It was presently found that a credit for money deposited in the Cham- ber was quite equivalent to so much cash in band; and the custom was introduced of effecting payments by the transfer of these credits from the account of the payer to that of the receiver. In this way the trouble of counting large sums of coin, and of transporting it from one part of the city to another, was wholly avoided. So great were the supposed advan- tages of this method of doing business, that what at first had been vol- untary on the part of the merchants, was afterwards enforced by law. Every merchant.