South Sea Company were accepted, and that body held itself ready to
advance the sum of two millions towards discharging the principal and
interest of the debt due by the state for the four lottery funds of
the ninth and tenth years of Queen Anne. By the second act, the Bank
received a lower rate of interest for the sum of 1,775,027 pounds 15
shillings due to it by the state, and agreed to deliver up to be
cancelled as many Exchequer bills as amounted to two millions
sterling, and to accept of an annuity of one hundred thousand pounds,
being after the rate of five per cent, the whole redeemable at one
year's notice. They were further required to be ready to advance, in
case of need, a sum not exceeding 2,500,000 pounds upon the same terms
of five per cent interest, redeemable by Parliament. The General Fund
Act recited the various deficiencies, which were to be made good by
the aids derived from the foregoing sources.

The name of the South Sea Company was thus continually before the
public. Though their trade with the South American States produced
little or no augmentation of their revenues, they continued to
flourish as a monetary corporation. Their stock was in high request,
and the directors, buoyed up with success, began to think of new means
for extending their influence. The Mississippi scheme of John Law,
which so dazzled and captivated the French people, inspired them with
an idea that they could carry on the same game in England. The
anticipated failure of his plans did not divert them from their
intention. Wise in their own conceit, they imagined they could avoid
his faults, carry on their schemes for ever, and stretch the cord of
credit to its extremest tension, without causing it to snap asunder.

It was while Law's plan was at its greatest height of popularity,
while people were crowding in thousands to the Rue Quincampoix, and