From time to time other clerks from every house enter
the room, and, passing along, drop into the box the checks due by
that firm to the house from which this distributor is sent. The
clerk at the table enters the amount of the several checks in a
book previously prepared, under the name of the bank to which
they are respectively due.
Four o'clock in the afternoon is the latest hour to which the
boxes are open to receive checks; and at a few minutes before
that time, some signs of increased activity begin to appear in
this previously quiet and business-like scene. Numerous clerks
then arrive, anxious to distribute, up to the latest possible
moment, the checks which have been paid into the houses of their
employers.
At four o'clock all the boxes are removed, and each clerk
adds up the amount of the checks put into his box and payable by
his own to other houses. He also receives another book from his
own house, containing the amounts of the checks which their
distributing clerk has put into the box of every other banker.
Having compared these, he writes out the balances due to or from
his own house, opposite the name of each of the other banks; and
having verified this statement by a comparison with the similar
list made by the clerks of those houses, he sends to his own bank
the general balance resulting from this sheet, the amount of
which, if it is due from that to other houses, is sent back in
bank-notes.
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