loating private
currency, which in three or in six months is sure to return, coupled
with an awkward protest, to his door. Probably in his own early
experience, or in the days of his father, he has received a salutary
lesson, better than a thousand treatises upon the law and practice of
acceptance; and accordingly, while he will lend you his purse with
readiness, he will not, for almost any consideration, subscribe his
name to a bill. To persons thus situated, the accommodation granted by
the bank cash-credits, is the greatest commercial boon that ever was
devised; but as the committee of the House of Lords, in the report
already quoted, has borne ample testimony in their favour, it is
unnecessary for us to dwell with further minuteness on their utility.

We must again have recourse to Mr Thomson for an exposition of the
reasons which, if a metallic currency were forced upon us, would lead
to the discontinuance of the cash-credits. "I do not think the
cash-credits would be maintained at all; the banker's profits might be
made up by the charge of a commission on each credit; but it is not
probable that the holders of accounts would pay at such a rate, if
they could borrow money upon bills at a cheaper rate, which they would
do. They would discount bills at five per cent. A banker would not be
disposed to come under the obligation to give a running credit with a
cash account, and thereby bind himself to keep in his hands a stock of
gold to supply the daily operations of a cash-account, while he might
find it perfectly convenient to discount a bill and give the money
away at once." In short, it has been stated, and distinctly proved,
that the difference to the trader between an operating cash-credit and
accommodation by discount, _is the difference between paying five and
a quarter by discount, and two and a half per cent by cash-credit_.
Are our merchants and traders prepared or disposed to submit to such a
sacrifice; more especially when it is considered, that a bank will
often refuse to discount a bill for L100, when it would make no
difficulty, from its opportunities of control, in granting a
cash-credit for five times that amount?

If individuals are thus to be crippled, the general commercial
business of the country must retrograde as a matter of course. Still
Edinburgh, and Glasgow, and the larger towns might, although they
would suffer immensely, get over the crisis by adopting some system of
internal arrangement