peculiarly requiring consistency and special attainment would be
managed by a shifting and untrained ruler. In fact, the whole plan
would seem to an Englishman of business palpably absurd; he would
not consider it, he would not think it worth considering. That it
works fairly well in France, and that there are specious arguments
of theory for it, would not be sufficient to his mind.

All such changes being out of the question, I can propose only three
remedies.

First. There should be a clear understanding between the Bank and
the public that, since the Bank hold out ultimate banking reserve,
they will recognise and act on the obligations which this implies;
that they will replenish it in times of foreign demand as fully, and
Lend it in times of internal panic as freely and readily, as plain
principles of banking require.

This looks very different from the French plan, but it is not so
different in reality. In England we can often effect, by the
indirect compulsion of opinion, what other countries must effect by
the direct compulsion of Government. We can do so in this case. The
Bank directors now fear public opinion exceedingly; probably no kind
of persons are so sensitive to newspaper criticism. And this is very
natural. Our statesmen, it is true, are much more blamed, but they
have generally served a long apprenticeship to sharp criticism. If
they still care for it (and some do after years of experience much
more than the world thinks), they care less for it than at first,
and have come to regard it as an unavoidable and incessant irritant,
of which they shall never be rid. But a bank director undergoes no
similar training and hardening. His functions at the Bank fill a