Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 38.djvu/225

 the House of Commons in committee on 15 Dec. 1692, and a bill was ordered to be brought in. By this bill new duties were imposed on beer and other liquors, on the credit of which a million was to be raised by life annuities. As the annuitants died their annuities were to be divided among the survivors until their number was reduced to seven, when the remaining annuities as they fell in were to lapse to the government. The bill was rapidly passed through both houses (4 William and Mary, c. iii.), and the loan which it authorised was the origin of our national debt (, Hist. of England, iv. 325-326). Adopting Patterson's scheme for a national bank, Montagu in the spring of 1694 introduced the Tonnage Bill, by which a loan was to be raised to meet the expenses of the French war. In order to induce the capitalists to advance the 1,200,000l. required, the subscribers were to be formed into a corporation, known as the Governor and Company of the Bank of England, and were to be allowed to treat the loan to the government as part of their capital, the interest on which, at 8l. per cent., was to be secured by taxes. In spite of considerable opposition in both houses, and a furious paper warfare outside, Montagu's bill, by which the Bank of England was established, became law (5 William and Mary, c. xx.) So eagerly was the new investment taken up in the city that in ten days after the books were opened it was announced that the whole of the money had been subscribed (, iii. 331-2, 333, 338). As a reward for his brilliant services Montagu was promoted to the office of chancellor of the exchequer on 30 April 1694, and was sworn a member of the privy council on 10 May following. On 20 Feb. 1695 he was appointed a commissioner of Greenwich Hospital. At the general election in October 1695 Montagu was returned to parliament for the city of Westminster. While supporting the bill for regulating trials in cases of high treason, which had been reintroduced early in the first session of the new parliament, Montagu suddenly 'seem'd to be so surpriz'd that for a while he could not go on ; but having recovered himself, took occasion from his very surprize to enforce the necessity of allowing Council to Prisoners, who were to appear before their Judges, since he who was not only innocent and unaccus'd, but one of their own members, was so dash'd when he was to speak before that wise and illustrious Assembly' (Life, p. 30). The use of this oratorical device is, however, attributed to Anthony, third earl of Shaftesbury, by Horace Walpole and others (Cat. of Royal and Noble Authors, iv. 56 ; see also Parl. Hist. v. 966, and, Hist. of England, iv. 644).

Aided by Somers, Locke, Newton, and Halley, Montagu determined to remedy the alarming depreciation of the currency. To such an extent had the nefarious practices of clipping and counterfeiting been carried, that the current coinage throughout the country was on an average but little more than half its proper weight, After much controversy, Montagu, on 10 Dec. 1695, carried eleven resolutions, by which it was agreed that the new coinage should be 'according to the established standard of the mint both as to weight and fineness,' that the loss on the clipped silver should be borne by the public, that all crowns and half-crowns should be in future milled, and that a day should be fixed after which no clipped money should pass (Journals of the House of Commons, xi. 358). Owing to the amendments made in the House of Lords to the Re-coinage Bill, which had been framed in conformity with these resolutions, Montagu was obliged to bring in a fresh bill in a slightly modified form, which he succeeded in passing through both houses (7 & 8 William III, c. i.) To provide for the expense of the re-coinage, which occupied four years, and was not completed until 1699, Montagu instituted the window tax (7 & 8 William III, c. xviii.) While the provisions for the new currency were being carried out the credit of the government reached its lowest ebb. Most of the old silver had been withdrawn, and but little of the new had got into circulation. At this crisis Montagu availed himself of the clauses which he had succeeded ingrafting on Harley's National Land Bank Bill (7 & 8 William III, c. xxxi.), empowering the government to issue negotiable paper bearing interest at the rate of threepence a day on a hundred pounds, and he issued the first exchequer bills. They were drawn for various small amounts varying from five to one hundred pounds, were rapidly distributed over the kingdom by post, and were everywhere welcome. By this ingenious scheme credit was revived, and ever since 'the issue of Exchequer bills has been the form in which Government gets its first credit from the House of Commons' (, Historical Gleanings, 1st ser. p. 33, and First Nine Years of the Bank of England, p. 67 ; cf. art. ). In the autumn of 1696 Montagu warmly supported the bill of attainder against Sir John Fenwick, and still further increased his reputation in the House of Commons as a consummate debater. In the same session he carried his scheme popularly known as the General Mortgage, whereby a