thought would cure itself better without their interference. Petitions
were presented, praying the house to take commercial distress into its
consideration; and government was charged by several members with
being insensible to the misery which prevailed, and the danger which
threatened; but nothing could move them to implicate themselves in
transactions which might have involved them in pecuniary embarrassments.
But relief was afforded in some degree by the Bank itself. Although
the directors had refused to go into the market for the purchase of
exchequer-bills, they came to a resolution of lending three millions on
direct or collateral security. This measure was immediately carried into
execution; and commissioners were appointed by the Bank in the principal
provincial towns, in order to distribute the money. The whole of this
sum, however, was not applied for; the very knowledge that such loans
were attainable having a considerable effect in restoring confidence
among the commercial classes. In some of the provincial towns the
offices of the Bank commissioners, who were almost uniformly mercantile
persons connected with the district where they were stationed, were
almost unfrequented. The applications for advances, indeed, were made
with great moderation; none were required beyond what the need of the
applicant demanded. The adoption of this measure rendered it necessary
for the security of the Bank to introduce a bill regarding the law of
principal and agent. The Bank, indeed, in consenting to advance three
millions, made it a condition of their compliance, that the protection
of the statute should be extended to them immediately. Accordingly a
bill was brought in and passed to enable persons in the possession of
goods, and of the documents conferring the property of them, although
such persons should be merely factors or agents, to pledge them with the
Bank as effectually as if such persons were the owners. Such were
the measures recommended by ministers, and adopted by parliament, to
palliate the existing distress, and to provide security against some of
the causes which had produced it. And they tended greatly to those
ends. Commerce, feeling itself unshackled, soon repaired its losses
and extended its operations; it found its way not only through European
nations, where barriers had hitherto been raised against it, but
penetrated the most barbarous regions of the earth.

APPOINTMENT OF A COMMITTEE ON EMIGR