Likewise, when the drawer gives advice of his having drawn such a bill upon him, he gives an account of the sum drawn, the name of the person it is payable to, the time it is drawn at, that is, the time given for payment, and he adds thus—'I doubt not your giving my bill due honour;' that is, of accepting it, and paying it when it is due.
This term is also used in another case in foreign trade only, namely—a merchant abroad (say it be at Lisbon, or Bourdeaux) draws a bill of £300 sterling upon his correspondent at London: the correspondent happens to be dead, or is broke, or by some other accident the bill is not accepted; another merchant on the Exchange hearing of it, and knowing, and perhaps corresponding with, the merchant abroad who drew the bill, and loth his credit should suffer by the bill going back protested, accepts it, and pays it for him. This is called accepting it for the honour of the drawer; and he writes so upon the bill when he accepts it, which entitles him to re-draw the same with interest upon the drawer in Lisbon or Bourdeaux, as above.
This is, indeed, a case peculiar to foreign commerce, and is not often practised in home trade, and among shopkeepers, though sometimes I have known it practised here too: but I name it on two accounts, first—to legitimate the word honourable, which I had used, and which has its due propriety in matters of trade, though not in the same acceptation as it generally receives in common affairs; and, secondly, to let the tradesman see how deeply the honour, that is, the credit of trade, is concerned in the punctual payment of bills of exchange, and the like of promissory notes; for in point of credit there is no difference, though in matter of form there is.
There are a great many variations in the drawing bills from foreign countries, according as the customs and usages of merchants direct, and according as the coins and rates of exchange differ, and according as the same terms are differently understood in several places; as the word usance, and two usance, which is a term for the number of days given for payment, after the date of the bill; and though this is a thing particularly relating to merchants, and to foreign commerce, yet as the nature of bills of exchange is pretty general, and that sometimes an inland tradesman, especially in seaport towns, may be obliged to take foreign accepted bills in payment for their goods; or if they have money to spare (as sometimes it is an inland tradesman's good luck to have), may be asked to discount such bills—I say, on this account, and that they may know the value of a foreign bill when they see it, and how far it has to run, before it has to be demanded, I think it not foreign to the case before me, to give them the following account:—
1. As to the times of payment of foreign bills of exchange, and the terms of art ordinarily used by merchants in drawing, and expressed in the said bills: the times of payment are, as above, either—
(1.) At sight; which is to be understood, not the day it is presented, but three days (called days of grace) after the bill is accepted: (2.) usance: (3.) two usance.[[47]]
Usance between London and all the towns in the States Generals' dominions, and also in the provinces now called the Austrian Netherlands [Belgium], is one month. And two usance is two months; reckoning not from the acceptance of the bill, but from the date of it. Usance between London and Hamburgh is two months, Venice is three months; and double usance, or two usance, is double that time. Usance payable at Florence or Leghorn, is two months; but from thence payable at London, usance is three months. Usance from London to Rouen or Paris, is one month; but they generally draw at a certain number of days, usually twenty-one days' sight. Usance from London to Seville, is two months; as likewise between London and Lisbon, and Oporto, to or from. Usance from Genoa to Rome is payable at Rome ten days after sight. Usance between Antwerp and Genoa, Naples or Messina, is two months, whether to or from. Usance from Antwerp or Amsterdam, payable at Venice, is two months, payable in bank.
There are abundance of niceties in the accepting and paying of bills of exchange, especially foreign bills, which I think needless to enter upon here; but this I think I should not omit, namely—
That if a man pays a bill of exchange before it is due, though he had accepted it, if the man to whom it was payable proves a bankrupt after he has received the money, and yet before the bill becomes due, the person who voluntarily paid the money before it was due, shall be liable to pay it again to the remitter; for as the remitter delivered his money to the drawer, in order to have it paid again to such person as he should order, it is, and ought to be, in his power to divert the payment by altering the bill, and make it payable to any other person whom he thinks fit, during all the time between the acceptance and the day of payment.
This has been controverted, I know, in some cases, but I have always found, that by the most experienced merchants, and especially in places of the greatest business abroad, it was always given in favour of the remitter, namely, that the right of guiding the payment is in him, all the time the bill is running; and no bill can or ought to be paid before it is due, without the declared assent of the remitter, signified under his hand, and attested by a public notary. There are, I say, abundance of niceties in the matter of foreign exchanges, and in the manner of drawing, accepting, and protesting bills; but as I am now speaking with, and have confined my discourse in this work to, the inland tradesmen of England, I think it would be as unprofitable to them to meddle with this, as it would be difficult to them to understand it.[[48]]