iQ"] Canadian Metallic Currency 243 



be sent in in sterling at the specified rate of 4s. 4d. for the dollar. Bills 

 of exchange might be issued at the rate of 103 for 100 payable in London. 

 But the very fact that the British silver when paid out in the colonies 

 could be used to purchase exchange on Britain resulted in its being im- 

 mediately returned to the Military Chest, or the vaults of the banks, 

 while the actual currency of the colonies remained paper bank notes 

 and the over-rated Pistareens and French silver, together with the 

 American and Mexican silver dollars. But the chief currency used to 

 buy up the British silver were the local Canadian Bank notes and these 

 were all expressed in dollars. The very efforts therefore of the Imperial 

 authorities to put British coinage in circulation, proved to be the most 

 effective method of excluding it from circulation, and of insuring the use 

 of the American medium of exchange. The fact was that though the 

 dollar was the nominal standard the metallic currency in circulation 

 consisted of the odds and ends of the coinage of all commercial nations, 

 most of it too highly over-rated or too much worn and defaced to be profit- 

 ably exported. 



For fractional currency the Spanish Pistareen became the most com- 

 mon silver coin in the English sections of Canada. It was being dis- 

 carded in the United States owing to the reformation of their currency, 

 and passed over to Canada where it was accepted as a shilling piece, i.e. 

 20 cents, while in the United States it was worth only 17c. or i8c. As a 

 matter of fact the Pistareens and their halves were among the most worn 

 and defaced coins in circulation. 



Copper coinage in the early days was also very scarce though con- 

 siderably over-rated. About 1825 it consisted of discarded and worn 

 British half-pence, farthings, various private tokens, native and foreign, 

 and even brass buttons hammered smooth. As indicating the manner 

 in which the Canadian copper currency was regarded, we may take the 

 following extract from a letter of one of the Dorking immigrants. "Tell 

 John to bring as many farthings as he can get, and old halfpence, as they 

 go for as much as a penny piece; they call them coppers." In Upper 

 Canada the enterprising firm of Ed. Leslie and Sons imported a consider- 

 able number of tokens for their own use, and the demand for them be- 

 came so great that in 1831 they applied to the Government to either 

 furnish a supply itself or sanction importations to meet the public need. 



There was an increasing demand on the part of the mercantile 

 element in the country for a Canadian silver and gold coinage, on the 

 basis of the decimal system of dollars and cents. But in 1830, under 

 Sir James Kemp, another effort was made to have the British standard 

 adopted. A Bill was introduced providing for the sterling standard and 

 the rating of the dollar at 4s. 4d. It provided also for calling in the 



