Every Year,
Regulations Are Published Respecting These Women, And Such As Have Grown
Old In The Service Are Struck Off The List.
In the evening, these women
walk abroad in dresses of different colours, unveiled, and prostitute
themselves to all strangers who love debauchery; but the Chinese themselves
send for them to their houses, whence they do not depart till next morning.
The Chinese coin no money, except the small pieces of copper like those we
falus, nor will they allow gold and silver to be coined into specie, like
our dinars and drams; for they allege that a thief may carry off ten
thousand pieces of gold from the house of an Arab, and almost as many of
silver, without being much burthened, and so ruin the man who suffers the
loss; but in the house of a Chinese, he can only carry off ten thousand
falus at the most, which do not make above ten meticals or gold dinars in
value. These pieces of copper are alloyed with some other metal, and are
about the size of a dram, or the piece of silver called bagli, having a
large hole in the middle to string them by. A thousand of them are worth a
metical or gold dinar; and they string them by thousands, with a knot
distinguishing the hundreds. All their payments, whether for land,
furniture, merchandize, or any thing else, are made in this money, of which
there are some pieces at Siraff, inscribed with Chinese characters.
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Words from 33049 to 33299
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