profits over the Paris crisis. Hence, now that money is cheap again speculation is again drifting here; and, though the political events which have lately moved the nation have for the moment checked gambling in some of the leading departments of the Stock Exchange, it has not checked the strong flood-tide of new securities.

During May this influx has been considerably more extensive than in all the previous four months put together. The application of first importance has undoubtedly been the second half (£14,589,800) of the Italian loan of last year. At the issue price of 88-or 2 per cent. under the first moiety-it would appear to have attracted a fair amount of subscriptions, though it is reported that it was not entirely covered. Still, this is a matter of no great moment, for European markets will readily absorb the balance. Then, there have been a number of external railway applications from America, Spain, India, the Cape, and Brazil; and of more miscellaneous ventures, a good sprinkling have made their appearance, though some of them it is said have not been well received. *

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But, after all, it has been the "electricity market" which has witnessed the great speculative excitement. Since the beginning of this year over thirty companies of this class have been brought out, involving net subscriptions to the value of over £7,000,000, after making deductions for shares allotted to vendors. Of this total no less than twenty-six companies, with a combined application of £4,250,000, were brought forward last month, and most of them obtained the money they asked for. Indeed, for many of them, the rush of subscribers was great. Some of the companies were fully placed on the first day of applications being received. Yet it hardly appears that the public have been so infatuated with the electric light and power mania as the Stock Exchange itself has been. Speculators therein have found that every company of the class brought out went to a premium, and that applications for shares would probably place them in possession of similar premiums; and hence it would seem that most of these shares have passed into the hands of operators who will have to sell again. Indeed, the premiums quoted upon not a few of the concerns recently introduced have already vanished, and selling will not prove so profitable an operation as those led away by the rush anticipated.

The occurrences which have brought about this speculation are worthy of consideration. In the first place it may be conceded that electricity is a great power, the utilisation of which is even as yet but little understood. The exhibition at the

Crystal Palace, the discovery of the Faure accumulator, and the additional lighting of our streets and railway stations have all attracted public attention to these new inventions. The Anglo-American Brush Company, which has certainly borne its share in acclimatising the electric light here, has recently paid a good dividend, and granted licenses to various persons to introduce the light into provincial towns. The first and most important of these licenses was to Mr. Hammond, which covered the counties of Northumberland, Cumberland, Westmoreland, Yorkshire, Lancashire, Derbyshire, Sussex, and Hampshire, together with Westminster. He forthwith formed a company with £250,000 capital, which took over his rights in January last. This concern soon went to a premium, and when at the recent Brush Company's meeting a glowing account of the company's progress was given, there were soon a number of applicants for concessions. As these applications were made, the prices of "Brush" and "Hammond " shares began to rise, and rather more than two months ago a sharp movement placed the former at 100 per cent. premium, and dealings in the Stock Exchange became numerous. This increased the ardour of the applicants for concessions greatly, and the more they applied the more the Stock Exchange put up the price of the shares and gambled in them. On May 16, the £10 paid shares of the Brush Company were dealt in as high as 68, or 580 per cent. premium, and the £4 paid shares at 30, while "Hammond" shares with £2 10s. paid ran up to 21. These high prices have not been maintained, but they have served their purpose by making the shares of the new offshoots eagerly subscribed for. What may be the future of all these undertakings it is impossible to foretell; probably a few years will find the bulk of them transferred, or in the liqui dator's hands. In the meantime, they are highly profitable to the vendors, who, with curious reiteration, offer their patent rights as the best yet discovered. But, even supposing that the Brush, Edison, Gulcher, Chertemps, Pilsen, Fitzgerald, Siemens, Volckmar, Swan, and a host of other lights now exhibited were all equally good, it is apparent that the inevitable competition between themselves, and with the gas companies, which retain a remarkable latent power to be developed by competition, the profits of electric lighting companies cannot be so great as interested parties are trying to make people believe; and, further than this, any day a fresh invention may outstrip all those in existence at the present day.

THE SCOTCH BANKS.

