EXCHANGE IN ANCIENT GREECE.

Extract from a work nearly ready for the press, entitled: "The Judicial System and Procedure of the Athenians, by M. H. E. Meier and G. F. Schömann; to which is added the Courts of Arbitration in Ancient Greece between Sovereign States, with an Appendix containing a Greek inscription and notes on the same, by M. H. E. Meier. Translated from the German by A. Lamb." (The extract taken is from a note by the translator.)

*

The passage of Isocrates, Trapeziticus. § 19, is the only one adduced from the classical Greek authors, by writers on Jurisprudence, and the history of commerce, to show that there is a trace of the use of bills of exchange by the ancient Greeks. We will give a translation of so much of the passage as is necessary to present a complete view of the transaction to which reference is therein had, together with a few comments upon the same. We translate as follows:

"For O, judges, Stratocles being about to make a voyage to the Pontus," (that is, to the kingdom of Bosporus, on the north coast of the Euxine Sea,) "I, wishing to have a very large sum of money thence remitted to me, requested Stratocles to leave his money with me, and to receive in return the same amount from my father in the Pontus," (that is, in the kingdom aforesaid,) "thinking that it would be a great advantage to me to make this arrangement; since in that case I should not incur the risk of losing my money at sea; especially as the maritime supremacy was at that time possessed by the Lacedæmonians.

Stratocles inquiring who would return him the money if my father should not comply with my directions, or if he himself upon his return voyage, should not find me here, I introduced (ovvéornoa) Pasion to him, and Pasion promised to return him the principal, together with the interest." Upon this, the desired arrangement seems to have been made, and Pasion to have become the surety (¿yyunıns) for the repayment of the money advanced by Stratocles to the person who is represented to have delivered the speech.

*Sec 8 Kent's Comm., Sect. 44. p. 88, n. c. 9th ed.

This person, whose name has not been transmitted to us, was the son of Sopæus, who was a favorite of Satyrus, king of Bosporus, the present Crimea and the adjacent country, and was entrusted by the latter with the gov ernment of a large district in this kingdom, and with the command of all his military forces.+ Satyrus reigned from B. C. 407 or 406 to B. C. 393 or 392. ‡ The transaction mentioned in the passage translated seems to have been managed by something similar to our bill of exchange; but it seems from the manner in which it is related, to have been rather an exceptional transaction, and not in the ordinary course of business. And, indeed, our surprise at finding so few traces of anything like bills of exchange in ancient Greek authors of the classic era, will be at least very much diminished, if not entirely removed, when we consider how little confidence there was, and how little reason there was for confidence, in ancient Greece in relation to matters of business; "the failure of moral principle, the imperfection of the political constitutions, and of the civil law, and particularly the difficulty of prosecuting one's right in a foreign State. Their courts were ill constituted, and all sorts of evasions and fraudulent artifices could be practised by a knavish debtor. Dishonesty seems to have been the rule and honesty the exception." Such is the testimony of Polybius and of others of the most reliable ancient historians.§

Besides, with regard to Athens in particular, the Athenian money was not only everywhere current, but was in foreign States at a premium, and was therefore exchanged to advantage; and the custom of loaning money on contracts of bottomry and respondentia upon the security of a ship or its cargo, or a portion of the latter, at a high rate of maritime interest, enabled a merchant or other lender, to transfer for his own use, or to his correspondent in a foreign state, or to any other person with whom he should have made an arrangement for the purpose, his funds, with a fair prospect of making a profit by the transaction; for when the loan was made for a single- that is, for either

See Smith's Dict. of Gr. and Rom. Geogr., Art. Bosporus Cimmerius, and Dict. of Gr. and Rom. Biogr. etc., Art. Satyrus.

† See Isocr. 1. c. § 3.

+ See Smith's Dict. of Gr. and Rom. Biogr. etc. 1. c.

See Böckh's Pub. Econ., Vol. 1, pp. 176 seq. 272 seq. 2d ed. Lamb's Tr., pp. 175, 269 seq.

the outward or the homeward-voyage, the principal and interest were to be paid at the place of destination, either to the creditor, if he went with the vessel, or to an agent, or to some other person authorized to receive it.*

Prof. Bockht asserts that the ancient Greeks had no system of exchange for transferring funds from one country or place to another, and that consequently transfers were generally made by exporting gold coin; and this seems to be the correct view of the subject.

Upon comparing what is here stated with the note above cited from Kent's Comm., it will be perceived that in the latter are contained the following errors; which, although of no importance with reference to the subject to which the note relates, yet it would be well, for the sake of scholarly accuracy in a work of that standard authority, to correct, namely:

1. Sopæus is in the note said to have been "the governor of a province of Pontus." One would understand from this the country Pontus in Asia Minor; but Sopeus was the governor of a district in the kingdom of Bosporus.

2. Stratocles is said to have been "about to sail from Athens to Pontus." The statement in the speech of Isocrates is that he was about to sail "els Tov ПóvTov;" that is, to that part of the coast of the Euxine Sea which comprised the kingdom of Bosporus.

3. "The young man" himself, not "the orator," as is stated in the note, is represented to have said, that "this was deemed" [by himself,] "a great advantage."

