The first day of July 1845 was the period fixed for the payment of the last installment of the original debt, contracted for the construction of the Erie and Champlain Canals. In May, of the preceding year, notice was given to the holders of the outstanding stock that the State was prepared to pay the debt, and that on the first of July, 1845, funds would be placed in the Manhattan Company for this purpose, and that after that date no interest would be paid on the debt. Between the 1st and 8th of July, $530,000 of the debt was redeemed, leaving a balance of debt to come in of $252,620 30. To meet this balance there was in the bank, as certified to the Canal Board by the President and Cashier the sum of $481,335,41. With these facts before them, the Canal Board, on the 11th of July, 1845, proceeded to make a general reduction in the rates of toll on the canals, regarding the debt as substantially paid. The reduction on agricultural products was half a mill per 1,000 pounds per mile: merchandise generally was reduced from 9 to 8 mills, and a discrimination was made on sugar, molasses, coffee, nails, spikes, iron and steel, reducing these articles from 9 to 5 mills per 1,000 pounds per mile. Mineral coal, not entitled to a bounty, was reduced to one mill per 1,000 pounds per mile, for the purpose of bringing the bituminous coal of Ohio to tide water, which was effected to some extent.

In the annual report of the Commissioners of the Canal Fund in 1846, it is stated: "That the opening of the Wabash and Erie Canal, of the Miami extension, connecting Cincinnati by canal navigation with Lake Erie, and the Erie extension canal, affording a like connection between Pittsburg and Lake Erie, rendered it expedient, if not necessary, that the tolls of our canals should be reviewed and adapted to the important changes which the opening of these various channels of trade might produce. It was with this view that essential reductions were made by the Canal Board in July last, and particularly those on merchandise, to take effect at the opening of navigation in 1846."

The report also shows the total charge on 1,000 pounds of flour from Buffalo to Albany, and 1,000 pounds of merchandise back, by the rates in 1832, 1834, and as fixed in 1846, as follows:

Tolls on 1,000 lbs. of flour and the same of merchandise.. $7 62.20 $4 89.05 $3 81.15

On a boat load of fifty tons of flour from Buffalo to Albany, and a return cargo of 30 tons of merchandise, the transporter would gain $272 25, comparing the rates of 1832 with those of 1846.

In February, 1846, and before the reduced rates of toll went into operation, the Commissioners of the Canal Fund were called upon by a resolution of the Senate, to report the amount of tolls received in 1845, on products of this State and other States, and how much less they would have been at the rates fixed by the Canal Board for 1846. The report showed that the reduction on the products of other States in 1845, would be equal to $159,442; and on the products of this State $196,445; total amount of reduction $355,887.

The reports said :-" It should not, however, be inferred that this is to be the measure of the reduction of the receipt of tolls in 1846, or that there is to be any reduction in those receipts." And the belief was expressed that

the effect "would be to increase rather than to diminish the canal revenues." And such was the effect, as shown by the report of 1848, Assembly Doc.

No. 11, in which the tolls for two years previous to the reduction, and two years subsequent, were compared as follows:-

In the winter of 1846, in anticipation of the foreign demand for vegetable food, and the probable opening of the British ports to our breadstuffs, representations were made to the Canal Board, by persons interested in the corn trade in the Valley of the Wabash, showing, that if the tolls of the Erie Canal on corn were reduced to 2 mills per 1,000 pounds per mile, great quantities of corn would be sent from that region as far down as Lafayette, through the Erie Canal, from the desire to ship that article from New York, without exposing it to the warm climate of New-Orleans. In February, 1846, a proposition was made in the Canal Board to reduce the toll on corn from 4 to 2 mills per 1,000 pounds per mile, on which the members of the board were equally divided. A reduction of one mill, however, was made by one majority. The unprecedented demand for vegetable food caused by the famine in Europe, and the high price growing out of this state of things, brought the immense quantities of corn to the ports of the Atlantic; but the reduction in the rate of toll, small as it was, had a material influence in securing a large portion of this trade to the New York canals.

The following statement shows the quantity of corn transported on all the New York canals, as well as the quantity coming to tide water, for four years preceding, and four years subsequent to this reduction of toll, and, also, the amount of revenue derived in each year on the article of corn:—

This statement shows an increase in the quantity of corn coming to tide water in four years after the reduction in the rates of toll, compared with the four previous years, of more than fifteen million of bushels; and an increase of revenue during the same period from the toll on corn of $646,016. The toll on corn was reduced to two mills per 1,000 pounds per mile, to take effect on the opening of navigation in 1849.

