writer closed the first part of his paper, promising
on a future day to trace the history of interest to the
present day.
A USE FOR THE THAMES TUNNEL has at length
been suggested. A suffering ratepayer, writing to
the Times this week upon the new drainage scheme,
says:—

Hitherto the "Thames Tunnel" has been of really
little use to the public in return for its immense cost.
Pray allow me to ask why the public should not have one
half of it converted into a " crossing sewer " from the
south to the north side of the river ? Business people
cross over the river at the Tunnel stairs in the ferry for
Id., while sightseers or scientific visitors explore ( with
much loss of time and fatigue) its lower regions, for whom
the other half might suffice. The entire sewage might
then be delivered at West Ham, and before it would get
to the German Ocean its best liquid or semi-liquid portions
would be applied to the arable and grass lands along its
route.

MR. LOVE was on Monday elected a director of the
Eastern Counties Railway, in the room of Mr. Wad-
dington, by a majority of 2,375 votes over his an•
tagonist Mr. Malins.
THE WESTMINSTER PLAY, this year, is The
Andrea of Terence. The nights fixed for the re-
presentation are Thursday, the 11th, Monday, the
15th, and Thursday, the 18th of December. On
the last two nights there will be an Epilogue and
Prologue. _ _

THE ROYAL Socirrx held its anniversary meeting
at Somerset-house on Monday, Dec. 1. Lord Wrot-
tesley, president, took the chair, and delivered the
customary address, in which the advancement of
science and the advantages likely to accrue from in-
timate relations between the Government and the
representatives of science were earnestly set forth.
The proposed Arctic expedition in search of the

relies-of the Franklin party was
following terms :

in the

It is not extraordinary that those who are disposed to
form a low estimate of the value of scientific research
should also entertain doubts as to the propriety of hazard.
ing human lite in its behalf. In the late discussions on
the expediency of undertaking another Pair expedition, it
seemed to be assumed by some that the well-grounded an•
ticipation of valuable contributions to physical and geo•

graphical science would not alone be sufficient to justify
the exposing of the lives of gallant men to peril—not even
of those who were most willing and anxious to be so em-
ployed, emulous of such distinction and regardless of the
risk. However this may be, it is certain that science has
ustained, and does still sustain, injury from the fear of
offending against this popular notion that it is wrong to
hazard human life for such au object. Tu the case of the
proposed Polar expedition the risk would be very small, in-
asmuch as the exploration, instead of being as formerly a
tentative one, embracing many thousand miles of unknown
coast, would be confined to a fixed and limited locality,
hitherto unexplored and possessed of great scientific in-
terest. Independently of additions to our geographical
and physical knowledge, the possible recovery of the mag-
netical observations and the journals of the Franklin ex-
pedition is a consideration of great moment, since the