(M684) This kind of trading was regulated by the Code.(729) Unfortunately, the opening sections of the part dealing with the relations of principal and agent are lost; but from what is left we see that it insisted on exact accounts being taken, on both sides, of the amounts of money or value of goods thus invested. If the merchant intrusted money to his agent, he was to take a receipt for it. If the agent received goods, he was to enter their money value and obtain his principal’s acknowledgment of the amount of his debt. If he suffered loss of goods from his caravan by bandits, or in an enemy’s land, he could swear to his loss, and be exempt from repayment to his principal. But if he did not prosper in his business, or sold at a loss, he had to make good the capital, at least, to his principal. The Code leaves nothing to chance. If the agent is foolish enough not to obtain a sealed memorandum of the amounts received, or a receipt for what he pays to his principal, it is enacted that money not sealed for cannot be put in the accounts. Much was clearly left to the good faith of the agent. The principal was tolerably secure of receiving back his money and had hope of profit. Against that he had to set possible loss by robbery of the caravan. But he was not bound again to employ the same agent. An agent detected defrauding his principal had to pay threefold. But it speaks well for the Code as protector of the weak that it made the capitalist who defrauded the agent repay sixfold. (M685) From the contemporary documents we learn that the name for the business was _girru_. That this was also the name for an “expedition,” warlike as well as peaceable, points to its connection with the caravan trade. The sign for _girru_, also used for _ḫarrânu_, a “journey,” came in later times to be used for all kinds of business transactions. That the relations noted in the Code actually were carried out in practice, many tablets show. Thus we read: One shekel of silver, price of one hundred and eighty _ŠE_, and three shekels of silver which Zuzana lent Aplâ son of Edishu, for five _years_, to enter on his _girru_. He shall pay one hundred and eighty _ŠE_ and three shekels of silver to take back his sealed receipt.(730) Here the capital intrusted was a quantity of corn worth a shekel, and three shekels in money. This was in order to enter on a business journey. The agent Aplâ had to return the capital in full, as the Code enacts, to take back his bond. There is no agreement as to profits, which might be wanting; that was left to be understood. As a rule, the time was shorter, generally “one year.” The agent appears to have often borne the name of _muttalliku_, “one who wanders about,” “a hawker.” The same may be denoted by _AḪ-ME-ZU-AB_, a group of signs whose reading is not yet clear, but may be a variant of the ideogram for _šamallû_. (M686) Business was also done, as the Code shows, as speculation in futures. Thus(731) we read: