There is so
much cordiality and courtesy that, as at this hotel, the bill
recedes into the background, and the purchaser feels the indebted
party.
The money is extremely puzzling. These islands, like California,
have repudiated greenbacks, and the only paper currency is a small
number of treasury notes for large amounts. The coin in circulation
is gold and silver, but gold is scarce, which is an incovenience to
people who have to carry a large amount of money about with them.
The coinage is nominally that of the United States, but the dollars
are Mexican, or French 5 franc pieces, and people speak of "rials,"
which have no existence here, and of "bits," a Californian slang
term for 12.5 cents, a coin which to my knowledge does not exist
anywhere. A dime, or 10 cents, is the lowest coin I have seen, and
copper is not in circulation. An envelope, a penny bottle of ink, a
pencil, a spool of thread, cost 10 cents each; postage-stamps cost 2
cents each for inter-island postage, but one must buy five of them,
and dimes slip away quickly and imperceptibly. There is a loss on
English money, as half-a-crown only passes for a half-dollar,
sixpence for a dime, and so forth; indeed, the average loss seems to
be about twopence in the shilling.
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