In suspending the operation of the Banking Act, the Whigs tacitly admitted that, in their opinion, whether lately adopted or not, there was something fundamentally injurious and wrong with the measure. The subject was a very serious one. You may bungle sanitary bills, pass coercive laws, or tamper with the jurisprudence of the country, without doing more than a limited amount of evil. But the subject of the currency is so intimately and vitally connected with our whole commercial greatness, that it must be handled with the utmost precaution. A leak in a ship is not more dangerous than a flaw in a monetary statute; and, when once discovered, not a moment should be lost in repairing it. Not one member of the present Cabinet was in any way competent for the task. It is most extraordinary, that the Whigs, after all their official experience, should exhibit such a singular incapacity in every matter which has the slightest connexion with finance. They do not seem to comprehend the subject at all; and if their private affairs were conducted in the same slovenly fashion as are those of the public when unfortunately committed to their guidance, we should very soon see the Gazette adorned with some elegant extracts from the Court Guide. The only respectable Chancellor of the Exchequer whom they ever produced was Mr Baring; and he, it is rumoured, was considered too scrupulous to be admitted to that post again. Besides this, his views upon the currency were known to be diametrically opposite to those entertained by Sir Robert Peel. Sir Charles Wood, the worst financier that ever disgraced the memory of Cocker, had committed himself before the suspension of the Act, in an especially ridiculous manner. At one time, this gentleman was quite jocund and hopeful, a firm believer in the existence of a plethora, and smiled at the idea of a crisis with a happy air of mingled indifference and satisfaction. Shortly afterwards, however, he took the alarm, attempted to eat in his own words—an operation which he performed with most indifferent grace,—and possibly became dimly conscious that a Chancellor of the Exchequer has more duties to perform than to sign the receipt for his salary. Sir Charles evidently was not the man to grapple with the difficulty; and besides this, he could not afford to offend Sir Robert Peel, or give a triumph to his political opponents, who had all along denounced the Banking Act as an experiment of a perilous nature. In this position, the Whigs adopted the safest course for themselves, if not for the country. They asked for a committee, both in the Lords and Commons, to consider the question of the currency, taking care, of course, to nominate members whose opinions were already known. We thoroughly agree with Mr Herries, that the inquiry was a work of supererogation. The subject has been already investigated in every possible way. Blue books have been issued from time to time, containing