San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1896-11-05
HONEY SUBSTITUTES.
Queer Mediums of Exchange Used
in Many Countries.
Articles of Every Description Converted
Into Currency by Races Which
Have No Civilized Form
OF Government.


found hens eggs the only money
throughout the Province of Janja, in
Peru; that would be some so years ago.
The people transmitted them by thou
sands to the provincial capital and
made their purchases Herewith at the
rate of 40 or so to the dollar. We are
to understand that the country people
had little use for cash among them
selves. In Manchuria brick tea and
floss silk represent money; but the
latter is going out of fashion. The
usual brick of tea, 10 inches by s inches,
~ inches thick, is equivalent in trade
with Russians TO 60 kopecs $50 pence).
1t is divided to make any change nee
essary. Russian merchants have tried
to introduce a paper currency, the
notes representing 60 kopecs and parts
thereof, but Tartars reject them. When
brick gets discredited, that is, too
much worn by long circulation, it is
consigned to the teapot.
Several old travellers assure us that
cats eyes were employed in the great
Indian kingdom of Vijianagar; else
where iron worked into the form of
large needles, cakes of salt, or again,
says Nicolo Cont, cards inscribed with
the name of the king. The Abyssinians
also use cakes of salt in remote dis
tricts. Various negro tribes have a
currency of iron hoes. Nongua shells
were the money of the Indians in Brit
ish Columbia, one string representing
the value of one beaver. In Australia
rough slabs of freestone, to be fash
toned into hatchets, represented cash.
The men who hawked these slabs from
tribe to tribe were sacred, passing I'M
harmed through all the districts, even
at war. Marco Polo reckoned bank
notes among the oldest substitutes for
money; his account of the notes issued
by Kublai Khan and his reflections on
the system are peculiarly delightful.
He tells of people in the great province
of Thibet who use coral, but we must
ask where they got it. Had he said tur-
quoise it would have been quite intel
ligible. for the Thibetans still employ
that stone at need. Elsewhere Marco
speaks of "sprigs of gold" and "porce-
lain" In the latter case, also, an error
may be suspected. Our word is adapted
from the Portuguese, signifying hogs
back" their name for cowry shell.
Excepting regular coinage, no ''cir-
culating medium" has a vogue to COM
pare with that of the cowry. Perhaps
it would not be ineXact to say thatevery
people in whose territory the shell ex-
lists once used it for cash. But this
seems very strange, opposed to common
sense and political economy, when we
hear the supply is unlimited. Over
thousands of miles of coast a man can
gather a sackful in an hour. But the
fact is indisputable, however it be ex-
planned. The value fluctuates enor-
mously, of course, over such an i'm
mense area, but in a very rough way,
we believe, African traders used to es-
innate 1000 cowries at a shilling. An
glo-Indian traders had no need to make
reckoning, probably, for the shell,
though very largely current among
the natives, was never reckoned into
their transactions. Mungo Park count
ed $50 cowries to the shilling in his day
and in the countries where he travelled.
But the "bar" was Mungo's cur
rency. In the beginning it was liter
ally bar of iron imported from Eu-
rope, but as the trade developed it be
came merely a word of value. Twenty
| r. Al Hlo, |.
lon of spirits "bar," and the natives
would not willingly allow any iuctua'
ton in quantity, whether more OF
less. If an energetic newcomer tried
to push business by offering more rum
or tobacco to the "bar," he was regard
ed with suspicion; no old hand ven,
tured to offer less. In all parts of Bor'
neo, probably. one may still hear prices
reckoned in brass guns-that is, can
non; but man who has transactions OF
that Importance willinstantly translate
the sums into dollars at the present
time. There was an age when ten oil
twenty Founders did actually pass
from hand to hand. The Malay empires
were rich then, and made such show
as astonished the early navigators. But
for long while past, even in the do
minions of the sultan of Bruni, bras:
guns have been merely an expression O.
value, the article itself being practical
ly nonresident. There are great stores
however, quite useless now, at Bruni
which was the mint, so to speak.
Not dissimilar is the practice of th'
Red Karens in Burmah, who reckon
large sums in kyeezees, or drums o
copper; but they always had currenc!
of silver ingots. The drums are pc
culiar, however, in the respect tina
their value does not lie in the weight o
metal or even in the excellence of work
manship, though they are adorne'
with figures of birds, animals and fish
1t is the quality and volume of SCUM
they emit which decide their worth
objects not visibly differing may b
estimated at SIS to 6 so. One nigh
think that connoisseurs would disagree
upon the quality of the sound, but
drum. no Doubt. is more easily value