344 MO&EY IN 



CHAP. XXVII. 



but it has escaped the notice of no observing traveller 

 in India that the natives, who have any rupees or 

 other coin, instead of carrying them in a purse 

 together, wrap up each piece singly in a cloth to 

 prevent loss by rubbing. A less loss must have 

 been suffered from friction also, owing to the 

 general practice adopted by princes and others in 

 times of insecurity of hoarding treasure. In their 

 vaults it would suffer nothing ; and in an experi- 

 ment which we have seen recorded, some silver 

 money which had been hoarded in the treasury of 

 a native prince had lost in weight only at the rate 

 of one per cent, in thirty years, whilst a parcel of 

 other rupees of the coinage of 17^9 and 1760, 

 which had been in general circulation, had in 

 twenty-three years been worn so thin as to be no 

 longer passable, except by weight, and at a conse- 

 quent great loss. 



As far as can be known by any examination 

 within our power, it does not appear that any great 

 changes have taken place in Asia, in the prices of 

 articles which form the principal means of subsist- 

 ence. There may have been variations caused by 

 the greater or less productiveness of seasons, or by 

 the improvement or deterioration in the modes of 

 cultivation, or in the administration of the several 

 governments ; but there have been no such changes 

 as were universally experienced in Europe on 

 the introduction of the produce of the mines of 

 America, or of such as have been since occasioned 



