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Show Chinese Money. One of the most troublesome questions : to contend with in traveling in China is that of money. As is well known the Chinese have no other currency than the copper cash, about fifteen hundred of which are worth at Peking a Chinese ounce of pure silver, called by foreigners a "tael of sycee." Silver is naturally used in commercial transactions, but as bullion only, and by weight, so every one has to have a set of small scales. The inconvenience that this weighing entails would be comparatively small were all the scales throughout the empire em-pire uniform; but such is not the case. They differ considerably from one town to another, and even in the same locality. local-ity. Thus at Peking there is a government govern-ment standard, a maritime customs standard and a commercial standard. The same diversity is found over all the empire, and the consequent complications compli-cations and even serious loss in exchange are a continual vexation. Nor is it possible pos-sible to escape this loss by carrying copper cop-per cash with one, for, putting aside their excessive weight, there is not even a standard cash in China. Those used at T'ien-tsin are not used at Peking; those at Peking are not current, except nt a discount, at T'ai-yuan. Here I bought a very debased kind of cash, giving giv-ing one "large cash" for four of them. A hundred miles farther south these small cash were at par, and even, in a few cases, at a slight premium over the intrinsically more valuable large one. The Mongols, Thibetans and Tnrke-stanese Tnrke-stanese have never consented to use the Chinese copper cash, although it is the standard money of the realm. The first named people use silver ingots or brick tea; the others have a silver currency Df their own. Cor. Century, |