with the other Consular Ports for doing business with dealers in the interior. At present the only article taken in return is Sycee Silver, and it may be, some opium. The places where opium is made use of at Fong-je-how, however, are not publicly known; and the foreign traveller has some difficulty finding them out. The article, it is said, is carried to Fong-je-how by the way of Shaou-hing foo. Until recently, say up to the autumn of 1856, clean Carolus dollars, in company with Sycee, were the media of exchange;—but latterly there has been such extraordinary fluctuations in the value of the dollars, (Government edicts, perhaps, have had somewhat to do with it,) that Sycee Silver or Copper cash are the only articles in which, as a rule, value is returned.
The people employed on the Tea works are all paid after the rate of a mace a day, in hard coin; and it is easy therefore to understand that copper cash will be in great demand;—but over and above the labourers' wages there must be a large surplus, and it is to be regretted that an introduction can not be made of our woollen goods. It would be even advisable to give away woollen comforters and socks and mits for a time in places like Fong-je-how, in order to induce a fancy to such things. In cold weather—and by common report it is cold enough—they would be invaluable, and highly appreciated. Up to late in the spring it is not uncommon to see small brass hand baskets, with live ashes, carried about from place to place, and moved from foot to foot as requisite;—poor substitutes for the comfort of worsted stockings.
The land tax here is after the rate of 360 cash per mow (6 mows, or, to be precise, 6, mows going to an English acre) the best land letting for
