147

THE  CURRENCY
of  exchange  between  his  home  and  the  place  of  his  temporary ­
  sojourn.  Even  then,  however,  he  is  dependent
on  the  banker  in  the  matter  of  the  quality  of  silver  ,  fortunately, ­
  the  commercial  honor  of  the  Chinese  bankers
stands  high,  though  it  is  hardly  to  be  expected  that  they
should  not  profit  by  their  expert  knowledge.
In  China  you  must  prove  your  axioms.  We  are  accustomed ­
  to  currencies  in  which  the  unit  of  value  is  a
defined  and  accurate  weight  of  an  alloy  of  a  precious  metal
(commonly  gold)  of  an  exact  and  known  degree  of  fineness.
In  China  the  silver  currency  is  an  article  of  barter,  of  which
neither  the  weight  nor  the  quality  is  anywhere  fixed  ;  and
in  treating  of  the  tael  of  silver,  we  must  answer  two  questions ­
  :  What  is  a  tael  ?  and  What  is  silver  ?  Since  “  tael  ”
connotes  both  a  weight  and  a  value,  and  since  an  essential
element  in  value  is  the  quality  of  the  silver,  we  must  first
answer  the  question  What  is  silver  ?
Silver
Silver  is  most  commonly  current  in  oval  ingots  called
“  shoes  ”  from  their  resemblance  to  a  Chinese  shoe  ;  but
what  may  be  called  fractional  currency  is  in  obovoid  lumps
weighing  up  to  two  or  three  taels.  At  Mengtsz  the  sycee
most  commonly  current  is  the  chieh-ting,  more  commonly
known  as  the  pai-fang  ingot  ;  when  laid  fiat  on  a  sheet  of
paper  and  traced  with  a  pencil,  it  has  eight  curvilinear
lines,  a  figure  not  unlike  the  brass  pieces  inserted  in  doors
to  protect  key-holes  ;  in  weight  the  pieces  vary  from  two
taels  up  to  five  taels.  At  Peking  the  Sungkiang  ingot
is  about  io  taels.  The  standard  ingot  of  China  weighs
about  50  taels  (from  49  to  54)  and,  formerly  called  ting,
is  now  called  pao  (jewel,  article  of  value,  as  in  the  inscription
on  the  copper  cash  tung-pao  —  “  current  coin  ”)  and  more
commonly  yuan  pao,  probably  standing  for  “  round  ingot  ”
from  its  shape,  oval  in  plan.
The  shoes  of  Shanghai  are  as  shown  in  the  accompanying
plate,  which  represents  a  shoe  inscribed  in  ink  by  the
Assay  Office  of  the  Foreign  Settlements  as  weighing