The Sun.
London, England, 1857-11-21 00:00:00

LONDON, SATURDAY, NOV. 21, 1857.

The returns from the Bank of England to the
18th instant, prove beyond the possibility of
doubt, that, but for the Government letter of the
12th, the Bank itself would either have been un-
able to meet its engagement; or it should have
imposed such restrictions on the commercial in-
terests, as would have led to wide-spread ruin and
all but universal bankruptcy. It is true that by
steadily refusing all accommodation, and not even
taking any security tendered, however unexcep-
tionable, into consideration, they might possibly
have saved themselves. But even that is doubtful,
inasmuch as the private deposits alone (to
83,Y. nothing of the public deposit 4,
tvimh might not be pressed for) amounted
to no less than 12,935,0001., and the seven
day and other hiili to 853,9151., against
this, and the 14,475,0001. of notes issued agaiLif;
securities, and for which there was not a single
ounce of g',1.1 deposited, they had a beggarly
reserve of notes not only for the parelt establish-
ment in Threadnecdle-street, but for all its nu- 1
merous branches in town and country of 957,7101.,
and of coin in the banking department of
504,4431. Making thus, assets, 1,461,153%,
against liabilities 28,263,9751.1 or adding the
Government deposits in round terms some
713,500,000%, or about 10d. in the 1/. We need
scarcely say how soon an organised run, such as
would probably occur during a severe panic)
would dispose of the 1,462,1531. which was alone
available.

The present returns prove that the Bank has
largely transgressed its limits, that the Act of
1844 has been, distinctly violated, and that the

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promised indemnity • must be asked from
Parliament. The first point deserving at-
tention is the Postscript or note, respect-
log the issue department. Of the notes issued,
we are informed that 2,000,000/. aro issue d
under the authority of the First Lord of the
Treasury and the Chancellor of the Exchequer,
and there has been a corresponding addition of
2,000,000/. of securities to the other side of the
balance•sheet. In the banking department, we
find that the public securities have diminished by
no less than 3,037,6941., of which 2,000,000/.
is accounted for by the transfer thereof to the
other branch, showing that securities to the no-
minal amount of 1,037,6941. have been sold or
disposed of during the week for the purpose of
strengthening the reserve.
That reserve now stands at 1,148,1851., being
a nominal increase of 190,4751., but a reil de-
crease (taking the 2,000,0001. extra issued on
securities) of 1,809,5251., so that if the drain
continues at a similar rate there must be a new
infraction of the Charter within less than another
week.

The bullion, too, has fallen considerably. It
now stands (in both departments) at 6,484,0961.,
showing a decrease of 686,4121. within the week.
At the time of the previous suspension it stood
at 7,865,4451., being the lowest amount to which
it was ever reduced since the passing of the Act
of 1844, until within the last few weeks, when 1
it has been nearly 1,400,0001. in round
terms, lower in amount. On the other side
we find an increase in the other.securities (which
have now reached the unprecedented amount of
30,299,270/0, being an increase of 4,185,817/. ;
and at the same time the public deposits are
augmented by 169,222/., and the private by
1,023,822/., and the rest, or amount of profit
realised within the week, by 69,1441. No wonder
that the directors and proprietors call the act the.,l
perfection of human wisdom, and think a minimum
rate of 10 per cent. a very pleasing state of
affairs. Nearly 70,000/. sterling per week,
3,640,0001. per annum, would certainly reconcile
the recipients to any amount of suffering and
inconvenience on the part of the general public.
But will the general public submit to such ter-
rible trials and privations as they have recently
endured for the sake of the moneyocracy ? Every
pound wrung from the hard hands of the work-
ing classes is defiled by the misery it has occa-
sioned. Under more favourable circumstances the
Bank would make very fair, aye handsome profits,
and they would be paid. There would be no
killing the goose that laid the golden eggs ! B)th
sides might live, and industry would flourish
under the beneficial aid that could be afforded.
At present it is crushed and paralysed. Its very
life-blood is wanting, or rather it is stagnant in
the national veins, and nothing but the introduc-
tion of a totally different system will remedy the
evils produced by the most iniquitous and impo-
litic law that ever received the Legislative sanction.

It is -satisfactory to think that at last some
energetic measures are really being set on foot, in
earnest, with a view to the " putting down," if
possible forthwith, of the intolerable Gas Mono-
poly. The meeting convened on Wednesday, at
the Court-house, Marylebone, we are fain to re-
gard merely as the precursor of many others of a
similar character—as the inauguration of a reso-
lute and systematic movement. As such, it ap-
pears to have been at once and instinctively re-
cognised by those who were gathered together on
the occasion ; the individuals present being, for
the most part, members of impromptu deputa-
tions, appointed, as it were, upon the spur of the
moment, by various vestries and district boards of
the metropolitan parishes—deputations, number-
ing amongst them the repie6euLAtivcs of the
Vestries of Marylebone, Islington, St. Pancras,
Paddington, St. George's Pimlico, and Sr.
James's, Westminster. It was certainly time
enough that some step of this decisive kind
should be taken, considering the extraordinary
course recently adopted by the several Gas Com-
panies of the Capital. That course being nothing
less than the comprehensive division of the me-
tropolis into districts, with a view to—what ?
the prevention of competition ! In other words,
with an avowed determination to organise with
the most flagrant effrontery, the most grinding
and iniquitous monopoly. Once tolerate this as
a precedent and—as one of the speakers very
reasonably remarked on Wednesday—by the
time the coal tax has expired (not so
very many years hence, in truth, but
one brief lustre, namely in 1862), we may
then have the coal merchants of the metropolis
(in emulation of the Gas Companies of London
and Westminster) parcelling out the capital in
precisely the same way ; precluding the consumer
from any benefits that might otherwise accrue
from the remission of the impost, and, in this
shameless manner, consolidating and perpetuating
this vexatious and notorious monopoly. Without,
however, looking in any way to these purely col-
lateral consequences, the evil resulting from the
measure recently adventured upon by the Metro-
r politan Gas Companies must in itself be regarded
as sufficiently deplorable. That measure, if per-
mitted to ripen into regular operation, will neces-
sarily and obviously place the consumer more than
ever at the mercy of the Gas Companies. Ac-
cording to the new arrangement, as described in
its actual effects already by the Chairman of the
meeting ou Wednesday last, in Marylebone—the
consumers are even now so entirely at the mercy
of the Monopolist-Gas-Companies that cases are
asserted to have occurred in which gas has been
refused t 3 in-coming tenants unless they con-
sented in the first place, without demur, to pay
up the arrears that might chance to have been'
left behind them by their predecessors. An inti-
mation that we sincerely hope may have originated
in some unwitting exaggeration—a vague rumour
that has somehow grown into a deliberately ex-
plicit statement. However it may be in regard
to this one insulated charge, there cannot be much
duubt we conjecture as to the absolute reasonable-
ness of the aggregate accusations directed for years
past by the general public against the metropoli-
tan gas companies collectively. The gravamen
of those accusations being in simple truth that the
whole system is nothing less than one monstrous
monopoly. The imputation holds good more or
less over the entire period during which c trba-
retted hydrogen gas has lit the streets and houses
of London and Westminster. The whole hittiry
of gas lighting indeed, for that matter, i 3 iu one
respect a history of disappointments, if in another
1
I it is also iueonteetihly a history of co.-rip:ellen:live
I and Lir the most part extraordinary improvements.
The discovery of c )al gas as a permanently elastic
and inflammable aeriform fluid—adisco very origi-
nally ascertained by the successful cxperimenta of
the Rev. Dr. CLAYTON-dates back to actually
more than a whole century from the present year
of grace 1857 : the succinct narrative of the dis-
covery having been published as far back as 1739
' in the then current volume of the " Piiilosoph -
cal Transactions." Yet very nearly a hundred
and twenty years have failed to give the publ c
I generally the access they should in reason I,>n,,
since have obtained to thin wonderful boon—this
all but magical moans of illumination. It is a

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significant fact that meets us upon the initial page
of the History of Gas Lighting, that the ingenious
and unfortunate gentleman who was the first to
apply gas practically to the illumination of streets
and houses—after expending a considerable for-
tune in bringing his admirable contrivance to
bear, in other terms by bringing gas into public
use in our dwellings and thoroughfares—never
received any national recognition of his services,
or even for that matter what might be called any
adequate compensation. The treatment of Mr.
WINSOR was significant. It furnishes us with
a key to au otherwise inscrutable mystery of con-
fusion, a clue through an otherwise impenetrable
labyrinth. It illustrates by the very first inci-
dent in the narrative how it has come to pass
that the History of Gas Lighting is the history of
a huge and indefensible monopoly. That mono-
poly threatens now, after a century's growth,
to establish itself among us, as the French
say, en permanence. Against the realisa-
tion of this formidable threat it behoves
us to be on our guard. Happily the principal
parishes of London appear at length to be alive
to the urgency of the case ; and seemingly recog-
nise, at the eleventh hour, the necessity of a final
and energetic movement. In curious enforce-
ment of this resolve came, at the close of Wed-
nesday's meeting, the opportune missive from the
Town Clerk of Manchester, intimating that the
"profits" of Gas Lighting to the Corporation—
not, observe ! to Monopolist Gas Companies, but
to the Corporation—amount annually to between
30,0001. and 40,0001. sterling : profits applied
yearly to local improvements. Sufficiently tan•
talising, all this, to the poor Londoners Or—
instead of tantalising, suppose we say enspiriting.