By the last stamp Act (33 & 34 Vict., cap. 97) this was altered, and all orders to pay money on demand wherever dated, are subject to the uniform duty of one penny.

Cheques to be valid must be payable to "bearer" or to uorder."

If to ubearer" it is legal to insert either the name of the payee, a number, the article paid for, or to leave it blank, thus: Pay to

Mr. Smith No. 1513 Housekeeping or bearer.

or pay to bearer.

On the other hand, cheques payable to "order," as they require the indorsement of the payee, require his name to be inserted; it would obviously be absurd to say "Pay to No. 1513, or order."

A cheque must contain the sum to be paid, and may now be legally drawn for any amount, however small, provided it be expressed in sterling money, as a banker is not bound to honour cheques drawn for francs, dollars, etc.

We have seen that by the Act of 1853 the drawer of a cheque may make it payable to "order." The effect of this is that the payee before it is presented for payment must indorse it in the same way as a bill of exchange.

Provided an indorsement purport to be that of the payee, the banker is justified in paying the amount, and he is specially held harmless even though it should afterwards be proved that the indorsement was a forgery. Some bankers still refuse to recognise indorsements "per procuration" although protected by the decision in the case of Cookson v. Bank of England.

There appears to be a difference of opinion amongst bankers as to the proper course to adopt in the case of cheques bearing several indorsements, some contending that if the first be in blank, the cheque is thereby made payable to bearer, and the banker relieved from the necessity of further examination. The general and probably the safer practice is in this respect to treat bills and cheques alike, although we believe the point has not been judicially decided.

Should the drawer have made any mistake in the orthography or style of the payee, the latter must in the indorsement copy the error, adding his correct name beneath.

The question frequently arises how should a cheque be indorsed if made payable to a lady by her husband or late husband's name, thus: "Pay to Mrs. Charles Smith, or order"? Here the correct indorsement would be "Mary Smith, wife of Charles Smith," or "Mary Smith, widow of the late Charles Smith."

The payee of a cheque is bound to present it in "reasonable time," and according to late judgments it appears that the limit is the close of business hours on the day following the receipt of the cheque. If he holds it longer than this he does it at his own risk as regards the insolvency of either banker or drawer. In the case of the death of the latter payment would be refused. Non-presentation of a cheque, however, within a reasonable time will not release the drawer from his liability (except by the action of the statute of limitations) unless he has actually sustained loss from the holding of the cheque, which he would do in the following hypothetical case :

A gives a cheque drawn on B to C, who feeling satisfied as to the stability of A does not present it for several days, during which time B fails, having* assets of A's in his hands. Here C holds the cheque at his own risk; had he presented it on receipt, or within a day or two, it would have been paid. For A to bear the consequences of C's neglect would be obviously unjust, for by the non-presentation of the cheque his balance in B's hands is larger than it would otherwise have been, and his loss by the failure would thus be increased by the amount of the cheque.

Had A's been an overdrawn account he would not have been injured by C's neglect, the only effect of which would be that A's debt to B at his failure would be smaller than if the cheque had been paid in due course.

The holder of a cheque, not being the payee, is bound to present it during business hours not later than the day following its receipt; otherwise the person from whom he received it would be released in the event of the insolvency of the bank or the dishonour of the cheque. For this holder (in case of the insolvency of the drawer) to be able to charge the drawer, it is necessary that the cheque, whatever number of hands it may have passed through, should be presented within the same time as if it had remained in the original payee's possession. Still, if the drawer has sustained no injury from the non-presentation his liability is not cancelled. Where a cheque is drawn on a bank at a distance from the payee's place of residence, it would seem sufficient that the post of the second day should be the medium of presentation; in this case, as in all others, Sundays and Bank holidays must not be counted as days.

Presentation through the clearing house is recognised as strictly legal; country cheques may also be passed through the country clearing, although this entails, in most instances, the delay of a day.

The question of crossed cheques, about which so much has lately been written and spoken, now demands consideration, If we bear in mind that legislation on this point affects the greater part of the cheques now drawn, it will be at once seen that it is of the utmost importance that the law dealing with them should be founded on sound principles, and that it should be perfectly clear and easily understood.

The practice of crossing cheques, which has proved at once so simple and so great a safeguard against fraud, originated at the clearing house, where for the purpose of identification the clerks used to cross the cheques on other bankers with the name of their own house, and gradually the public adopted the system. For many years, however, although bankers used to take notice of the crossing, they were not compelled to do so; indeed, in the case Bellamy v. Majoribanks it was held that the crossing of a cheque to a banker did not affect the negotiability to such banker, or to any banker, but was simply a memorandum to the payee or holder to desire him to present through that banker, which memorandum he had the right to disregard if he chose. Such being the case Act 19 & 20 Vict., cap. 25, was passed to give a legal effect to the crossing of cheques. It consisted of but two clauses :