CLEARFIELD, a co. in w. Pennsylvania, intersected by the Susquehanna river and Clearfield creek, and reached by a branch of the Pennsylvania Central railroad; 1150 sq.m.; pop. '70, 25.741. The e. portion is rugged and mountainous. but in other parts there is some good land. Coal and iron are plentiful. Co. seat, Clearfield.
in banking. The business facilities afforded by bankers to their customers in collecting their bills, checks on other firms, and like obligations, early im posed the necessity for an organized form of interchange of such securities, which would at once save labor and curtail the amount of floating cash requisite to meet the settlements of the bankers if effected singly. This was first done by the clerks, when out collecting from the different banking-houses, meeting daily at the counter of one of the houses for the purpose; but about 1775, the building in Lombard street, known as the " Clearing-house," was set anart for it, under the direction of a.committee delegated by the different firms, and the immediate-management of two paid inspectors. The arrangement of the establishment may be briefly described: From time to time during the day each firm transmits to the clearing-house checks and bills which are payable by other bankers for classification, taking account of the obligations coming against their firm, so that, at the close of the day, they are the better able to make up their private books. At 4 o'clock the accounts are closed: each bank has till 4.45 to decide whether it will honor the drafts upon it; and by half-past 5 the officials are able to learn that the several houses are agreed between themselves, who has to pay money and who has to receive, and how much, by making up an account of the form subjoined. It is made up
as between time particular bank receiving it and the clearing-house representing every other bank with whom the former may have had any business on the day in question: The comparatively small balance thus exhibited, used to be settled by each banking house which owed money sending down to the clearing-house the amount, and paying it, not to the officials there, but to any clerk whose house claimed a balance. But now, to avoid the risk of handling such a large amount of bank-notes, it is settled by means of a species of check on the bank of England appropriated to the purpose, and called transfer tickets, signed by each banking-house, and certified by an inspector of the clear ing-house. A white one is used when the bank has to pay a balance to the clearing house, and a green one when it has to receive a balance from it. By this means, trans actions to the amount of several millions daily are settled without the intervention of a bank-note; and the importance of the arrangement may be assumed from the fact, stated in evidence before the House of Commons, that before the connection of the London and Westminster bank with the clearing-house, they were obliged to keep in hand £150,000 in notes for negotiating their exchanges.