صفحة 877 من 2651

If bankers are restrained from issuing any circulating bank

notes, or notes payable to the bearer, for less than a certain

sum; and if they are subjected to the obligation of an immediate

and unconditional payment of such bank notes as soon as

presented, their trade may, with safety to the public, be

rendered in all other respects perfectly free. The late

multiplication of banking companies in both parts of the united

kingdom, an event by which many people have been much alarmed,

instead of diminishing, increases the security of the public. It

obliges all of them to be more circumspect in their conduct, and,

by not extending their currency beyond its due proportion to

their cash, to guard themselves against those malicious runs,

which the rivalship of so many competitors is always ready to

bring upon them. It restrains the circulation of each particular

company within a narrower circle, and reduces their circulating

notes to a smaller number.