WHAT, it is to be hoped, will prove the last stage in the windingup of the City of Glasgow Bank has now been entered upon. In October last the outstanding liabilities of the bank, which at the date of failure amounted to about 12 millions, had been reduced to about £1,361,000, while the remaining assets were then estimated at fully £1,500,000. There was thus brought out a slight surplus of assets over liabilities, and the ultimate payment in full of all creditors was, so to speak, guaranteed. Very naturally, however, the creditors are not satisfied with merely the prospect of future payment. What they wish is the immediate settlement of their claims, and they have been all the more inclined to insist upon this, because the deferring of payment has been asked for, not in the interests of the shareholders as a body, but only in the interests of the few proprietors that have remained solvent after meeting the heavy calls made upon them. Unfortunately, however, the remaining assets, consisting mainly of properties in New Zealand and an interest in certain Indian gold mines, are of such a kind as not to be immediately realisable except at a great sacrifice, and the liquidators, while unable to resist the demand of the creditors for prompt payment, have at the same time been disinclined to subject the few still solvent proprietors to further losses. In these circumstances the idea of forming a company to take over the assets has commended itself to them, and with the sanction of the Court of Session the "Assets Company" has been incorporated, to which, if it be successfully floated, the remaining assets of the bank will be handed over for the sum sufficient to meet the liabilities, and the liquidation, it is hoped, will thus be closed.

Of the prospects of the new company this is not the place to speak. It is only as the possible means of bringing to a speedy close the winding-up of an institution that has proved ruinous to so many unfortunate shareholders, and which by its fall has caused almost a revolution in the constitution of our joint-stock banks, that we have alluded to its formation, and a reference to it suggests a consideration of the effects which the discreditable collapse of the City of Glasgow Bank has produced upon the other Scotch banking institutions. It might have been supposed that, as it was the downfall of a Scotch bank that showed the disastrous character of unlimited liability, the banks north of the Tweed would have been the first to avail themselves of the alteration in the law which permitted unlimited institutions to limit their liability. So far, however,

from that being the case, the Scotch banks have been almost the last to make the beneficial change in their constitution. It is only within the past five months that they decided to move in the matter; but as the decision when arrived at was concurred in by all save the three senior institutions, who claim to be limited by charter, limited liability in one form or other may now be said to prevail, so far as the banks are concerned, throughout the whole of Scotland. But in the amount of the uncalled liability, as will be seen from the following table, there is an enormous difference between the two classes of banks.

Thus, while two of the banks claiming to be limited by charter have no reserve of liability whatever, and the third bank a reserve of only one-half of its paid-up capital, all the other banks have a reserve of uncalled capital amounting to four times the amount of capital called up, and as the latter are bound by law to add the word "limited" to their title, the public ought to know that, in the case of the Scotch banks especially, the meaning of this designation is, that the banks using it offer their customers a guarantee of security which the others do not, and, as at present constituted, cannot possibly give.

It may be noted in passing, too, that the adoption of limited liability in Scotland has added a new complication to the currency arrangements of the country. Now the limited banks give indirectly a security for their issues. In the event of the failure of any one of them- an event which it is needless to say is a most remote contingency--the noteholders would have a first claim upon the reserve liability of the shareholders, and the notes of those banks may thus be said to be pretty fully secured. But it is very different with the three senior banks. For their issues

practically no security whatever has been provided, for the gold upon which their issues in excess of the authorised circulation are based is not specially hypothecated to the noteholders, but is merely a portion of the general assets of the bank. Thus we have now in Scotland two issues, one quite unsecured and the other secured in a sort of accidental fashion by the Act of 1879, and it will be curious to notice whether this distinction between the two classes of notes will affect their circulation. That it ought to do so, if the public understood their respective positions, cannot be doubted; but it is doubtful whether the distinction is so generally recognised as to affect the issues.

But while there are those differences in the positions of the various banks, there is one respect in which the experience of all of them is similar. They have all been increasing their deposits, and now, according to tables published by the Economist, their aggregate deposits amount to £79,000,000, as compared with an aggregate of £78,000,000 prior to the failure of the City of Glasgow Bank. To what extent the various banks have participated in this increase the following statement will show. The general teaching of the figures is that Scotland has now recovered from the effects of the disastrous failure of the City of Glasgow Bank, and that its banking business is again being conducted under its normal conditions. That the recovery has been so rapid shows how sound generally is business in that portion of the kingdom. The figures quoted are those published by the Economist in the month of May in each of the years 1878, 1879, and 1882: