--a sum of
which the figures glide smoothly and glibly enough off the pen or
tongue, but a mass of treasure, nevertheless, that few persons can
realise to themselves a distinct and accurate conception of. And
yet--and what an idea does the fact present of the multitudinous
resources, the unrivalled industry, the latent power of this
country!--all that heap of precious metals, all that is besides in
circulation, with the addition of the bank-note currency, is
comparatively nothing when weighed against the true and real
exchangeable wealth of Great Britain; wealth of which this coined
and convertible paper-money is merely the standard sign of value,
the recognised medium by which all things are bartered. It is easy
to give one or two significant and startling illustrations of this
fact--significant and startling in other respects than in enabling
us to see pretty clearly through the currency-cobwebs industriously
woven from time to time amongst us. All the money in the three
kingdoms, the whole circulating medium of the realm--gold, silver,
copper, paper--does not certainly exceed, if it reaches, which is
very doubtful, the national revenue for one year, to say nothing of
local rates and burdens! And it would, moreover, require all the
money circulating in Great Britain and Ireland, including notes to
the last farthing, to pay for the spirits, beer, and tobacco
consumed annually by the people of the United Kingdom! The
note-issues of the Bank of England are about L.19,000,000; its
reserve in gold and silver, as we have seen, is upwards of
L.14,000,000 sterling: these amounts added together would no more
than about discharge the alcohol and weed score of the country for
little more than seven months! Lightning-flashes these, that throw
vivid gleams over the industrial activity, resources, powers,
plague-spots of this mighty, restless, enterprising, but far from
sufficiently instructed or disciplined British people.

But let us enter the great money-temple. Very imposing to me has
always appeared the army of clerks seated in saturnine silence at
the desks, or gliding with grave celerity about the place, and
variously employed in balancing enormous accounts, shovelling up
heaps of sovereigns, receiving and distributing bank-paper of vast
value as coolly and unconcernedly as if engaged in counting out so
many chestnuts. A strange feeling must, I suspect, perturb the mind
of a newly-appointed clerk amidst all that astounding