From the confidential report of its organisation let me quote one illuminating paragraph which is full of suggestion for American banking, for it shows the new idea of British preparedness for world business. Here it is:
"Nearly as important as the Board would be the General Staff. It is fair to assume that women will in the future take a considerable share in purely clerical work, and this fact will enable the institution to take fuller advantage of the qualifications of its male staff to push its affairs in every quarter of the globe. Youths should not be engaged without a language qualification, and after a few years' training they should be sent abroad. It could probably be arranged that associated banks abroad would agree to employ at each of their principal branches one of the Institution's clerks, not necessarily to remain there for an indefinite period, but to get a knowledge of the trade and characteristics of the country. Such clerks might in many cases sever their connection with the banks to which they were appointed and start in business on their own account. They would, however, probably look upon the institution as their 'Alma Mater,' Every endeavour should be made to promote _esprit de corps_; and where exceptional ability is developed it should be ungrudgingly rewarded. If industry is to be extended it is essential that British products should be _pushed_; and manufacturers, merchants and bankers must combine to push them. It is believed that this pushing could be assisted by the creation of a body of young business men in the way above described."
The scope and purpose of this British Trade Bank suggest another East India Company with all the possibilities of gold and glory which attended that romantic eighteenth-century enterprise. Perhaps another Clive or a second Hastings is somewhere in the making.
That the British Government proposes to follow the German lead and definitely go into business--thus reversing its tradition of aloofness from financial enterprise--is shown in the new British and Italian Corporation, formed to establish close economic relations between Britain and Italy. It starts a whole era in British banking, for it means the subsidising of a private undertaking out of national funds.