Nor were those who were much nearer these banks, _i.e._ the denizens of our large towns, much better circumstanced. Of the existing establishments in 1861 there was a large proportion of them open for so short a time, and at such inconvenient hours, as practically to make them closed banks to our working population. That they did little business is not to be wondered at; though we think our readers must be astonished to know that of the entire number of Savings Banks much more than half of them only received, on the average, a dozen deposits a week! Astonishing as this is, all wonder may well cease when it is found that of the whole 638 Savings Banks of the United Kingdom only twenty were open daily, while 355 were open once a week, and fifty-four but _once a fortnight_, and ten but _once a month_! Of the remainder a considerable number were open two and three times a week, and the rest did business at various periods. Investigating the matter a little more closely still, we find that, in 1861, fifty Savings Banks were open but _four hours monthly_; 124 were open only _one hour each week_; and 150 open _but two hours per week_. In England the 498 banks were open in the aggregate 1,988 hours a week, giving an average of about four hours per week for each bank, or, if we leave the metropolitan banks out of the consideration, an average of about two hours and a half per week. Further, taking three English counties, solely chosen on account of their alphabetical order, Bedfordshire, with five Savings Banks, had seventeen and a half hours per week of Saving Bank accommodation; Berkshire, with _ten banks_, had only twenty-one hours; and Buckinghamshire, with six banks, but an aggregate of eight hours each week, during which its population could resort to the banks with their savings. After these facts, let no one wonder that the odd savings of the poor burnt holes in their pockets, and led them to resort to the "house of call" open within a stone's-throw almost at all hours.