Such temporary measures as the nature of the crisis admitted were taken locally. The Legislature passed two Bills guaranteeing a portion of the note issue of both the Union Bank and the Commercial Bank; while a loan of 400,000 dollars was procured from the Bank of Montreal, and additional loans from the Bank of Nova Scotia and the Royal Bank of Canada: thus "the financial sceptre passed to Canada."[49] At the same time the manager and directors of the Commercial Bank were arrested on a charge of having presented a fraudulent balance sheet. Reuter's correspondent at St. John's noted that in this time of trouble the idea of union with Canada gained ground rapidly. How hopeless the position seemed to calm observers on the spot may be gathered from the following vivid extracts from a letter by _The Times_ correspondent at St. John's:[50] "Twelve large firms controlled the whole export trade of the colony--fish oils and fish products, valued at about 7,000,000 dollars. Of these twelve only two remain ... and these are sorely stricken. These firms occupied the whole waterside premises of St. John's, gave employment to hundreds of storekeepers, coopers, stevedores, and others, beside some thousands of unskilled labourers occupied in the handling of the fish. All these men are now without a day's work, or any means of obtaining it. The isolation of the colony, away out in the Atlantic with no neighbour, is its greatest curse. People unemployed cannot emigrate, but must swell an army of industrials depending on the Government for relief. The city is a veritable aggregation of unemployed; it is a city to let. Every business, factory, wharf, store, or shop employing labour has either suspended business or has curtailed the number of its employees to the lowest possible limit. It is not unreasonable to estimate the number unemployed here to-day at 6,000, every one of whom must be without work until spring opens." It is not surprising to find that in this difficulty the minds of the colonists turned towards the Imperial Exchequer. But the distinction is vital between an Imperial grant in relief of a visitation of nature and a grant in relief of financial disasters which may be the result of improvidence or extravagance. The Imperial Exchequer is drawn from complex sources, and cannot be diverted to irregular purposes without injustice to large numbers of poor people. These facts were not unnaturally overlooked in Newfoundland, for in trouble the sense of proportion is apt to disappear. Thus on March 2nd, 1895, Sir W. Whiteway, the Newfoundland Premier, in a letter to _The Times_, said: