world," is the money-market of London. And as with the idea of a market we generally associate that of a market-place, so, in speaking of the London moneymarket, we naturally think of that particular locality where the greater part of its transactions are carried on-the bank, the royal exchange, the stock exchange (which lie within a few paces of each other), and the surrounding neighborhood. This will include the banking-houses of Lombard street, Lothbury, and the Poultry (the continuation of Cheapside from Bucklersbury and the old Jewry to Cornhill, is termed the "Poultry"); the counting-houses of the bullion, bill, and discount brokers, of the stock and share brokers, and the places of business of those establishments where wealthy individuals, under the general title of "merchants," without any other specific designation, carry on many of those operations which come more immediately within the sphere of the money-market.

The royal exchange lies between Cornhill and Threadneedle street, its principal front being toward Cornhill. Threadneedle street, which is narrow, separates it from the eastern or upper end of the bank. Bartholomew Lane (one of the four streets which isolate the bank) extends from the Threadneedle street front of the Royal exchange to the street which at one end is termed Lothbury, and at the other Throgmorton street. The one side of Bartholomew Lane is formed by the eastern front of the bank, the other by a connected range of buildings, a part of which is a church, and part is occupied chiefly by stockholders. In about the centre of this range is Capel court, where is the principal entrance to the stock exchange: there are other entrances by courtways or passages from Throgmorton street. At the bottom of Bartholomew Lane, and the corner of Throgmorton street, is a handsome building termed the Auction Mart, erected about thirty-six years ago, as a kind of central establishment for the sale of estates, annuities, shares, &c., by public auction. Very great improvements have recently been effected in this neighborhood, and more are in progress. Two fine streets, in particular, have been opened, and their frontages are occupied by handsome ranges of buildings. Still, the stranger will find much to convince him that trade and commerce here have been more chary of space than to spend it on spacious streets. Let him try to thread some of those narrow passages, which, at first sight, might appear to him to lead only to some private house or private establishment: he will be surprised to find them crowded thoroughfares, communicating with one narrow street or another. Here, in these seemingly out-of-the-way places, are numerous shops, whose occupants are in possession of a snug and money-making trade--taverns and coffeehouses with steady frequenters places of business where much may be transacted in the brief hours of a business-day. Narrow passages, communicating with streets, are numerous in all the older parts of London; but those which lead from Threadneedle street, Throgmorton street, Cornhill, &c., &c., are more especially calculated to excite surprise in a stranger, from the extreme narrowness of some of them, and their seeming obscurity, compared with the crowds passing through, and the business which is transacted in them.

There are three hundred and thirty-four stockbroking establishments (many of them firms with two or more partners) in London, whose places of business are in Threadneedle street, Bartholomew Lane, at the Royal exchange, in Lothbury and Throgmorton street, Cornhill, and Lombard street. To these we must add thirtyfour bullion, bill, and discount brokers, about two hundred and forty ship and insurance brokers, and about one thousand "merchants," some of whom deal in bullion and bills to a considerable extent, whose places of business are all within five and ten minutes' walk of the bank and Royal exchange. And this is, without reckoning the bankers, the general and commercial agents, the colonial, cotton, silk, and wool brokers, the corn and coal merchants, the solicitors and notaries, the tradesmen and shopkeepers, all within the same neighborhood, as well as the offices of great insurance companies, railway companies, steampacket companies, &c.

The Royal exchange was erected originally by Sir Thomas Gresham, the corporation of the city having given the ground on which to build it. The idea of the building, and its name, were imported from the continent; it was termed the Burse, or Bourse. But two years after its erection, Queen Elizabeth having visited it in great state, cause it to be proclaimed by sound of trumpet, that its name should be "the Royal exchange." Exactly a century after the erection of this building it was destroyed in the great fire. The present building was erected immediately afterward, at

an expense of nearly sixty thousand pounds; a few years ago, it underwent a very substantial repair.

The ground floors of the Royal exchange are occupied by stockbrokers, insurance brokers, stationers, newsvenders, music-sellers, opticians, tobacconists, &c., their shops fronting the streets. On entering the gateway, either from Cornhill or Threadneedle street, we arrive in a handsome quadrangle, in the centre of which is a statue of Charles II. There are statues of the kings of England in niches round the court, above the paved colonnade or piazza. This piazza affords a shelter and promenade to the merchants who meet here to transact business. From the piazza there are staircases which lead to the upper part of the Royal exchange, over the shops. Here a gallery extends round the quadrangle, leading to offices occupied by merchants, underwriters, the Royal exchange assurance office, &c., and by the society of underwriters at Lloyd's subscription coffeehouse. There are two suites of rooms in this establishment; one open to the public, the other reserved for the subscribers. In order to become a subscriber the candidate must be proposed by six members, and afterward accepted by the managing committee. "The establishment of insurances at Lloyd's," says the Baron Dupin, "has rendered signal services both to the commerce of the British empire and to that of other states. The society has agents in most of the principal ports of all parts of the world; it makes public the events, both commercial and maritime, which it learns through their means: these accounts are received by the public with a confidence which nothing for more than a century has tended to destroy." "At Lloyd's," says Von Raumer, "close to the dial which tells the hour, is one still more interesting here, which tells the direction of the wind, and is connected with the weathercock on the roof. Intelligence of the arrivals and departures of ships, of the existence and fate of vessels in all parts of the world; reports from consuls and commissioners resident in every foreign town, newspapers and gazettes from every country are here to be found, arranged in such perfect and convenient order, that the entire actual state of the commercial world may be seen in a few minutes, and any of the countless threads that converge to this centre may be followed out with more or less minuteness. The whole earth, or the whole commercial machinery of the earth, appeared to me to be placed in the hands of the directors of Lloyd's coffeehouse."

