1S60.] Asiatic Sovereigns and Paper Currency, 183 



19. The last link of corroborative evidence in favour of the Trans- 

 Himalayan source of the Dihong is the greater coldness of its waters 

 compared with those of the Ganges and other rivers, for the know- 

 ledge of which fact I am indebted to Colonel Phayre. I conclude 

 that the greater frigidity of the Dihong is due to the large volume 

 of melted snow supplied by the Tsanpu, which imparts some portion. 

 of its original coldness to the waters of the Dihonsr. 



Attempts of Asiatic Sovereigns to establish a Paper Currency. — By 

 E. B. Cowell, M. A. 



The old motto " Ex Oriente 2«a?" holds true in many departments 

 of science ; Europe is no doubt indebted to Asia for many an inven- 

 tion and idea ; but if there be one science above others, which is all 

 her own and where the Western mind is utterly unindebted to the 

 East, it is that peculiar discovery of modern times, Political Economy. 

 In fact it is not under despotisms like those which have prevailed 

 from time immemorial in the great nations of Asia, that such a 

 science could even take root, much less bear fruit. And yet it is 

 singular, here and there, in the moral and philosophical treatises of 

 Eastern authors, to come upon imperfect attempts to develope some 

 of its principles ; and in the same way, amid the bloody annals of 

 Eastern kings, to trace an occasional abortive effort to anticipate the 

 financial measures of modern times. Their very failures, in fact, are 

 deeply interesting. They tell us that mere physical might is 

 powerless in the moral world ; that that magic influence of national 

 credit, which is the firmest pillar of an empire's stability, is beyond 

 the tyrant's control, in spite of his armies. 



It may not be uninteresting at the present time to trace a series of 

 these attempts in one particular direction, — I refer to the endeavours 

 of the kings of China, Persia and India to establish something like 

 a paper currency in their respective dominions. These attempts were 

 made during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries ; they all failed 

 after a longer or shorter period, and probably from the same causes. 



We first meet with the idea in China. It is said that the plan was 

 originally started by a native Chinese monarch of the Song dynasty, 

 two centuries before the Moghul conquest ; and we certainly find it 



2 b 2 



