THE CHINA MAIL.
HONGKONG, TUESDAY, MARCH 24, 1874.
ONE LOLLAR NOTES. THE protest against the proposed aboli- tion of ose dollar notes has assumed so universal a character that no reasonable doubt can possibly exist in the mind of H. E. the Governor as to the strong feel. ing entertained on the subject. Four han dred and thirteen foreign, and six hun- dred and forty-four Chinese, signatures which represent with one single excep tion) every bank, house of business and resident of importance in the Colony, testify to the sense entertained by the public of the convenience which these notes have proved both in a business and domestic sense, The memorial will lie at the Hongkong and Shanghai Bank a few days longer to afford any one who may have accidentally omitted to sign it the opportunity of doing so, but this is in no sense necessary to increase its overwhelming testimony to the strength of public feeling on the matter. Nothing further is needed to prove that the Bank souferred a great benefit on the Colony in issuing the notes, and that the Colonists are sensible. of that benefit. The next step of any interest to the public will be to note the effect produced upon the Commissioners of the Treasury, for we believe we are justified in assert- i ing that the sympathies of H.E. the Governor are entirely with the memorial, No pains will, we trust, be spared to impress upon the minds of home officials the actual nature of the alternative which obstructive action on their part would force apon Hongkong. It is not, as at home, a question between a coinage and paper currency, but between the latter and bul- lion in the lump. Let those at home be induced to realize, for instance, what sort of lock would ensue, were every holder of half-crowns and shillings compelled to weigh them before receipt or submit to inevitable loss, the process being reversed as he paid them out. Let them further be asked to conceive what would be the result if no other coin but the crown piece were in common cirenlation, that being subject to similar disabilities, and they will perhaps the better understand the position of Hongkong at this mo- ment. They will no longer wonder that the paper representative of clipped, bat-
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tered, defaced, and weighty bullion-to say nothing of debased coins-was hailed with delight by all through whose hands such a wretched parody of a coinage pas- sed. If to this be added the consideration that the one dollar notes do iu actual fact take the place of subsidiary coinage for nearly all purposes of domestic use--that is that here one pays three or five dollars where at home a similar number of shil- lings will often serve--the arguments in favour of their retention should be strong enough to convince even the Lords Com- missioners of Her Majesty's Treasury,
It cannot, of course, be too strongly pointed out that the only valid objection against the issue of notes of small deno- mination does not apply in Hongkong, This has already been stated, but we do not remember to have seen any precise definition of the actual difference between such matters here and at home. The difference is briefly this: that at home notes of small denomination are apt to get into the bands of vast numbers of the poorer classes, to each of whom they represent a high positive value, the in- comes of the holders being very small. Here, on the contrary, they mostly get into the hands of people who regard them as convenient subdivisions of sums they would otherwise hold in bullion or in notes of larger denomination. The one dollarnotes in Hongkong ure, and will continue to be, in the hands of people who want them as change in every day transactions, not of people who regard them as so much saved capital. The Scotch peasant who possessed a one pound note used to regard it as a sort of nest, egg, and upon any danger menacing the bank of issue his first thought was to rescue his small savings; hence "rushes" often took place which serious ly embarrassed perfectly solvent Banks fu Hongkong, people hold, say, five one dollar notes merely because they are more convenient than one five dollar note, or five pieces of silver of uncertain weight and purity, Aud, assuming the possibility of
a
"rush," no greater embarrasstment would be caused to the bank by the pre sentation of fifty dollar notes than of one fifty-dollar note, All this is trite en- ough to local readers no doubt: but it is something which the home authorities do not yet fully comprehend, and we risk indulging in repetition in order to impress it on the minds of home readers.
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