$450,698,624.00 $218,276,620.69 $270,507,787.63 $314,744,423.73 $73,842,705.87

Total assets, $1,328,070,161.92.

Besides savings banks there are in the several States and Territories, say, 5,600 national and State banks and private bankers, with a paid up capital of $806,000,000 and deposits of $2,100,000,ooo, with most of which small deposits are made. It is pure conjecture to estimate what part of these deposits should be classed as savings; but the Comptroller of the Currency gives official and unofficial returns of the deposits in so-called savings banks, of which we have taken no account, as $100,037,406; and, if the amount of savings deposits in these should be estimated at threefourths, or, say, $77,000,000, and the savings deposits with national and State banks and private bankers in the thirty-five remaining States and Territories at $220,000,000 (which is perhaps within the true amount), we shall have a total savings deposit in the country of $1,500,000,000. But this amount seems small for a country which affords the facilities for accumulation which the United States possesses, and is to be accounted for by the number of life insurance and co-operative building loan companies in which savings are invested, the easy terms and cheap prices at which land can be purchased in all the States and Territories, and the moderate amount of capital required for starting business on one's own account. All these absorb savings that would be directed into savings banks, and perhaps hinder their incorporation in States where none exist. It is a singular fact that in cities like New York, Boston, and Philadelphia, where savings banks have been in operation the longest, and where the number of depositors is greatest, the masses of the people are the most law-abiding; and, although anarchists and socialists from abroad. have lately come among the foreign-born population, to incite to riot and resistance to law, the voice of public opinion has been almost unanimously against them, causing their arrest and indictment on the first breach of the peace, followed by trial and imprisonment, which has completely frustrated their attempts to destroy the power of the government. While in places like Chicago and Milwaukee, having no savings banks, this class of people, with evil designs, have influenced "fellows of the baser sort" to riot; and together they committed murders, which were punished by the judicial execution of five persons and the life imprisonment of others. It may not, therefore, be claiming too much to say that savings banks have demonstrated that accumulations in them of capital by the masses, whose trustees largely invest in property in the vicinity of the banks and in the bonded debts of the Com

monwealths and of the United States, influence the depositors to become more useful and peaceable citizens; for they correctly reason that the safety of their deposits and the certainty of dividends depend primarily on the enforcement of law and the maintenance of order.

In some States, their savings banks are required only to set aside a small percentage of earnings to meet contingencies: others annually divide nearly all the net earnings; and a disposition to declare large dividends is too general, which State officials contend against, it being a weakness of mankind to take optimistic views of the future and to make little provision for reverses, which are almost certain periodically to occur.

New York, called the Empire State, has the largest banks and the greatest deposits. Its experience, also, is the ripest, on which its general savings-bank law is founded. It was enacted after its banks had passed through many trials and tribulations, and is the model of the country. Down to May, 1875, all of them had special charters which were unlike in their provisions and powers. In that year, a commission of experts prepared the present law, which was enacted by the legislature, to which all the banks were required to conform ; and its success has been marvellous. The badly managed banks have been weeded out or brought to a higher standard. Under it, investments are restricted to firstclass securities, individual deposits are not permitted to accumulate beyond $3,000, ordinary dividends must not exceed five per cent. per annum, a surplus fund in each bank must be gradually accumulated until it reaches fifteen per cent. of its deposits, estimating securities that are worth it at par and others, if any, at their market value, after that any excess earned is to be divided once in three years among the depositors. Already the surplus in the oldest and best managed institutions has reached six to eight per cent., after paying semi-annual dividends at the rate of about four per cent. per annum for the past thirteen years.

Other States have recognized the wisdom of this advanced legislation, and are gradually adopting its most prominent features as experience points out the necessity. In a republic like the United States, if laws are not at first scientifically perfect, it is usually because experience has not demonstrated their defects; but, once the necessity of amendment is clearly shown, the power of public opinion is brought to bear, then the tendency is, not that justice shall be done in the future, but that the transgressions of the past shall be atoned.

New York State has 125 banks, with 1,325,062 depositors and $505,017,751 on deposit, which is nearly two-fifths of the depositors and more than two-fifths of the deposits in all the savings banks; while the population does not greatly exceed one-fifth that of the thirteen States. These banks have seventeen per cent. surplus and undivided profits, estimating securities at their market value. They paid in dividends to depositors about $17,000,000 the past year, and their total increase in resources in the past ten years has been $243,732,549.

The average cost per annum for the care of each acccount is $1.23, or of 1 per cent. to total deposit. It has also the largest individual bank in the world, viz. :

The Bowery Savings Bank, which has 106,303 depositors, $44,621,033.64 on deposit, with a surplus of more than twenty per cent., estimating securities at their market value, or 9 per cent., estimating them at par. It is also the largest creditor of the government among the savings banks, and owns $22,000,000 United States 4, 4, and 6 per cent. bonds, which are worth in the market $27,342,390. Its gross income is 4.97 per cent. of its deposits, its expense of management is of 1 per cent., it pays interest, semi-annually, at the rate of 4 per cent. per annum on deposits from $5 to $3,000, which have been in the bank at least three months prior to January and July 1st, and has paid to depositors since its incorporation in May, 1834, $37,758,326.53 in fifty-four years. It has one account in the bank now drawing interest which was opened in 1842, more than forty-five years ago; and there are 1,933 accounts now drawing interest which have been open twenty years or more. It has added nearly 1 per cent. to its surplus fund the past year. It employs 19 clerks and 6 other employees, and had 218,379 transactions with depositors in the year, averaging 728 for each working day.

The average expense of savings-bank management in all the thirteen States is less than of 1 per cent., the average interest paid is nearly 4 per cent. In the six New England States the average is greater than 4 per cent. In Vermont it was 4 per cent., and in Rhode Island 46 per cent. was paid in 1887. The trustees who manage these institutions, and under whose direction these good results are achieved, are men of affairs, who, besides managing their private business, meet once a month as a board of trustees: many of them serve on committees, weekly and sometimes daily. In making investments and in general management, they assume all the liability of trustees, and the laws and public opinion