Passing away from the necropolis of dead and buried notes, we visit the Treasury, whence they originally issued. This is a quiet-looking room, scarcely more imposing in appearance than the butler’s pantry in a West-end mansion, but the modest-looking cupboards with which its walls are lined, are gorged with hidden treasure. The possible value of the contents of this room may be imagined from the fact that a million of money, in notes of one thousand pounds, forms a packet only three inches thick. The writer has had the privilege of holding such a parcel in his hand, and for a quarter of a minute imagining himself a millionaire—with an income of over thirty thousand per annum for life! The same amount might occupy even less space than the above, for Mr. Francis tells a story of a lost note for thirty thousand pounds, which, turning up after the lapse of many years, was paid by the Bank _twice over_! We are informed that notes of even a higher value than this have on occasion been printed, but the highest denomination now issued is one thousand pounds. In this department is kept a portion of the Bank’s stock of golden coin, in bags of one thousand pounds each. This amount does not require a very large bag for its accommodation, but its weight is considerable, amounting to two hundred and fifty-eight ounces twenty pennyweights, so that a million in gold would weigh some tons. In another room of this department—the Weighing Office—are seen the machines for detecting light coin. These machines are marvels of ingenious mechanism. Three or four hundred sovereigns are laid in a long brass scoop or semi-tube, of such a diameter as to admit them comfortably, and self-regulating to such an incline that the coins gradually slide down by their own weight on to one plate of a little balance placed at its lower extremity. Across the face of this plate two little bolts make alternate thrusts, one to the right, one to the left, but at slightly different levels. If the coin be of full weight, the balance is held in equipoise, and the right-hand bolt making its thrust, pushes it off the plate and down an adjacent tube into the receptacle for full-weight coin. If, on the other hand, the coin is ever so little “light,” the balance naturally rises with it. The right-hand bolt makes its thrust as before, but this time passes harmlessly _beneath_ the coin. Then comes the thrust of the left-hand bolt, which, as we have said, is fixed at a fractionally higher level, and pushes the coin down a tube on the opposite side, through which it falls into the light-coin receptacle. The coins thus condemned are afterwards dropped into another machine, which defaces them by a cut half-way across their diameter, at the rate of two hundred a minute. The weighing machines, of which there are sixteen, are actuated by a small atmospheric engine in one corner of the room, the only manual assistance required being to keep them supplied with coins.