Mr. Sikes first sought an interview with Sir George C. Lewis, and obtained one, in company with Mr. Wickham, M.P.; and the letter which followed was the result of a request on the part of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, that the different points should be fully and clearly set before him. So far as we have been able to find, Mr. Sikes deserves the credit of having been the first to point out the inherent defects in all parts of the Savings Bank system, and the first to suggest an entirely fresh form of management.[147] Almost all the previous _brochures_ relating to Savings Banks had exclusive reference to the matter of the frauds which had occurred, and the security which depositors possessed in such cases. On this subject, Dr. Hancock, of Dublin, had published two very able pamphlets, which had originally been read as papers before the Dublin Statistical Society, of which Dr. Hancock was secretary. Mr. Edward Taylor of Rochdale had, at a still prior period, written a pamphlet on the same subject. Mr. Sikes, in the _Letter_ we are now considering, adverted at length to the same point, but by no means confined his attention to it. He, on the contrary, dwelt on the dormant state into which many of the banks had sunk; the extremely unequal way in which they were furnished to the people; the limited time for which the majority of banks were open; the various rates of interest allowed; the inequalities in the contributions to the "separate surplus fund;" the non-establishment, for many years, of new Savings Banks; and generally, the unsatisfactory state of the law with regard to them.