446 



THE CENTURY BOOK OF FACTS. 



represent the extremest variation of dimen- 

 sions known among modern systems of coin- 

 age, the smallest piece of the Maundy money 

 being a silver penny. 



The Chinese probably illustrate in the most 

 extreme manner the length to which loose 

 views concerning currency can be carried. The 

 history of their currency presents that mingling 

 of the grotesque with the tragic which most of 

 their actions have when viewed through West- 

 ern eyes. Coined money was known among 

 them as early as the eleventh century before 

 Christ, but their inability to comprehend the 

 principles upon which a currency should be 

 based has led them into all sorts of extrava- 

 gances, which have been attended by dis- 

 order, famine, and bloodshed. Coins came at 

 last to be made so thin that one thousand of 

 them piled together were only three inches 

 high ; then gold and silver were abandoned, and 

 copper, tin, shells, skins, stones, and paper were 

 given a fixed value and used until, by abuse, 

 all the advantages to be derived from the use 

 of money were lost, and there was nothing left 

 for the people to do but to go back to barter, 

 and this they did more than once. They can- 

 not be said now to have a coinage ; 2900 

 years ago they made round coins with a 

 square hole in the middle, and they have since 

 made no advance beyond that. The well- 

 known cash is a cast brass coin of that descrip- 

 tion, and although it is valued at about one 

 mill and a half of United States money, and 

 has to be strung in lots of one thousand to 

 be computed with any ease, it is the sole meas- 

 ure of value and legal tender of the country. 

 Spanish, Mexican, and the new trade dollars 

 of the United States are employed in China ; 

 they pass because they are necessary for larger 

 operations, and because faith in their standard 

 value has become established ; but they are 

 current simply as stamped ingots, with their 

 weight and fineness indicated. 



The coined money of Great Britain is the 

 most elegantly executed, and among the purest 

 in the world. The greater part of the conti- 

 nental coinage is poorly executed and basely 

 alloyed. In Holland, and most of the German 

 states, the coins legally current as silver money 

 are apparently one third brass, and resemble 

 the counterfeit shillings and sixpences of a 

 former period in England. In France and j 

 Belgium, the new gold and silver coins are I 

 handsome, and so likewise are the large gold 

 and silver pieces of Prussia. The coins and 

 medals executed by direction of Napoleon in 

 France are in a high style of art. 



The Latin Monetary Union was established 

 in December, 1865, for the purpose of main- 

 taining the double standard of metallic cur- | 



rency, or keeping silver at a constant ratio 

 with gold. The combination was formed by 

 a union of France, Italy, Belgium, and Swit- 

 zerland . . 



The possible depreciation of silver was fore- 

 seen, and some of its fluctuations had been 

 experienced, but it was thought that, by a 

 close union of silver-using powers rating silver 

 at a common value, its price could be made 

 permanent. At first the combination proceeded 

 boldly. It threw open the mints of the Union 

 to bullion owners, declaring that it would coin 

 silver at the ratio to gold that it had estab- 

 lished of fifteen and one half to one, and pro- 

 claimed that the coins thus issued should have 

 in the markets both a legal tender efficiency 

 and an intrinsic efficiency in exchange exactly 

 represented by that proportion. 



The plan worked well until the year 1873, 

 when Germany demonetized silver. But in the 

 meantime it was sought to give the double 

 standard a broader foundation by bringing 

 other nations into the combination. For 

 j this purpose, at the invitation of the French 

 ! government, forty-five representatives of twen- 

 | ty-three countries met at Paris, in 1867. 

 | The proposed double standard was examined 

 and discussed from every point of view by 

 men skilled in financial science, and was at 

 last rejected by a vote of forty-three to 

 two. In 1870, there was a second gathering 

 of the same kind, which, by a smaller majority, 

 arrived at the same conclusion. Meantime' 

 silver had begun to accumulate, and deprecia- 

 tion to foreshadow itself more clearly. The 

 demonetization of the metal by Germany gave 

 the first sharp alarm. The Union was imme- 

 ! diately forced to limit the coinage for 1874 to 

 $24,000.000. This was increased to $30,000,- 

 000 in 1875, but again reduced in 1876 to 

 $24,000,000, and in 1877, to $11 ,600,000. In 

 the meantime, also, France, Belgium, and 

 Switzerland stopped the coinage of five-franc 

 pieces, thus reducing what silver they had to a 

 large subsidiary currency. Later signs of the 

 dissolution of the Union with the defeat of its 

 objects were supplied by the failure of the 

 monetary conference at Paris, and by the with- 

 drawal of Switzerland from the Union. 



GREAT BRITAIN, COINED MONEY 

 OF. 



In Great Britain, money of the current and 

 standard coinage is frequently signified by the 

 term sterling, as "one pound sterling," etc. 

 With respect to the origin of the word ster- 

 ling there are three opinions. The first is that it 

 is derived from Stirling Castle, and that Ed- 

 ward I., having penetrated so far into Scotland, 

 caused a coin to be struck there, which he 



