The Sun.
London, England, 1854-04-21 00:00:00

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.bees ile of-thiai institution,-which'pationiies. Chaieellore o
the Exchequer, and talks, of the public money and public
privil?ges placed in its hands as if they were its own r
are not saying whether Such a step would be desirable or
not. Many considerations besides the words and demean-
our of Bank directors and their friends must be maturely
weighed before any resolution can be arrived at on so mo•
mentous a subject ; but this we say, that in the event of:a
severance from Government, the Bank would immediately
sink to the level of any other joint.stock bank in the coon•
try, and cease to occupy the position in the public eyo
which it now fills. • .

Without involving ourselves. in the consideration of such
momentous changes, there-is ,one step which we sincerely
hope the Chancellor of the Exchequer will lose no -time in.
taking, for it is diCtated both by the-interests of 'the GO-
Vernment and the convenience of the yublic.' . The neceii-
sity of-making large payments for the interest on the 'debt
four times in- the, year has led to the system of keeping
lsrge balances in the hands of• the Bank Of England,. and
that, again, to the prietiee of moderating the evil by mean
of deficiency bills and smaller balances. Why-should -not
the-yearly sums to be paid by the: Bank be divided:into
twelVO equal pacts, each to be made payable on -.the. :first
day of every month ? Thus the mischief of- withdrawing
large sums from. the circulation, and SUCldenlY,Fe.juning
them would
thewould be avoided, and-the derangenieit would be so
,slight as to be hardly perceptible: The. fi=st 'Step itewards
a readjustment of the relations between. Clcirgrnment and
the Vtahlr would be to 'do away With-the neceSeity'Of bo,r-
rOwing and the excuse for large deposit*. , '

. .
THE BANK OF ENGLAND AND 'THE'

CIVIL SERVICE.

