EXAMP

EXAMP. 1. If London remit 1000 l. Sterling to Spain, by way of Holland, at 35s. Flemish per pound Sterling; thence to France, at 58d. Flemish per crown; thence to Venice, at 100 crowns per 60 ducats; and thence to Spain, at 360 mervadies per ducat; how many pialtres, of 272 mervadies, will the 1000 l. Sterling amount to in Spain?

In order to abridge the terms divide 58 and 420 by 2, and you have the new antecedent 29, and the new consequent 210; reject two ciphers in 100 and 1000; divide 272 and 360 by 8, and you have 34 and 45; divide 34 and 60 by 2, and you have 17 and 30; and the whole will stand abridged as above.

Then, $29\; \backslash times\; 17\; =\; 493$ divisor; and $210\; \backslash times\; 30\; \backslash times\; 45\; \backslash times\; 10\; =\; 2835000$ dividend; and, $493)2835000(5750\backslash frac\{1\}\{2\}$ pialtres. Ans.

Or, the consequents may be connected with the sign of multiplication, and placed over a line by way of numerator; and the antecedents, connected in the same manner, may be placed under the line, by way of denominator; and then abridged, as follows:

And, $493)2835000(5750\backslash frac\{1\}\{2\}$ pialtres. Ans.

The placing the terms by way of antecedent and consequent, and working as the rules direct, save so many iterations of the rule of three, and greatly shortens the operation. The proportions at large for the above question would stand as under.

If we suppose the course of direct exchange to Spain to be 42$\backslash frac\{1\}\{2\}$d. Sterling per pialtre, the 1000 l. remitted would only amount to 5647$\backslash frac\{1\}\{2\}$ pialtres; and, consequently, 103 pialtres are gained by the negotiation; that is, about 2 per cent.

2. A banker in Amsterdam remits to London 400 l. Flemish; first to France at 56d. Flemish per crown; from France to Venice, at 100 crowns per 60 ducats;

from Venice to Hamburg, at 100d. Flemish per ducat; from Hamburg to Lisbon, at 50d. Flemish per crusade of 400 rees; and, lastly, from Lisbon to London at 64d. Sterling per millree: How much Sterling money will the remittance amount to? and how much will be gained or saved, supposing the direct exchange from Holland to London at 36s. 10d. Flemish per pound Sterling?

To find how much the exchange from Amsterdam directly to London, at 36s. 10d. Flemish per l. Sterling, will amount to, say,

In the above example, the par of arbitration, or the arbitrated price, between London and Amsterdam, viz. the number of Flemish pence given for 1 l. Sterling, may be found thus:

Make 64d. Sterling, the price of the millree, the first antecedent; then all the former consequents will become antecedents, and all the antecedents will become consequents. Place 240, the pence in 1 l. Sterling, as the last consequent, and then proceed as taught above, viz.

Or the arbitrated price may be found from the answer to the question, by saying

The work may be proved by the arbitrated price thus: As 1 l. Sterling to 36s. 5$\backslash frac\{1\}\{2\}$d. Flemish, so 219 l. 8s. 6$\backslash frac\{1\}\{2\}$d. Sterling to 400 l. Flemish.

The arbitrated price compared with the direct course shows whether the direct or circular remittance will be most advantageous, and how much. Thus the banker at Amsterdam will think it better exchange to receive 1 l. Sterling for 36s 5d. Flemish, than for 36s. 10d. Flemish.

EXCHANGE signifies also a place in most considerable trading cities, wherein the merchants, negotiants, agents, bankers, brokers, interpreters, and other persons concerned in commerce, meet on certain days, and at certain times thereof, to confer and treat together of matters relating to exchanges, remittances, payments, adventures, assurances, freightments, and other mercantile negotiations, both by sea and land.

In Flanders, Holland, and several cities of France, these places are called barres; at Paris and Lyons, places de change; and in the Hanse towns, colleges of merchants. These assemblies are held with so much exactness, and merchants and negotiants are so indispensably required to attend at them, that a person's absence alone makes him be suspected of a failure or bankruptcy. The most considerable exchanges in Europe, are that of Amsterdam; and that of London, called the Royal Exchange.

Even in the time of the ancient Romans, there were places for the merchants to meet, in most of the considerable cities of the empire. That said by some to have been built at Rome in the year of the city 259, 493 years before our Saviour, under the consulate of Appius Claudius and Publius Servilius, was called collegium mercatorum; whereof it is pretended there are still some remains, called by the modern Romans leggia, the lodge; and now, usually, the Place of St. George. This notion of a Roman exchange is supposed to be founded on the authority of Livy, whose words are as follow; viz. Certamen consulis inciderat, uter dedicaret Mercurii adem. Senatus a se rem ad populum rejecit: utri eorum dedicatio iussu populi data esset, eum praefisse a nonis, mercatorum collegium institueri iussit. Liv. lib. ii. But it must be here remarked, that collegium never signified a building for a society in the purer ages of the Latin tongue; so that collegium mercatorum institueri must not be rendered to build an exchange for the merchants, but to incorporate the merchants into a company. As Mercury was the God of traffick, this edes Mercurii seems to have been chiefly designed for the devotions of this company or corporation.