impossible to have any confidence in the Bank as long as it would not
resume specie payments. Mr. Biddle defended himself through papers paid
for the purpose, finally in the Augsburg Gazette, while he waited for
the soap bubble to burst. His retained defenders claimed that the
150,000 bales of cotton sent to Europe had not been sold, but received
on commission. Advances in paper had been made which in the month of
August, 1839, were to be paid in notes by the Southern banks, for a new
grant made to the Bank by the State of Pennsylvania permitted it to buy
the shares of other banks, and by this means to gain their management;
their notes lost 20 to 50 per cent. as compared with the Northern banks.

Through his profit upon the difference of the notes, and through the
payment for the cotton in paper, and through the sale of bullion
exchange, Mr. Biddle had made five to six million dollars, which lay at
his command in London.

The protection of his bills of exchange made a great impression in
England; the rebound was felt in America, where the panic, moderated in
1837 through the intervention of the Bank, burst forth with renewed fury
in 1839, and brought about the complete liquidation of that
establishment.

At the same time the English market was very much pressed, for,
according to a notice of the Chamber of Commerce, the number of that
year's bankruptcies was greater than usual. From June 11, 1838 to June,
1839, there were 306 bankruptcies in London, and 781 in the
"provinces,"--in all, 1,087. At Manchester there were 82, at Birmingham
54, at Liverpool 44, at Leeds 33. The London Exchange was flooded with
unsalable paper, an occurrence which had also taken place on a smaller
scale in 1837.