Now, it is clear that if there were a great quantity of forged notes in circulation, people would be afraid to take notes at all; and that if this great quantity came out all of a sudden, it would for a while put an end to all payments and all trade. And if such great quantity can with safety be put out, I leave you to guess, Jack, at the situation of your five pounds. I will now show you, then, that I could do this myself, and with perfect safety and ease. I could have made, at a very trifling expense, a million of pounds in bank-notes of various amounts. There are fourteen different ways in which I could send them to England, and lodge them safely there, without the smallest chance of their arrival being known to any soul except the man to whom they should be confided. The Banks might search and ransack every vessel that arrived from America. They might do what they would. They would never detect the cargo! There they are then, safe in London; a famous stock of bank-notes, so well executed that no human being except the Bank people would be able to discover the counterfeit. The agent takes a parcel at a time, and drops them in the street in the dark. This work he carries on for a week or two in such streets as are best calculated for the purpose, till he has well stocked the town. He may do the same at Portsmouth and other great towns if he please, and he may send off large supplies by post. Now, Jack, suppose you were up at London with your master's waggon. You might find a parcel of notes. You would go to the first shop to buy your wife a gown and your children some clothes, yourself a hat, a greatcoat, and some shoes. The rest you would lay out at shops on the road home; for the sooner you got rid of this _foundal_, the less chance of having it taken from you. The shopkeepers would thank you for your custom, and your wife's heart would bound with joy. The notes would travel about most merrily. At last they would come to the Bank. The holders would lose them; but you would gain by them. So that, upon the whole, there would be no loss, and the maker of the notes would have no gain. Others would find, and nearly all would do like you. In a few days the notes would find their way to the Bank in great numbers, where they would all be stopped. The news would spread abroad. The thieftakers would be busy. Every man who had had his note stopped at the Bank would alarm his neighbourhood. The country would ring with the news. Nobody would take a bank-note. All business would be at a stand. The farmers would sell no corn for bank-notes. The millers would have nothing else to pay with. No markets, because no money. The baker would be able to get no flour. He could sell no bread, for nobody would have money to pay him.