Having taken this great step in the right direction, it became the first and most important duty of government to have provided, simultaneously with the commencement of the undertaking, _a currency independent of foreign drains_, commensurate to the vast addition made to the industry and engagements of the nation. Its _capital_ was far more than adequate to the undertakings, how vast soever. This is now decisively proved by the event. Two-thirds of the railways are finished; the remaining third is in course of construction; and interest is in London from _three_ to _two-and-a-half per cent._ But capital alone is not sufficient for carrying on undertakings. Currency also is requisite; and if that be deficient, the most boundless overflow of capital will not avert a monetary crash, or save the nation from the most dreadful calamities. Here, too, the event has thrown a broad and decisive light on this vital question, and the cause of our calamities. Interest was fixed by government, after the crash, for advances by the Bank of England, in October 1847, at eight per cent; it rose, in private transactions, to twelve and fifteen per cent. Why was that? Not because capital was awanting, but because the bankers, from the drain of specie to buy foreign grain, and the operation of the Bank Charter Acts of 1844 and 1845, could not venture to issue notes to their customers. The nation resembled a great army, in which vast stores of provisions existed in the magazines at its disposal, but a series of absurd regulations affecting the commissariat prevented the grain they contained being issued to the soldiers. Accordingly, when the absurd restrictions were removed, things soon began to amend. When the Bank Charter Act was _pro tempore_ repealed, by Lord John Russell's famous letter of October 1847, the effect was instantaneous in allaying the panic, and interest gradually fell, until now money has become overflowing, and it is to be had at two per cent, although the years since that time have been the most disastrous to capital ever known in the British annals, so that no subsequent increase has been possible.