The London Bankers' Clearing-house was established in 1775; in 1864, the Bank of England was admitted to it; and since then, the Clearing-house itself, and all the bankers and firms using it, keep accounts with the Bank of England, and the balances, formerly settled by money, are now adjusted by simple transfers of account on the books of that great Bank. This carries out the grand principle of the Clearing further than it has yet been carried in this Country, although the United States Sub-Treasury not very long ago joined the New York Clearing-house, while the practical details of the Clearing are simpler and better in New York than in London. The average clearings in the London house (and there are besides many other clearing-houses in the United Kingdom) were £5,218,000,000 a year for 1875-80, and the amounts cleared frequently rose to £20,000,000 a day; which, if paid in gold coin, would weigh about 157 tons and require about 80 horses to carry it; and if paid in silver coin would weigh more than 2500 tons and require 1275 horses. This is stated on the excellent authority of the late Professor Jevons. The total business of the 23 clearing-houses of the United States in 1880 was over $50,000,000,000; the New York Clearing-house did 65% of that business for that year; and the average daily clearings there for the fiscal year 1879 were $76,167,983. We will now describe mainly from personal observation the New York Clearing-house, which was established in 1853, premising that the principle is the same, though the details may be different, in all other clearing-houses wherever located. Business men in New York, as elsewhere, usually pass in to their bankers as a deposit all the cheques and current credits received in the course of a business day. It is the custom for everybody to draw his own cheque _on_ his banker to make payments with, and to pass in _to_ his banker the cheques he receives from others. Say there are sixty clearing-banks in New York City. Each of these banks sorts out after business hours every day all the cheques it has received that day drawn on each of the other banks into separate parcels ready for the clearing the next morning. Each bank has, then, fifty-nine parcels _to deliver_, which represent the property of that bank, and are a _claim_ upon the other banks; and also _to receive_ fifty-nine parcels, which represent the property of the other banks, and are a claim upon _itself_.