Econ 6819.03 ARVARD COLLECT NOV 20 1903 LIBRARY Wolcott gund. The late Dr Bithell died in December 1992, while these pages were passing through the press. PREFACE. IN compiling the present Dictionary, the author has been guided by the following rules :— I. To exclude all words found in ordinary dictionaries, used in the same sense by bankers and merchants as by the public. II. To insert, as far as possible, all technical words used by bankers and merchants, but which are not used by others, except in connection with banking and mercantile affairs. III. To include all such words as are used in a vague sense in colloquial speech, but which have a restricted and technical meaning when employed in economic science. IV. All the principal moneys of account, the coins on which the exchanges are based, their weight and fineness, have been described with great minuteness. These descriptions are founded mainly on the information furnished by the reports of the Monetary Conference which met during the Paris Exposition of 1878, and on the tables, since drawn up by M. Sudre, Chef des Bureaux de l'Administration des Monnaies, and published in the Annuaire par le Bureau des Longitudes for 1879, 1880, 1881. In carrying out his scheme, the author has been assisted by the advice and information of several gentlemen experienced in City affairs. Some of them have kindly read the articles bearing on topics with which they are specially familiar, and have furnished suggestions and improvements, since embodied in the respective articles. In a work like the following it is obvious that its value must depend very largely on the care and assiduity exercised in the examination of writers and experts in the subjects treated of. A list of the works consulted, and from which definitions have been extracted, is given on page vii. It has not been found practicable, nor was it needful, that the name of every author quoted should be appended to each quotation. The constant repetition of names would have occupied so much space, and would have so encumbered the letter |