The leading provisions of the Act of 1844, are too well known to require much elucidation. They may in general be arranged under two divisions; those relating to the limitation of the right of issue, and those assigning the conditions under which that right should alone be exercised. The former have at least the merit of being extremely simple. They merely continue the privilege to all the issuing banks in existence at the passing of the Act, viz. about 250, and prohibit the formation of any new banks of issue. The latter, so far as the country banks of issue are concerned, are equally simple. They do no more than assign a maximum limit to the issues of each--that maximum being equal to the average issues, during a certain period, previous to the enactment, and amounting to nearly £8,000,000 in the total. The conditions imposed on the issues of the Bank of England, are more complicated. Those issues are divided into two classes--the issues on gold and silver, compactly denominated _bullion_ notes, and the issues on the Government debt, and other securities; which, as they are not represented by any gold or silver in the coffers of the Bank, may properly be designated _unrepresented_ notes. Of the latter, the authorized issue is limited to a maximum of £14,000,000, viz. £11,015,100 on the Government debt, and £2,984,900 on other securities; the bullion notes, on the other hand, are not restricted within fixed limits, but are subject to the single condition that the Bank must issue notes in exchange for all the gold (and a certain proportion of silver, not to exceed one fourth of the gold) that may be presented for purchase at the rate of £3 17s. 9d. per ounce, and must render gold for all the notes that may be tendered for payment, at the rate of £3 17s. 10½d. per ounce. Thus the total amount of unrepresented notes, which the united banks of issue in England and Wales are authorised to circulate, is about £22,000,000;[A] in addition to which, the Bank of England is allowed to issue bullion notes for every £1 of treasure which it may possess. [A] Perhaps we ought to mention that under one of the provisions of the Act of 1844, in case any of the banks of issue cease to issue their own notes after the passing of the Act, the Bank of England may be empowered to increase its securities and issue notes against them to an extent not exceeding two-thirds of the amount so discontinued; and that within the last few months the Bank of England has been thus authorized to increase its unrepresented issues by nearly £500,000. This increase, however, is only intended to prevent the unrepresented issues from falling much below the £22,000,000, and leads to no important results.