THE  CURRENCY  141
luxury,  their  throne,  which  endured  for  three  centuries  in
India,  fell  after  a  single  century  of  dominion  in  China  before
the  assault  of  the  unwarlike  Chinese,  driven  to  rebellion
by  the  burden  of  heavy  taxation  and  by  the  evils  of  an
irredeemable  and  depreciated  paper  currency.  The  first
Ming  Emperor,  T‘ai  Tsu,  whose  reign  title  was  Hungwu
(a.d.  1368-1398),  found  himself  confronted  by  a  financial
situation  of  grave  difficulty,  and  was  compelled  for  a  time  to
continue,  with  all  its  evils,  the  currency  system  of  his  predecessors. ­
  Government  notes  were  therefore  issued,  but
other  steps  were  taken  to  place  the  Imperial  finances  on  a
sound  basis,  and  it  redounds  to  the  credit  of  the  government ­
  that,  in  a  single  reign  and  a  single  generation,  they
were  able  to  “  resume  specie  payments.”
I  have  been  unable  to  obtain  a  copy  of  a  Mongol  government ­
  note,  which  would  have  had  a  special  interest  as
illustrating  the  currency,  the  benefits  of  which  Ser  Marco
Polo  described  in  such  glowing  terms  to  an  open-mouthed
and  open-eared  Europe.  I  give,  however,  a  reduced
reproduction  of  a  note  for  1,000  cash  issued  by  the
first  Ming  Emperor  (Hungwu,  a.d.  1368-1398),  who  may
be  assumed  to  have  followed  closely  the  procedure  and
copied  the  forms  of  his  predecessors.  This  500-year-old
instrument  of  credit  has  a  curious  history,  furnishing  an
absolute  guarantee  of  its  authenticity.  During  the  foreign
occupation  of  Peking  in  1900-1  some  European  soldiers  had
overthrown  a  sacred  image  of  Buddha,  in  the  grounds  of
the  Summer  Palace,  and,  deposited  in  the  pedestal  (as  in
the  corner-stones  of  our  public  buildings),  found  gems  and
jewelry  and  ingots  of  gold  and  silver  and  a  bundle  of  these
notes.  Contented  with  the  loot  having  intrinsic  value,  the
soldiers  readily  surrendered  the  bundle  of  notes  to  a  bystander ­
  who  was  present  “  unofficially,”  Surgeon  Major
Louis  Livingston  Seaman,  U.S.A.,  of  New  York,  and  he
gave  to  the  Museum  of  St.  John’s  College  at  Shanghai  the
specimen  which  is  here  reproduced.
The  note  is  printed  on  mulberry-bark  paper,  which  now
is  of  a  dark  slate  colour,  the  “  something  resembling  sheets