Northern Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1857-07-24 00:00:00

THE NEW BANKING BILL.

Although in committee on the new Banking Bill the
amendment in favour of limited liability was abandone-s,
its withdrawal was merely on the tepreFentation that the
moment is inopportune for its discussion, the question
being among those bsfore the Bank Charter Committee,
whose report it will be de liable to await. The matter
therefore is but pestponed, and if the potent paternal
system is to be maintained its advocates must be prepared
next session to show upon whet grounds a principle which
is no longer applied to joint stock companies in their
dealings with commodities of which money is simply the
representative should be continued with regard to their
dealingi in money itself. Meanwhile it would be waste of
time to reopen the argument. A remark is necessary,
however, on the indirect attempts made by several members
on different occasions to impugn the results of limited
liability as already witnessed in general trade. All the
supporters of that measure were well aware at its intro-
duction that for several succeeding years it would have to
bear the odJun of every financial difficulty, just as
free trade was for a time the scapegoat for all poli-
tical or domestic evils. It has turned cut. however,
thus far, that the results have been wonderfully smooth,
much more so, indeed, than could have been hoped by the
most sanguine supporters of the change, since a state of
transition always warrants anxiety. Of course, the alle-
gation is ready that this is to be attributed not to the in-
herent soundness of the law, but to the peculiar state of
the money market, which has checked spemlation. There
is always some:hing to prove that those who resisted re-
form were perfectly right, but that the untoward course of
Providence in some way prevented the fulfilment of their
predictions. It was the Australian gold discoveries alone
that falsified the Protectionist prophecies of 1847, and if
Baron Rothschild ware admitted to parliament to-morrow,
and the country were not unchriatianised, there woule,
doubtless, be some special interposition to account for the
anomaly. But the fact, whatever may be the mode of
explaining it, still remains, and if it were necessary it
could easily bs p oved that the pressure of the last year
or two has not prevented a Air trial of the system. Many
companies have been started under it ; some have gone on
to respectability and success, others have failed, and others
have wound up. In every way, therefore, its operation
has been tested, and the most gratifying circumstance con-
nected with this experience is that it has been found that
the prudence of the public has been stimulated in,tead of
..c1 that in no case have they sesseeea aamage.
The greater reserve with which credit is given is a striking
feature, and several concerns have apparently been forced
to Wine up, llot Cuw/ abauluto lo:moot but from inability to
carry their transactions to a paying extent. In the long
run character will be the ground on which they must all
stand. If a concern appears to be well managed, it will
be trusted to any requisite amount ; while, in the opposite
case, the fact that there is no mysterious source of wealth
in the shape of a body of unsuspecting shareholders to fall
back upon will beget caution even ou the part of those
who would otherwise, by granting reckless credit upon
extortionate terms, be ready to acteist in bringing it to ruin.
If the fact were kept in rview that it is those who give
credit without inquiry that destroy all sound bus -
Iles; here would be lens anxiety to maintain a
system that seems to have been framed solely for
their encouragement. Bat the cry, always is—
" You must make the borrower prudent— not the
lender." In this way great alarm is expressed by many
persons at that clause of the new Banking Bill which
Proposes to allow any number of persons beyond six to
associate as a company for banking purposes. No im-
portance seems to be attached to the fact that it is not
proposed that the law shall compel any one to trust them.
It ts sai d " they will enjoy all the status in society and all
jthe advantages which a jotrit-stork bank enjoys." But a
oint-stock bank ens no particular status, except such as
it derives from leakypital end proprietary. If seven un-
own men, with £350 paid up, choose to invite the de-
posits of the public, are we to believe the public so icap- •
able of resisting the invitation that we must make a
tspecial law to retrain them? If so, why not make laws
o the prohibit them from Every other imprudence to which in
bex n ercise of their free .ev. ill they may be liable ? The
elief is that the public, on the whole, ought with the as-
sistance of the Criminal Courts to be able to take care of
themselves, and that, at all events, if they are defective in
this power, they are not likely to acquire it by never being
allowed to try. It would be at least but fair that the ex-
periment should be made. A year's trial can scarcely
Yield us a combination of cases worse than those of the
TiPPera the London and Eastern, and the Royal British
Banks, and if the Government still find that we are unfit
to be out of leading-strings they can then return to the
protective method, which in the spare of little more than
twelve months presented us with these specimen of its
utility.—Times City Article.

A Pot-tree eorrespondent, writes the Greenock Adver-
liser, under date of 17th t—A report has reached this that
an insane man in Ilist, Lorg Islaed, has committed a
fearful murder of a threefold character, vie., his father,
his mother, and his aunt; and so
determined and
'barbarous had he been in the execution of the fatal deed,
that he scooped the eyes out of his aunt's head, After
'having left the place, he returned, set on the machinery
'of the millowhich caught fire, end it was burned to the
ground.—Glasgow Mail.
DEATH PROM FXCESSTVE OBESITY.—A corresrondent
"Tula a cotempeary the particulars of a remarkable death
which has jest taken place in the Royal Infirmary, the
Cause being the extraordinary fatness of the patient. The
ease was that of a female cook recently employed some-
where in in Alban
palend. who seems to have been of gigantiC
sions alto2ether ; she was five feet ten inches in
._eiiillt, thirty inches broad across the shoulders, and
weighed twentv-'•.even stones. On a post mortem exami-
nation the fat was found to be of extraordinary thickness
4a some Places D,ath. was occasioned by the gradual
Closing up of the oriqce of the windpipe till it had become
"l'e small to admitof sufficient air to keep the lungs in
plawy--utedoian
r. Mercury.
NW'
Who i.e •1, reesimoey, AND BEGGARY.—An aged.) rnan,
povert:lded in the Rue Guisarde, where her ' :eplorable
all the4c:click aPPeararee long excited the "eompasaien of
bed she d.abitants, died a few days v.-) . On her death-
burnto 'splayed extraordinary pee - nony She refused
teocHitt which wee;
person, or
ranges, she said, ' present ; for
sent" her by a charitable
ew,arn .°"enge, likewise a
being
Pressed to make are -"e
too expensive to eat.
On
out
jute a fit of rage 4 of these trifling gifts, she burst
_e
Nece?" af• 9 which hastened her end. The judge. d_ exist, ar,„ e.er her death to seal up any property that might
Wetrt- -4 he declared the whole of the furniture and
t-,vell•t,ebe possesved by the deceased to be worth less than
the atY francs- When on the point of leaving the room,
• III) with filth
of this officer was directed to a basket heaped
filth • the foot of the bed.
a ouch. Y rags, which stood at
Wei
hlng this basket with his foot he was f4t-ink with its
floef., t',/l!hud on examination it was found nailed to the
ana „,'",e 010.7 c)ntents of the basket were thrown out,
(3 37„trie bottom was discovered a sum of 63,003 f.
Caia's -v) in gold. The treasure was at once taken to the
e des to
a Ile Doti anti Consignations; and it is said that
Nevi fj- a
already instituted a claim
.011 this 0 the deceased has
,/,,,,, Unexpected inheritance. The deceased, who had
eight
.y been a servant in several high families, was
gutve h • f her death. She
lived years of
forag at t e time o
by begging the last forty years.— Galinani.;