four directors; it also lays down rules respecting the qualifications of voters and of directors, with other regulations. In 1697 the bank was allowed to enlarge its capital to £2,201,171 10s. for the purpose of supporting public credit, bank notes being then at 20 per cent. discount, owing to the want of punctuality in the payments of Government. This capital was increased from time to time, till at Michaelmas, 1746, when the whole debt to the bank from the public was £11,686,800 and its divided capital has been raised to £10,780,000.

From an early period after the establishment of the bank, it had been the practice of the company to assist Government with money, in anticipation of the land and malt taxes, and by making temporary advances on Exchequer Bills and other securities. In the year 1781 the sums thus lent to Government, amounted to upwards of eight millions, in addition to the permanent debt of £11,686,800. The company now sought for a renewal of their charter, and offered to advance two millions on exchequer bills; this being agreed to, a call was made of 3 per cent on their capital, which was now increased from £10,780,000 to £11,642,400. The Bank of England acts not only as an ordinary bank, but as a great engine of state. It receives and

pays the greater part of the annuities which are due to the creditors of the public; it circulates Exchequer Bills; and it advances to Government, as we have already seen, the annual amount of the land and malt taxes, which are frequently not paid up for some years. It discounts bills of merchants, and upon different occasions it has supported the credit of the principal houses, not only of England, but of Hamburgh and Holland.

The company is properly a trading company; and that which is peculiarly distinguished by the appellation of bank stock, is a trading stock, the dividend of which, on a capital of £11,642,400, paid half-yearly, besides occasional bonuses, accrues from the annual income of the company; and this arises from the interest received for the money advanced by the proprietors to the public, on the permanent debt, from interest on annual temporary advances, from profits of their dealings in bullion, and of their discounts; from the interest of stock held by the company; and from the sums allowed by Government for the management of the annuities paid at the offices of the bank.

The method of opening an account with the Bank of England.—The accounts opened with the bank, are either cash accounts or discount accounts. The person wishing to open a cash account must apply to the chief clerk of the drawing-office in the hall, who, upon the receipt of £500 (which is the lowest sum that an account can be opened for), will deliver the necessary book to the party, with a quantity of checks, on which he draws out such sums as he occasionally requires.

To open a discount account, the party must apply to a director; and sucn application must be laid before the court of directors for their approbation, which, if obtained, application is also made to the chief clerk of the drawing office, who takes the signature in a book kept for the purpose, where the accounts are also kept, and, when required, powers of attorney are granted, to enable persons to act for their principals.

The chief clerk of the drawing-office then delivers a book to the party, wherein the account is opened, who receives also a quantity of checks.

Different columns are appropriated in the books for the entries of cash paid, cash received, and bills deposited in the bill-office until due, which, when received, are passed forward to the parties' book.

To pay cash into the Bank.-Take the cash with the book to one of the tellers, who gives a voucher to the drawing-office, and it will be immediately entered to your credit; and when you have occasion to pay money, draw the sum wanted upon one of the checks, in the following manner:

To the cashiers of the Bank of England.

Pay to (the name), or bearer, one hundred pounds.

£100.

August 1st, 1853.

J. W. & Co.

When you wish to have your accounts examined, which is termed checking your books, the same is to be left at the Accountant's-office, where all drafts paid are written off the bank-book, and returned cancelled to the drawer.

No money will be paid without such a check or write-off, which is a printed slip of paper, with a blank for the sum. These slips are always hung up at a desk in the great hall, and are filled up as follows:

Write off from our bank-book, one hundred pounds.

£100.

August 1st, 1853.

J. W. & Co.

This being delivered to one of the clerks of the drawing-office, he writes off the sum required, and gives the money, reserving the write-off as a voucher.

When bills are intended to be received, which are payable in London, they should be indorsed and carried with the book to the bill-office, where they are written, or, as is technically termed, entered short, and are allowed in the bank-book so left the day after they are paid.

All charges of noting and protesting are paid to the clerks of the billoffice, by whom also all bills dishonoured are returned.

Where you intend that the bank shall pay any of your acceptances, make them payable there; and before they come due, an order must be addressed to the cashiers to pay the same when presented.

The order should contain a short abstract of the bill, specifying the drawer, the payee, the amount, and when due, and be signed by the acceptor, in the same manner as a draft for cash.

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In reference to bills presented at a bank for discount, Mr. Gilbert, in his History and Principles of Banking" says, that they may generally be divided into the following classes:

"1. Bills drawn by producers or manufacturers upon wholesale dealers. "2. Bills drawn by wholesale dealers upon retail dealers.

"3. Bills drawn by retail dealers upon consumers.

"4. Bills not arising out of trade, but yet drawn against value, as rents, &c. "5. Kites, or accommodation bills.

"The first two classes of bills are the best, and are fair legitimate bills for bankers to discount. The third class ought not to be too much encouraged. They are for comparatively small amounts, and are drawn by shopkeepers and tradesmen upon their customers. To discount these bills freely would encourage extravagance in the acceptors, and ultimately prove injurious

to the drawers. When a man accepts bills to his butcher, baker, tailor, or upholsterer, he may fairly be suspected of living beyond his income. Solvent and regular people pay their tradesmen's accounts with ready money. The fourth class of bills, though sometimes proper, ought not to be too much encouraged. Persons out of trade have no business with bills. The last class of bills should almost always be rejected. To an experienced banker who knows the parties, the discovery of accommodation bills is by no means difficult. They are usually drawn for even amounts, for the largest sum that the stamp will bear, and for the longest term that the bank will discount, and are presented for discount soon after they are drawn. The parties are often relations, friends, or parties who, from their vocations, can have no dealings with each other."

Although this quotation is addressed rather to a banker than a shopkeeper, still there are some hints in it which we deem valuable to the latter, and therefore worth his consideration.

A third sort of banking concern consists of the banks of private men, or partnerships, who deal in the same way as the former, upon their own single or joint stock or credit. Such are the Lombard-street bankers, &c.

BOOK-KEEPING.

Book-keeping is the art of teaching how to dispose the accounts of business, so that the true state of every part and of the whole may be easily and distinctly known. Merchants' books are kept either by single or by double entry, the former method by retailers of merchandise, and the latter by merchants, wholesale dealers, &c.

The most considerable books, according to the Italian method of double entry, are the waste-book, the journal, and the ledger; but besides these three, which are absolutely necessary, there are several others, called auxiliary books, which are used in proportion to the business a man carries These books are the cash book, the bill-book, the invoice-book, the account current-book, the commission, or order, or advice-book, the letterbook, &c., of all which we shall treat more fully hereafter.

on.

The Waste-book may be defined a register, containing an inventory of a merchant's effects and debts, with a distinct record of all his transactions and dealings, in the way of trade, related in a plain simple style, and in order of time as they succeed one another. The waste-book opens with the inventory, which consists of two parts; first, the effects, that is, the cash or bills of exchange a merchant has by him, the goods he has by him, his part of ships, houses, farms, &c. with the debts due to him; the second part of the inventory consists of the debts due by him to others; the difference between which and the effects is what the merchants call neat stock.

When a man begins the world, and first sets up in trade, the inventory is to be gathered from a survey of the particulars that make up his real estate, but ever after it is to be collected from the balance of his old books, and carried to the new.

After the inventory is fairly related in the waste-book, the transactions in trade come next to be entered down, which is a daily task, to be performed as they occur. The narrative ought to exhibit transactions with all the circumstances necessary to be known, and no more. It should contain the names of persons with whom the merchant deals upon trust, the conditions

of bargains, the terms of payment, the quantity, quality, and prices of goods, with everything that serves to make the record distinct, and nothing else. The waste-book, if no subsidiary books are kept, should contain a record of all the merchant's transactions and dealings in the way of trade; and that hot only of such as are properly and purely mercantile, but of every occurrence that affects his stock, so as to impair or increase it, such as private expenses, servants' wages, house-rent, taxes, money gained, &c.

The Journal is the book in which the transactions recorded in the wastebook are prepared to be carried to the ledger, by having their proper debtors and creditors ascertained and pointed out: whence it may be observed, that ́ the great design of the journal is to prevent errors in the ledger: again, after the ledger is filled up, the journal facilitates the work required in revising and correcting it; for first the waste-book and journal are compared, and then the journal and ledger; whereas to revise the ledger immediately from the waste-book, would be a matter of no less difficulty than to form it without the help of a journal: lastly, the journal is designed as a fair record of a merchant's business, for neither of the other two books can serve this purpose. Hence it is, that in case of differences between merchants and their dealers, the journal is the book commonly called for and inspected by a civil judge in the courts of justice.

