DAVIS. — CERTAIN OLD CHINESE NOTES. 281 



meant much. The one kwan Ming notes of the period 1368-1398 

 are the only notes which permit of comparison, one with another, and 

 hence furnish foundation for an opinion as to their thorough uni- 

 formity. There are enough of these, however, accessible for such a 

 purpose, both by actual comparison of the notes themselves with each 

 other, and also with the photographic process pictures made use of in 

 illustration of books, to permit the expression of an opinion that there 

 are well established variations in the different specimens. 



We have already seen what books contain pictorial representations 

 of these one kwan Ming notes of the Hung Wu period. Further we 

 have seen that in 1842 there were three of these notes at St. Peters- 

 burg and that the British Museum has two, one acquired in 1890, 

 the other in 1902. Besides these the note that furnished Morse his 

 lithograph is in the Museum of St. John's University, Shanghai. 

 There is one at the Essex Institute, Salem, Massachusetts. There 

 is, or was, one in the Knickerbocker Trust Co., New York, and there is 

 one in the possession of the American Bank Note Co. Besides these 

 there are at least the same number of private individuals known to 

 have specimens of this particular note, and some of them have more 

 than one specimen. It may reasonably be inferred that this scattered 

 ownership would be found to be much larger if persistent attempts 

 were made to run down the location of these notes. 



The appearance of the notes justifies the belief that they were 

 printed from wood cuts and the differences which can be established 

 between them lead to the conclusion that there must have been 

 numerous places of issue at which the blocks were cut for that purpose. 

 The first place on the face of the notes which one would naturally 

 select for purposes of comparison would probably be the ornamenta- 

 tion of the border. Ramsden, quoting, it may be inferred, from the 

 Chinese numismatical work, upon which he relied for information as 

 to these old notes, gives their prescribed color as blue black and 

 describes the ornamentation of the border, thus: "design: dragons 

 on border." Even though the worn condition of the specimens inter- 

 feres with the mechanical comparison of the several notes, yet it does 

 not absolutely prevent it. On some of the notes this dragon pattern 

 is obvious, on others it is hard to find. The statement may be made, 

 not only that the notes are not absolutely uniform, but that they must 

 have come from several independent sources. It may indeed be as- 

 serted that the Chinese characters on the face of the notes are not 

 themselves uniform. My attention was called to this point while 

 examining the question of penalties for counterfeiting and rewards 