• •
(Prom the Dotty News.) • , •
The Times yesterday had two articlee diasks. 'g its
course respecting the Bank of -England and the Civil Sa-
vice, and abusing the Liberal press, to which, by the
abuse, it admits that it does notleloug- -Not to waste the
reader's time by_ preliminary remarks, we shall atone° say
of the article . on-the Civil Service that the Times very
complacently assumes 'that the monopoly plan; like free
trade, is to confer unknown blesseings on mankind, and
;erroneously,
.asserts that. falsehood and evil are eminently
barren. But free trade only -Conferred unkiioirn :benefits
on-mankind, because the systeni of restriction was fruitful
of unknown evils.. The proverb says that one falsehood
begets another, and one false step, whether taken by
woman or lawyer,- involves, if it cannot be retraced, innu-
merable others. If the. Times were not as ignorant as it is
assuming, it would know, that falsehood and evil are as
Prolific parents o 1 their proper offspring as truth and good-
ness, and it would not have propounded in another article
as a harmless scheme a plan of general plunder at the dis-
cretion of the Government.
Those who oppose the Civil Service plan are not led
away, like the Times, by assertions of would-ba monopolists,
and they:repudiate the assumption that examinations of
crammed aspirants for office
intellect. That they who are
oppose admirable
the gaugesscheme
em eat
shrink,
ihnuk as
hle
iinenhserciineign
tleivnlolstulidtn-cijeofbromvimoonuotspohlyelisnporatts,cttwruicheao,
treshili
ce
since
g Times
i theyt lOn says,
gofthe
rw with
assume to be intellectual heroes, and expect to defeat them.
Following in the wake of the Rev. Rd. Dawes, AI.D , Dean
of Hereford, the Times asserts that there are wanting mo-
tiveifor self-improvement, unless the Government create
them, and it exults at the effect which the mere pro-
pounding of the scheme has had in improving the educa-
tional institutions of the country. But . the retjaatiop of
Greek, at which the Times exults, has long been recom-
mended by the Liberals, while the Rev. B. Jewett, one
of the authors of the scheme, advocates its retention. The
journal has forgotten its teachers ; for while they are for
an " examination on a level with the highest description
of education in the country," the education given at Cam-
bridge and Oxford, the Tinies contents- itself with the
practical education proper to the counting-house. Fear-
ful, too, of the effects of public discussion, now that the
subject has been ventilated, the Times is for carrying
the scheme into effect by an order in council, though
the commissioners, in the first flush of the conception, and.
in the confidence of success, recommended an act of Par-
liament. -From the intellectual test of discussion in Par-
lenient the Tines shrinks, and suggests that the 'scheme
should be at once carried into effect by the Executive Go-
vernment. There is a conflict amongst its proposers as
to what is to be aimed at, and how it is to be accomplished,
and their division, the result of ignorant pretensions, is
the forerunner of defeat.
As to the Bank, the Mats misstates, if it do not mis-
take, the question at issue. The poor humble Bank, the
mere creature, in its present form, of the Executive Go-
vernment, has never for one moment presumed to oppose
the Chancellor's will ; but those who represent commerce,
alarmed at the unusual demand made by the Chanoellor
of the Exchequer on the capital of the country, objected.
to his proceedings as an injury to trade. The Times, how-
ever, assails the Bauk, and summing up the privileges it
ekkjoys, and the advantages it derives from being the
banker of the Government, threatens it w*h the loss of
them because it is not a sufficiently convenient tool for the
Chancellor. We require the Bank Charter to be abolished
for the good of the public, because its existence is a viela-
tion of the principle of free trade; the Times, regardless
of the public arid of principle, objcts to it as a restraint
on the extravagance or carelessness of the Chancellor of
the Exchequer.
In enumerating its priVileges, the Times forgi3ts the re-
straints imposed on it in conjunction with them, and the
improper duties it is required to perform. The" State con-
stitutes the Bank the regulator of the currency, and directs
the appropriation of its resources as if they belonged to
itself. The Bank would lose nothing by losing its privi-
leges, if it also lost its official dignity and its burdens. Re-
dticed tcla :item Joint-stock Bank, instead of makin; a
dividend of 9 per cent., it might make, like other Joint-
stock Banks, 10, 12, or even 13. Such is . the ignorance
however, of the Times, that it represents the former figure
as very large, and as due to the privileges enjoyed by the
Bank ; while it is notorious that in the last 6 months it
has been exceeded by the gains of every -Joint-stock Bank
in the metropolis. In fact, the restrictions imposed on the
Bank in conjunction with its privileges prevent it making
a proper use of its resources. They are all impediments to
the free use of capital, and injure the Bank as well as the
public.
The Times assumes that the Government has exclusively
the power to issue promises to pay. Every man has the
power; the Bank has the power,' but selfishly submits to
restrictions on its own issue to secure more effectually re-
strictions on those of other men. When the Government as-
sumes the power, it invariably abuses it. Russian paper
money, to quote only one example, though there is no State of
Europe that will not supply others, was debased till it fell
about 1840 from 40d., the ordinary value of a rouble, to 11 id.
It was then restored ; but according to late intelligence
from St. Petersburg, the Czar had again begun to debase
it by the issue of 60,000,000 roubles, about 10,000,0001.
The Times claims such a power for the Chancellor of the
Exchequer, and his quarrel with the Bank is, that it =ay
be a check on his possible rapacity. "No one," it say!,
"except a Government whose affairs are too large and too
abstruse to be regulated by the homely dictates of common
sense, would think of borrowing at all, while it had an
unexceptionable and ,facile means at hind of making
money. To issue paper promises to pay by the Govern-
ment is certainly a facile means of raising a limited sum of
money, but all history is as false as the columns of the Times
if it be unexceptionable. Against Government becoming
the issuer of promises to pay, debasing the currency to any
extent it pleases, and vitiating the measure of value, there
is this . unanswerable objection, that there is no means -of
compelling it to keep its promise. It is a debtor who can-
not be coerced. Even a revolution is powerless to make it
pay, for the simple and plain reason that it has nothing to
pay with. It has only taxation. Though the Timer holds
out to the people as a lure the levying of 20,000,000/. on
themselves by the promises of the Government to pay on
demand, they will never trust a debtor whom they have
no means of coercing, and will prefer the old lady of
Threadneedle-street to an active and rapacious chief of the
'Civil—or rather the restrictive and despotic—Service.
The real 'question at issue is not between the Bank and
the Government, but between the trade of the country and
the Chancellor of the Exchequer. The balances in the
Exchequer and the public deposits were on the sth of April
as follows : _