In the journal, persons and things are charged debtors to other persons and things as creditors; and in this it agrees with the ledger, where the same style is used, but differs from it as to forms and order; so that it agrees with the waste-book in those very things where it differs from the ledger; and, on the other hand, it agrees with the latter, in the very point where it differs from the former.

The Ledger.The ledger is tne principal book wherein all the several articles of each particular account that lies scattered in other books, according to their dates, are collected and placed together in spaces allotted for them, in such a manner that the opposite parts of every account are directly set fronting one another, or opposite sides of the same folio.

The ledger's folios are divided into spaces for containing the accounts, on the head of which are written the titles of the accounts, marked Dr. on the left hand page, and Cr. on the right; below which stand the articles, with the word To prefixed on the Dr. side, and the word By on the Cr. side; and upon the margin are recorded the dates of the articles, in two small columns allotted for that purpose. The money columns are the same as in other books before them stands the folio column, which contains figures directing to the folio where the corresponding ledger entrance of each article is made; for everything is twice entered in the ledger, namely, on the Dr. side of one account, and again on the Cr. side of some other account; so that the figures mutually refer from one to the other, and are of use in examining the ledger. Besides these columns, there must be kept in all accounts, where number, measure, weight, or distinction of coins is considered, inner columns to insert the quantity; and for the ready finding any account in the ledger, it has an alphabet or index, wherein are written the titles of all accounts, with the number of the folio where they stand.

How the ledger is to be posted from the journal.

1. Turn to the alphabet and see whether the Dr. of the journal post to be transported is written there; if not, insert it under its proper letter, with the number of the folio to which it is to be carried.

2. Having distinguished the Dr. and the Cr. sides, as already directed, recording the dates, complete the entry in one line, by giving a short hint of the nature and terms of the transaction, carrying the sum to the money columns; and inserting the quantity, if it is an account of goods, &c., in the inner columns, and the referring figure in the folio column.

3. Next turn to the creditor of the journal post, and proceed in the same manner with it, both in the index and ledger; with this difference only, that the entry is to be made on the Cr. side, and the word By prefixed to it.

4. The post being thus entered in the ledger, return to the journal, and on the margin mark the folios of the accounts, with the folio of the Dr. above, and the folio of the Cr. below, and a small line between them, thus . These marginal numbers of the journal are a kind of index to the ledger and are of use in examining the books, and on many other occasions.

5. In opening accounts in the ledger, follow the order of the journal as to Dr. and Cr., and leave a sufficient space in the ledger for the different persons' accounts, according to the extent of them, so as to prevent the necessity of transferring the accounts to different folios in the ledger. Begin with the first journal post, allow the first space in the ledger for the Dr. of it, the next for the Cr., the third for the Dr. of the following post, if it is not the same with some of those already opened, and so on till the whole journal be transported; and supposing that, through inadvertency, some former space has been allowed too large, you are not to go back to subdivide it, in order to open another account in room thereof. Though these rules are formed for simple posts, where there is but one Dr. and one Cr. yet they may be easily applied to complex posts.

Cash Book, is so called, because it contains, in debtor and creditor, all the cash that comes in and goes out of a merchant's stock, the receipts on the debtor side, the persons of whom it was received, on what, and on whose account, and in what specie, and the payment on the creditor side, mentioning also the specie, the reasons of the payments, to whom, and for what account they are made.

Invoice Book. This book is kept to copy the invoices in, and to preserve the journal from erasures, which are unavoidable in drawing out the invoices of several sorts of merchandise received, sent out, or sold, wherein very minute particulars must be entered. It is also useful in finding out at once the particulars of each invoice without reference to the waste book, &c.

Account Current Book.-This book contains copies of the accounts which are sent to correspondents, in order to settle them in concert, before they are balanced in the ledger.

Warehouse Book.-This book contains a list of all the merchandise that are lodged in the warehouse, those that are taken out of it, and those that remain, by which means the warehouse stock at the end of the year is the more readily ascertained.

Book of Payments or Debts.—In this book is written down the day on which all sums become due, either to be paid or received, by bills of exchange, notes of hand (promissory notes), merchandise bought or sold, or otherwise. By comparing receipts and payments, one may in time provide the necessary funds for payments, by getting the bills, notes, &c., due to be paid, or by taking other precautions.

Bill Book. In this book are entered the bills of exchange which merchants accept, also notes of hand, specifying the drawer, to whom payable,