Equal in importance to the insurances is the business transacted on the Royal exchange in bills of exchange and in the importation and exportation of bullion-i. e., gold and silver, either in coin or in any other form. The late Mr. Rothschild was in the ordinary habit, when times were quiet, of buying, week by week, from eighty thousand pounds to one hundred thousand pounds worth of bills drawn for goods shipped from England. He gave his testimony that, in general, business on the Royal exchange was done very fairly. Dealers in bills purchase them either to get a commission, or in return for goods imported. Thus bills drawn by the trading and manufacturing towns, as Liverpool, Manchester, &c., and which come to every banker and merchant in London, are bought, and sent abroad. Against these, the dealers in bills buy on the continent bills drawn on England for commodities imported. If there be not a sufficient quantity of foreign bills to meet British billsthat is, if they have sent out more goods than have been imported, and thus put the foreign merchants in their debt, then the dealers, not being able to get bills, must bring in gold, from Paris, from Hamburgh, or from wherever it is requisite. But if the reverse is the case, if British merchants are in debt to foreign merchants, then the deficiency of bills must be made up by drawing gold from the bank to send abroad. This is the state of things which is watched by the bullion and bill brokers, that they may make a profit either by buying bills, or importing and exporting bullion. When commodities are cheap in England, it generally turns the exchanges in their favor, as they then get a greater number of customers than usual, who buy from Britain what at the time they can not get so cheap elsewhere.

The national debt of Great Britain amounts at present to between 700,000,000l. and 800,000,0007., on which an annual interest of 28,000,000l. is paid to the creditors. There are probably two millions or three millions of people directly concerned in the receipt of this annual interest-for though the debt stands in the names of only about two hundred and eighty thousand individuals, many of these are merely trustees, directors, or managers, acting for societies, associations, &c., numbers of whom have what is called "money in the funds"-i. e., a claim on government for money lent. The creditors can not demand their money back, for the original condition by which

the money was borrowed, and the stock created, does not provide for paying off the principal; but the annual interest must be paid. A certain proportion of the debt exists in the form of terminable annuities-that is, annuities terminating at a given time. Another portion is called the floating or unfunded debt, as it exists in the shape of exchequer bills-a kind of paper money issued by government. But by far the largest portion of the debt is funded or permanent. In order to accommodate the creditors, government enables them to sell their claims to whoever will buy themfor more than the full amount if they can get it, or for less if they can not help it. For this purpose an establishment is kept up at the bank of England called the transfer office. When a creditor sells his claim to any other person, the transaction is called a "transfer of stock," because the right to receive the annual interest is transferred from one person to another. Transfers of stock are almost all effected through the agency of stock brokers, who charge one eighth per cent., or 2s. 6d. for every 1007. transferred.

All the more respectable of the stock brokers are members of the stock exchange in Capel court, Bartholomew Lane, into which they must be elected by ballot. No person is allowed to enter or transact business in this building but members. When a bargain has been concluded, the parties step over to the transfer office at the bank, where certain simple forms are gone through, the transfer clerks verifying and ratifying the transaction. There are certain days in the week allotted to each description of stock, on which only transfers can be made.

CHAPTER XXXI.

COMMERCE-THE RIVER AND PORT, AND THE DOCKS.

FROM the sea up to within a few miles of London, the banks of the Thames present but little of picturesque scenery. The river flows through a flat marshy level, which, especially on the Essex side, has a monotonous aspect. A range of hills, of small elevations, runs from Gravesend to Greenwich, at a varying distance from the bank, and this preserves the scenery from being altogether tame and uninteresting. But it is the river itself which is the great source of interest-the consideration of what it has been and of what it is. It has been a commercial highway for these eighteen hundred years past-it is at present the most important one in the world! On arriving off Gravesend, which is opposite Tilbury fort, and twenty-five miles from London, we begin to remark, more particularly, the great traffic on the Thames. Hence, upward, vessels are lying at anchor here and there in the stream, or are moving by the aid of the wind; some great and heavy-laden ship is being towed up or down; and steamers, large and small, are every now and then rushing past. On reaching and passing Woolwich, the interest rapidly increases. In a short time we are at the entrance of what is legally the port of London (that is, the space comprehended in the harbor regulations), which extends from London bridge down to Bugsby's Hole, immediately below Blackwall, a distance of nearly six miles and a half. The actual port, or harbor, known under the names of the Lower and Upper pools, is only about four miles in length. Turning round by Black wall, with its taverns whose windows overhang the water, Greenwich opens distinctly on the view, with its noble and palace-like hospital, and its back-ground of park and woody hill, crowned by the observatory. Opposite Greenwich and Deptford is the marshy peninsula of the Isle of Dogs, nearly round which the river makes a great, sweep, from north to south, and from south to north. There is one of the harbormasters in his boat; and that flag, floating from the flag-staff over the harbor-master's office at Greenwich, is the "collier's detention flag," warning the colliers lying moored in the river that there is yet no room for them in the lower pool, and that they must "bide their time." When the flag is hauled down, the first in turn move upward; and as soon as the allotted spaces are occupied the flag is hauled up again. We are now in Limehouse Reach, and entering the Lower pool. In the distance