SUMMARY OF AUSTRALASIAN BANK RETURNS. Compiled from the Sworn Averages for the Quarter ended 31st December, 1881. New Zealand.-This includes £588,330 Government deposits. + Tasmania.-In this colony's Bank Returas, deposits bearing interest are not distinguished from those not bearing interest. PARLIAMENTARY PAPERS, SESSION 1882. DURING the Parliamentary Session it is proposed to give the titles, &c., of such Parliamentary Papers, Returns, Bills, Acts, &c., as have been issued from time to time. The following additional Papers have been already issued :— REPORT NO. 138. POST OFFICE ANNUITIES AND LIFE ASSURANCE POLICIES, PRICE 1S. 3d. RETURN No. 3-II. AccOUNTS RELATING TO TRADE AND NAVIGATION OF THE UNITED KINGDOM DURING MARCH, 1882, PRICE 6d. REVENUE, TAXATION AND POPULATION, PRICE 1d. MERCHANT SHIPPING TABLES FOR 1881, PRICE 5d. NATIONAL DEBT (ANNUITIES), PRICE 1d. RETURN NO. 88. No. 133. NOTE. The foregoing Papers may be obtained as under : Parliamentary Papers, Report and Bills at Messrs. Hansard's, 13, Great Queen Street, Lincoln's Inn Fields. Acts at Messrs. Eyre and Spottiswoode's, East Harding Street, Fetter Lane, E.C. Parliamentary Papers, Reports and Bills issued by the House of Lords may be obtained at the Sale Office, House of Lords. Persons in the country, and others who may find it inconvenient to send personally to the above places, may obtain any of the Papers and Acts by communicating with Mr. P. S. King, Canada Building, King Street, Westminster, S.W., who undertakes, on payment of the cost and postage, to send them with as little delay as possible. VOL. III.] [PART IV. JOURNAL OF THE INSTITUTE OF BANKERS. JUNE, 1882. SIR JOHN LUBBOCK, Bart., M.P., President, in the Chair. OUR GOLD COINAGE. AN INQUIRY INTO ITS PRESENT DEFECTIVE CONDITION, WITH A VIEW TO ITS REFORM. BY JOHN BIDDULPH MARTIN, Esq, M.A., F.S.S. [Read before the Bankers' Institute, Wednesday, 19th April, 1892.] "It is, we believe, undeniable that a very large portion of the gold coins circulating in this country is below the current weight, or very nearly so, and a gradual re-coinage will soon become a matter of necessity under any circumstances."-Report of Royal Commission on International Coinage, 1868. I was permitted two years ago to read before the Institute of Bankers a paper on the system of paper currency in this and other countries, and while I feel flattered in being called upon to appear before the Society a second time after so short an interval, I deem that the compliment is paid rather to the subject than to the lecturer. There is, as yet, by no means a dearth of matter to which the attention of this Society might advantageously be called, and in our muster-roll we have no lack of capable exponents thereof; but it was suggested to me that an inquiry into our bank-note system might suitably be followed up by a paper on the gold currency of this country, and ultimately my own diffidence yielded to my sense of the importance of the subject, and, I may add, to the inexhaustible importunity of our late esteemed secretary. It need hardly be said that the question of the currency is one that is vital to the prosperity of every country, and one that has during the whole period of our national history engrossed the attention of both statesmen and theorists; there has been at all times a struggle between Royal prerogative and private ingenuity, honest or otherwise, to make the coin of the realm do more than its fair share of |