In London and throughout the provinces there were numerous small firms of private bankers--small, that is to say, when contrasted with their joint-stock competitors. The banks in a manufacturing district or in a busy city would, especially during periods of active trade and rising prices, be called upon to advance large sums to their customers; but if a banker collected his deposits from a few branches within the district whence the demand arose, he would soon find himself unable to meet the requirements of his customers. But the joint-stock banks, which have branches in many counties, can pour their deposits into those centres where demand is active; and it is obvious that a small private banker cannot hope to compete successfully against the superior organization of the companies. With the private banker it soon became a question of restricting advances; and his customers, finding that they could not obtain all the accommodation they required, naturally applied to his rivals, who, if tangible securities were forthcoming, met their demands with ease. The London and provincial banking companies, which farm both the agricultural and the manufacturing districts, by pouring their surplus capital into the London money-market, speedily obtained all the best business; and those private bankers who did not either amalgamate with, or adopt the system of, their successful rivals found themselves hopelessly out-distanced. Hence the triumph of joint-stock banking and the advent of the director and his humble, most obedient servant, the clerk-in-charge, who “manages” a country branch, but whose power, in reality, is of the smallest, all the applications for advances above a certain sum having to be submitted to the chief office, while he himself is powerless to act until he receives his instructions from headquarters. This form of competition would be felt less in an agricultural county where the deposits a banker collects are greatly in excess of the demand made upon him for advances; but even there the private banker’s luck has deserted him; for the agricultural depression thinned the ranks of his best customers, and, of course, left him a legacy of bad debts. We should, therefore, expect to see the private bankers disappear from the great towns first, and, finally, from the agricultural centres. The law of the land has kept them small; and the tentacles of the joint-stock companies have almost exterminated a class of men who enjoyed the friendship and confidence of their clients to an extent that a clerk-in-charge upon a salary of from £200 to £500 a year can never even approach.