Des Arc citizen., 1859-08-10
From the New York Daily News.1
 BANKING AND COINAGE

this question:" Will you give me such { simple account of the origin and progress of Banks and Banking as can read 10 m. snquisilive children with certainty 0 instructin2 without tring them2" We do mol hope that our effort 10 oblige this cor respondent will be so successful as he and we could wish; but that is no reason for hesitating about putting, in the mos familiar style we can employ, the nforma. ton he soliclts.
 The Lombardo Italians have the honor of originating the frs, bank some time in sos. This fact is interesting, connect ed with the money and blood squandering doings now going on in Lombardy. The great banking street in London, which IS called Lombard street to this day, testfies to the fact of the associations of banking with the Lombards.
 The name bank, which is chosen to signify trade. is very simple in its origin. being derlved from the Italian word Banco which meens bench. In the old times money was exchanged over very rude looking counters fitted up in the ordinary market place, and not deserving state- fer title than benches.
 People, however, did not wholly trust their coins to these bench bankers. There was mint for the preservation of public and private funds. The mint at the Tow Sr of London was broken in confidence, as they phrase 1t, in l640. and from that .ine traders have tried to ge! up banks somewhat on the principle now in vogue. The goldsmi,hs in Lombard street were tue frs, real English bankers for they be- came in l645, the preservers of merchant funds, which they stored in huge iron chests prepared for the purpose, and abandoned afierward with the occasion which called them into use.
 The oldest bank now in existence is, we believe, that of Venice. IL Is cer- ,a'nly the oldest bank claiming national character, and IS just seven hundred and two years of age, having been formed in ll57. The most modern banks are those of our own States and the branch banks of England. The banking system as such was planted with us in l79l.
 The far-famed Bank of England was not always great national affair, such as 1t now is. That great establishment was first planned and put into working order, by merchant named Patterson, and it be- came the Bank of England by stress of all controlling circumstances. When Will liam of Orange, badly needed cash, he bethought him of borrowing from this bank all it had, and giving in return charter of incorporation. The sum lent for this consideration, amounted 10 El 200, 900. This occurred in 1891, when that much money had greater relative value than the same figures would now represent The first published Banking Account was about f2.000,000 That was in l7lS. Since then, the Account of the famous Bank of England has made rapid strides upward, showing an average regular cap- ital since, 1900, of about ElS,000, ,000. When the Bank was first announced, the notes were 20 per cent. discount, and not quite hundred years ago they were un- der par. By par is meant sameness of quantity. Bank bills were paid in silver In l754; bank bills were issued in l754 {; small notes were issued in 1759 cash payments were discontinued in 1797, and 1t was in that same year that one pound notes and two pound notes were put into circulation. The note circulation has of- ten exceeded the amount in bank. h. deed the fuctuation is often so consider. able as to make difference of millions Since 1852. that fuctuation has been less, and the condition of bullion in the bank steady.
 Our fathers of England owed the intro daction of any coinage system to the Ro- mans who had become their masters, and Colchester, where they had an immense camp, has the honor of being the first British spot whence Britannia coinage issued They had many shapes of coin age cons ruction--square, oblong and round, and it was only in the middle ages that the last became the arbitrary type.
 The Groat, not anything so large as a half.dollar, was the largest silver coin used before ;he year l53l, of our era. Before ae year 1916, rents and almost all other Aayments were made in kind; for the 31rons absorbed all the cash, but since
 s.i com has had its sterling character
 'sied to 1t. The first mention of a gold soaage IS connected with Henry III and
 e year 1857. About one hundred years agarward Edward III struck the gold lofIn The same sovereign introduced six smiling pieces in gold, and also the nobles. The first old sovereigns were mn,ed in l494, and the first guineas were coined by order of Charles II in 1873. Double guineas, five guinea pieces and half guinea pieces immediately followed from the same source. The British sov- ereignis comparatively new thing, hav- ing been first issued in 1916. Angles were coined by Edward " and had as representation figure of Michael and the dragon.
 The first shilling coin was struck in 1903, and crowns and half crowns fol. lowed ln about halfa century. Tenpenny bits, sixpenny, fourpenny and threepen- ny are all, more or less, modern spec- mems, and the latest stretch in this direc- tion which the British coinage has taken is toward the forin, pretty coin, worth two shllings British money, something like opr haif ,JoII.r