Directory_and_Chronicle_1889 — Page 809

WEIGHTS AND MEASURES, MONEY.

CHINESE.

WEIGHTS.

Chinese weights are mostly decimal. Although English weights and measures are used to a considerable extent in trade with foreigners, being legalised in Hongkong for that purpose, the following are also recognised by Ordinance 22 of 1844:-

1 li 1 fan,

or cash or candareen

or mace

1 leung, or tael

10 li 10 fan 10 tsin

= 1 tsin,

16 leung

100 kan

120 kan

1 kan, or catty

= 1 tà, or picul

1 shek, or stone

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·0013 oz. avoir.

·0133 oz. avoir.

·1333 oz. avoir.

1} oz. avoir.* 1 lb. avoir. 133 lb. avoir. 160 lb. avoir.

The words candareen, mace, tael, catty, picul, are no Chinese.

Almost all commodities, even liquids, are sold by the above weights amongst Chinese.

MEASURES.

English measures are legal, but so are also the following Chinese:-

10 fan = 1 tsün,

10 tsün = 1 chek,

or inch or foot

10 chek 1 ch'eung or fathom

about 1.41 English inch. about 14.1 English inch. 4 yards (nearly),

The Treaty of Tientsin fixes the ch'eung at 141 English inches.

1 li, or mile

mile English.

10 li = 1 pò, or league 3 miles English (about).

Land is measured by the mau or acre, equal to about of an English acre.

MONEY.

This is almost entirely represented by weights of silver, accounts being kept in leung, tsin, fan, and li (taels, mace, and candareens) as given above. Their values may be taken to be the following :—

1 li

1 fan

or casht = .06d. ord. or candareen .6d. or jd.

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1 tsin or mace 1 leung or tael

= 6d. = 58.

Not one of these weights is represented by any coin, unless we may take the cash to represent the value of a li of silver.

Silver is used uncoined, in ingots or shoes, sometimes called sycee; small sums are paid in what is called broken silver. At the Treaty Ports this generally consists of the fragments of Mexican or Spanish dollars, hammered to pieces by the Shroffs in their process of chopping. This broken silver is weighed by means of small steel- yards called li-tang.

Cash may be said to be the only coin of China. The Chinese call them tsin. They are bronze coins, not unlike thin farthings with a square hole in the centre for stringing together. The Hongkong Government cash or mils are smaller, and the hole is round. The value of cash fluctuates greatly, and is very much a matter of bargain. About 1,200 to a Mexican dollar is an average quotation.

HONGKONG MONEY.

A legal tender in Hongkong consists of Hongkong or Mexican dollars; 20, 10, or 5 cent silver pieces to an amount not exceeding two dollars; or bronze cents or mils to an amount not exceeding one dollar. Japanese yen, American, Spanish, and South American dollars are also in circulation, and the 10 and 20 cent pieces of the Straits Settlements, which are accepted indifferently with those of Hongkong. Japanese small coin is also accepted at a small discount.

• The Tael actually in use is 1.351 oz.

† The i when representing weight is never spoken of as a cash, but probably the original value of a cash was 1 li of pure silver,