Local treasuries were to issue notes
of the nominal value of two strings, i.e. 2000 wen or cash, for every
ounce of flowered silver, and 20,000 cash for every ounce of gold. Ten to
1 must have continued to be the relation in China down to about the end of
the 17th century if we may believe Lecomte; but when Milburne states the
same value in the beginning of the 19th he must have fallen into some
great error. In 1781 Sonnerat tells us that formerly gold had been
exported from China with a profit of 25 per cent., but at that time a
profit of 18 to 20 per cent, was made by importing it. At present[4]
the relative values are about the same as in Europe, viz. 1 to 15-1/2 or 1
to 16; but in Canton, in 1844, they were 1 to 17; and Timkowski states
that at Peking in 1821 the finest gold was valued at 18 to 1. And as
regards the precise territory of which this chapter speaks I find in
Lieutenant Bower's Commercial Report on Sladen's Mission that the price of
pure gold at Momein in 1868 was 13 times its weight in silver (p. 122);
whilst M. Garnier mentions that the exchange at Ta-li in 1869 was 12 to 1
(I. 522).
Does not Shakspeare indicate at least a memory of 10 to 1 as the
traditional relation of gold to silver when he makes the Prince of
Morocco, balancing over Portia's caskets, argue:
"Or shall I think in silver she's immured,
Being ten times undervalued to tried gold?
O sinful thought."
In Japan, at the time trade was opened, we know from Sir R. Alcock's work
the extraordinary fact that the proportionate value set upon gold and
silver currency by authority was as 3 to 1.
(Cathay, etc., p. ccl. and p. 442; Lecomte, II. 91; Milburne's
Oriental Commerce, II. 510; Sonnerat, II. 17; Hedde, Etude, Pratique,
etc., p. 14; Williams, Chinese Commercial Guide, p. 129; Timkowski,
II. 202; Alcock, I. 281; II. 411, etc.)
NOTE 6. - Mr. Lay cites from a Chinese authority a notice of a tribe of
"Western Miautsze," who "in the middle of autumn sacrifice to the Great
Ancestor or Founder of their Race." (The Chinese as they are, p. 321.)
NOTE 7. - Dr. Anderson confirms the depressing and unhealthy character of
the summer climate at Momein, though standing between 5000 and 6000 feet
above the sea (p. 41).
NOTE 8. - "Whereas before," says Jack Cade to Lord Say, "our forefathers
had no books but score and tally, thou hast caused printing to be used."
The use of such tallies for the record of contracts among the aboriginal
tribes of Kweichau is mentioned by Chinese authorities, and the French
missionaries of Bonga speak of the same as in use among the simple tribes
in that vicinity.
