The junior clerks are adding up column after column of figures, and are totally absorbed; the chief cashier is pondering deeply over a letter and annotating it.

By-and-by he puts it down, and slowly approaches.

But after you have gone through the preliminary ceremony of waiting, which is an institution of the place, the treatment quite changes.

Your business is accomplished with practised ease, any information you may require is forthcoming on the instant, and deft fingers pass you the coin.

In brief, the whole machinery of banking is here as complete as in Lombard Street.