3IO PRICES 



The main facts in the history of the currency are as 

 follows : The average annual coinage between 1800 

 and 1835 was Rx. 1,860,000; in the succeeding twenty 

 years — i.e., from 1835 to 1854 — the average annual 

 coinage was a little over Rx. 2,581,000. After that year 

 the imports of silver and the coinage of rupees in- 

 creased rapidly. In 1856 12 crores of silver were 

 imported and 10 coined. In 1861-65 amounts of 13 

 and 14 crores were imported annually, rising in 1865 

 to 20 crores of silver imported and 14 crores coined. 

 As the century drew to its close the amounts imported 

 and coined steadily increased up to the end of 1893, 

 by which year the total coinage of the nineteenth 

 century {i.e., of ninety-three years) had reached the 

 enormous total of Rx. 410,000,000. It will be seen from 

 the tables that the gross coinage from 1800 to 1854 

 was Rx. 133,670,000, whereas in the next forty years 

 the gross coinage amounted to Rx. 276,793,000, or 

 rather more than double that amount. It would have 

 been contrary to all experience and reason if this 

 enormous increase in the supply had not caused a fall 

 in the value of money — that is to say, if it had not 

 produced a rise in prices. What the actual circula- 

 tion was at the three dates 1800, 1854, and 1893, we 

 can only conjecture. A certain amount of coin in all 

 countries is lost or destroyed, and thus withdrawn 

 from circulation. Moreover, when the rupee circu- 

 lated at its intrinsic value, coins were probably 

 melted down in considerable quantities, to be made up 

 as ornaments. The accumulation of jewellery has 

 usually been considered a form of saving in India, 

 and as long as the rupee had no higher value than 

 so many grains of silver, it was at least as prudent a 

 habit as the French peasant's practice of hoarding coins 

 in a stocking. For these reasons the amount of coin 

 withdrawn from circulation was probably large, but 

 the exact quantity can only be conjectured. Mr. 

 Fred J. Atkinson has published, in the paper referred 



