84 



being deducted from them, are made a legal tender 

 for the payment of all debts ; and on which four per 

 cent, interest is to be paid by the Bank. When the 

 instalment of the first year is paid, the two per 

 cent, is to be divided among all the holders of the 

 Bank debentures, by a lottery. The drawers of the 

 fortunate numbers will then be paid in full. The 

 others will receive their interest, at the rate of 

 four per cent, till their numbers are drawn prizes, 

 some of which must, of course, wait till the expira- 

 tion of the twenty-eighth year; at which period, 

 upon this plan, if it should work well, all the debts 

 will be liquidated. 



I have only noticed this project as a corroboration 

 of the accounts I collected of the general state of 

 embarrassment in which the Landowners in Poland 

 are involved. It may, however, be remarked, that 

 the assumption of the proprietors being able, in their 

 united capacity of landlord and tenant, to live on 

 their estates, and have a surplus of six per cent, 

 on their value, is quite gratuitous, and founded on a 

 rate of prices for produce, which of late years has not 

 been nearly realized. It leaves, too, an opening 

 to fraud in the power of desperate proprietors, who 

 may neglect the amount of future imposts, for the 

 sake of temporary relief. In fixing the rate of 

 interest so low as four per cent, this project sacrifices 

 the interests of the creditors to those of the debtors r 

 for money is worth much higher interest on the best 

 of all securities. 



The Bankers of Warsaw discount their own 

 acceptances at the rate of half per cent, per month. 

 There are but few bills, it is true, drawn on them ; 

 but when accepted they become to the acceptors a 

 secure mode of making interest of their capital. The 

 number of bills drawn in Warsaw is few, and the 

 amount small ; but the rate of interest on them may 

 be considered as. the best criterion of the actual 

 worth of the use of money, when no risk is incurred. 



