and kilogramme, a law of 16th Vendemaire 2 (7th October 1793), prescribed that the principal unit, both of gold and of silver coins, should be of the weight of ten grammes. The propor tional value of gold to silver was retained, as it had long before been established in France, at 15 for one. The alloy of both coins was fixed at one-tenth; and the silver franc of that coinage would have been worth about thirty-eight cents, and the gold franc a little short of six dollars. The law was never carried into execution. It was superseded by one of the 15th August 1794 (28 Thermidor 3), which reduced the silver franc to five grammes; and it was not until after a law of 7 Germinal 11 (28th March 1803) that gold pieces of twenty and forty francs were coined, at 155 of the former to the kilogramme. "In the new system, the name of livre, or pound, as applied to money or coins, was discarded; but the franc was made the unit both of coins and moneys of account. "The franc was a name which had before been in common use as a synonymous denomination of the livre. The new franc was of intrinsic value more than the livre. The franc is decimally divided into decimes of, centimes of, and millimes of 1000 of the unit; but the smallest copper coin in common use is of five centimes, equivalent to about one of the United States cents. The silver coins are of one-fourth, one-half, one and two francs, and of five francs; the gold pieces, of twenty and forty francs. The proportional value of copper to silver is of one to forty, and that of billon to silver of one to four; so that the kilogramme should weigh 5 francs of copper coin, 50 of the billon, 200 of the silver, and 3,100 of the gold coins; and the decime of billon should weigh precisely two grammes. The allowances, known by the name of remedy for errors in the weight and purity of the coins, are of upon copper, which is only for excess: those upon the weight of billon are of 1000; upon silver, 1200 for one-quarter francs, 14 for one-half francs, and of, or one per cent., on one and two-franc pieces, and of 1000 for five-franc pieces: that of the gold coin is of 1000-all, excepting the copper, allowances either for excess or deficiency. But the practice of the Mint never transgresses in excess; and the deficiency is always nearly the whole allowed by law. The remedy of alloy is of 1000, either of excess or defect, for billon; of 100 for silver; and of 200 for gold. It is said that the actual purity of the coins, both of gold and silver, is within 100 less than the standard. 100 "The conveniences of this system are: "First, The establishment of the same proportion of alloy to both gold and silver coins, and that proportion decimal. 66 Secondly, The established proportions of value between gold and silver, mixed metal, and copper coins. "Thirdly, The adaptation of all the coins to the weights, in such manner as to be checks upon, and tests of each other. Thus 'the decime of billon should weigh two grammes; the franc of silver, five; the two-franc piece of silver, and the five-centime piece of copper, each ten; and the five-franc piece, fifty. The allowances of remedy disturb partially these proportions. These are practices continued in all the European mints, after the reasons upon which they were originally founded have in a great measure ceased. In the imperfection of the art, the mixture of the metals used in coining, and the striking of the coins, could not be effected with entire accuracy. There would be some variety in the mixture of metals made at different times, though in the same intended proportions, and in different pieces of coin, though struck by the same process, and from the same die. But the art of coining metals has now attained a perfection, that such allowances have become, if not altogether, in a great measure unnecessary. Our laws make none for the deficiencies of weight; and they consider every deficiency of purity as an error, for which the officers of the mint shall be excused only in case of its being within part, or about 1-for if it should exceed that, they are disqualified from holding their offices. Where the penalty is so severe, it is proper that the allowance should be large; but, as obligatory duty upon the officers of the mint, an allowance of 1000 would be amply sufficient for each single piece, and no allowance should be made upon the average.' ""* The account of the introduction of the decimal system of coinage into the United States of America, is thus given by Mr. Quincy Adams :— "At the close of our war for independence, we found ourselves with four English words,-pound, shilling, penny, and farthing, to signify all our moneys of account. But, though English words, they were not English things. They were nowhere sterling; and scarcely in any two States of the Union were they representatives of the same sums. It was a Babel of confusion by the use of four words. In our new system of coinage we set them aside. We took the Spanish piece of eight, which had always been the coin most current among us, and to which we had given a name of our own,—a dollar.* Introducing the principle of decimal divisions, we said, a tenth part of our dollar shall be called a dime, a hundredth part a cent, and a thousandth part a mille. Like the French, we took all these new denominations from the Latin language; but, instead of prefixing them as syllables to the generic term dollar, we reduced them to monosyllables, and made each of them significant by itself, without reference to the unit of which they were fractional parts. The French themselves, in the application of their system to their coins, have followed our example; and, assuming the franc for their unit, call its tenth part a decime, and its hundredth a centime. It is now nearly thirty years since our new moneys of account, our coins, and our mint, have been established. The dollar, under its new stamp, has preserved its name and circulation. The cent has become tolerably familiarised to the tongue, wherever it has been made, by circulation, familiar to the hand. But the dime having been seldom, and the mille never, presented in their material images to the people, have remained so utterly unknown, that now, when the recent coinage of dimes is alluded to in our public journals, if their name is mentioned, it is always with an explanatory definition, to inform the reader that they are ten-cent pieces; and some of them which have found their way over the mountains, by the generous hospitality of the country, have been received for more than they were worth, and have passed for an eighth, instead of a tenth part of a dollar. Even now, at the end of thirty years, ask a tradesman or shopkeeper in any of our cities what is a dime or a mille, and the chances are four in five that he will not understand your question. But go to New York and offer in payment the Spanish coin, the unit of the Spanish piece of eight, and the shop or marketman will take it for a shilling. Carry it to Boston or Richmond, and you shall be told it is not a shilling, but ninepence. Bring it to Philadelphia, Baltimore, or the city of Washington, and you shall find it recognised for an eleven-penny bit; and if you ask how that can be, you shall learn that, the dollar being of ninety pence, the eighth part of it is * Dollar; from Thaler (German), or Tallaro (Italian). The Spanish name is Duro, meaning hard. |