Year: 1861




The Bank ofEngland must be seen on
the inside as we'll as out, and to 90 into
the interior of this remarkable building, to
observe the operations of an institution that
exerts more moral and political power than
any sovereign in Europe, you must have
an order from the Governor of the Bank.
The building occupies an irregular area of
eight acres fgroud-an edifice of no archi,
tectural beauty, with not one window tow,
ard the street, being lighted altogether from
the roof of the inclosed area.


was led on, presenting my card of ad-
mission, into private room, where, after a
delay of few minutes, messenger came
and conducted me through the mighty and
mysterious building. Down we went into
a room where the notes of the bank,
received the day before were now examined,
compared with the entries in the book, and
slowed away. The Bank of England never
isues the same note second time. 1t re-
ceives, in the ordinary course of business,
about 100000, or 100000, daily in
notes; these are put up into parcels accord
ing to their denominations, boxed up with
the date of their reception, and are kept
ten years; at the expiration of which period
they are taken out and ground in the mill
which I saw running, and made again into
paper. If, in the course of these ten years,
any dispute in business, or law suit, should
arise, concerning the payment of any note
the bank eau produce the identical bill.


To meet the demand for notes so con-
stantly used up, the bank has its own pa
per-makers, its own printers, its own eugra-
vers, all at work under the same roof, and
it even makes the machiueryaby which the
most of its own work is done. A compli-
Gated but beautiful operation is register,
extending from the printing office to the
banking Offices, which marks every sheet of
paper that is struck off from the press, so
that the printers cannot manufacture a sim
gle sheet of bank-notes that is not record
ed in the bank. On the same principle of
neatness, shaft is made to pass from one
apartment to another, connecting a clock
in sixteen business wings of the establish
ment, and regulating them with such pre-
cision that the whole of them are always
pointing the same second of time. In an
other room was a machine, exceedingly
simple for detecting light gold coin. A
row Of them is dropped one by one upon a
spring scale. If the piece of gold was of
the standard weight, the scale rose to
certain height, and the coin slid off upon
one side of the box; if less than the stand
ard, it rose little higher and the coin slid
off upon the other side. I asked the
weigher what was the average number of
light coins that came into his hands, and
strangely enough he said it was question
he was not allowed to answer.


The next room I entered was that in
which the notes are deposited which
are ready for issue. awe have thir-
ty-two millions ofpounds sterling in this
room," the officer remarked to me; "will
you take little of it2" 1 told him it
would be vastly agreeable, and he handed
me million sterling, which received with
many thanks for his liberality, but he in
sisted on my depositing it again with him
as it would hardly be safe to carry so much
money in the street, l very much fear
that 1 shall never see that money again.
In the vault beneath the door were di-
rector and cashier, counting bags of gold
which men were pitching down to them,
each bag containing thousand pounds
sterling just from the mint. This world
of money seemed to realize the fables of
Eastern wealth aud gave me new and
strong impressions of the magnitude of the
business done here, and the extent of the
relations of this one institution to the COM
merce of the world