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being in danger would bring in support from the most un-
expected quarters. It was only because people knew them
to be so very safe, that in some cases (as she lamented to
say in Mr. Nosnibor’s) they felt that their support was un-
necessary. Moreover these institutions never departed from
the safest and most approved banking principles. Thus they
never allowed interest on deposit, a thing now frequently
done by certain bubble companies, which by doing an ille-
gitimate trade had drawn many customers away; and even
the shareholders were fewer than formerly, owing to the in-
novations of these unscrupulous persons, for the Musical
Banks paid little or no dividend, but divided their profits
by way of bonus on the original shares once in every thirty
thousand years; and as it was now only two thousand years
since there had been one of these distributions, people felt
that they could not hope for another in their own time and
preferred investments whereby they got some more tangi-
ble return; all which, she said, was very melancholy to think
of.
Having made these last admissions, she returned to her
original statement, namely, that every one in the country
really supported these banks. As to the fewness of the peo-
ple, and the absence of the able-bodied, she pointed out to
me with some justice that this was exactly what we ought
to expect. The men who were most conversant about the
stability of human institutions, such as the lawyers, men of
science, doctors, statesmen, painters, and the like, were just
those who were most likely to be misled by their own fan-
cied accomplishments, and to be made unduly suspicious

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