Chapter III: Part 3

The late Mr. Cobbett, to express his idea of the intrinsic
worthlessness of these sheets, in comparison with the prices at which
they pass current, was wont to designate Bank Notes as “Rags.” It may,
indeed, be said of them that, “Rags they were, and to tinder they
return;” for they are born of shreds of linen, and, ten years after
death, are converted in bonfires into the finest of known tinder. It
may be considered a curious fact by those who wear shirts, and a
painful, because hopeless one, by those who make them, that the refuse
or cuttings of linen forms, with a slight admixture of cotton, the
pabulum or pulp of Bank Note Paper. Machinery has made no inroads on
this branch of paper-making. The pulp is kept so well mixed in a large
vat, that the fibrous material presents the appearance of a huge
cauldron of milk. Into this the paper-maker dips his mould, which is a
fine wire sieve, having round its edge, a slight mahogany frame,
called the “Deckel,” which confines the pulp to the dimensions of the
mould. This dip is quite a feat of dexterity, for on it depends the
thickness and evenness of the sheet of paper. The water-mark, or, more
properly, the wire-mark, is obtained by twisting wires to the desired
form or design, and stitching them on the face of the mould; therefore
the design is above the level face of the mould, by the thickness of
the wires it is composed of. Hence, the pulp in settling down on the
mould, must of necessity be thinner on the wire design than on other
parts of the sheet. When the water has run off through the sieve-like
face of the mould, the new-born sheet of paper is transferred to a
blanket; this operation is called “couching,” and is effected by
pressing the mould gently but firmly on the blanket, when the spongy
sheet clings to the cloth. Sizing is a subsequent process, and, when
dry, the water-mark is plainly discernible, being, of course,
transparent where the substance is thinnest. The paper is then made up
into reams of five hundred sheets each, ready for press. The
water-mark in the notes of the Bank of England is secured to that
Establishment by a special Act of Parliament. Indeed, imitation of
anything whatever connected with a Bank Note is an extremely hazardous
feat.

A scrupulous examination of this curious piece of paper, implants a
thorough conviction that it is a very superior article—in short,
unique. There is nothing like it in the world of sheets. Tested by the
touch, it gives out a crisp, crackling, sharp, sound—a note
essentially its own—a music which resounds from no other quires. To
the eye it shows a colour belonging neither to blue-wove nor
yellow-wove, nor to cream-laid, but a white, like no other white,
either in paper and pulp. The rough fringiness of three of its edges
are called the “deckled” edges, being the natural boundary of the pulp
when first moulded; the fourth is left smooth by the knife, which
eventually cuts the two notes in twain. It is so thin that, when
printed, there is much difficulty in making erasures; yet it is so
strong that a “water-leaf” (a leaf before the application of size)
will support thirty-six pounds; and, with the addition of one grain of
size, half a hundred weight, without tearing; yet the quantity of
fibre of which it consists, is no more than eighteen grains and a
half.

The process of engraving the Bank Note is peculiar. Its general design
is remarkably plain—steel plates are used, and are engraved in a
manner somewhat analogous to that employed in the Mint for the
production of the coin, except that heavy pressure is used instead of
a blow. The form of the Note is divided into four or five sections,
each engraved on steel dies which are hardened. Steel rollers, or
mills, are obtained from these dies, and each portion of the Note is
impressed on a steel plate to be printed from by the mills until the
whole form is complete.

By means of a very ingenious machine, the engraving on the plates when
worn by long printing is repaired by the same mills, and thus perfect
identity of form is permanently secured. The merits of this system are
due to the late Mr. Oldham, and the many improvements introduced not
only into this, but into the printing department, are the work of his
son and successor, Mr. Thomas Oldham, the present chief engraver to
the Bank of England. The plate—always with a pair of notes upon it—is
now ready for the press; for it contains all the literary part of the
work, except the date, the number, and the cashier’s signature.

We must now review the manner of printing. Before passing through the
press, all paper must be damped that it may readily absorb ink; and
Bank Note paper is not exempt from this law; but the process by which
it is complied with is an ingenious exception to the ordinary modes.
The sheets are put into an iron chamber which is exhausted of air;
water is then admitted, and forces itself through every pore at the
rate of thirty thousand sheets, or double notes, per minute!

In a long gallery that looks like a chamber of the Inquisition with
self-acting racks, stands a row of plate-printing presses worked by
steam. Every time a sheet passes through them they emit a soft “click”
like a ship’s capstan creaking in a whisper. By this sound they
announce to all whom it may concern that they have printed two Bank
Notes. They are tell-tales, and keep no secrets; for, not content with
stating the fact aloud, each press moves, by means of a chain, an
index of numerals at the end of the room; so that the chief of the
department can see at any hour of the day how many each press has
printed. To take an impression of a note plate “on the sly,” is
therefore impossible. By a clever invention of Mr. Oldham the
impression returns to the printer when made, instead of remaining on
the opposite side of the press, after it has passed through the
rollers, as of old. The plates are heated, for inking, over steam
boxes instead of charcoal fires.

When a ream, consisting of five hundred sheets or one thousand notes,
have been printed, they are placed in a tray which is inserted in a
sort of shelf-trap that shuts up with a spring. No after-abstraction
can, therefore, take place. One such repository is over the index
appertaining to each press, and at the end of the day it can at once
be seen whether the number of sheets corresponds with the numerals of
the tell-tale. Any sort of mistake can thus be readily detected. The
average number of “promises to pay” printed per diem is thirty
thousand.

As we cannot allow the dot over an _i_, or the cross of a _t_ to
escape the focus of our critical microscope, we now proceed to apply
it to the Bank Ink. Like the liquid of Messrs. Day and Martin, this
inestimable composition, with half the usual labour, produces the most
brilliant jet-black, fully equal to the highest Japan varnish, and is
warranted to keep in any climate. It is made from the charred husks of
Rhenish grapes after their juice has been expressed and bottled for
exportation to the dinner-tables of half the world. When mixed with
pure linseed oil, carefully prepared by boiling and burning, the
vinous refuse produces a species of blacks so tenacious that they
obstinately refuse to be emancipated from the paper when once enslaved
to it by the press. It is so intensely nigritious that, compared with
it, all other blacks are musty browns; and pale beside it. If the word
of a printer’s devil may be taken, it is many degrees darker than the
streams of Erebus. Can deeper praise be awarded?

The note is, when plate-printed, two processes distant from
negotiable; the first being the numbering and dating—and here we must
point out the grand distinction which exists between the publication
which we have the satisfaction of stating, now lies before us (but it
is only a “Five”) and ordinary prints. When the types for this
miscellany, for instance, are once set up, every copy struck off from
them by the press is precisely similar. On the contrary, of those
emitted from the Bank presses _no two are alike_. They differ either
in date, in number, or in denomination. This difference constitutes a
grand system of check, extending over every stage of every Bank Note’s
career—a system which records its completion and issue, tracks it
through its public adventures, recognises it when it returns to the
Bank, from among hundreds of thousands of companions, and finally
enables the proper officers to pounce upon it, in case of inquiry, at
any official half hour for ten years after it has returned in
fulfilment of its “promise to pay,” To promise an explanation of what
must appear so complicated a plan, may seem to the reader like a
threat of prolixity. But he may read on in security; the system is as
simple as the alphabet.

Understand then, that the dates of Bank Notes are arbitrary, and bear
no reference to the day of issue. At the beginning of the official
year (February) the Directors settle what dates each of the eleven
denominations of Bank Notes shall bear during the ensuing twelve
months, taking care to apportion to each sort of note a separate date.
The table of dates is then handed to the proper officer, who prints
accordingly. The five-pound Note which now rejoices our eyes is, for
example, dated February the 2nd, 1850; we therefore know that there is
no genuine note in existence, for any other sum, which bears that
date; and if a note for ten, twenty, fifty, hundred, &c., having “2nd
Feb., 1850,” upon it were to be offered to us or to a Bank Clerk, we
or he would, without a shadow of further evidence, impound it as a
forgery.

Now, as to the numbering:—It is a rule that of every date and
denomination, one hundred thousand Notes—no more and no less—shall be
completed and issued at one time. We know, therefore, that our
solitary five is one of a hundred thousand other fives, each bearing a
different number—from 1[2] to 100,000—but all dated 2nd Feb., 1850.
The numbers are printed on each Note by means of a letter-press, the
types of which change with each pull of the press. For the first Note,
the press is set at “00001,” and when that is printed, the “1,” by the
mere act of impression, retires to make room for “2,” which impresses
itself on the next Note, and so on up to “100,000.” The system has
been applied to the stamping of railway tickets. The date, being
required for the whole series, is of course immovable. After this has
been done, the autograph of a cashier is only requisite to render the
Note worth the value inscribed on it, in gold.

Footnote 2:

To prevent fraudulent additions of numerals, less than five figures
are never used. When units, tens, &c., are required, they are
preceded by cyphers. “One” is therefore expressed on a Bank Note
thus:—“00001.”

While the printers are at work, manufacturing each series of Notes,
the account-book makers are getting-up a series of ledgers so exactly
to correspond, that the books of themselves, without the stroke of a
pen, are a record of the existence of the Note. The book in which the
birth of our own especial and particular “Five” is registered, is
legibly inscribed,

“Fives, Feb. 2, 1850.”

When you open a page, you find it to consist of a series of horizontal
and perpendicular lines, like the pattern of a pair of shepherd’s
plaid inexpressibles, variegated with columns of numerals; these
figures running on regularly from No. 1, on the top of the first page,
to No. 100,000 at the bottom of the last. It must therefore be obvious
to the meanest capacity that the mere existence of that book, with its
arbitrary date and series of numbers, corresponding to the like series
of Notes, is a sufficient record of the existence and issue of the
latter. The return of each Note after its public travels, is recorded
in the square opposite to its number. Each page of the book contains
two hundred squares and numbers; consequently, whatever number a Note
may bear, the Clerk who has to register its safe return from a long
round of public circulation, knows at once on which page of the book
to pounce for its own proper and particular square. In that he inserts
the date of its return—not at full length, but in cypher. “S” in red
ink means 1850, and the months are indicated by one of the letters of
the word AMBIDEXTROUS, with the date in numerals. Our only, and
therefore favourite, five is numbered 31177. Should it chance to
finish its travels in the Accountant’s Office on the 6th of August
next, it will be narrowly inspected (for fear of forgery) and
defaced—a Clerk will then turn at once to the book lettered “Fives,
Feb. 2,” and so exactly will he know which page to open, and where the
square numbered 31177 is situated, that he could point to it
blindfold. He will write in it “6 t,” which means 6th August; that
being the eighth month in the year, and “t” the eighth letter in the
chosen word.

The intermediate history of a Bank Note is soon told.
Nineteen-twentieths are issued to Bankers or known houses of business.
If Glynn’s, or Smith’s, or any other banking firm, require a hundred
ten-pound Notes, the Clerk who issues them makes a memorandum showing
the number of the Notes so issued, and the name of the party to whom
they have been handed—an easy process, because Notes being new,[3] are
always given out in regular series, and the first and last Note that
makes the sum required need only be recorded. Most Bankers make
similar memoranda when notes pass out of their hands; and the public,
as each Note circulates among them, frequently sign the name of the
last holder. When an unknown person presents a Note for gold at the
Bank of England, he is required to write his name and address on it,
and if the sum be very large, it is not paid without inquiry. By these
expedients, a stolen, lost, or forged note can often be traced from
hand to hand up to its advent.

Footnote 3:

The Bank ceased to re-issue its Notes since 1835.

The average periods which each denomination of London Notes remain in
circulation has been calculated, and is shown by the following

ACCOUNT OF THE
NUMBER OF DAYS
A BANK NOTE
ISSUED IN
LONDON REMAINS
IN
CIRCULATION:—

£5 72·7 days
10 77·0 „
20 57·4 „
30 18·9 „
40 13·7 „
50 38·8 „
100 29·4 „
200 12·7 „
300 10·6 „
500 11·8 „
1000 11·1 „

The exceptions to these averages are few, and, therefore, remarkable.
The time during which some Notes remain unpresented are reckoned by
the century. On the 27th of September, 1845, a fifty pound Note was
presented bearing date 20th January, 1743. Another for ten pounds,
issued on the 19th November, 1762, was not paid till the 20th April,
1843. There is a legend extant, of the eccentric possessor of a
thousand pound Note, who kept it framed and glazed for a series of
years, preferring to feast his eyes on it, to putting the amount it
represented out at interest. It was converted into gold, however,
without a day’s loss of time by his heirs, on his demise. Stolen and
lost Notes are generally long absentees. The former usually make their
appearance soon after some great horse-race, or other sporting event,
altered or disguised so as to deceive Bankers, to whom the Bank of
England furnishes a list of the numbers and dates of stolen Notes. In
a Chapter on Forgery, which we are preparing, the reader will see some
singular facts on this point.

Mr. Francis, in his “History of the Bank of England,” tells a curious
story about a bank post bill, which was detained during thirty years
from presentation and payment. It happened in the year 1740:—“One of
the Directors, a very rich man, had occasion for 30,000_l._, which he
was to pay as the price of an estate be had just bought; to facilitate
the matter, he carried the sum with him to the Bank and obtained for
it a Bank bill. On his return home, he was suddenly called out upon
particular business; he threw the Note carelessly on the chimney, but
when he came back a few minutes afterwards to lock it up, it was not
to be found. No one had entered the room; he could not therefore
suspect any person. At last, after much ineffectual search, he was
persuaded that it had fallen from the chimney into the fire. The
Director went to acquaint his colleagues with the misfortune that had
happened to him; and as he was known to be a perfectly honourable man
he was readily believed. It was only about four-and-twenty hours from
the time that he had deposited his money; they thought, therefore,
that it would be hard to refuse his request for a second bill. He
received it upon giving an obligation to restore the first bill, if it
should ever be found, or to pay the money himself, if it should be
presented by any stranger. About thirty years afterwards (the Director
having been long dead, and his heirs in possession of his fortune), an
unknown person presented the lost bill at the Bank, and demanded
payment. It was in vain that they mentioned to this person the
transaction by which that bill was annulled; he would not listen to
it; he maintained that it had come to him from abroad, and insisted
upon immediate payment. The Note was payable to bearer; and the thirty
thousand pounds were paid him. The heirs of the Director would not
listen to any demands of restitution; and the Bank was obliged to
sustain the loss. It was discovered afterwards that an architect
having purchased the Director’s house, had taken it down, in order to
build another upon the same spot, had found the Note in a crevice of
the chimney, and made his discovery an engine for robbing the Bank.”

Carelessness, equal to that recorded above, is not at all uncommon,
and gives the Bank enormous profit, against which the loss of a mere
thirty thousand pound is but a trifle. Bank Notes have been known to
light pipes, to wrap up snuff, to be used as curl-papers; and British
tars, mad with rum and prize-money, have not unfrequently, in time of
war, made sandwiches of them, and eaten them between bread-and-butter.
In the forty years between the years 1792 and 1812 there were
out-standing Notes (presumed to have been lost or destroyed) amounting
to one million, three hundred and thirty odd thousand pounds; every
shilling of which was clear profit to the Bank.

The superannuation, death, and burial of a Bank of England Note is a
story soon told. The returned Notes, or promises performed, are kept
in “The Library” for ten years, and then burnt in an iron cage in one
of the Bank yards.

A few words on the history and general appearance of the Bank of
England Note will conclude our criticism.

The strong principle to insure the detection of forgery is uniformity;
hence, from the very first Note issued by the Bank, to that, the
merits of which we are now discussing, the same general design has
been preserved,—only that the execution has been from time to time
improved; except, we are bound to add, that of the signatures, some of
which are still as illegible as ever. Originally, Notes were granted
more in the form of Bank post-bills,—that is, not nominally to a
member of the establishment, but really to the party applying for
them, and for any sum he might require. If it suited his convenience,
he presented his Note several times, drawing such lesser sums as he
might require; precisely as if it were a letter of credit, after the
manner of the Sailor mentioned in the latest edition of Joe Miller.
Jack, somehow or other, got possession of a fifty pound Note; the sum
was so dazzlingly enormous that he had not the heart, on presenting it
for payment, to demand the whole sum at once, for fear of breaking the
Bank. So, leaning confidentially over the counter, he whispered to the
cashier, that he wouldn’t be hard upon ’em. He knew times were
bad,—so, as it was all the same to him, he would take five sovereigns
now, and the rest at so much a week. In like manner, the fac-simile on
the opposite page, while it presents a specimen of one of the earliest
Bank Notes in existence, shows that the holder took the amount as Jack
proposed;—by instalments. It was granted to Mr. Thomas Powell, on the
19th of December, 1699, for five hundred and fifty-five pounds. His
first draft was one hundred and thirty-one pounds, ten shillings, and
one penny; the second “in gould,” three hundred and sixty; the third,
sixty-three pounds, nine shillings, and elevenpence, when the note was
retained by the Bank as having been fully honoured.

With this curious specimen of the ancient Bank of England Note, we
take leave of the modern ones—only, however, for a short time. In a
week or two, we shall change the topic (as we have previously
intimated) to one closely bearing upon it. Circumstances, however,
demand that we should change the subject of it at a much earlier date.

INNOCENCE AND CRIME.
AN ANECDOTE.

A benevolent old gentleman—the late Mr. Harcourt Brown of Beech
Hall—was plodding his way home to his hotel from a ramble in the
suburbs of London; and having made a bold attempt at “a short cut,”
soon found himself lost in a maze of squalid streets, leading one into
the other, and apparently leading no where else. He inquired his way
in vain. From the first person, he received a coarse jest; from
another, a look of vacant stupidity; a third eyed him in dogged
silence. He stepped with one foot into several wretched little shops;
but the people really seemed to know nothing beyond the next street or
alley, except one man, a dealer in tripe, of a strange, earthy colour,
who called over his shoulder, “Oh, you’re miles out o’ your way!” The
only exception to the general indifference, rudeness and stupidity,
was a thin sallow-cheeked man, who had a fixed smile on his face, and
spoke in rather an abject cringing tone of obsequiousness, and even
walked up one street and down a second to show Mr. Brown the way. But
it soon became evident that he knew nothing about the matter, and he
slunk away with the same fixed unmeaning smile.

In this state of affairs Mr. Brown buttoned up his coat, and manfully
resolved to work his way out of this filthy locality by walking
straight forward.

Trudging onward at a smart pace, the worthy gentleman presently heard
the sound of sobbing and crying, and behind the boards of a shed at
the side of a ruined hovel he saw a girl of some nine or ten years of
age, clasping and unclasping her hands in a paroxysm of grief and
apprehension. “Oh, what _shall_ I do?—what _shall_ I do?” sobbed the
child.

She started with terror as Mr. Brown approached, and hid her head in
the folds of her little apron; but on being assured by the mild voice
of Mr. Brown that he had no thought of hurting her, she ventured to
look up. She had soft blue eyes, flaxen hair of silvery glossiness,
pretty features; and, notwithstanding the stain of tears down a cheek
which had a smear of brickdust upon it, had a most innocent and
prepossessing face.

“What is the matter, my little girl?” inquired Mr. Brown.

The child turned one shoulder half round, and displayed the red and
purple marks of blows from a whip or stick.

“What cruel wretch has done this?” asked Mr. Brown. “Tell me, child;
tell me directly.”

“It was mother,” sobbed the child.

“Ah—I’m sorry to hear this. Perhaps you have been naughty?”

“Yes, Sir;” answered the child.

“Poor child,” ejaculated Mr. Brown; “but you will not be naughty
again. What was your offence. Come, tell me?”

“I shook it, Sir; oh, yes, it’s quite true; I did shake it very much.”

“What did you shake?” inquired Mr. Brown.

“I shook the doll, Sir.”

“The doll! Oh, you mean you shook the baby; that, certainly was
naughty of you;” said Mr. Brown.

“No, Sir; it was not the baby I shook—it was the doll; and I’m afraid
to go home—mother will be sure to beat me again.”

