156  THE  CHINESE  EMPIRE
grains,  the  Market  of  55 2 '4  grains,  and  the  Metropolitan
or  Two-tael  *  scale  of  54 I- 7  grains—and  two  recognise
standards  of  silver,  1,000  and  980  fine  respectively.  aC
standard  of  weight  (except  the  Kuping)  is  expresse  1
each  of  the  two  standards  of  silver,  with  the  resu  t  mattiere ­
  are  at  Peking  seven  taels  all  equally  current,
foreign  banks  established  there  have  within  a  few  year
adopted  the  Kung-fa  tael  of  1,000  silver  as  their  cuirency
of  account.  Each  of  these  currencies,  except  the  Kuping
and  Kung-fa,  is  further  subject  to  a  difference  of  0  6  to  o  9
per  cent,  according  as  it  is  “  equalised  ”  or  empty  °
"  mercantile  ”  or  “  complete  ”  ;  thus  100  Kung-fa  tae  s
are  equivalent  to  Metropolitan  taels  102  80  if  mercanti  e,
10270  if  empty,  102  60  if  equalised,  but  only  102  00  1
complete.
Tientsin  Taels.
At  Tientsin  I  have  note  of  nine  taels  generally  known,
and  two  standards  to  which  silver  is  reduced.  Of  these,
the  tael  which  for  forty  years  past  has  been  recognise
as  “  the  Tientsin  tael  ”  is  the  Merchants  tael  weighing
557‘4  grains  of  silver  992  fine.  For  some  occult  reason
there  has  lately  (since  1900)  been  introduced  a  New
Merchants  "  tael  of  557-6  grains,  differing  from  the  old
established  local  tael  by  only  0  00038  part  of  itself  or  less
than  Y00  °1  one  per  cent.,  the  standard  of  silver  remaining
the  same  ;  this  new  tael  has  not  yet  worked  its  way  into
general  acceptance.  As  an  illustration  of  the  ordinary
Chinese  rough-and-ready  methods  of  banking  it  may  be
noted  that  the  true  equivalence  of  Haikwan  Tls.ioo
is  Tientsin  Tls.105  215  ;  and  that  for  many  years,  in  paying
Customs  duties,  for  every  100  Haikwan  taels  Chinese  merchants ­
  paid  Tientsin  Tls.106,  foreign  merchants  in  general
paid  Tientsin  Tls.105,  und  Russian  merchants  for  tea  paid
Tientsin  Tls.104.
The  addition,  of  2  taels  in  the  hundred,  2  per  cent.,  will  bring
this  to  the  value  of  the  Market  tael  ;  hence  probably  the  name.