In December, 1849, a meeting of forwarders and shippers engaged in the commerce of the lakes and canals, was held at Buffalo, and a memorial was prepared for the Canal Board, asking a further reduction of toll. In this memorial it is stated that the reduction of 45 per cent on sugar, coffee, iron,

&c., in 1846, had produced an increase in three years in those articles, from 103,870,304 to 166,472,536 pounds, equal to an increase of 60 per cent in three years. It appears by a statement published by J. L. Barton, in September last, that although an average reduction of about 20 per cent was made in the rates of toll in the spring of 1850, the tolls of this year would be equal to the preceding; and the result at the close of the navigation sustains his position.

As a system of revenue, the regulations for the collection of tolls on the New York canals, has been eminently successful. The collectors are required to deposit daily the sums received by them with some bank or agent designated by the Canal Board; and each one send to the canal department a weekly abstract, showing the sum received and deposited each day; and at the close of the month a statement is made to the same department by the bank or agent, giving the sum received each day, and furnishing a check on the reports of the collector. At the close of each month, also, the collectors return to the canal department, their monthly rolls, on which are entered the names of boats and the sums paid on account of tolls, an examination and comparison of which enables the department to detect erroneous statements in regard to the sums received for toll at any collectors office, as returned on the weekly abstracts; each collector being charged by a neighboring office with all the tolls as receipted by him on each clearance, with the name of the boat on which the toll was paid, and all particulars necessary to a full explanation of the charge.

The whole expense of collecting the revenues on seven hundred miles of canals is about fifty thousand dollars, which includes the sums paid to collectors and their clerks, weigh-masters, inspectors of boats, and all the expenses of their several offices. For the last ten years the expenses of collecting the revenue averaged only a fraction over two per cent of the gross sum received for tolls.

Art. III. THE INTERNAL MANAGEMENT OF A COUNTRY BANK.*

MUCH of the present work has appeared in detached parts, for the last three years, in the London Bankers' Magazine, and they obtained for the author, Joseph Langton, Esq., General Manager of the Bank of Liverpool, a high degree of celebrity, both in England, and to some extent in America; where, however, the knowledge of them has been confined to persons who have had access to the English monthly magazine in which they were published. The author has now re-arranged the subject into a more methodical series, and has greatly enlarged the original text. The letters profess to be written to a young man of twenty-six years of age, who has been recently promoted from a clerkship to the management of a branch bank, in a country town. We do not recollect that the author has stated anywhere his own station or position, but we may infer, from his knowledge and advice, that he is supposed to be an old banker, and occupying the higher station of General Manager, which seems to be a term applied in England to an independent

*The Internal Management of a Country Bank. A series of letters on the functions and duties of a Branch Manager. By Thomas Bullion. 18mo., pp. 203. London.

(or as we should say in America,) a mother bank, in contradistinction to a manager of a branch bank, and who is hence styled a Branch Manager.

An acute English philosopher, Godwin, has said that Locke wrote on the human understanding, not by reason that he possessed more knowledge on the subject than other men, but that he possessed more knowledge by reason of his having written thereon. We may apply the same remark to the present treatise on banking, and whatever may have been the author's stock of banking knowledge when he commenced his letters, he has at least instructed himself into a degree of proficiency that must make his services uncommonly valuable in the important station which he occupies, in a city which is secondary in England to only London. Except for this resulting benefit to a didactic author, we might well doubt how far literary occupation can be compatible with the absorbing duties of an active banker; but thus viewed and limited, we find that the two occupations aid rather than obstruct each other.

The author seems to have been governed by two distinct objects,-to instruct a young banker in the duties of his profession, and to instruct commercial men how to deal with banks, so as to obtain the proper banking aids, which alone can result advantageously to themselves and to banks. In both these undertakings the author has been eminently successful. His instructions are given in language so plain, and in a style so lucid, that a single ambiguity cannot really be found in the whole book; while the arrangements are so natural, that a distinct understanding of the subject cannot be avoided by the most casual and hasty reader. The author has clearly understood what he has sought to impart, (an attainment not universal,) and to this, probably, more than to any great elaboration, we may impute the suc cess which has been attained.

