In the Banking department is transacted the ordinary business of bankers. Here other banks keep their “reserve,” and hence draw their supplies as they require them. The Issue department is intrusted with the circulation of the notes of the Bank, which is regulated as follows. The Bank in 1844 was a creditor of the government to the extent of rather over eleven million pounds, and to this amount and four million pounds beyond, for which there is in other ways sufficient security, the Bank is allowed to issue notes without having gold in reserve to meet them. Beyond these fifteen million pounds, every note issued represents gold actually in the coffers of the Bank. The total value of the notes in the hands of the public at one time averages about twenty-five million pounds. To these must be added other notes to a very large amount in the hands of the Banking department, which deposits the bulk of its reserve of gold in the Issue department, accepting notes in exchange. All Bank of England notes are printed in the Bank itself. Six printing-presses are in constant operation, the same machine printing first the particulars of value, signature, &c., and then the number of the note in consecutive order. The paper used is of very peculiar texture, being at once thin, tough, and crisp; and the combination of these qualities, together with the peculiarities of the watermark, which is distributed over the whole surface of the paper, forms one of the principal guarantees against imitation. The paper, which is manufactured exclusively at one particular mill, is made in oblong slips, allowing just enough space for the printing of two notes side by side. The edges of the paper are left untrimmed, but, after printing, the two notes are divided by a straight cut between them. This accounts for the fact, which many of our readers will doubtless have noticed, that only one edge of a Bank-note is smooth, the other three being comparatively ragged. The printing-presses are so constructed as to register each note printed, so that the machine itself indicates automatically how many notes have passed through it. The average production of notes is fifty thousand a day, and about the same number are presented in the same time for payment.