Here we think both arguments and facts are at fault. There can be no question that at this time there were many almost insuperable obstacles to the profitable investment of small sums. These obstacles, caused by the state of society and the tendency of legislation, especially on the distribution of land, have since been removed, and no longer influence the case. Why, however, the best should not be made of existing means is at least a fair question? People must save money--hoard it, if the term be liked better--before it can be used. It may be uninteresting and unsocial to save money instead of spending it, but people must do either the one thing or the other; and if they do the former, they at least know the value of a secure place of deposit where their money shall lie in safe and remunerative custody till it be needed. Then as to the facts. "The acts of faith and prudence," "so dry, so transcendental, &c.," were at that time, as at present, more frequent where the agricultural labourer is in strongest force than in almost any other part of the kingdom. In Dorsetshire--"poverty-stricken Dorsetshire," as it is called by the _Times_ itself--the Savings Banks return for 1843 averaged more than 2_l._ a head for the entire population, while in Lancashire, with its highly-paid manufacturing population, it only averaged 1_l._ Nor is this a solitary instance. The rural population throughout the country are by no means the least frequent visitors to Savings Banks.[61] Far more important, however, in their disastrous results than those attacks from without, were the blows levelled at Savings Banks from within. There were now developed inside these institutions seeds of much mischief, which materially retarded the growth of Savings Banks in subsequent years, if not of the habits which the promoters of Savings Banks sought to engender and foster. The subject of Savings Bank frauds will belong to a subsequent chapter; but as one or two cases occurred during the time treated of here, and had their influence on subsequent legislation, we have considered it advisable to dispose of them before proceeding to describe the legislation of the last twenty years.