Travels in India (Tavernier) 154.11

154.11

for in fact there are very few who coin after one passes beyond the Empire of the Great Mogul, and it is still bar silver only which comes from Japan. As for gold, there are many Kings who coin it, as the King of Pegu, the King of Achin, and the King of Macassar; and besides their golden money, they have also copper and tin money. The Chinese—who are careful in all things—in selling their goods calculate according to the standard of the silver; for all that they receive in foreign countries, when they have arrived in their own, they reduce to their own standard, and make it into ingots. The principal part of the profit derived from these reales which are coined at Batavia, went into the purses of the General, the Councillors, and the Master of the Mint. The "States-General" having had notice of it, considered it very singular that the gentlemen of the Company had assumed authority to coin money without having asked permission, and forbade the Company to continue to do so. They condemned them likewise to a large fine, and to make a careful search for all these reales, in order to give an equal number of good ones to those who had received the bad ones. On this voyage which I made to Batavia, when in the island of Ceylon, I sold some jewels to a lady of Point de Galle, who paid me with these reales.