is, therefore, not merely an order for goods, as a card or paper
requesting payment; it is itself a thing of value (tho this value may
be due partly or solely to its possessing the money function). Such
things as a telegram when transferring an order for the payment of
money, as the spoken word, and as a mere promise to pay, are not
money. Even checks and drafts are merely substitutes for money. Money
passes from hand to hand, is a thing that can be handled, and is or
can be bodily transported.

The application of the definition is not always easy, for money shades
off into other things that serve the same purpose and are related in
nature. In many problems money appears to be at the same time like
and unlike other things of value, and just wherein lies the difference
often is difficult to determine. Even special students differ as to
the border-line of the concept, but as to the general nature of money
there is essential agreement.

8.# Metal money without or with coinage#. In antiquity the metals
were used as money in bulk; that is, the amount was weighed at each
transaction and the quality was tested whenever there was doubt.[4]
In countries industrially backward, payments are still made in this
manner. For some time after the discovery of gold in California, gold
dust was roughly measured out on the thumb-nail. In shipments of gold
to-day by bankers to settle international balances, metal may be in
the form of bars that bear the mark of some well-known banking house.
In all of the cases of this kind the gold is money in fact, but not by
virtue of any act of government. The metal is simply a valuable good,
the receiver of which values it according to its weight and fineness.
This is true even when the government mint, for a small charge, tests
and stamps the bars at the request of citizens.