Madam, – Skimming through The Devil's Dictionary, by Ambrose Bierce (written between 1881 and 1906), I came across this: "Commerce: A kind of transaction in which A plunders from B the goods of C, and for compensation B picks the pocket of D of money belonging to E."
Readers may derive some amusement of the gallows-humour kind by assigning contemporary names to those alphabetical place-holders. – Yours, etc,