Ovn readers will have noticed that some of the correspondents whose reports on the condition of the distressed districts we have published, have at times referred to the losses incurred in the exchange of silver for copper cash. Those who distributed relief after the Yellow River inundations, some two years ago, had similar experiences, and we suppose it would be the same anywhere in the empire where foreign commerce has not increased the working capital of bankers and merchants. The rise in the price of cash caused by the sale of the few thousand taels of sycee that have been sent to Shantung and Manchuria this year, may have partly arisen from the exactions of the money changers, but we are inclined to think that it has been chiefly brought about by what we may call natural causes, Money changers are seldom possessed of more than a few thousand taels of capital and very often they have only a few hundred. The influx into a district of a quantity of sycee which would have no effect on the money market of even a second or third rate open port, would very soon exhaust the urees of all the cash bankers in the inland districts. We are aware that in some places the bankers have behaved very liberally in their dealings with the missionaries who have been distributing the ief funds, but where capital is very limited and business almost at a standstill, from the condition of the country, it could not be expected that the most generous conduct of bankers would have much effect on the market pri of copper cash, But the probability that the bankers were able to do very little to prevent losses in exchange from lack of means. Even if they bought sycee at prices considerably under those ruling in the other provinces, they have not the means of transporting it which would enable them to realise a profit, and it is evident that the supply of cash and the amount of sycee Used in the districts we are referring to, are both limited.
The writer of Chinese Characphically described the state of the currency, if we can apply this tenn to the wretched cash of the country, aul the troubles which await all those who have to ise it. We were all more or less acquainted, with these evils, which we take tobe about the most serious which injure China. The conditions of the cash in use in all theprovincesbecomes alnest periodically so bad that the Peking Gazette is stulfed. with Memorials and Edicts on the subject, from which but little good results.
The truth is, as we have said, before, that there are tuo many people, of all' ranks and degrees, throughout the empire, some of whom are enriched by and others live upon the badness of cash and the inequalities of sycee, for any great improvement in either to be attempted by the Government. No doubt, sume of the higher officials would be glad to see the evils abolished and even a coinage introduced, but reform in this direction like other western improvements must come slowly. It is a matter of regret that the
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.