Till reading this work we were not apprised of the great difference that exists between the modes of country banking in England, and in this country; and we are inclined to think that the book can impart to us a knowledge of these differences, to a very interesting extent; and thus yield, to the American reader, a useful purpose wholly unexpected to the author, and unappreciable by an English reader, to whom the usages referred to are already known. And though our modes of business are greatly different from much that is detailed in the book, yet the prudential motives inculcated, with reference to English transactions, are all applicable to our transactions; and the human nature which the English banker has described, will assail the American banker in some modes essentially the same, as it has to be encountered by the English banker. An American banker, for instance, will not meet with approaches precisely like the following; but he will meet them in some other shape, in which they will be equally troublesome :

"It may, as you state, be a trial to your feelings to have to refuse an advance to a gentleman of excellent family and disposition, with whom, probably, the previous day you have dined, and with whom you are in the habit of constant and friendly intercourse. But this is on the hypothesis that a banker is entitled to have feelings, which, however, the best authorities distinctly deny. 'Business is business,' they will tell you; and there is no more occasion for the exercise of 'the feelings' in declining to lend a gentleman money without security, than in declining to make a bet, or go a voyage, or make a tour with him, or anything else that is simply inconvenient. It may be an amiable weakness to think and act otherwise; but if a bad debt, or a series of them, is to be the price of this amiability, the sooner your disposition is soured the better. I would remark, further, that the gentleman who places you in the unamiable position of having to

refuse his cheque, is himself the aggressor. And, as by that act he shows no respect for your feelings, it does not appear upon what ground you are called upon to show any unusual tenderness for his."

We find, incidentally, that the absence of usury laws in England, on commercial paper, results in a banking difficulty, which is never experienced by us, where the rates of discount being established by law, no man expects a deviation therefrom, except under some peculiar circumstances. In England an agreement about the rate seems to be the rule of business, rather than the exception;-it semes also to afford a criterion whereby a banker is enabled to form a judgment of the solvency of his dealer-for instance :

"The rates of discount levied latterly upon Barnes's bills were exorbitant, as compared with the prevailing rates of the day. I infer from that, that upon this point he had become indifferent,-a deadly symptom of incipient insolvency. When the customer becomes regardless of the interest on his account, let the banker look well to the principal. No man doing a business which renders him largely dependent upon procuring discounts, can well become indifferent to the rates of discount, until he has reached that point when the question with him is not one of discount and commission, but of mercantile existence. When a man asks you, therefore, in ordinary times, to discount certain bills for him, and to 'charge what you like,' be sure he is tempting you by a higher premium than ordinary, to a more than ordinary risk. I believe I entertain a hearty ar dislike to the whole tribe of screws as I have heard you frequently and vigorously express; but better endure a half-hour's huxtering over the discount on a good-bill, than a whole year's remorse over the lost principal of a bad one."

The word "currency" seems to be used in England with a different meaning from that which it signifies here, where it ordinarily means the circulating medium of the country, the money that will pass without a discount. In England it means the period which a bill has to run before it becomes payable thus:

"I allude to the currency of bills. Now, whatever the state of the moneymarket may be, a banker will prefer a short-dated bill to one of longer currency -and for obvious reasons. In the first place, the risk is less. In the ordinary course of things, more firms will give way in six months than in three. I say it with respect; but there is always a better chance of the first house in England standing for three months than for six. In the next place, the banker could, for every bill at six months' date, discount two at three months' date within a given period; and so make his resources doubly available to his customers. If you have a certain sum that you can prudently lay out in discounts, and you select for this purpose bills not exceeding three months' currency, it is obvious that, at the expiration of the three months, you have the same amount to invest again; whereas, if you were to lock it up in the discount of six months' bills, double the space of time would elapse before you were in a position to repeat the operation. The result for the year would be, supposing your capital available for discounts to be £50,000, and that you invested it in the shorter-dated bills, that you would turn this capital over four times within the year; whereas, by selecting the longerdated securities, you would turn it over twice only. In the one case, your discounts to parties would amount to £200,000 per annum; in the other, to only half that sum."

Accommodation drafts are one of the dangers of English banking, as they are of American banking, and with the further disadvantage in England, that they appear to be taken there without endorsers, more frequently than they are by our inland bankers. The shrewdness with which a practiced banker will detect them, amid all the disguises with which their true character is sought to be concealed, is thus portrayed: