reprint of a volume made up of almost a dozen papers-all but two of which were formerly lectures or contributions to the press upon authors and literary themes. The two alluded to are upon Milton and Pope respectively; the rest upon Johnson, Burke, The Muse of History, Charles Lamb, Emerson, The Office of Literature, Wornout Types, Cambridge and the Poets, and Bookbuying. The reader must not be repelled by the old, familiar themes, for the author has not a tedious page in his book. Indeed, he was in conscience bound to be entertaining, for he believes that to be the duty of every author. "I protest," he writes in this very volume "that it is a matter of indifference whether an author is happy, or not, I want him to make me happy. That is his office. Let him discharge it." He has the wit and intelligence to follow his own teaching. 'Every author," he says also, "be he grave or gay, should try to make his book as ingratiating as possible. Reading is not a duty, and has consequently no business to be made

disagreeable. Nobody is under any obligation to read any other man's book." This author is both grave and gay, and his book is most ingratiating. His papers are not long enough to weary, nor exhaustive enough to be exhausting. He has a sensitive intelligence that finds a phase of interest in the lives of the persons of whom he writes, and he treats it seriously enough to enlighten his reader fully, and, for the most part, humorously enough to win his smiles. He writes from fullness of knowledge. To those familiar with his themes he is a most charming commentator, while to those whose critical judgment is immature, he is a singularly intelligent help and guide. He has a large charity that makes you think well of men whom all critics have not always spoken well of, and he has a discrimination that is excellent and trustworthy. His style is fresh, and brilliant, and fascinating, and the book is sure to win a place among the favorite volumes of your library.

In the last year of the preceding century Aaron Burr tried his prentice hand at stealing a bank charter through the New York Legislature, securing its passage under the guise of a bill chartering a company to supply the city of New York with water. From that early date until the establishment of our present national banking system, the legislatures of the various States spent much time and labor in tinkering with bank charters.

Banking privileges were granted in some cases by special and in others by general enactments. Like the traveler, choosing between two roads in an Indiana swamp, whichever way was selected, the State was apt to wish that it had tried the other. Where "special acts were required, too often the only result was that specially active lobbying and log-rolling was necessary to get the charter granted. Thus in 1813, Governor Snyder of Pennsylvania vetoed a bill granting charters to twenty-five banks, with an aggregate capital of nine millions.

Next year, however, a more generous policy on the part of the pullers of wires enabled them to pass a bill over the second veto of the governor, chartering forty-one banks with an aggregate capital of seventeen millions, of which only one-fifth was required to be paid in. Of this number thirty-seven went into operation, and of these, fifteen failed within four years.

The birth of such a litter of wild cats was certainly a great calamity; but the passage of a general enabling act, which made possible their spontaneous generation over a whole State, seems to have been worse. In 1837, Michigan passed such an act: and it may be well to glance at her experience, before turning to that of Nebraska Territory, which is the subject of the present paper.

The act was supposed to have been carefully drawn, but almost immediately after its passage, banks were springing up all over the State, in unheard of places, in the depths of the forest, in saw mills, in asheries, and in the pockets of dishonest

men." Their circulation soon became so enormous that there was probably $300 of it for each man, woman, and child in the State. H. M. Utley says that paper cities were brought into existence merely to give plausibility to the lie which made people believe that a sound bank was located in some unvisited corner of the State, and mortgages on the lots of these alleged towns were shown as the real estate security required by law. Speaking of the city and bank of Brest, he says that the contemplative traveler who should penetrate to the desolate frog-pond, which the lithographic advertisements of the place had represented as thronged with the merchantmen of the world, "would never dream what great possibilities had been unrealized on that spot." Three unhappy commissioners were appointed to visit all the banks and see that they complied with the law. Spies dogged their steps and notified each bank as they approached. A considerable supply of specie was carted along ahead of them to enable each bank in turn to make a good showing. "An examination into the affairs of the Lenawee County Bank showed the requisite specie on hand. Suddenly descending upon the bank a few days later, the total amount of cash in the vaults was found to be $34.20. At the same time, the circulation of the bills of the bank amounted to more than $20,000." In 1839 the bank commissioners made an almost pathetic report, in which they affirmed that at a low estimate there were $1,000,000 of worthless notes in the hands of the people. In an agony of haste to get rid of the thing, the law was repealed and declared unconstitutional at the same time.

But however calamitous might be the outcome of these early experiments, each new State was in turn anxious to try the intoxicating influence of inflation; and each in turn had to undergo the depressing, headachy process of recovering from the financial spree. In the early days of Nebraska, many

things, ranging in importance from the chartering of a town to the granting of a divorce, required a special act of the Territorial legislature, and the competition for bank charters was eager from the first.

Wherever powerful economic forces have their origin in what are termed "practical politics," we are apt to find that the political part of applied political economy is by far the more important one. And in the case under consideration it will be found that the struggle of these banks to get into existence is the most suggestive phase of their history. The early legislatures of Territorial Nebraska were of rather extraordinary composition. Nearly all the members of the first assembly came across the Missouri River from Iowa for the express purpose of being elected. To make perfectly sure of this devoutly wished for consummation, some of them even went so far as to bring along their entire constituencies from the older State. Thus two wagon loads of the citizens of Council Bluffs provided themselves with ballot boxes, and election blanks, and very refreshing refreshments, and on election day made a little excursion into the tract of prairie and woodland that acting Governor Cuming had marked off as "Burt County,' where there was not at the time a single bona fide inhabitant. The result was a set of vastly formal election returns, which entitled two representatives and one councilman to seats in the Territorial assembly. In fact, Nebraska had a fully developed State government so early in her history that it was at first necessary for her to borrow citizens to fill the offices. The second, third, and fourth assemblies, of which I shall have occasion to speak, were of course made up of men who were for the most part citizens of the Territory, but all through the fifties the legislative body was of such a nature that at any time muscle was liable to become a factor in legislation, and "the revolver to serve as a representative of the people." A Territory so governed was certainly a con

genial habitat for the financial lynx rufus. The first special act of incorporation passed by a Nebraska legislature for any purpose whatever, brought into existence the Western Exchange Fire and Marine Insurance Company of Omaha. This company was a banking establishment in disguise, and was soon known as the Western Exchange Bank. It was the only one chartered by the first legislature; for though there was a good deal of log-rolling to get other bills of the kind passed, yet sectional interests (relative to the location of the capital) were paramount, and in the trading of influence between the various factions these bank charters were finally defeated. The contest for their chartering brought out a tremendous burst of oratory from a certain Mr. Jones, who claims to have been the only man in the first assembly that consistently opposed all the charters. In the greatest effort of this since modest dealer in real estate, he exhorted his fellows to remember posterity, and their constituents, and other things supposed to have a cautionary influence upon legislators; and as he warmed to his peroration he declared that, "when he (Jones) should be gathered to his fathers, and a humble monument should be erected to his memory, it would gratify his soul to look down from the high battlements of heaven -the region of the blest-and read upon that monument the simple and truthful inscription: 'Here lies an honest man-he voted against wildcat banks in Nebraska.""

In the second Territorial assembly, that of 1856, Mr. Jones was not a member, and so was debarred from doing additional work to earn the coveted monument. But there was this year in the lower house a young man of twenty-two, J. Stirling Morton, who was fresh from college, and full to running over of the principles inculcated by Wayland's Political Economy. He was chairman of a special committee on the chartering of the Richardson County Bank, and submitted an adverse minority report,

in which he argued at length against what he termed John Lawism, and said that every bill issued by such concerns as the legislature was asked to create, should be stamped with the legend: "Bill-holders individually liable." His fight and that of others in the other chamber, was vigorous, brilliant, and unsuccessful. His report was denied a place in the House Journal, and five banks were incorporated in spite of all opposition.

The charters of these five banks were all drawn according to the same model. The company was in each case made up of less than a dozen persons. The stock was either $50,000 or $100,000, to be increased at will to $500,000, and was divided into shares of $100 each. When $25,000 of the stock had been subscribed, the company could organize and begin business. The stock was assignable and transferable according to such regulations and restrictions as the directors might think proper. The bank had power to issue notes, bills, and other certificates of indebtedness, to deal in exchange, etc. The stockholders were individually liable for the redemption of the currency, but there was no provision for a fixed specie reserve, nor other guard against individual rascality or incompetency. There was, indeed, a clause requiring an annual report of the condition of the bank to be made to the State auditor, and this report was to be published in three papers of the Territory. No such report was ever made.

In the third session of the Territorial assembly, there was an increasing number of banks seeking "the awful right to live." But by this time there was a growing suspicion that paper money might not be found to be as much of a help in the development of the young commonwealth as had been supposed. There were already six banks for a population of twelve thousand. A majority report of the council committee to which had been referred "sundry bank

Their

bills," was adverse to their passage. adverse report is something of a curiosity, and seems to have been not so much the outcome of the teachings of political economy as an ebullition of good sense and common honesty. As an evidence of what the untrained intellects of plain men can do in dealing with such a problem, considerable extracts are here given with no attempt to revise the grammar, orthography, or punctuation.

The two men, Messrs. Reeves and Miller, boldly say that they are, "not at all in favor of banking in general," yet neither do they feel positive that the new State can get along without banks, for they think that under such circumstances the Eastern banks would send their money thither and monopolize the gold and silver themselves [!]. Concluding, then, that it may be necessary to compete with other States in the issuing of bad money, the committee "would further state that if it was true that a little of a thing was good therefore more was better, this legislature might go on and charter at bank for every county in the Territory. . . . . But where are to be found the honest men who would invest capital in a banking operation when every twenty-four square miles has a machine for grinding out a mean representation of money. Your committee can easily conceive that they are recreant to the interests of the persons who would readily engage in the business of securing charters and putting bills in circulation to the extent of their ingenuity, and when no more could be issued a failure would ensue and the bill holders would have the privilege of holding them." After considering the evils of inflation in a style equally forcible and ungrammatical they go on to say: “Look now, sir, at this machine as a bank of exchange and tell us what banker in any of our eastern cities would honor our paper, none would dare because they would have no certainty that the soulless thing would have any existence when the draft should

But suffer us again. We have now six

return by express.. to return to the issue. banks; add six more and we have twelve, a bank for every thousand inhabitants there with a capital stock of $250,000; each [therewith a capital stock of $250,000 each,] would be equal to $300,000 [3,000,000 evidently intended], three times that annually, which is the remaining sum which they have a positive right to issue would be $900,000 $9,000,000] this upon equal division would give to every man, woman and child $750 currency, allowing every fifth of our twelve thousand inhabitants to be business men, then we would have for each man $3,750.

"There is another view of this matter it would be well to look at. Who are the men that ask for these charters? Are they sovereign squatters of Nebraska.? Most, if not all the leading men are from other states who would be much obliged to us now to legislate to them the opportunity of filling our pockets with their bills, but who would laugh us to scorn when they had our gold and our property in their possession.

"Who in his senses would think of intrusting money in the vaults of such institutions, if past experience would teach us anything. We would dread them as a highway robber, for hundreds have confidence in them, have waked up in the morning and have found that the body of the soulless thing had evaporated, and that there was nothing to represent his pocket full of bills but an old store, a counter and a broom."

The committee next take high moral ground, for after saying that "it will avail us little to wail over our folly and wickedness when the territory is bankrupt," they point to the fact that "privileges, exemption, and facilities for speculation encourages and multiplies rascals. The honest portion of the community with vice constantly before their eyes become assimilated with it; its odious features and soon become familiarized; they wink at the monster[!], and it is