An impulse of benevolence led Mr. Brown’s hand to search for his
purse. Had he tried the wrong pocket? His purse was on the other side.
No, it was not—it must be in this inner pocket. Where _is_ Mr. Brown’s
purse? It is not in any of his pockets! He tries them all over again.
And his pocket-book!—chiefly of memorandums, but also having a few
bank notes. This is gone too—and his silk handkerchief—both his
handkerchiefs!—also his silver-gilt snuff-box, filled with rappee only
five minutes before he left the hotel this morning—he is certain he
had it when he came out—but it is certainly gone! Every single thing
he had in his pockets is gone.

The child also—now _she_ is gone! Mr. Brown looks around him, and
yonder he sees the poor child flying with frequent looks behind of
terror,—and now a shrill and frightful voice causes him to start.
Turning in that direction, the sudden flight of the little girl is
immediately explained. Over the rubbish and refuse, at a swift, wild
pace, courses a fiendish woman, with a savage eye and open mouth, her
cheeks hollow, her teeth projecting, her thin hair flying like a bit
of diseased mane over her half-naked shoulder; she has a stick in her
hand, with which she constantly threatens the flying child, whom her
execrations follow yet more swiftly than her feet.

Mr. Brown remained watching them till they were out of sight. He once
more searched all his pockets, but they were all empty. He called to
mind the man with the fixed smile on his hollow cadaverous cheek, and
several other faces of men whom he had casually noticed in the course
of the last half hour, thinking what a pity it was that something
could not be done for them. He now began to think it was a very great
pity that something had not _already_ been done for them or with them,
for they had certainly “done” him. Poor Mr. Brown!

Some six or seven months after this most disagreeable adventure, it
chanced that Mr. Brown was going over the prison at Coldbath Fields,
accompanied by the Governor. As they entered one of the wards, the
voice of a child sobbing, attracted the ears of our philanthropist. In
answer to his inquiries, the Governor informed him that it was a child
of about eleven years of age, who had been detected in the act of
picking a lady’s pocket in one of the most crowded thoroughfares.

On a few kind words being spoken to her, she looked up; and in the
blue eye, glossy flaxen hair, and pretty features, Mr. Brown at once
recognised the little girl who had “shaken the doll.”

“This child is an innocent creature!” cried he, turning to the
Governor, “the victim of ignorance and cruel treatment at home. I
recollect her well. Her mother had beaten her most shamefully; and the
last glimpse I had of her was in her flight from a still more savage
assault. And for what crime do you suppose?”

“For not picking pockets expertly, I dare say:” replied the Governor.

“Nothing of the sort!” exclaimed Mr. Brown. “Would you believe it,
Sir; it was for nothing more than a childish bit of pretence-anger
with her doll, on which occasion she gave the doll a good shaking.
Mere pretence, you know.”

“My dear Sir,” said the Governor, smiling, “I fancy I am right, after
all. She was beaten for not being expert in the study and practice of
pocket-picking at home. You are not, perhaps, aware that the lesson
consists in picking the pockets of a figure which is hung up in the
room, in such a way that the least awkwardness of touch makes it
shake, and rings a little bell attached to it. This figure is called
the ‘doll.’ Those who ring the bell, shake it in emptying its pockets,
are punished according to the mind and temper of the instructor.”

“Good heavens!” ejaculated Mr. Brown, “to what perfection must the art
be brought! Then it is all accounted for. The sallow gentleman with
the fixed smile must have been master of the craft of not shaking the
doll, when he took my purse, pocket-book, snuff-box, and both
handkerchiefs from me, without my feeling so much as the motion of the
air!”

* * * * *

Monthly Supplement of “HOUSEHOLD WORDS,”
Conducted by CHARLES DICKENS.

_Price 2d., Stamped, 3d._,
THE HOUSEHOLD NARRATIVE
OF
CURRENT EVENTS.

_The Number, containing a history of the past month, was issued with
the Magazines._

------------------------------------------------------------------------

TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES

● Fixed typos; non-standard spelling and dialect retained.
● Renumbered footnotes.
● Enclosed italics font in _underscores_.
● The caret (^) is used to indicate superscript, whether applied to a
single character (as in 2^d) or to an entire expression (as in
1^{st}).