The movement has all the precision of a military drill. When the second bell sounds, at exactly 10 o'clock, each delivery clerk takes one step forward, hands the proper package to the settling clerk of the bank next to him, drops the accompanying ticket showing the amount into an aperture like a letter box, and places before the settling clerk his schedule, on which the latter places his initials. Thus the procession moves uninterruptedly until each delivery clerk has presented to each settling clerk the proper package and ticket. Usually this part of the operation is completed in ten minutes. Meanwhile the proof clerk, who occupies a desk near the manager, has entered the claims of each bank under the head "Bank Cr." on a broad sheet of paper.
Inasmuch as the amount of each bank's claim against the Clearing House (entered under the head "Banks Cr.") is the sum of all the tickets which its delivery clerk has pushed into the letter boxes of the other banks, it follows that all the tickets of all the banks should equal all the entries under that head. The next step in the operation is for each settling clerk to arrange the amounts of all the tickets in his letter box in a column, add it up, and send the amount to the proof clerk, who transcribes and arranges it according to the bank's number under the head "Banks Dr.," so that the debit of Bank A shall be on the same line with its credit.
Then the difference between the two will show how much the bank owes the Clearing House or how much the Clearing House owes the bank. The time occupied by the settling clerks in arranging their tickets and adding up the columns is about half an hour. As fast as these footings are completed, they are sent to the proof clerk, who puts them in the debit column opposite the credits of the banks, respectively. When all are completed, if no error has been made, the footings of the credit and debit columns must be exactly equal and the footings of the two other columns, which show the differences, must be exactly equal. Then these differences are read off slowly and in a distinct tone by the manager, so that each settling clerk can write down the sum that his bank has to pay or to receive. As time is money at the Clearing House, a fine is exacted for every error and every delay in making footings, for every disobedience of the orders of the manager, or for every instance of disorderly conduct.—Horace White: Money and Banking.
2
The Treasury, in connection with its money washing, has asked national banks to exercise more care in sending in money for redemption. Banks frequently put into the same bundle, good notes, bad notes, and notes of different denominations. When they are mixed in this way, it requires a good deal of work to separate the money. The Treasury thinks that the banks could do this work, so that, when the money reaches Washington, it could easily be separated by packages instead of each package having to be separated first. The Assistant Secretary says he believes that, when he gets the subject worked out in detail, new washed money will be returned to the bank in any denomination desired on the same day that it is received; that money unfit for laundering will be destroyed and new money issued. This expeditious handling of money sent in for redemption cannot, however, be attained, he admits, without the co-operation of the banks. In a short time, he believes, all banks will see that it is to their benefit to do this.
CHAPTER XXI
THE CORPORATION
The study that we have thus far made of the various kinds of businesses would be incomplete did we not briefly outline the different types of organization by which modern business is conducted. This will naturally lead us to a discussion of stocks and bonds, which are of great importance in every big business and of interest to individuals as means of investment. However, as the subjects are probably outside the experience of most students, we shall treat them as simply as possible, letting the chapter stand rather for the information it contains than for its application to the study of English expression.