It may, therefore, we think, be laid down as an important practical rule, that the Bank should be required to render the equivalent on the principle of proportioning its payment to the amount of unrepresented notes in circulation, and that the rate imposed should increase as that circulation increased. The only difficulty appears to consist in devising a simple natural plan for accomplishing this result; a plan that would be readily comprehended by the public, and that would involve no very complicated system of calculations on the part of the Bank. Now, it so happens that this difficulty can be easily surmounted as will appear from the following explanation. The authorized circulation of unrepresented notes has already been shown to consist of two parts, viz. about £11,000,000 issued upon the Government debt, and £3,000,000 issued upon other public securities. Upon the £11,000,000 lent to Government the Bank receives interest at the rate of 3 per cent.; and there can be no question that this is not so great a profit as the Bank could obtain from those £11,000,000 if employed in ordinary banking operations It may fairly be considered therefore that the Bank is entitled to derive a higher share of profit out of those £11,000,000 than out of the other £3,000,000, which have not been lent to Government, and which, as pointed out above, the Bank should be set at liberty to withdraw from the issue department, and incorporate amongst the working capital. In like manner, when the Bank is allowed to increase its unrepresented issues, for the purpose of replacing the country notes, the additional notes so issued, as well as the £3,000,000 just mentioned, being so much over and above the £11,000,000 lent to Government, and the Bank therefore rendering no actual service to the State in return for the privilege of issuing them, it would be perfectly legitimate that the State should require something like an equitable participation of the profits derivable from their issue. During the next ten years, under the operation of the plan proposed, these additional notes would increase annually, according as the country notes diminished, viz as follows:-- 1856 £000,000 1857 800,000 1858 1,600,000 1859 2,400,000 1860 3,200,000 1861 4,000,000 1862 4,800,000 1863 5,600,000 1864 6,400,000 1865 7,200,000 1866 8,000,000