Memoirs of a banking house

MEMOIRS OF A BANKING-HOUSE. 15
most destitute situation. The business of the house at London
was of itself noway considerable ; but it became of importance to
the general interest by their being the correspondents of the house
at Edinburgh, who drew their bills on them, and transacted through
them their exchange business. The London house had not a person
in it Avho was entitled to sign the firm, and although the business
was very well attended to by Mr Keith, who held the company's
power of attorney, it was impossible that he could have the weight
of a partner, and it is wonderful that things went on so well as they
did. At Edinburgh, matters Avere, if possible, still worse ; as there
was no ostensible partner but Mr Stephen, whose slender abilities
were altogether inadequate to the task of conducting the houses, and
for which my youth and inexperience rendered me extrenjely ill
qualified. It was therefore a singular instance of the goodness of
Providence to us, that, under such feeble management, the houses
still supported their credit and reputation. Indeed, I must chiefly
attribute it, under Heaven, to the popularity of Provost Coutts and
his family in Edinburgh, and the established reputation of their
firm, by which the friends and correspondents of the house were
induced to continue their business there as formerly. Yet even
that advantage would not have been sufficient, had I not been
strongly supported and assisted by my intimate friend and com-
panion, Mr Hunter, whom I have mentioned as my fellow-
apprentice in the house. Although he was nearly two years younger
than me, yet such were his superior abilities, that, thi-ough him
alone, I may say, it was owing that Mr Stephen and I did not
sink under the load of conducting a banking-house such as ours,
inconsiderable as the business then was compared with what it has
since become. Even then, however, the house was one of the first
reputation in Edinburgh, for, of course, everything must be
estimated by comparison. The first resolution which Mr Hunter
and I formed, on finding ourselves practically the sole conductors
of the house, was to wind up the corn-speculations then existing,
and to relinquish that trade entirely, so as in future to confine the
house to its proper and natural business of exchange and banking,
by which prudent resolution, and by unremitting assiduity and
attention, we were enabled to go on Avithout any apparent
diminution of business.
But to return from this digression, as Messrs James and
Thomas Coutts, the only two brothers remaining capable of doing
business, were bankers in London, and their eldest brother having
fortune sufficient for his requirements in his retired mode of life,
they would probably have given themselves little trouble about