Company News and Views

bank, payable on demand
A CHEQUE is an order for money, drawn by one who has funds in the
bank, payable on demand. Banks provide blank cheques for their
customers and it is a very simple matter to fill them out properly. In
writing in the amount begin at the extreme left of the line. The
illustrations given here show a poorly-written cheque and a copy of
the same cheque after it has been ‘raised.’ The original cheque was
for $7.50 and shows very careless arrangement. It was a very easy
matter for the fraudulent receiver to change the ’seven’ to ’seventy’
and to add a cipher to the amount in figures. The running line was
written in on the raised cheque to deceive the bank. In this case Mr.
Carter and not the bank must suffer the loss. Mr. Carter cannot hold
the bank responsible for his carelessness. Drawers of cheques should
exercise the greatest care in writing in the amount to prevent changes
or additions. Draw a running line, thus: ~~~_Nine_~~~ before and after
the amount written in words. If the words are commenced close to the
left margin the running line will be necessary only at the right. The
signature should be in your usual style familiar to the paying teller.
The plain, freely written signature is the most difficult to forge.
Usually cheques are drawn ‘to order.’ The words ‘Pay to the order of
John Brown’ mean that the money is to be paid to John Brown or to any
person he ‘orders’ it paid to. By indorsing the cheque in blank (see
indorsements) he makes it payable to bearer. If a cheque is drawn ‘Pay
to bearer’ any person–that is, the bearer–can collect it. The paying
teller may ask the person cashing the cheque to write his name on the
back, simply to have it for reference. Safety devices to prevent the
fraudulent alteration of cheques are of almost endless variety, but
there has not been a preventive against forgery and alterations yet
invented, which has not been successfully overcome by swindlers. A
machine for punching out the figures is in common use, but the
swindler has successfully filled in the holes with paper-pulp and
punched other figures to suit his purposes. The safest cheques are
those carefully written upon what is known as safety paper.

should be safe and profitable investments
Mortgages upon improved property, if properly graduated in amount,
should be safe and profitable investments. The buyer, however, must
exercise great care and good judgment. Should there be collusion
between the loaning agent and the land-owner, the money advanced may
be largely in excess of the actual property value. Villages with less
than a dozen houses are often the sites of investment companies doing
business under pretentious names and offering mortgage investments at
interest rates which by the local conditions are impossible. One of
the devices of these enterprising companies is to offer their own
guarantees as to both principal and interest of all mortgages
negotiated by them. The investor should be sure of two things: (1) The
safety of the principal, and (2) regularity in the payment of the
interest. There is great danger of default from causes not anticipated
by the mortgagor and over which he has no control.

of raw and thrown silk exported is about $57,500,000 annually
The most distinctive natural product of Italy is SILK, and the amount
of raw and thrown silk exported is about $57,500,000 annually. Silk
culture is carried on all over the kingdom, though the industry
flourishes most extensively in Piedmont and Lombardy, in the north.
Over 550,000 people are engaged in rearing silkworms, and the annual
cocoon harvest approximates 100,000,000 pounds. Silk-’throwing,’
or-spinning, is the principal manufacturing industry, and the amount
of silk spun and exported is about 45,000 tons, most of which goes to
France. After silk the products of the country that constitute the
principal exports are OLIVE OIL, FRUIT (oranges, lemons, grapes,
almonds, figs, dates, and pistachio nuts), and WINE (in casks). The
olive-oil export and the fruit export are each about a fifth of the
export of silk, and the wine export about a sixth. Other important and
characteristic exports are raw hemp and flax, sulphur, eggs,
manufactured coral, woods and roots used for dyeing and tanning, rice,
marble, and straw-plaiting. The principal import is WHEAT, for
agriculture, though generally pursued, is still in a backward state
of efficiency, and the average grain crop is only one third what it is
in Great Britain. One eighth the total amount of wheat needed to
support the people has to be imported. In fact, the total amount of
food-stuffs raised in the kingdom is much less than the amount
required, being, for example, per inhabitant, not more than one half
of what is raised in France. In particular, there is a deficiency of
meat, and the amount of meat raised per inhabitant is the lowest in
Europe. As a consequence the Italians are poorly fed, and it is
estimated that four per cent. of the annual death loss is occasioned
by impoverishment of blood due to insufficiency of wholesome food.
After wheat and raw cotton, the next principal import is COAL, for
Italy has no workable coal-fields. As far as possible water power is
used as a motive power instead of coal, especially in the iron
industries. An important import also is FISH, for, owing to the great
number of fast days which the Italian people observe, and to the
dearness and scarcity of meat, fish is a very general article of
consumption. Six million dollars” worth is imported annually, and
perhaps an equal amount is obtained from local fisheries, for there
are over 22,000 vessels and boats and over 70,000 men engaged in this
industry. After silk-throwing, the most characteristic Italian
manufacturing industries are those which are of an artistic or
semi-artistic nature, such as the making of fine earthenware,
porcelain, glassware, mosaics, and lace. VENICE (154,000) and GENOA
(225,000) are still the principal seaports and trade centres of Italy,
but in commercial importance these famous cities are only the mere
shadows of what they once were. NAPLES (529,000), the largest city, is
a place of little enterprise, for its imports, principally cereals,
are three or four times the value of its exports, which are mainly
cheap country produce. MILAN (457,000) and TURIN (348,000) are the
great trade centres of the north interior, and the most prosperous
places in the kingdom, being the chief seats of the silk-throwing
industry. Milan is also the chief seat of the Italian cutlery
manufacture. PALERMO (284,000) and MESSINA (150,000), in Sicily, are
the chief ports for the export of Italian fruits, and also of Italian
fish (anchovies, tunnies, etc.). ROME (474,000) and FLORENCE (207,000)
owe their chief importance to their art interest and to their historic
associations, but Florence has an important manufacture of fine
earthenware and mosaics. Rome is the chief seat of government. CATANIA
(127,000), in Sicily, is the chief seat of the Italian sulphur export
trade. LEGHORN (104,000), the port of Florence, is the chief seat of
the export straw-plaiting trade. It should be noted that
notwithstanding Italy”s extent of coast-line a large part of her
foreign commerce is transacted northward by means of the railways that
tunnel the Alps.

