The Sun.
London, England, 1861-03-20 00:00:00

REIGN COUNTRIES.

Mr. LIDDELL gave notice that, after Easter, he would
call attention to those portions of the report of the com-
mittee on the Merchant Shipping Act which related to
reciprocity in respect to navigation with foieign countries.
COUNTY RATES AND EXPENDITURE BILL.
Sir J. TRELA WNY, in moving the second reading of
this bill, said he did not require the house to pass it in its
present form, but merely by the second reading to affirm its
principle, which was to afford ratepayers greater control in
the management of rates for counties. The bill contained
123 clauses, of which about thirty were important
to his purpose. The first clause was essential
to the object he proposed to accomplish, and it provided
that a board should be constituted for the purpose of dealing
with county expenditure, which was to be elected by the
Board of Guardians. One magistrate and one guardian
were to be members of this board, and they should each be
rated at the value of £lOO a year in the county where they
resided. He proposed also to give guardians the
power of dealing with the expense of the constabulary, re-
pairing prisons, and other matters of a financial character.
However, it was his intention that magistrates should re-
tain as much power in reference to such subjects as would
induce them to take an interest in county business, which
they might not be inclined to do, if they did not possess
certain authority. With regard to gaols, which came in
the same category as constabulary, he proposed that what
related to them should be placed in the hands of the
financial board for the establishment of which the
bill provided. As regarded temporary repairs he would
give the board the power of making them where they were
of a temporary character. With respect to pauper lunatics
the bill provided that magistrates still retain the same
functions as at present, but committees should be formed to
secure an economical course in reference to the expenditure.
These were the principal points of the bill, and he did not
propose to go into details. In considering the objections
to the bill, he said he was aware that it had been asserted
by the opponents of the measure that the present system
worked very well ; but what he complainad of was that the
magistrates were a fluctuating body, and there was no se-
curity for their having the same magistrates for four
consecutive quarter sessions. The hon. baronet then referred
to the large in-crease in county expenditure to show
the necessity that existed for its being placed under more
responsible and efficient control.
Sir M. RIDLEY moved, asian amendment, that the Lill
be read a second time that day six months. He said that
the bill brought forward in 1850 was limited to the present,
and the committee who reported on the bill considered it
would have the effect of excluding a numerous body of gen-
tlemen in the country from attending county business.
He did net oppose) 'the election principle, but it
was a very serious matter to attempt to infuse,
in any . considerable degree, a new element into
an aneientlinstitution, which practically had :not been
found an inoperative or exhausted statute. He believed
the present bill, so far from simplifying the checking of
accounts, would have an effect directly contrary, and create
confusion, from the conflicting interests that would be
brought into contact by its provisions. If the measure
were passed into law, in his opinion, it would affect most
injuriously the proper discharge of county business, and
utterly fail in remedying the evils which some members
considered to exist.

vv
Mr. W. E. FORSTER said that he did not pledge him-
self to the details of the bill, but he felt bound to support
its principle. He thought the time had arrived when they
should do away with the anomaly of money being disposed
of without any contest by the taxpayers, which does not
exist in regardjo other disbursements of money, whether
for imperial or local purposes. He might be asked
why this question was agitated at present, and his reply
was that a number of sources ior county expenditure had
arisen which had not existed some years ago, as might be
shown by the appointment of constabulary and other
charges *ith which hon. members were acquainted.
(Hear, hear.) He objected to one detail of the bill, that
which provided for the election of one magistrate on the
board which the hon. baronet proposed to constitute.
It was very desirable they should have a judicial element
on that board, but he thought magistrates would object to
the principle of election, and he thought the better plan
would be to allow them to make the selection from their
own body themselves. He concluded by expressing a hope
that the house would agree to the second reading, and any
alterations that were considered desirable could be made in
committee.

Mr. PACKE opposed the bill on similar grounds to
those of the hon. baronet who had moved the amendment,
and that the measure was too crude to be brought forward
in its present state.
Sir J. SHELLEY supported the bill and he thought the
objections raised to the bill would be more appropriately
considered in committee. Great authorities, including the
late Sir Robert Peel, had approved of the principle on
which the bill was based, and he thought the time had
arrived for settling the subject to which it related.
Mr. PHILIPS said that he thought the hon. baronet
(Sir J. Trelawny) should have brought forward some in-
stance to show that the present system was defective, but
he was unable to do so. He defended the mode of dealing
with county expenditure, and entered into details to show
that such expenditure was legitimately increased, in conse-
quence of disbursements that were imperatively required.
He did not see the propriety of affirming the principle of
the bill which the hon. baronet (Sir J. Trelawny) asked them
to do when they disapproved of the details, what he consi-
dered a very clumsy mode of legislating. He felt bound,
therefore, to oppose the motion for the second reading of
this bill.

LLEPT SPEAKING.]

COMMERCIAL BANS OF LONDON.