4. The clause "over a sea covered with Lacedæmonian pirates," is erroneous. It was not "pirates" of whom the speaker was apprehensive, but the public ships and pri vateers of the Lacedæmonians; who, he says, at that time held the supremacy at sea. This we find by referring to the Grecian history, was the case during nearly the whole of the reign of Satyrus in the kingdom of Bosporus; and the Peloponnesian war was at the same time raging.

5. In the last two lines of the note Sopæus is called "the governor of Pontus," and his son, "the young Pontian;" whereas, as said before, the former was the governor of a district in the kingdom of Bosporus, and the latter an inhabitant of the same kingdom and a subject of its king.‡

*See Böckh, 1. c., p. 187; Lamb's Tr., p. 185.

↑ L. c., pp. 44, 67; Lamb's Tr., pp. 45, 67.

C.f., in confirmation, the authorities already cited, and also those cited at the end of this article.

The same error with regard to the term Pontus is found in C. R. Kennedy's Translation of the speeches of Demosthenes, ag. Aphobus, ag. Phanus, and ag. Onetor, Preface, p. 30; where the son of this Sopæus, the plaintiff in the action to which the speech of Isocrates cited relates, is said to have been "a merchant from Pontus," instead of "from the kingdom of Bosporus," and Satyrus is said to have been the sovereign of "Pontus," instead of "the kingdom of Bosporus.” The phrases εἰς τὸν Πόντον, and ἐκ τοῦ Πόντου, in the speech of Isocrates, have reference to a particular part of the coast of the Euxine Sea; namely, to that part of it which comprised the kingdom of Bosporus.

In Watson's translation of Xenophon's Hellenics, or Grecian History, Vol. 1, 28, p. 436, Bohn's ed., the phrase Ex Toù lóvrou is translated "from Pontus;" it should be "from the Euxine Sea." *

The denomination Pontus applied to the country, subsequently so called, in Asia Minor, was not known to Isocrates, Xenophon, and the contemporary authors; and it was not until after the death of Alexander the Great that this country, by this name, made any figure in history; for although it is stated by Dr. Leonard Schmitz, in his article Pontus, in Smith's Dict. Gr. and Rom. Geogr., that "Xenoophon is the first ancient author who uses Pontus as the name of the country," that is, the country mentioned, in Asia Minor, we are confident, that, if the reader will turn to the only passage to which the learned Doctor refers,† and will peruse in connection with it the last two chapters of the fourth book, and the first six chapters of the fifth book of the work cited, he will come to the conclusion that Xenophon uses the phrase ἐκ τῶ Πόντῳ in the said passage, in the signification" on the coast of the Euxine Sea."‡ After the term Pontus came to be applied to the country, so called, in Asia Minor, it was not usual to prefix the article before it when used in that sense.§

See Grote's Hist. of Gr., Vol. ix., p. 534, 4th ed.; Thirlwall's Hist. of Gr., Vol iv., p. 476, London, 1845-1855.

Xen. Anab. Vol. 6, § 15.

Cf. Grote, 1. c. p. 179; Thirlwall, 1 c. P. 369; Anthon's Class. Dict., Art. Pontus; and Böckh, 1. c. p. 126, n. a. Lamb's Tr. p. 124, n. 1.

See the Greek authors after the time of Alexander the Great, passim.

[From the Law Times.]

LORD MACAULAY.

Died Dec. 28th, at his residence, Holly-lodge, Campdenhill, Kensington, in the 59th year of his age, the Right Hon. Thomas Babington, Lord Macaulay, of Rothley Temple, in the county of Leicester.

Such are the few brief words in which the daily papers announce the departure from amongst us of one of the great literary lights of the nineteenth century. As Lord Macaulay was a barrister-at-law, we may be pardoned for placing on record in the Law Times a short memoir of his career.

Thomas Babington Macaulay was the son of the late Mr. Zachary Macaulay, well known for his exertions in company with Clarkson and Wilberforce in the cause of the abolition of the slave trade. His mother was Miss Selina Mills, the daughter, we believe, of a bookseller at Bristol. He was born at Rothley Temple, Leicestershire, in 1800. The distinguished historian graduated in due course at Trinity College, Cambridge, having already been elected to the Craven scholarship in 1821, and became a fellow in the suc ceeding year. In 1826 he was called to the bar at Lincoln'sinn. As early as 1824 he had given evidence of his literary talent by some poems contributed to various magazines, and in 1826, his essay on Milton, in the Edinburgh Review, drew upon him the attention of the entire reading public. The leaders of the Whig party, in acknowledgment of his literary superiority, appointed Mr. Macaulay a Commissioner of Bankruptcy, and in 1830 he entered Paliament as member for Calne. He afterwards became Secretary of the Board of Control, and entered with great spirit into the discussions of the Reform Bill, defending the policy of the Grey Ministry against all opponents. Having acquired a large amount of parliamentary celebrity, Mr. Macaulay was returned with Mr. John Marshall as member for the newly enfranchised borough of Leeds in Dec. 1832. Early in 1834, to the disappointment of his constituents, he accepted an appointment as Legal Member of the Supreme Council of India.

The avowed purpose of his Indian Mission was the formation of a code of criminal law for that country; its real