Page:Forgotten Man and Other Essays.djvu/396

 at Philadelphia caused by the failure of the Southern remittances. The money markets in all these cities were very stringent until October. On the ninth of that month the Bank of the United States failed on drafts from New York, and on the tenth the news was received that the drafts on Hottinguer had been protested. He had given notice that he would not pay unless he was covered, and the drafts arrived before the specie did. Jandon succeeded in getting Rothschild to take up the bills. The amount was seven million francs.

The banks south and west of New York and some of the Rhode Island banks now suspended again. Specie at Philadelphia was at one hundred and seven to one hundred and seven and one-half. United States Bank stock at seventy. On October 15, it was at eighty, and sold at New York at one-fourth premium. Scarcely any New York City notes were in circulation.

This suspension was the real catastrophe of the speculative period which preceded. A great and general liquidation now began. Perhaps as many as two hundred of these banks never resumed. The stagnation of industry lasted for three or four years. The public improvements so rashly begun were suspended or abandoned. The states were struggling with the debts contracted. Some repudiated; some suspended the payment of interest. The New England states and New York escaped all the harsher features of this depression and emerged from it first. In proportion as we go further south and west we find the distress more intense and more prolonged. The recovery was never marked by any distinct point of time, but came gradually and imperceptibly.

The credit of the Bank of the United States bore up wonderfully under the shock of its second suspension. Its friends were ready to attribute its misfortunes to conspiracies, jealousy, or any other cause but its own faults.