There is at present due to this Bank from the £1,600,000 Government on the original fund at £6 per cent. For cancelling of Exchequer bills, 3 George I 1,500,000 Purchased of the South Sea Company 4,000,000 Annuities at £4 per cent. charged on the duty on 1,750,000 coals since Lady Day, 1719. Ditto, charged on the surplus of the funds for the 1,250,000 lottery of 1714 Total due to the Bank of England £10,100,000 Give me leave to observe here, that most of the foreign trade of this town is transacted by brokers, of which there are three sorts, viz., 1st, Exchange-brokers, 2ndly, brokers for goods and merchandise, and 3rdly, ship-brokers. The exchange-brokers, who are versed in the course of exchange, furnish the merchant with money or bills, as he has occasion for either. The broker of goods lets the merchant know where he may furnish himself with them, and the settled price; or if he wants to sell, where he may meet with a chapman for his effects. The ship-broker finds ships for the merchant, when he wants to send his goods abroad; or goods for captains and masters of vessels to freight their ships with. If it be demanded what share of foreign trade London hath with respect to the rest of the kingdom; it seems to have a fourth part of the whole, at least if we may judge by the produce of the customs, which are as three to twelve, or thereabouts. As to the manufactures carried on in the City of London; here mechanics have acquired a great deal of reputation in the world, and in many things not without reason; for they excel in clock and cabinet-work, in making saddles, and all sorts of tools, and other things. The door and gun locks, and fire-arms, are nowhere to be paralleled; the silk manufacture is equal to that of France, or any other country, and is prodigiously enlarged of late years. Dyers also are very numerous in and about London, and are not exceeded by any foreigners in the beauty or durableness of their colours: and those that print and stain cottons and linens have brought that art to great perfection. Printers of books, also, may equal those abroad; but the best paper is imported from other countries.