Page:History of the Indian Archipelago Vol 3.djvu/496

 480 COMMEnCIAL DESCRIPTION OF The natives of the country are extremely inex- pert in judging of the quality of gold. They know no means of separating the metals which alloy the ore, being wholly unacquainted with the chemical menstrua, and other means, which Europeans em- ploy for that pui-pose. They are even unaware of the presence of foreign metals at all, and imagine that gold, more or less alloyed, is but the same metal, differing intrinsically, as it is, in a state of less or higher maturity. »Some of the native deal- ers in gold have, however, acquired the practice of assaying the metal, by the touch-stone, from the natives of Telinga. The scale of these last people, instead of being divided, as among us, into twenty- four parts, contains only ten degrees. The resi- dent Telingas themselves are the most expert as- sayers of gold. Native merchants have, indeed, been in the habit of employing the Hindus of the little colony of this people, residing at Malacca, to assay their gold for them, which was done for a trifling per centage. The packages were sealed with their signet, and often passed current for the quantity and value they were said to contain, with- out examination. From the unskilfulness of the natives in assaying gold, and their consequent fear of imposition, they seldom or ever cast gold into bars, and we do not therefore meet it in this form in the markets of the Archipelago. It maybe strongly recommended to any of the European go- 12