The following is the report of the directors :
" Information having been received at a late hour on the
evening of Friday, 15th February, that the bank had been
robbed by a ledger-keeper at Henrietta-street (named.
Durdin), to the amount of £67,000, steps wero at °ace
taken to summon all the directors in or Rear London for

the following morning.
"At this meeting, after consultation with the solicitor
and manager of the bank, it was determined that, as the
first duty of the directors was to protect their customers
against the run which was inevitable, it was desirable to
seek assistance in some shape from one of the joint-stock
banks. The London and Westminster being the largest
bank, negotiations were at once opened with that establish-
ment, and they engaged to advance any sum, not exceed-
ing a million, which might be required to meet your lia-
bilities ; you directors undertaking, as far as lay in their
power, to influence their customers to transfer their
accounts to the London and Westminster Bank. The
details of this arrangement, which you are now asked to
confirm, will be read at the conclusion of this report.
" The arrangement was confirmed by a board especially
summoned for the purpose at eight o'clock in the morning,
on Monday the 18th ult.
" In adopting the course they did, the directors were in-
fluenced by the following considerations :
"Three courses were open to them :—To close the doors
of the bank—to stand a run which was certain—or to make

some such arrangement as is now submitted to you.
"To .lose the bank's doors would have been an unneces-
sary and unjustifiable cruelty to its custcmers, and would
have exposed the commercial world to a panic, the
extent of which, at the present moment, it is impossible
to measure. To the shareholders, the result would have
been a winding-up under bankruptcy, with its attendant
vexation and expense. This course, therefore, was dis-
carded at once. _ _ _

" The bank was in a position to risk the second course,
and stand any run, which could be reasonably anticipated ;
but with money at 8 per cent. as the minimum rate, and an
inevitable sacrifice on securities not instantly convertible,
the price of fighting the battle must have most seriously
affected the property of the shareholders.
" The directors believed, looking to the result of the run
on them in 1866, when the deposits were reduced from
£1,500,000 to £BOO,OOO, a reduction from which they. had
not, up to the present time, recovered to any appreciable
extent, that a second run would leave them at its termina-
tion no business worth preserving. The winding-up of the
bank must have followed, and that would, practically, have
plabed you in the same position in which you now stand ;
but with this materiel difference, that you would then have
paid a heavy price for that which now costs you nothing.
" It may be said that the bank, forced, for these reasons,
into an arrangement of some kind, might have made a better
one. Your directors think otherwise. With a week—with
Party-eight hours before them—they might possibly have
done it; but Monday would have found the bank with a
run upon it ; and the London and Westminister positively
refused to deal with us in any shape after a run had once
commenced.

"There can be little doubt that other banks, influenced
by the same considerations, would have followed this coarse.
Be that as it may, the want of time, the necessity for secrecy,
so long as secrecy was possible, prevented negotiations with
other establishments.

"The present arrangement, by which the great majority
of your customers have transferred their accounts to the
London and Westminster Bank, may be looked on as the
price paid to that company for having saved you from the
anxiety and loss of a run. "
Doubtless it is a most painful price to pay; it was not
agreed to until other proposals had been made and rejected;
but if your directors are right in their belief that remune-
rative business was at an end, this price becomes nothing,
as your accounts would have left you of themselves, as
they did in 1856. The profits, if any, of the small business
which might have been left to you (looking at the necessity
of re-creating a reserve fund), would have afforded little or
no dividend for a series of years, during which your shares
must have remained at a nominal price.
" As it intended to ask you to appoint some of your own
body to advise and co-operate with
.the directors, in the pre-
sent position of the bank's affauy, !,.t has not been thought
necessary, nor was it possible within the time, to give you
more than an approximate statement of the liabilities and
assets on the evening of last Saturday, the 16th inst. The
figures, however, are given, which show the state of the
accounts on the day of the transfer of the business and at
the present time.
" Whilst, on the one hand, the directors would regret to
state anything calculated to create an unfavourable impres-
sion of the value of the shareholders' property, they must
(having regard to the notorious uncertainty attending the
realisation of assets under the circumstances the bank is
now placed), guard themselves against making any state-
ment that may create expectations which the result may not
realise :—they confine themselves to the expression of their
hope:that the shareholders' capital will be returned to them
in full."

Advices from Naples announce that the sale by
auction of the property of the late Prince of Syracuse is to
take place immediately, beginning with the objects of art.
The Chioja Palace and its beautiful garden were to be put
up at 200,000 ducats (4f. 25c. each), and his Villa at Sor-
rento at 100,000 ducats.

The ,Armonia of Turin, the ultra-clerical organ,
announces that one of its editors is going to proceed to
Rome, in order to lay at the feet of the Supreme Pontiff, a
large chest filled with valuables, and the sum of 64,000 fr.
collected during the two first months of the present year.
The same journal asserts that the Pope has received 1500
sterling offered by the savages of Australia ! We are glad
to hear that the savages of that distant country are so well
off.