constantly being replenished by alluvium brought down from its high
mountains by its immense rivers
India owes much of its fertility to the fact that its soil is
constantly being replenished by alluvium brought down from its high
mountains by its immense rivers. The valleys of the Indus (1800 miles
long), the Ganges (1600 miles long), and the Brahmapootra (1500 miles
long) include an area of 1,125,000 square miles, a part of which, the
Indus-Ganges plain, consists of a great stretch of alluvial soil whose
fertility is as rich as that of any portion of the globe. One hundred
and eighty millions of people live in this plain. So finely pulverised
is its soil that for a distance of almost 2000 miles not even a pebble
can be found in it. And so fertile is it that there are some
agricultural districts in the plain where the population exceeds 900
to the square mile. In that part of the plain which the Ganges waters,
60,000,000 of people find support on the soil by agriculture, at a
density of over 700 persons to the square mile, which is 140 persons
more to the square mile than the density of Belgium, the most thickly
populated country in Europe.

freight was compelled to break bulk and suffer trans-shipment at the
end of each line, where a new corporation took up the traffic and
carried it beyond
Prior to the completion of the organisation of trunk or through lines,
freight was compelled to break bulk and suffer trans-shipment at the
end of each line, where a new corporation took up the traffic and
carried it beyond. To prevent this breaking of bulk and to expedite
the carriage of freight, fast freight lines on separate capitalisation
were organised. The purpose of the interstate-commerce law is largely
to prevent discrimination and corruption in freight charges, to secure
for every person and place just and equal treatment at the hands of
the transportation companies. The freight rates are arranged and
regulated by the traffic associations, and the various conditions and
compromises necessary have made both classifications and rates about
as complicated as anything possibly could be.

that the main basis upon which the grouping of commodities rests is
the relative value of the goods
From this description of freight classifications it will be perceived
that the main basis upon which the grouping of commodities rests is
the relative value of the goods. The gradations cannot, however, be
made strictly according to value. The goods are frequently put into a
lower class than their value would warrant in order to stimulate their
production and shipment or to develop the industries depending upon
those articles.

termini or joining a common industrial region with seaboard points is
that the road whose line is the longest and whose expenses of
transportation are greatest is obliged to charge the lowest rate
An interesting result of the competition of roads connecting common
termini or joining a common industrial region with seaboard points is
that the road whose line is the longest and whose expenses of
transportation are greatest is obliged to charge the lowest rate. The
short lines can charge more because they compete for traffic under
more favourable circumstances. The lower charge of the longer line is
called a differential rate, and it is customary for the shorter or
’standard’ lines to agree to allow the ‘differential’ line a
stipulated differential rate. This is the concession which the
standard lines are obliged to make to temper competition and to
prevent rate wars. The Grand Trunk, running from Chicago to Boston by
way of Montreal, is a good example of a differential line, and the New
York Central is a good instance of a standard line.

doubt intended for consumption in China and Japan
[6] A portion of the exportation of breadstuffs made to Hongkong is no
doubt intended for consumption in China and Japan.

is not obliged to make any
Unless something is said in the lease concerning repairs the landlord
is not obliged to make any. This statement shows at once the need of
having a written lease. If the house is out of order–the locks,
blinds, doors, and windows are not in good order–the tenant cannot
claim anything of the landlord or require him to put them in good
condition. Even if a house should become unfit for habitation in
consequence of fire, or is blown down, or is flooded with water, the
landlord is not bound to do anything unless he has stated that he will
in his lease.