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favour the tael against eight in favour of the dollar.
T'ang Tach'en, in his Memorial, also favoured the tael currency; and from the point of view of national dignity it seems to us that we ought to try to stand alone, and that we cannot afford to throw away our sovereign rights in order to gratify the wishes of others; while from the point of view of the people we should follow a course suitable to the greater number, and not change a tradition of the country for the convenience of the open ports or trading marts.
This is as much a fundamental principle for our guidance in making the enactment to-day as it will be an essential factor for the future success of the measure itself: and as we have dealt with this point in previous Memorials there is no need to elaborate it further.
We now propose merely to present a few of the principal arguments on both sides in the problem of adopting a dollar or tael currency; the remainder either advocating the use of both concurrently, or proposing the introduction of a new coin of 7 mace.