206] ANNUAL REGISTER, 1813. 



Leave was given to bring in the 

 bill, which afterwards passed with- 

 out opposition. 



THE LOAN. 



Nov. 15, in a committee of ways 

 and means, the Chancellor of the 

 Exchequer rose, to state the terms 

 on which the Loan had been that 

 daj' contracted for. He began by 

 mentioning the supplies which had 

 been already voted, or which were 

 likely to be required before the 

 Christmas recess. Of these, eleven 

 millions had been already voted for 

 the naval service, five millions for 

 paying off Exchequer bills issued 

 under an act of last session, and an- 

 other sum of six millions would 

 be requisite for army services, 

 making in the whole 22,000,000/. 

 The way in which it had been 

 thoughtmost expedienlto meet these 

 supplies, was by Loan ; and accord- 

 ingly, that morning a Loan had 

 been contracted for, to the amount of 

 22millions. As however it had been 

 an unusual practice in our financial 

 system, to make a new Loan while 

 the payment of the preceding was 

 only pending, and not yet com- 

 pleted, it might be necessary to ex- 

 plain some of the cii-cumstances 

 which had induced Government to 

 adopt this course. At the same 

 time when the Loan was made, in 

 June last, it was stated to the con- 

 tractors, that though Government 

 considered it probable thatit would 

 be sufficient for the services of the 

 year, yet they would not deem 

 themselves precluded from raising 

 a farther sum, should circum- 

 stances render it expedient. But 

 the expenditure of the country in 

 the interim having been greater 

 than was then contemplated, it be- 

 came evident on the approach of 

 the meeting of Parliament, that a 



Loan would be necessary ; and, 

 fortunately, the circumstances un- 

 der which it was to be raised were 

 highly favourable to public credit. 

 It was true, that a large sum might 

 have been raised by the funding of 

 Exchequer bills, as had usually been 

 the practice before Christmas; but 

 then it was to be considered, that 

 the favourable state of public cre- 

 dit, by attracting large sums to the 

 funds, rendered Exchequer bills 

 a less marketable commodity, and 

 made it more difficult to dispose 

 of them. On these grounds, it 

 was thought expedient that a loan 

 of the present amount should be 

 resorted to. It was true that a 

 loan of 10 or 12 millions might 

 have been sufficient for ail the pur- 

 poses of Government previous to 

 the recess ; but it was also deemed 

 proper to relieve the Exchequer 

 bill market as much as possible; 

 and with this view it was con- 

 ceived proper at once to extend the 

 loan to 22 millions, making the 

 one-half of that amount payable in 

 Exchequer bills. When the loan 

 was first proposed, a claim was put 

 in by other persons for an open 

 competition with the former con- 

 tractors. It was conceived by 

 Government, however, that though 

 the contractors for the former loan 

 had no strict claims to preference, 

 inasmuch as the liberty of raising 

 more money within the year was ex- 

 pressly reserved, though its exercise 

 was deemed improbable, yet upon 

 the whole it was only fair to give the 

 former contractors the first oflFer ; 

 while at the same time, the in- 

 terests of all parties would be pro- 

 perly attended to. This had ac- 

 cordingly been done ; the late con- 

 tractors had come up to the pro- 

 posals of Government, and he was 

 now happy to lay before the Com- 



