The Express.
London, England, 1856-10-08 00:00:00

Int (14,-xpreots.

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LONDON, WEDNRBD4Y, OCTOBER 8.

Tug Royal British Bank diluter will not have
happened wholly in rain if it form upon our commer-
cial claws an intimate and profound conviction of
the utter inadequacy of our existing legal machlasey
for dealing with such asses of mercantile catastrophe.
Our columns for many day. past have borne witness
to the confusion and dismay with which the luckless
victims of this gigantic fraud regard the prospect of
that litigation which awaits them in the Winding-up
cams. It is a state of things which would hoes stirred
to grim laughter the sardonic humor of Reemals.
There an two courses of ruin through which the
sufferers must graduate—that which is provided for
them by the villany of dinettes, and that which,
under the guise of a remedy, is provided for them by
the benevolent wisdom of the law. It is no doubt
sufflaieutly harassing to fled yourself the plundered
dupe of some plausible respectability in the shape of
a manager, who has for beard meeting after board
meeting lured you deeper and deeper into the raim
ends by a solemn Nguema of official lies! but it is
almost, if not quite, as bad to have to assist
at the legal ceremonial of seeing all that is
heft of your substance melted down, seennelens erten.,
into fees and casts, while lawyers wrangle sad
judges hold solemn conclave over the miserable rev
mains of what was own perhaps a pretty little for-
tune, or a decent competency. It it not agreeable to
feel that you are liable to your last shilling, and your
lest acre, in ccasequease of heads which you had no
mane of discovering, sad no power to check. It is
still lam pleasant to find that these ultimate relies
of your possessions go, sot into the pockets of the
depositors who have suffered, but of the lawyers who
have raised, by you. It is bad enough to be robbed
by Cinema : it le worse still to be ruined by
Chancery.

So again of the Depositoth It is natural iamb
that this oleos of sufferers Amid, in the tint ammo
of indignatioo, yield to the dictates of that revenge
which even moralists admit to be a kind of wild jus-
tice, and determine to be satisfied with nothing Ism
than the uttermost farthing. Bat have they courted
the met of trying to get it ? Have they ever realised
the feet that, if they throw compromise to the winds
and resolve to go in for their strict rights, for every
pound which they may ultimately recover they will I
have I. all probability to pay another pound in costa ?
And yet such would in sine oases oat of ten be the
malt if they were mad enough to insist
ea their full legal rights and hunt the
.. _ .

shareholders—who are attar ail, be it remembeved,
their fellow starers only use degree removed—
thrush court after court eves to the costly penelnlia
of the House of Lords. For thither, as the law
etude. a ehareho'der, who disputes hie liability, may
in the kat degree resort.
What an abominable state of the law! cubist
the public. And so, no doubt, it ia. Nothing as be
well ware. The substantive law is bed, the judicial
ergashatios is bad, the procedure Is worse still. The
sainting legal method of administering the nests of
bankrupt estates, whether by the Beakruptey Coen,
es la the nee of private firms, or by the Winding-up
Acts, se is the me of public ampules. is • discredit
to this great mereastile memalty. As it was very
ably and truly pointed eat the ether day by Mr.
Burros, in the paper reed by him before the Tri-
bunals of Conneeree Amputation, these systems of
administration, " though estesaiWy made for ma-
esone, were assuredly sot made by commercial see,
see for their us." They have been anima by
lawyen, they are worked by lawyers, and, biting
to their melte, it might be very easy to membmie
that they are kept up for the sole benefit of /wpm
It is astonishing that in the grommet siseasills
country is the world such a system should se keg
ban been submitted to. The fat is that British of
merle is almost ea mush and as isjurionly under the
dominion of the lawyers as Britkh lead: the hiss
trawler of the see, and the butane-like meagement
ef the other, are alike impeded by the same eases Hem
este, Mr. Hume, in the address already alluded
to, bee pet the whole troth of the one is law and
forcible word,. " The souse ci the existing vices of
pet mereutile law lies in the sabjesties of the am-
menial mind to the legal mind; and the remedy mew
mists in shaking off mush subjectioo." That is a tells
which the business ma of Ragland would do well
deeply to ponder. It lea truth especially to be bone
is vied in reference to such a beams as the mkt.
aletratke of the mete of the Royal British Beak.
We have no latest.* to impute motives, bat we
take human nature awe fled it, and it is impossible
for any one who has looked a little closely into the psi-
seeding. of the Court of Cesaesty and the Winding-up
'Men not to be well aware that the rapidity of legal
progress is is interne rade to the amount of property to
be legally dealt with. Wherever there enlarge feeds in
court there will be a long litigates; and it is imps.
Bible to speculate wittiest dismay epee the probable
protraction of the prooeedioge where—se in theme
of the Royal British Bank—the cash is head amounts
in round numbers to coreething like 80.0001. nine no
declamatory radical, or levelling enthusiast, but a
grave and ermined sage of the laworho described title
notable machinery of the Wiselleg-up worts es •
mill foe griadiog cute, ruinous to the many and
imative to the few.' Let shareholders and Is.
potters bethink themeless before they consent tele
thus triturated into costa. Let them take coque
together boleti they safer the wreckers of the law to
make spoil of what still remains of the faithless bark
that ban sunk under them. They have yet the mass
in their own power. They have not yet got their min
under the legal yoke. Let theta be wise in time. Let
the Shareholders meet at oyes and resein to sake
a fend sellicient to pay an immediate dividend soy
se. to the pound, and let the Depositors ogres le
accept this instalment at ones, and to improvise
their claim toe an ultimate dividend of 10s. in fall
satisfaction of all demands. That this wield be the
wile wane no ale can doubt who is at all sow
versant with the raison oaten of the litigates
that most ensue ifsome nob course be sot forthwith
adopted. That this, or ssythist like this, will beta

course really punned is, we fear, far mere than sun
be anticipated. Depositors will think sore of the'
intrinsic justice of their domande than of the diffi-
culties of substantiating them ; shareholders will rely
on the chances of evading by a quibble liabilities
which they cannot contest in conesionos; while those
who have bought up claims for the sake of profit will
think of nothing else but getting a share in the
plunder. When we add to all this the influence of
that powerful clam who are certain to profit by setting
in motion the gloat cost•mill, we fear there is bat
little reason to anticipate that the shareholders
and &pedlars of the Royal British Bank will ulti-
mately retrieve much from the close grips of the law.