The Bay State Monthly, Volume 3, No. 1

It is to be observed also that section 5204 specifies that if losses have at any time been sustained by a bank equal to or exceeding its "undivided profits" on hand no dividends shall be made.

Now the surplus fund is not undivided profits, except in so far as it is earnings not divided among the shareholders. It is made upon a division of the profits—so much to the stockholders and so much to the surplus fund. If the law had intended that losses might be charged to surplus fund in order to leave the other earnings available for dividends it is to be presumed that care would not have been taken to use the words "undivided profits," in the connection in which they are used, as stated above.

Furthermore, if losses may be charged to surplus when at the same time the other earnings are used for dividends to shareholders, a bank may go on declaring dividends, and never accumulate any surplus fund whatever if losses be sustained, as they are in the history of nearly every bank. A construction of the law which would render inoperative the requirement for the creation of a surplus cannot be sound; and as the only way to insure that a surplus shall be accumulated and maintained is to charge losses against other earnings as far as may be before trenching upon the surplus; it must be that the law intended that the "undivided profits" which are not in the surplus fund shall first be used to meet losses.

To a full understanding of the subject it is proper to say that after using all other earnings on hand at the usual time for declaring a dividend to meet losses the whole or any part of the surplus may be used if the losses exceed the amount of the earnings other than surplus, and then at the end of another six months a dividend may be made if the earnings will admit of it, one-tenth of the earnings being first carried to surplus and the re-accumulation of the fund thus begun.

This is because the law has been complied with by charging the losses against the "undivided profits," as far as they will go, and it is impossible to do more, or require more to be done, for the re-establishment of the state of things that existed prior to losses having been sustained than to do what the law requires shall be done to originally establish that state of things.

CONCORD, N.H

IMPRESSIONS D'UN FRANÇAISPar le Professeur Emile Pingault

Quand les Français, les Français de France, comme disent leurs cousins canadiens, parlent de l'Amérique ou pensent à cette reine des républiques, ils n'ont en vue que les grandes villes. New-York, Boston, Philadelphie, Chicago, la Nouvelle Orléans etc. … forment seuls, pour eux, l'immense continent découvert par Christophe Colomb.

Je voudrais essayer de réagir contre l'idée générale qu'on a, que la lumiére, l'intelligence, la prospérité ne se trouvent que dans les grands centres.

La Providence a voulu que je vinsse établir ma tente dans une ville qui, bien qu'étant la capitale du New-Hampshire, paraît comme un point microscopique auprès des villes que j'ai citées plus haut. Eh bien, sans flatterie aucune, si l'on a pu appeler Boston l'Athène de l'Améríque, je ne vois pas pourquoi on n'appellerait pas Concord un petit Rambouillet, toute proportion gardée.

Je ne vous dirái pas que Concord est une petite ville située sur la Merrimac, de 14,000 à 15,000 habitants, mais ce que je puis vous dire c'est qu'il faudrait aller bien loin pour trouver une ville plus intelligente et plus éclairée, je dirais même plus patriarcale. Tout le monde s'y connaît et s'estime l'un l'autre. Il y a dans cette ville une émulation pour le bien et pour l'instruction qui ne peut être surpassée.

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