__._ .• _ .
Public Deposits. Balance in the Exchequer.
1850
1851
1852
1853
1854

, .
, .
etaigrghtt,haenrr in 1854
eotoult theecußnanktiesreintutrhnse
was extremely easy, iu 1853 it was _ un-
steady in the three first of thesey
of private s • • •
,1201. • in .1854,
we see
spring quarter was, inlBs 3, 16,385
- )" 7261 • while the average of the highest returns in the
16 0:,-., • ,
that the etilh ea sh
tigi ghhets.t amount When
we
' quarter of the three preceding years was 12,745,0001.
Mate
,„, •,,-. as every one is well aware, that in 1853 and 1854
s'"'wl ''
commerce required 9
fully carried on. It was the duty of the Government, there-
fore, which exists but for the protection of the interests of
the people, and which has unwarrantably assumed to itself
the control of the issue of Bank notes, at least not so to act
from a peddling notion of saving 100,11001., which could not
bo saved—so as to embarrass commerce.. • The Chancellor
however, at 'the very time when commerce was straitened,
made, from a mere whim of his own, large and unus‘tal de-
mands on the means of -wminerde. This is the objection to
his proceedings. He disturbed and injured trade, 'which
he was bound to protect ; and from this charge the limes
will not divert the attention of commercial men by raising
a cloud of dust about tho profits aud privileges of theßank,
and about the very important butabstract-question
cof who
shoild issue promises to pay money.

DEATH FROM INTOXICATION.—Yesterday Mr. B;ent
held an inquest on a, retii ed City tradesman, aged forty-
two, whose death occurred under very distressing cir.
cumstances. It appears from the evidence of deceb.sed's
widow that her husband was carried home last Saturday
night in an insensible state, and considering that he suf-
fered from intoxication she had laid him on the Parlour
floor to sleep off the fit, as was his usual custom. She re-
mained with him until a late hour, when finding he con-
tinued unconscious she retired to rest, having previously
taken the precaution to loosen his cravat and collar. Upon
going to the parlour the following (Sunday) morning, she
found him lying in the same position in which she 'left
him the night previous, and quite dead, life -having
been extinct several hours. Mr. Hetherington, pro-
prietor of the Bull and Gate, said deceased came, to his
house on Saturday night, and as he was the worse
for liquor he refused to serve him, but as he (deceased)
refused• to leave the homic before he got a glass of Tum,
witness gave it him in order to get rid of him. After
deceased had the glass of rum, witness requested some
persons to assist him home, which they did. Mr.
Rawlins, surgeon, performed the post-mortem:exami-
nation, and found that death arose from congestion of
the brain produced by intoxicating liquers. It further
appeared that in the course of the evening preceding his
death the unfortunate man drank largely of both soi.
rituous and malt liquors, besides which he smoked for
several hours together. He was an inveterate tippler
and smoker. The verdict was in accordatuce with the
medical testimony.
PHOTOGRAPHS OF GRECIAN ANTIQITIES. ---- On the
walls of the Society of Arts there aren
viwseugenbydemd
number of very beautiful photographic
r.
Robertson, of Constantinople, in different parts ofGreece.
The collection comprises forty views in Athens; include
ing the Parthenon, the Temple. of Theseus, the Brae.
theuni, the Temple of Victory, the Tower of the Winds,
&c., three views at Egina, two at Corinth, two at Su-
nium, and in addition, views of the friezes of ate:Par-
themin, and blto-relievos in the Temple of- YioorY.
These pictures
. will remain on view for' about a week or
ten days, and should be seen by all. architpcteyartists
and students of ancient history.