At present it is supported by about eleven
hundred members, who each pay ten pounds per
annum, besides finding securities for between
eight hundred and nine hundred pounds. There
are also fifty authorised clerks allowed to transact
business within " the house," as it is called,
upon an annual payment of five pounds; and
some three hundred unauthorised clerks, who
are admitted to the same privileges for a smaller
annual subscription. This body is governed by
a stringent set of rules, carried out by a
committee of thirty members, possessing great
power.

The building is regarded as a mysterious
temple by the general public, simply because
only the authorised members are privileged
to enter it. A visitor, if he can find the
entrance up a court inThrogmorton-street, may go
as far as the door, and watch the excited crowd
of brokers, speculators, and jobbers, through a
glass partition, but this is all. If he ventures
inside the building he will stand a fair chance of
being hustled, and of having his clothes torn
and his hat battered in, amidst howling cries of
"fourteen hundred new fives."

On the wall at the left side of the building is
the ''black-board," a register of the names of
defaulting members who have failed under
disgraceful circumstances, and have not given up
their estates to be divided amongst their creditors
by the committee of the house. As the
law does not recognise stockjobbing transactions,
such creditors have no more hold over
their debtors than one betting man has over
another. The debts are merely debts of honour;
but, as such, are generally very scrupulously paid.
The black-board does not seem to be very full of
names; and some explain the fact by saying that
it is not used with strict impartiality. During
1850, particularly, individuals, whose conduct
merited the penalty of this public exposure, are
said to have escaped the ordeal by influence
with the committee.

ln the further right-hand corner of this building
is the consol market, a place where nearly
all transactions take place in the public funds.
Immediately under the glass screen at the
entrance, on each side of long tables, like
school tables, is the "rubbish market," as it is
contemptuously called, a spot where nearly all
the transactions take place in "miscellaneous"
shares. Twenty years ago, railway scrip, or
subscription paper, was classed under this head;
but now it can command a market to itself;
and its capital of four hundred millions sterling
makes it as important as consols. The other
stocks dealt in, represent foreign railways, banks,
mines, waterworks, gas and coke companies,
bridges, docks, canals, and insurance companies.

The mode of transacting business in the Stock
Exchange has often been explained; but in
consequence of the numerous technicalities and
intricacies surrounding it, it must always be
learned from professional experience rather than
from books. The small capitalist, wishing to
invest his money in the funds, or any other Stock
Exchange security, goes to a recognised broker
with an introduction, and gives him an order to
buy. The broker goes upon the Exchange,
where he seeks a stockjobber—one of the class
of members who remain stationary inside the
stock market always ready to buy or sell to any
amount. Much of this buying and selling, by
dexterous manœuvring, becomes little more
than a "time-bargain" in practice, or a bet
that certain stock will be at a certain price by a
certain day; but it is necessary for the furtherance
of business on the Stock Exchange, that
every seller should be able to find a buyer without
delay, and every buyer a seller. The jobbers
reserve a margin for themselves of one-eighth
per cent between the buying and the selling
price, the lowest price quoted being the selling
price, and the highest the buying price. This
eighth per cent added to the broker's commission
of an equal amount, makes a difference of
five shillings per cent against the outside
capitalist who wishes to invest his money in the
funds.

Certain dates have been fixed by the
committee of the Stock Exchange as settling days, for
the purpose of balancing time-bargain and stock-
buying accounts. These dates occur once a month,
as far as Consols are concerned, and at intervals of
a fortnight as far as concerns shares and foreign
stocks. On these days all bargains have to be
adjusted and closed, and many fearful settlings
are recorded in Stock Exchange annals. We
need not go back to the beginning of the present
century for examples of Stock Exchange panics,
as we have the history of one recorded by Mr.
Morier Evans, which occurred only the other
day, about the middle of 1859. The whole
Stock Exchange, according to the account given,
appears then to have been on the verge of
bankruptcy, the causes being injudicious speculations
for a rise, or a " Bull " account, and the
fall occasioned by the " Italian difficulty," and
the rumoured alliance between Russia and
France. Many members of the house owe their
ruin to the movements of the Emperor
Napoleon in that year—an Emperor who is at
least no unworthy successor of his uncle, in
the effect he is able to produce upon the Stock
Exchange. Twenty or thirty failures occurred
in a day, and the link of connexion between
the different stock markets was so close that
the suspension or embarrassment of one member
frequently jeopardised the position of seven
or eight. The panic continued all through
April, and the fall in consols was often as much
as one and a half per cent. At least a
hundred members of the Stock Exchange broke
down on this occasion—a number not equalled
since 1825—and many men of large fortune lost
all their previous accumulations. All this havoc
was produced by a wide and general depreciation
of foreign securities, and a fall in consols from
about ninety-five to eighty-eight, a price which
they were nearly touching a few weeks ago.

To read an account of this late panic by a
sympathetic observer, any one would suppose
that Bartholomew-lane, Old Broad-street, and
Throgmorton-street, were haunted by withered