5
total sum under discount by the Bank can only be interpreted
a permission to give accommodation
الم تعلم
to that amount.
Probably
at this moment
the Hong Kong and Shanghai
Bank have under discount about Thirteen Millions of Dollars and
under the above section it would
be possible for three Directors to
obtain accommodation each to
the amount of considerably more than Four Millions.
9. I confess I was so much struck with this latitude of accommodation secured to the
Directors by Ordinance that I was
anxious to curtail it by some
provision in the deed of settlement,
especially as many recent cases
showed how unsafe it is to entrust Directors with such extraordinary powers.
10. I found however on inquiry that the same provision existed
in so many other Bank Charters that I should be making an invidious distinction and one moreover adopted too late, as if made at all it should have been
done at the time when the Ordinance incorporating the Bank was before the Legislative Council.