Chapter I. Of Value.

be transmitted in the precious metals. In point of fact, the merchant who has the amount to pay will even then pay for it by a bill. When a person has a remittance to make to a foreign country, he does [pg 412] not himself search for some one who has money to receive from that country, and ask him for a bill of exchange. In this, as in other branches of business, there is a class of middle-men or brokers, who bring buyers and sellers together, or stand between them, buying bills from those who have money to receive, and selling bills to those who have money to pay. When a customer comes to a broker for a bill on Paris or Amsterdam, the broker sells to him perhaps the bill he may himself have bought that morning from a merchant, perhaps a bill on his own correspondent in the foreign city; and, to enable his correspondent to pay, when due, all the bills he